The Enneagram is unique among personality typologies in showing a picture of process, which is the essence of any story. Certain basic literary forms share assumptions about reality (world views) with certain Enneagram types, and the protagonists of these stories tend to be people of these types. For example, the basic basic “Eight” genre is the western, war story, or action-adventure story, which involves a single protagonist whose physical daring, appetite for confrontation, natural leadership, and determination to see justice done is an essential element of the form.

In this presentation Searle will discuss the correspondences between each of the nine Enneagram types and the genre(s) related to the world view/basic values of that type, with illustrative examples from literary works and films.

In her discussion of the genres, she will list “rules of the road”: implicit guidelines that each of the genres imposes on a storyteller (and which audiences expect to see observed). Searle will also discuss the ways writers”type cast”themselves in particular genres related to their personal type and why it is so difficult for many writers to switch genres.

If time allows, she will include an interactive exercise that guides participants to observe the natural genre in which they tell their personal stories.

Judith Searle is the author of The Literary Enneagram: Characters from the Inside Out (Metamorphous Press, 2001). She is a former board member of the International Enneagram Association and former Chair of its Southern California Chapter.

As an Enneagram consultant to the entertainment industry, she has spoken to various professional groups including The Directors Guild of America, The Writers Guild of America (both East and West Coast branches), Women in Theatre, and Women in Film. She has introduced the Enneagram to professional entertainment industry groups abroad, such as R.A.I. (the Italian state radio-television entity) and the PILOTS Screenwriting Conference (sponsored by the European Union). She is a longtime member of the Writers Guild of America and the Screen Actors Guild.

She offers weekend seminars on the Enneagram in the United States and abroad. Her”Great Movies, Great Books and the Enneagram”seminar features a twopronged approach to the Enneagram: showing typical behaviors through extensive clips from films and showing the underlying psychological processes through annotated excerpts from novels and memoirs.

An honors graduate of Wellesley College with a major in English Literature, she holds a Master of Education degree from Harvard University. Her non-Enneagram writings include Lovelife, a novel (NAL Books); Getting the Part: Thirty-three Professional Casting Directors Tell You How to Get Work in Theater, Films, Commercials, and TV (Limelight Editions); and In the Teeth of Time: Poems 1971-2004.

Judith Searle

2005

2005 IEA Global Conference

San Francisco, California, USA