DAY 2 TOPICS:

What Makes a Story?Writer’s NotebookYour Writing Process

What is Fiction?

a made-up story

actor and storyteller

painter and filmmaker

short story writer

symbols form words, which multiply to create sentences and paragraphs

words act with your imagination in such a way as to invite you into the reality of a story—you step through the looking glass—and you have no choice but to empathize with those who live in the alternate reality

powerful and portable

Humans possess a primal need for fiction—why?

What is Story?

narrative of eventsexternal

psychological

moves through and/or implies passage of time

involves change 

Generalizing about Forms

SHORT STORY

a song

  15,000 words maximum, or no more

than 60 typed pages average short story is the length of a

book chapter recent flash fiction is 1-2 pages in

length scope is narrow stories dig deeply, but never wander

outside of their tight focus

EXAMPLES  Cheever's "The Swimmer": a man's

attempt to swim home via neighbors' swimming pools

Wolff's "A Bullet in the Brain": focuses on a few minutes while a book critic stands in line at a bank

NOVEL

a symphony

80,000 words, or 300+ typed pages Bigger: more characters, more scenes,

more development, more heft central story is set within a swirling

world of activities (i.e., a plot accompanied by sub-plots)

 

EXAMPLES Tolstoy's War and Peace: countless

characters over years and thousands of mile and all aspects of humanity

Salinger's The Catcher in the Rye: several days in the life of a teenager

Joyce's Ulysses: 800 pages, weaving in and out of various minds and styles--one single day

What Makes Stories Succeed? “Anyone who has lived to the age of eighteen has enough stories to last a lifetime.” ~Flannery O’Connor

Idea Seeds: Writer’s Notebook

Didion’s Writer’s Notebook

Seeds are Everywhere—in the eccentric & exotic and the ordinary: character

name

situation

structure

overheard dialogue

setting

theme

vague feeling

WILLIAM LEAST HEAT MOON’S BLUE HIGHWAYS

 Your observation skills will become refined—other senses will intensify also. The world around you will become more alive, vibrant, multidimensional, entertaining, and meaningful.

Your First Writer’s Notebook Entries

YOU HAVE 2 MINUTES TO CREATE A LIST:

What are things you most love?

YOU HAVE 2 MINUTES TO CREATE SECOND LIST:

What are things you most hate?

Near & Far: Fertile Ground

NEAR: write what you know

FAR: write what ignites your interest

 

MARRIAGE BETWEEN YOU AND THINGS OUTSIDE OF YOURSELF.

Henry James: develop “the power to guess the unseen from the seen.”

Look at other people and imagine who they really are and what it would be like to walk around in their shoes.

Walk in Her Shoes

Try His

Or Theirs

Invite Strangers into Your Head

WRITING EXERCISE

JR 5: Jump Starts Think back over the past week—recall one stranger who made you think

twice about their presence or your interaction. Write about it quickly. Think back—list 3 outdoors settings you’ve visited recently. What room do you spend the most time in at home? If I went through your inside trash right now, what would I find? Think of the person with whom you spend the most time: what is the one

thing they habitually say or do that drives you crazy? What is one thing about you that very few people “get.” The kind of thing

that makes people think you might not be so normal. Have you felt embarrassed recently? Why or why not? Choose a parent. What is the thing you love most about him/her? What do

you most dislike about him/her? What is your most vivid childhood memory dealing with touch (e.g., a

tactile experience that ignited your imagination)?

 

WRITING PROCESSES

brilliant and lazyor

clueless and motivated

Practice is required. Improvement is incremental. Designated writing times are

required. If you catch as you can, you'll catch

nothing.

clueless and motivated

create a writing schedule: choose days of the week and times you are most free and stimulated

force yourself (and others) to stick to your schedule—it’s more important to stick to your schedule than to write something fantastic

discipline is your greatest strength

 figure out what works for you:

solitudeor 

the stimulation of public places

"Hard" Time versus "Soft" Time

hard time: writing, writing, writing  soft time: pondering work, research,

discussions/conversations, capturing bedtime dreams (place notepad by alarm clock)—like a crowbar when you're stuck

TWO WRITERS LIVE INSIDE YOU 

FREE SPIRIT                 STERN EDITOR 

Both do not see eye to eye, but they are a crucial combination for

success.

WRITING EXERCISE

JR 6: Portrait of a Writer

Invisible writing: turn off your computer screen, and craft a character description of yourself as a writer.

WRITING EXERCISE

JR 7: Make a Plan

a. With regard to who you are as a writer right now, what’s working for you? What’s not?

b. What writerly self-related changes need to be made to make the most of the next 6 weeks?

c. Create a soft and hard writing schedule you’ll stick to for the next month.

Writer’s Notebook

DIRECTIONS FOR WRITER’S NOTEBOOK:

YOU MUST CARRY THIS NOTEBOOK ON OR NEAR YOUR PERSON AT ALL TIMES OVER THE NEXT 6 WEEKS.

YOU SHOULD BE WRITING IN YOUR NOTEBOOK EVERY DAY, SEVERAL TIMES A DAY. DATE/HOUR EVERY ENTRY.

MINIMUM NUMBER OF ENTRIES: 50

Objectives:

1. refine your observation skills

2. heighten your senses on a meta-cognitive level (i.e., transform everyday life into something more alive, vibrant, multidimensional, entertaining, and meaningful)

3. start a habit

WRITING EXERCISE

JR 7: Cathedral

You have the remainder of the class to respond to the word Cathedral. Write as much as you can, as quickly as you can (i.e., let your stream overflow).