dvcrn story-biographer
Transforms conversation transcripts into narrative biographical text.
Description
Given a conversation history containing reminiscence or life review content, this skill structures the material into a readable biographical narrative.
When to Use
- After a life review conversation has gathered enough specific material
- When a person asks for their memories to be written as a story
- When creating biographical content from interview transcripts
- When notes contain clear scenes, relationships, routines, or turning points
What to Read
- Read references/narrative-templates.md to choose a story structure that fits the source material.
- Treat the templates as narrative scaffolds, not fixed formats.
Story Structure
Most drafts work best with this simple arc:
- Opening image: Begin with a scene, object, action, or line of speech
- Context: Place the reader in the time, setting, and relationships
- Development: Follow the memory through concrete details and lived rhythm
- Turn: Highlight the real emotional or practical shift, if one exists
- Reflection: Let meaning emerge from the person's own understanding
- Closing: End with a grounded image, habit, phrase, or takeaway
Writing Guidelines
- Preserve the subject's original voice, wording, and expressions whenever possible.
- Do not romanticize, dramatize, or flatten the material.
- Use first person or third person based on context, audience, and source voice.
- Stay within what the conversation supports. Do not invent motives or facts.
- Prefer vivid details over abstract summary.
- Keep each story between 500 and 1500 words unless the user asks otherwise.
Drafting Method
- Extract the main people, places, objects, and events.
- Identify the strongest sensory or situational anchor for the opening.
- Keep quoted language where it carries texture or identity.
- Organize the draft around one clear thread instead of every remembered fact.
- If the material is thin, ask for one or two clarifying details before writing a long draft.
Quality Bar
- The story should sound like it belongs to the subject, not the writer.
- Emotional weight should come from detail and sequence, not from inflated prose.
- Historical context can appear, but it must support the lived story rather than replace it.
- The ending should feel earned, not moralized.
Revision Focus
When revising, check:
- accuracy of names, places, and sequence
- whether the chosen point of view fits the transcript
- whether any sentence over-interprets the subject
- whether the draft can be tightened without losing voice