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license: mit
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---
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# LitVISTA: A Benchmark for Narrative Orchestration in Literary Text
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**[Paper (arXiv:2601.06445)](https://arxiv.org/abs/2601.06445)**
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## ๐ Overview
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**LitVISTA** is a structurally annotated benchmark designed to evaluate the **narrative orchestration** capabilities of Large Language Models (LLMs). Unlike traditional benchmarks that focus on causal coherence or local semantics, LitVISTA maps stories into a high-dimensional representational framework called **VISTA Space**.
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It focuses on how narrative events (Verbs+) serve distinct structural rolesโ**Impulses**, **Resonances**, and **Pauses**โto create the pacing, tension, and rhythm inherent in human-authored literature.
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## ๐๏ธ Dataset Structure
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The dataset is organized into `train`, `val`, and `test` splits (8:1:1 ratio). Each entry consists of two files:
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* `.txt` file: The raw literary text (sourced from LitBank/Project Gutenberg).
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* `.ann` file: The structural annotations in a tab-separated format.
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### Annotation Format
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Each line in the `.ann` file follows this structure:
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`Index` | `Anchor Topology` | `Offset` | `Verb+` | `Narrative Dependency`
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:--- | :--- | :--- | :--- | :---
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**0** | **Resonance** | 376,381 | Smoke | 49
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1. **Index**: The unique identifier for the narrative anchor.
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2. **Anchor Topology**: The functional role within VISTA Space:
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* **Impulse (V_I)**: Plot drivers that form the narrative backbone and advance the plot to a new stage (ฯ โ ฯ+1).
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* **Resonance (V_R)**: Descriptive expansions that provide texture and context without advancing the plot stage (ฯ โ ฯ+ฮด).
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* **Pause (V_P)**: Vertical intensity markers that freeze narrative time to dive into psychology or micro-details (ฯ โ ฯ).
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3. **Offset**: Character-level start and end positions of the anchor in the source text.
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4. **Verb+**: The textual anchor (canonical verbs or event-denoting nominals like "marriage").
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5. **Narrative Dependency**: The ID of the parent node, defining the global structural backbone or recursive attachments.
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## ๐ Key Statistics
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| Metric | Train | Val | Test |
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| --- | --- | --- | --- |
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| Avg. Length (Tokens) | 10.2k | 9.9k | 10.7k |
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| Predominant Role | Resonance | Resonance | Resonance |
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| Complexity | High cross-dependency and long-range narrative relations. | | |
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## ๐ Task: Narrative Structure Reconstruction
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The core task is to reconstruct the narrative topology. In the **Oracle Setting**, models are provided with the text and the `Verb+` anchors and must predict the `Anchor Topology` and `Narrative Dependency` (Head) for each.
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## ๐ Citation
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If you use this dataset, please cite our work:
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```bibtex
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@article{lu2026litvista,
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title={LitVISTA: A Benchmark for Narrative Orchestration in Literary Text},
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author={Lu, Mingzhe and Wang, Yiwen and Liu, Yanbing and You, Qi and Liu, Chong and others},
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journal={arXiv preprint arXiv:2601.06445},
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year={2026}
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}
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``` |
