Importance of Plot

[Whosis]

Basically, there's no story without a plot--not that I know of. Maybe someone can provide a counterexample?

So how important is plot overall to a story? Would you read a book with a less compelling plot than another story? What would be the reasons? What can an author do besides plot to create an enjoyable story?

I think runners up to plot include what we also can little do without, characters, and theme, which is like the lasting impact of a story. I find that if a story is relatable through its characters, they do not necessarily need to be killed off or even do anything, as in Waiting for Godot. I think as a general rule, plot needs to be decent and make sense. Its not always possible to fall back on characters, as in The Winter of Our Discontent by John Steinbeck. Literary elements certainly were lacking in that book.

What do you think?

[free]

I like plots and think that they are essential for a story. Of course, they are not the only thing that makes a good story. If a writer writes a story with no obvious plot, the story gets boring and looks, rather, like an experiment in writing, like an exercise. It can, also, be a form of the author's endeavour to express some thought behind, some philosophy of his own. Like in Godot, no plot and the title expressing the waiting for nobody knows who. I think that Beckett wanted to show the absence of the meaning of life. People's ignorance concerning it.

[JHG]

Plot is perhaps necessary to have a "literary" understanding of a work. The employee manual I was given at my first job had no plot, but it was never meant to be understood in a literary sense. Given that a work was designed to have no plot; if we wish to understand it as literature, we the readers would do our best to create a plot.

An example of this tendency jumping (pun intended) into my mind is ee cummings' r-p-o-p-h-e-s-s-a-g-r http://plagiarist.com/poetry/270/