How to build a Random Story Generator using Python?

In this section, we are going to make a very interesting beginner-level project of Python. It is a random story generator. The random story generator project aims to generate random stories every time user executes the code. A story is made up of a collection of sentences. We will choose random phrases to build sentences, and hence stories. 

Now, the pertinent question is – How we will do so? Its answer is very simple :

• We will first put the elements of the story in different lists.
• Then we will use the random module to select random parts of the story collected in different lists.
• And then concatenate them to make a story.

We will make use of random.choice() function. Before starting, let’s see an example of how random.choice() works.

Python3

import random

# list of books is stored in the list -'books'
books = ['Mother', 'Midnight Children', 'My experiments with truth']

# An item from the list 'books' is selected
# by random.choice()
print(random.choice(books))

Output

Midnight Children

As we can see, random.choice() function basically selects an item from a list of items. 

Following are the steps involved in this Random story generator project.

1. Import the random module, as it is a built-in module of python.  So, there’s no need to install it manually.

Python3

# Importing random module
import random

2.  Define several lists of phrases. Here, we have defined eight lists. We can define more also, it depends totally on our choice.

• Sentence_starter – This list gives an idea about the time of the event.
• character – This list tells about the main character of this story.
• time – This list defines the exact day on which some incident has occurred.
• story_plot – This list defines the plot of the story.
• place – This list defines the place at which the incident occurred.
• second_character – This list defines the second character of the story.
• age – This list defines the age of the second character.
• work – This list tells about the work the second character was doing.

Python3

# Defining list of phrases which will help to build a story
Sentence_starter = ['About 100 years ago', ' In the 20 BC', 'Once upon a time']

character = [' there lived a king.',' there was a man named Jack.',
             ' there lived a farmer.']

time = [' One day', ' One full-moon night']

story_plot = [' he was passing by', ' he was going for a picnic to ']

place = [' the mountains', ' the garden']

second_character = [' he saw a man', ' he saw a young lady']

age = [' who seemed to be in late 20s', ' who seemed very old and feeble']

work = [' searching something.', ' digging a well on roadside.']

3. With the help of random.choice() select an item from each list and concatenate the selected items to generate sentences for the story.

Python3

# Selecting an item from each list and concatenating them.
print(random.choice(Sentence_starter)+random.choice(character)+
      random.choice(time)+random.choice(story_plot)+
      random.choice(place)+random.choice(second_character)+
      random.choice(age)+random.choice(work))

Implementation:

Let’s try the full implementation with the help of an example.

Python3

# Importing random module
import random

# Defining list of phrases which will help to build a story

Sentence_starter = ['About 100 years ago', ' In the 20 BC', 'Once upon a time']
character = [' there lived a king.',' there was a man named Jack.',
             ' there lived a farmer.']
time = [' One day', ' One full-moon night']
story_plot = [' he was passing by',' he was going for a picnic to ']
place = [' the mountains', ' the garden']
second_character = [' he saw a man', ' he saw a young lady']
age = [' who seemed to be in late 20s', ' who seemed very old and feeble']
work = [' searching something.', ' digging a well on roadside.']

# Selecting an item from each list and concatenating them.
print(random.choice(Sentence_starter)+random.choice(character)+
      random.choice(time)+random.choice(story_plot) +
      random.choice(place)+random.choice(second_character)+
      random.choice(age)+random.choice(work))

Output:

In the 20 BC there lived a king. One day he was going for a picnic to  the mountains he saw a man who seemed to be in late 20s digging a well on roadside.

In this way, we can compile and run this code as many times as we want. And different short stories will be generated.