Quite a few narratives consist of what are commonly referred to as ‘stories within stories’ (on such occasions, the word ‘story’ is being used in its most general sense). The outer story is usually called the ‘frame narrative,’ for the simple reason that it ‘frames’ the other stories rather as a picture frame surrounds a picture.
We will have more to say about these stories-within-stories and frame narratives when we come to consider the role of the narrator (or narrators) later in this unit (or you can go there directly here). For now, it is enough to observe that plots structured in this way will inevitably consist of several plots even if those plots are all ostensibly about the same story (with that word now being understood in its strictest sense).
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