# Narrative books

> A reading list on narrative, interactive storytelling and sequential art: Murray, Laurel, Campbell, McCloud and Eisner. One of a series I put together between 2002 and 2004.

- Page: https://www.elasticspace.com/2002/05/narrative/
- Author: Timo Arnall (https://www.elasticspace.com/)
- Section: Notes (https://www.elasticspace.com/notes/)
- Published: 2002-05-14
- Updated: 2026-07-05
- Tags: Art, Books, Film, Media, Narrative, Research, Television
- Site map for agents: https://www.elasticspace.com/llms.txt

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This is one of a series of reading lists I put together between 2002 and 2004 when I was starting out in interaction and experience design, building out a personal canon from books I was buying, borrowing from libraries, or lending to students. The lists are grouped by topic. This one is on narrative: interactive storytelling, theatre as a model for interaction, story structure, and the sequential-art tradition of comics.

Janet Murray’s Hamlet on the Holodeck and Brenda Laurel’s Computers As Theatre are the two foundational texts that frame interaction design as a narrative practice. Campbell’s The Hero with a Thousand Faces is the story-structure canon. And Scott McCloud’s Understanding Comics, along with Eisner’s books, are among the most useful things an interaction designer can read, more practical than most HCI books for thinking about pacing, framing, and the relationship between words and images.

The Amazon links below are what I had at the time, most will be dead now, but the ISBNs will find you a copy.

### Hamlet on the Holodeck

Janet H Murray.
[amazon.co.uk](http://www.amazon.co.uk/exec/obidos/ASIN/0262631873/elasticspace-21) / [amazon.com](http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/ASIN/0262631873/elasticspace-20)

### Pause & Effect: The Art of Interactive Narrative

Mark Stephen Meadows.
[amazon.co.uk](http://www.amazon.co.uk/exec/obidos/ASIN/0735711712/elasticspace-21) / [amazon.com](http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/ASIN/0735711712/elasticspace-20)

### Computers As Theatre

Brenda Laurel.
[amazon.co.uk](http://www.amazon.co.uk/exec/obidos/ASIN/0201550601/elasticspace-21) / [amazon.com](http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/ASIN/0201550601/elasticspace-20)

### The Hero with a Thousand Faces

Joseph Campbell.
[amazon.co.uk](http://www.amazon.co.uk/exec/obidos/ASIN/0586085718/elasticspace-21) / [amazon.com](http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/ASIN/0691017840/elasticspace-20)

### Interactive Acting: Acting, Improvisation, and Interacting for Audience Participatory Theatre

Jeff Wirth.
[amazon.com](http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/ASIN/0963237497/elasticspace-20)

### Tell Me a Story: Narrative and Intelligence

by Roger C. Schank, Gary Saul Morson.
[amazon.co.uk](http://www.amazon.co.uk/exec/obidos/ASIN/0810113139/elasticspace-21) / [amazon.com](http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/ASIN/0810113139/elasticspace-20)

### Understanding Comics

Scott McCloud.
[amazon.co.uk](http://www.amazon.co.uk/exec/obidos/ASIN/006097625X/elasticspace-21) / [amazon.com](http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/ASIN/006097625X/elasticspace-20)

### Comics & Sequential Art

Will Eisner.
[amazon.co.uk](http://www.amazon.co.uk/exec/obidos/ASIN/0961472812/elasticspace-21) / [amazon.com](http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/ASIN/0961472812/elasticspace-20)

### Graphic Storytelling & Visual Narrative

Will Eisner.
[amazon.co.uk](http://www.amazon.co.uk/exec/obidos/ASIN/0961472820/elasticspace-21) / [amazon.com](http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/ASIN/0961472820/elasticspace-20)