- story
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Analogous words: *history, chronicle, annals: relation, rehearsing, recital, recounting (see corresponding verbs at RELATE)2 Story, narrative, tale, anecdote, yarn all denote a recital of happenings less elaborate than a novel.Story is the most general and the familiar word and may be interchanged with any of the others of the group, except in its generalized sense of legendary lore{
snowy summits old in story— Tennyson
}A story may be oral or written, factual or fictitious, in prose or in verse, and designed to inform or to entertain but characteristically treats of a connected series of events or incidents rather than a single incident{his life story
}{the story of an opera
}{the story of the Crusades
}{a story full of incident
}{he had told the story simply, without any visible attempt to work on her sympathy. Probably it was a true memory— Malamud
}The short story and a newspaper story may treat of but one incident.Narrative in its common use is more often factual than imaginative{his part of the book is impeccable; the narrative is a pleasure to read and the material of great interest— Geographical Jour.
}{historical narrative
}{a narrative of discovery
}As a literary composition narrative usually suggests a plot or causally connected series of motived incidents; thus, a chronicle or a diary is not ordinarily called a narrative{at this point he spun into the narrative a little yarn which he had fabricated last night in bed— Rolvaag
}Tale suggests, in consequence of its historical connection with oral telling, a more leisurely and more loosely organized recital, characteristically treating legendary or imaginary happenings, often those of ancient times, and may be in verse{Oriental tales
}{folk tales
}{tales of the court of King Arthur
}{tales based on folklore, legends of great men and small— Mahler
}Anecdote, retaining something of its original sense of an unpublished item, applies to a brief story of a single detachable incident of curious or humorous interest, often illustrative of a truth or principle or of the character or foibles of a notable person{an anecdote of Lincoln's boyhood
}{during the meal he entertained them with anecdotes of his travels— Meredith
}{an occasional anecdote, given as an example of the indignities she was made to suffer— Sackville-West
}Yarn often suggests a rambling and rather dubious tale of exciting adventure, marvelous or incredible, ingenious or fanciful, and not always reaching a clear-cut outcome{without motive a story is not a novel, but only a yarn— Caine
}{the uncle . . . would arrive from Australia once every few years bringing no gifts but his wonderful yarns. As far as Victoria remembered, he'd never repeated himself— Pynchon
}Analogous words: narration, description (see corresponding verbs at RELATE): *fiction, fable, fabrication3 *lie, falsehood, untruth, fib, misrepresentation
New Dictionary of Synonyms. 2014.
