What is an inciting incident?

Question

I've been struggling to find a clear definition of what exactly an inciting incident is.

According to Masterclass, an inciting incident is:

The inciting incident of a story is the event that sets the main character or characters on the journey that will occupy them throughout the narrative. Typically, this incident will upset the balance within the main character’s world.

Masterclass then categorizes the inciting incident into 3 types:

1. Causal inciting actions. Inciting actions involving a deliberate choice made either by the protagonist or about the protagonist. This deliberate choice informs all story elements to come. An example of this is Luke Skywalker’s recruitment in the original Star Wars film from 1977. The inciting action is the first step in Luke taking the archetypal “hero’s journey,” as famously described by Joseph Campbell. Learn more about the hero’s journey here.

2. Coincidental inciting actions. Inciting actions stemming from random chance, coincidence, or a protagonist “being in the right place at the right time.” In C.S. Lewis’s Chronicles of Narnia series, the children inadvertently stumble upon a magical land through a portal in the back of a wardrobe. This chance discovery leads to all subsequent actions in the story.

3. Ambiguous inciting actions. Inciting actions that occur under circumstances that are not fully explained. The audience is left to guess whether the protagonist is placed in her situation by choice or by chance. Such inciting actions are common in thrillers and mysteries like The Sixth Sense, and the true story is rarely revealed until the very end of the film.

I feel that Masterclass' definition of an inciting incident is too vague because it does not help writers identify which stories have an inciting incident and which stories don't. I also feel that it doesn't helps writers cleary identify what the inciting incident of a story is.

Masterclass' categorization of inciting incidents suggests that an inciting incident does not have to be caused by a specific character's choice and can instead be caused by an arbitrary or inevitable circumstance.

According to The Write Practice, the definition of an inciting incident is:

The inciting incident is an unexpected event in a story that upsets the character's status quo. This begins the story's movement, either in a positive way or negative, that culminates in the climax.

I feel that the problem with this definition is that there are stories in which the inciting incident does not upset the status quo of the main character and not all stories begin with the main character or protagonist being in a state of psychological or emotional stasis. Screenwriter Matt Bird points out in The Secrets of Story that police chief Brody's status quo wasn't upset by what is commonly considered the inciting incident in Stephen Spielberg's Jaws:

Now that we’ve established these three steps, let’s go back to Jaws, the book/movie that supposedly exemplifies the inciting incident paradigm. Is it really as simple as it seems? The attack that begins the story certainly could be described as something bad happening, and for most of the islanders, it is indeed an unwelcome intrusion into their complacent status quo—but not for our hero. Our hero, Chief Brody, is unhappy with the status quo. He feels unwelcome and disrespected in his new job. He needs an opportunity to establish his authority. The shark attack is atrocious, but it’s just the opportunity he needs. That’s why he’s the hero.

Bird also argued that the inciting incident is usually defined in such a way as to be rendered meaningless:

One problem I have with most structure guides is how vague they are. They’re presented as magic one-size-fits-all prescriptions for success rather than lists of common trends in successful stories, so they feel the need to phrase everything as generically as possible. As a result, everything the guide says is true for every story. There’s just one problem: A rule that’s true for every story provides no actual guidance.

As a result, we get generic terms like “inciting incident” that are essentially meaningless. The problem is, it’s impossible to create a story without something that could be called an inciting incident. The purpose of rules should be to separate strong choices from weak ones, so you can explain why some stories work and others don’t (or at least why some stories have broader appeal than others).

Bird then explained that Steven Spielberg's Jaws is often used as an example of how to write a story with a clearly defined inciting incident. In Jaws, the inciting incident occurs when the shark attacks the town.

He then described what he thinks are the 3 components of the inciting incident:

In most stories, the inciting incident actually consists of three distinct events:

1. A longstanding social problem
2. An intimidating opportunity
3. An unforeseen conflict that arises from pursuing that opportunity

The 3 components that Bird describes look like the events of a story or the parameters of a story that writers can use to identify what a story's inciting incident is. The problem is that Bird never actually provides his own definition of what an inciting incident is and his readers are left to piece together what his implied definition of an inciting incident could be. I think Bird wants writers to define a story's inciting incident in such a way as to exclude the possibility of an inciting incident occurring in a story that has a passive or reactive main character or protagonist. Bird seems to be more concerned about the best way to write an inciting incident than what an inciting incident actually is and how to identify stories that have no inciting incident.

Bird uses the romance genre to further explain what an inciting incident is:

For example, the setup for most romances is as follows:

1. Longstanding social problem: The hero’s loneliness (or dissatisfaction with a current relationship) intensifies.

2. Intimidating opportunity: A new love interest appears who is unavailable or out of the hero’s league.

3. Unforeseen conflict: Someone is opposed to the match (sometimes another lover, parent, or the actual love interest, who isn’t interested).

It looks like writers can use a story's genre to better identify what a story's inciting incident might be.

A video essay on the latest Dune movie adaptation led me to conclude that it's possible to write a coherent story without an inciting incident. The Closer Look made a video apologizing for the fact that he harshly criticized Dune (2021) for having a few fundamental problems in its story, but he also claimed in that same video that it didn't have an inciting incident. It looks like he deleted his old video on Dune (2021).

I think the creators of Dune (2021) either forgot to include or made the mistake of choosing not to include the business dealings between the Choam corporation and emperor Emperor Shaddam IV that led to the events of the first part of the Dune book, which the movie is based on.

What would the definition of an inciting be if one were to use the 3 parameters that Bird described? What are the most commonly cited definitions of an inciting incident? And what is the most common definition of an inciting incident? Is there a definition of an inciting incident that encompasses stories whose main characters or protagonists are either passive, active, or reactive? And is there a definition of an inciting incident that would enable writers to identify stories that don't have an inciting incident?

Answer 1

First of all, what is your writing problem? We are a writing community, not a literature scholarship community. If you want to theorize, https://literature.stackexchange.com might be a better fit.

Second, we are not a workforce to collect "the most commonly cited definitions" of an inciting incident for you. Please do your own research work.

The most common definition for an inciting incident is the one you cited:

An event that upsets the world the protagonist lives in and forces him or her to action.

I don't see how that is unclear and why you don't understand it.

The fact that some filmmaker (Matt Bird) disagrees with the common definition doesn't necessarily make him right. It is a banal fact that many artists don't see art the way that scholars see it. The idea of an "inciting incident" is a concept from scholarship, and not something that writers must use in their practical approach.

There is a common misconception on the side of aspiring writers. Aspiring writers often attempt to use scholarly views on literature as a practical help in their writing. That's like using a dictionary and grammar to speak, which usually results in stilted and unnatural utterances. In the same way texts constructed from scholarly findings are usually unelegant and lack the natural flow that texts have that are written from an instinctual understanding that comes from a combination of a lot of reading and a lot of writing.

Personally, I disagree with Bird. The shark attack upsets the protagonist's world of continous social discontent and provides him with an opportunity to finally integrate himself in his society. It is an inciting incident. Bird makes the mistake of confusing the status quo on the narrative level with the status quo on the story level. The fact that some protagonists are living in a state of waiting for something to upset the social situation they are unhappy with doesn't invalidate the concept of an inciting incident.

Not all stories are the same. There are stories in which the protagonist is happy with his or her life and the inciting incident is unwelcome. Here the original goal of the protagonist is to restore the original order. But of course there are also stories in which the protagonist is unhappy with his life and the inciting incident is a welcome opportunity. And there are stories where the protagonist is ambivalent and the inciting incident is met with both curiosity and trepidation.

Bird defines the inciting incident as an opportunity that presents itself to someone who is unhappy with a longstanding social problem and leads him or her to an unforeseen conflict. This is actually a subset of the common definition cited above. The opportunity is an event that upsets the world the protagonist lives in. The special case here is that the protagonist wants their world to be upset.

Bird makes the mistake of claiming that all stories must have a protagonist who is unhappy with aspects of their lives. That may be the stereotypical initial situation for a certain kind of current Hollywood movies and bestselling books, but it is not generally true for all stories. Many stories begin with a situation that the protagonists are content with.

For example, in Enid Blyton's Five on a Treasure Island the three siblings are torn out of their happy tradition of spending the summers in Polseath by the decision of their parents to spend this summer without their children in Scotland and sending the children to their father's brother Quentin. There is absolutely no indication that there is any kind of longstanding social problem or that the heroes are lonely or unhappy before this inciting incident. In J.R.R. Tolkien's The Hobbit, Bilbo is living in happy contentment when a visit by Gandalf, and later the thirteen dwarves, turns Bilbo's world upside down. Again, there is absolutely no indication of any kind of discontent, loneliness, or unhappiness on Bilbo's part. There is an endless number of similar stories that begin with an idyllic, almost utopian world order that is disrupted by an inciting incident.

The question of whether there are stories without inciting incident has been discussed often (usually in the form of whether there are stories without conflict or without antagonist). The only example I know is Adalbert Stifter's novel Der Nachsommer.

Answer 2

I agree with @user482877, this is not a literature scholarship group. It is a practical writing group.

That said, the notion comes from the Three Act Structure [3AS], the most commonly followed structure for stories.

I must note that the 3AS was not "invented", but "discovered", by the analysis of existing popular stories. And the commonality of structure in them is what became the 3AS.

It applies to novels, short stories, films, stage plays, all stories. (It is not the only structure; just the most prevalent. Shakespeare uses a 5 act structure, but it hits pretty much the same notes as the 3AS.

Stories are broken into 3 acts, but Act II (the "middle") is generally broken into two equal parts that serve slightly different purposes, so we call them Act II-A and Act II-B. That gives us four segments of approximately equal length, each 25% of the story. Each Segment tends to be broken in two parts, of approximately equal length.

In Act I, part 1, we see the protagonist's Normal World. It is an introduction; their way of life, their friends, daily concerns, an intro into their personality.

In the middle of Act I, roughly 12.5% into the story (give or take), the "Inciting Incident" occurs.

This is just a problem for the protagonist, they feel compelled to solve. It could be anything, from a computer that isn't working correctly, to a car crash. It could be just a traffic jam, keeping them from getting where they need to be. In a detective story, it could be a new client walking in the door.

Regardless, the protagonist is going to try and solve it, and the rest of Act I is devoted to their efforts.

However, at the end of Act I, 25% into the story, the protagonist is forced to leave their "Normal World", because the problem has escalated beyond their expectations. Maybe they made it worse, or it just got worse -- the traffic jam is because miles ahead Godzilla is rampaging through the city, smashing cars, breaking buildings, chomping people in half, and otherwise irresponsibly disobeying all traffic laws.

That's it. The inciting incident incites the protagonist to leave their Normal World (literally or just figuratively, in attitude and goals) and enter a New World (literally or just figuratively, with new goals, new attitude, and new problems that must be solved).

If you are doing research to actually get somewhere, stop. It is just this simple. Start writing.