My latest literary effort

[Steakpirate]

I just finished a Creative Writing assignment where I had to expand upon a two-page play dialogue I had previously written, based on the following prompt and without any actions. (Which is what I initially did, but reworked in the final version)

 

Prompt

 

 Scene: A park with many large trees and a grassy clearing with a bench in the center. On the bench sits a young man dressed in Levi's, tennis shoes, and a faded blue hooded sweatshirt. The day is cloudy: the time is late afternoon. The man fidgets with his hands, pulls his knees up to his chest, stands up and walks around the bench.
He appears agitated. He sits down, puts his hands over his face and begins a shrill but steady wail. A woman, also young, possibly 25-30 years old (older than the wailing man), approaches the park bench. She is dressed neatly, dressed for success, and walks with authority. She stops before the man.

Woman: What’s wrong?

Man: Huh. What?

 

Well, it was actually two additional assignments I combined.

The first, was to write a second scene with the same two characters, and bring in a third. I thought this was going to be difficult, as I originally had the Man leave the stage.

 

The second assignment was a third scene, with the Woman and the third character, but not the Man. That was a piece of cake.

 

In any case, let me know what you think. It was most certainly an experiment in the realm of humor.

[Steve E]

Hi.

Before I even read the thing: Scene: ...pulls his knees up to his chest, stands up and walks around the bench.... With his knees up to his chest? Weird.

 

I'll get back to you.

-Thoth.

[Steve E]

Hi, I'm back.

 

Okay, first impression: This is obviously a farce with farcical dialog. But does everyone have to be crazy? You must have realized this since Janice seemed reasonably sane at first, so she could serve as a foil for MAN and WOMAN. Then she turns into Krazy Kat (1913-1944) in masochistic love with her Ignatz Mouse. Even the ANNOUNCER is crazy. This is significant since he has more dialog than everyone else. (Seriously, have you ever heard an announcer talk like that?)

 

Structure. First, I probably would have established WOMAN immediately with something like: Why are you crying? Haven't you heard the GOOD NEWS? Something Jehovah's Witness-y. Second, this really isn't a 3-act play. The ANNOUNCER describes at least one other full act. You've probably heard this before: "Show. Don't tell." Third: I think the end fell a little flat. Did you consider (since we now know Janice is crazy too) having Janice and WOMAN conspire to carry out Robbie's work? You know, leave it a little open ended. Frankly, it was a downer ending for what was obviously meant to be a farce.

 

It's just my opinion. Disregard any or all of it as you see fit. YOINK!

-Thoth.

[Steakpirate]

Hi.

Before I even read the thing: Scene: ...pulls his knees up to his chest, stands up and walks around the bench.... With his knees up to his chest? Weird.

 

I'll get back to you.

-Thoth.

 

Yeah, that was the teacher's doing. He was also originally wearing a "blue sweatshirt with a hood on it".

 

The main issue is we didn't really have any guidelines. AT ALL. Just: "Write some shit with these characters."

I've not much experience writing plays (none), and at three A.M. you think differently than you do at other hours.

 

I think a big part of it is that I was just trying to get it done, to have something to turn in to do. Another part of it was that I didn't really consider the makings of a good story, but rather relayed a tale about a bunch of crazies.

 

I'd like to go back and rework it into something more complete and all-around better when I have more time, but frankly the whole thing was a joke because I wasn't too fond of the assignment in the first place.

 

Always good to hear feedback from those in the know

[Steve E]

Yeah, that was the teacher's doing. He was also originally wearing a "blue sweatshirt with a hood on it".

The main issue is we didn't really have any guidelines. AT ALL. Just: "Write some shit with these characters."

Ah, tenure.

 

I've not much experience writing plays (none), and at three A.M. you think differently than you do at other hours.

Too true. I wonder if there has ever been a study. How many brilliant ideas have been born at 3AM?

 

Another part of it was that I didn't really consider the makings of a good story, but rather relayed a tale about a bunch of crazies.

But isn't trying to make a good story always part of the assignment? I'm not defending your professor's lack of instruction but sometimes letting the student figure it out is the whole point. Some teachers employ a kind of Socratic Method for writers: Less work for them; More 3AM mind-stretching for you.

 

I'd like to go back and rework it into something more complete and all-around better when I have more time, but frankly the whole thing was a joke because I wasn't too fond of the assignment in the first place.

Fondness has nothing to do with it. There will be times in the middle of every script or novel when you will absolutely hate it. Hate the characters. Hate the plot. Wonder what you ever saw in the project in the first place. But you persevere. So I'm glad to see that you'd like "to go back and rework it into something more complete and all-around better". When you have the time, of course. Wrestle that bastard to the ground and show it who's the boss. Attaboy!

 

Always good to hear feedback from those in the know

Steakpirate, to be painfully honest, I don't think anybody is "in the know". I don't even truly believe that you can teach writing. Not real writing. That's why Storyist strives to be so flexible; to accommodate the needs of all the different processes different writers have. (Okay, some writers get drunk or high—nothing Storyist can do for you there, but you know what I mean.) What I'm saying is that you need to find your own process, hone it, make it serve you. The only way to get to that place is through practice, even when the assignments seem dumb.

 

Those who can, do. Those who can't do, teach. Those who can't teach get rich writing software to help people do. (Click here.)

-Thoth.

[Steakpirate]

Steakpirate, to be painfully honest, I don't think anybody is "in the know". I don't even truly believe that you can teach writing. Not real writing. That's why Storyist strives to be so flexible; to accommodate the needs of all the different processes different writers have. (Okay, some writers get drunk or high—nothing Storyist can do for you there, but you know what I mean.) What I'm saying is that you need to find your own process, hone it, make it serve you. The only way to get to that place is through practice, even when the assignments seem dumb.

 

Perhaps not, but if you knew how people work you can make one hell of a Guru, as far as motivation goes. Some people like me have trouble doing things on their own, and appreciate a good kick in the pants now and again. Structure helps.

[marguerite]

The main issue is we didn't really have any guidelines. AT ALL. Just: "Write some shit with these characters."

I've not much experience writing plays (none), and at three A.M. you think differently than you do at other hours.

 

I think a big part of it is that I was just trying to get it done, to have something to turn in to do. Another part of it was that I didn't really consider the makings of a good story, but rather relayed a tale about a bunch of crazies.

 

I'd like to go back and rework it into something more complete and all-around better when I have more time, but frankly the whole thing was a joke because I wasn't too fond of the assignment in the first place.

 

Always good to hear feedback from those in the know

Hmm. I'd like to draw your attention to a disconnect here. You say you didn't care for the assignment and didn't put your best effort into it, just throwing something together at 3 am to get the wacky professor off your back. But you also sent it to us for comments and say you'd like to work it into something more significant when you have time. The first says you don't care (in which case why not pitch the file into a folder marked "Lousy Assignments" and forget about it?). The second says you do.

 

I'm not asking you to explain the disconnect to us—it's none of my business and probably best left unexplored on a public forum. I'm suggesting you think about the disconnect in terms of characterization, which I suspect was the purpose of your assignment. (You could ask your professor if you're not sure.) It sounds as if you were asked to develop a pair of characters who, to make life easier for you, were in part predefined and then to consider how they would interact with a third character of your own invention.

 

What's the point of all this? Not to talk about you. Who among us has not put off an assignment because we'd rather hang out with the cute guy/gal down the hall and then panicked and slapped stuff together to meet a deadline? Rather, the point is that characters do that, too. They, too, are humans, albeit invented humans. They say one thing and do another, sometimes without knowing why. They ask for things—not always the things they want, because painful as it is to lack something basic, it's more painful to ask and face rejection. They have core needs (to be loved, respected, known, validated, free from constraints—the list is not infinite but it contains many more entries than this) that drive their behavior in ways that surprise even themselves. That combination of awareness and obtuseness, flaws and virtues, is what makes them interesting.

 

You could write a story about a mature student who invariably began considering his creative writing assignments the moment the professor made them, who asked clarifying questions and turned in perfectly formatted work two days before the deadline. But unless he turned out to be a serial killer or an invading alien, no one would want to read about such a prig. If you're serious about becoming a writer, though, you do need to adopt some elements of our fantasy student's approach, so you can develop your insights and shepherd characters through the process of discovery. One way to do that is to consider your own inconsistencies and those of the people around you, all those small weirdnesses that appear illogical on the surface but in fact have an internal psycho-logic that reveals the uniqueness of each person. Reading excellent writers and trying to figure out how they convey character is useful, too.

 

I didn't read your assignment, first because stuff was flying at me from all directions and then because I saw no point in spending time on something you yourself treated as a throwaway (if you don't care about what you're writing, how will you persuade a reader to care?). But I have followed the discussion with some interest, and I did read your previous efforts, about which you made some of the same comments. So I would leave you with several questions: Why are you taking this Creative Writing class? What do you expect to get from it? And if you are taking it to learn the craft of writing (which, pace Thoth, can be taught even if the art of writing cannot), how will you do that if you don't take the assignments seriously and try to make each one your best work?

Onward and upward!

Marguerite

[Steve E]

With respect to M's expression of polite disagreement ("pace Thoth"), I did not intend to imply that the nuts and bolts of writing (or painting or composing) cannot be taught but rather, as she more pointedly states, the art of it. Although the name of the class is "Creative Writing", creativity cannot be taught but it can be encouraged by exercising your creative imagination. Like a thousand pushups builds your biceps while one will not, a thousand little assignments will build up your imagination muscle. (Oh, lord. Did I just write that? "Imagination muscle"? It must be time to take my pills.)

 

Backward and downward, we roll into the valley of the mundane for lack of cowbell.

-Thoth.

[marguerite]

With respect to M's expression of polite disagreement ("pace Thoth"), I did not intend to imply that the nuts and bolts of writing (or painting or composing) cannot be taught but rather, as she more pointedly states, the art of it. Although the name of the class is "Creative Writing", creativity cannot be taught but it can be encouraged by exercising your creative imagination. Like a thousand pushups builds your biceps while one will not, a thousand little assignments will build up your imagination muscle. (Oh, lord. Did I just write that? "Imagination muscle"? It must be time to take my pills.)

I stole it—paraphrased it, actually—from Elizabeth George, one of my favorite writers:

"I've long believed that there are two distinct but equally important halves to the writing process. One of these is related to art; the other is related to craft. Obviously, art cannot be taught. No one can give another human being the soul of an artist, the sensibility of a writer, or the passion to put words on paper that is the gift and the curse of those who fashion poetry and prose. But it's ludicrous to suggest and shortsighted to believe that the fundamentals of fiction can't be taught." (Write Away: One Novelist's Approach to Fiction and the Writing Life [HarperCollins, 2004], p. ix).

 

I bought this recently on Amazon.com because I love the way George handles characterization, especially voice, and am desperately trying to figure out how she does it so I can do it myself. It is on my very short list of "best books for writers" and distinguishes itself because George gives examples only from novels, unlike the many, many books that primarily address the needs of screenwriters.

 

This is Elizabeth George the detective novelist (A Great Deliverance, For the Sake of Elena, With No One as Witness [where she plausibly if creepily supplies the POV of a serial killer of adolescent boys], etc.), not Elizabeth George the writer of inspirational romances.

 

Others to check out, although I've mentioned them elsewhere, besides such classics as Vogler's The Writer's Journey, are John Truby, The Anatomy of Story; Oakley Hall, The Art and Craft of Novel Writing; Nancy Cress, Beginnings, Middles, and Ends; Orson Scott Card's book on characterization; and Noah Lukeman, The First Five Pages, which in addition to numerous tips on staying out of an agent's or editor's rejection pile from a prominent literary agent includes the world's funniest rejection letter, published in full elsewhere in the forums. I reread them all on a fairly regular basis, because as I continue to write I find that I approach them differently and learn more each time.

Backward and downward, we roll into the valley of the mundane for lack of cowbell.

-Thoth.

:lol:

 

Love that line!

Best,

M

[Steve E]

Thanks for the list, M. I can personally recommend The Art and Craft of Novel Writing and The First Five Pages.

 

The cowbell line was inspired by Steakpirate's post, especially his sign-off line "Needs more cowbell" which, I assume, comes from a 2000 SNL skit where Columbia record producer Sandy Pearlman (played by Christopher Walken) is instructing the band, Blue Öyster Cult (the name is not about necrophilia, as some believe), in their recording of "(Don't Fear) The Reaper", from their 1976 album, Agents of Fortune. Sandy Pearlman (Christopher Walken) keeps making them start over insisting that the music "needs more cowbell".

 

BTW: SNL misidentifies the producer as Bruce Dickinson, and the cowbell player as Gene Frenkle (it was Albert Bouchard). Okay, probably more than you wanted to know.

-Thoth.

[Steakpirate]

Hmm. I'd like to draw your attention to a disconnect here. You say you didn't care for the assignment and didn't put your best effort into it, just throwing something together at 3 am to get the wacky professor off your back. But you also sent it to us for comments and say you'd like to work it into something more significant when you have time. The first says you don't care (in which case why not pitch the file into a folder marked "Lousy Assignments" and forget about it?). The second says you do.

 

I'm not asking you to explain the disconnect to us—it's none of my business and probably best left unexplored on a public forum. I'm suggesting you think about the disconnect in terms of characterization, which I suspect was the purpose of your assignment. (You could ask your professor if you're not sure.) It sounds as if you were asked to develop a pair of characters who, to make life easier for you, were in part predefined and then to consider how they would interact with a third character of your own invention.

 

You're completely right. It's not that I think these assignments—or any others for that matter—were a waste of time at all, I just have conflicting opinions on the subject. There are parts I like, parts I hate, parts that are great but don't fit at all.

 

It's a defense mechanism, really, one that I need to let go of. It's a compounding of issues, phobias, experiences, a fear of failure, a fear of being wrong; my way of both psychologically detaching myself to avoid hurt and of lowering people's expectations so that they react more positively.

 

In the Chinese culture, the mothers after preparing a meal, will often say that the food is no good, and that they only had such poor ingredients, to which the guests customarily respond by complimenting the dish or meal. I think my ego is in some similar mindset and expectancy of stroking.

 

Anything that you spend time writing is worth spending time to read, but as social skills aren't easily taught, I like to deflect. Nobody's perfect, I know, people have issues in all shapes, sizes and colors, and some are more or less mixed up than me.

 

In any case, for your amusement, a longer, more complete, and less consistently toned revision—which may or may not have addressed any of your suggestions or gripes— awaits!

 

 

What's the point of all this? Not to talk about you. Who among us has not put off an assignment because we'd rather hang out with the cute guy/gal down the hall and then panicked and slapped stuff together to meet a deadline? Rather, the point is that characters do that, too. They, too, are humans, albeit invented humans. They say one thing and do another, sometimes without knowing why. They ask for things—not always the things they want, because painful as it is to lack something basic, it's more painful to ask and face rejection. They have core needs (to be loved, respected, known, validated, free from constraints—the list is not infinite but it contains many more entries than this) that drive their behavior in ways that surprise even themselves. That combination of awareness and obtuseness, flaws and virtues, is what makes them interesting.

 

Character realism is an avenue down which I have very little driving experience; something I really need to look into and work on. One of these days I'll plan an outing just to observe how people really interact. The biggest issue with my literary development is simply the way I'm handling it. If I'm writing, I'm not reading, and vice versa, and often, I'm not doing either. A focus would help

Really though, I think my generation is a lot better at being distracted.

 

You've probably heard this before: "Show. Don't tell."

I very much understand the game of Show and Tell; in fact I wrote a rather long segment in one of my peer critiques about it, but in the case of this story, and the announcer specifically, I don't really know how to get that same information across in a way that is both humorous and descriptive visually. It is a play script, and not a screenplay, and so you really can't demonstrate too easily events that make up an action movie—car chases and the like.

 

I suppose you could have the men with the horse-headed crotch poles and go with representational acting, but I feel that the imagination does a better job at portraying events. (As far as reading and listening goes.)

[Steve E]

In the Chinese culture, the mothers after preparing a meal, will often say that the food is no good, and that they only had such poor ingredients, to which the guests customarily respond by complimenting the dish or meal. I think my ego is in some similar mindset and expectancy of stroking.

SP, if you only wanted compliments in response you should have said so. We can do that.

 

In any case, for your amusement, a longer, more complete, and less consistently toned revision—which may or may not have addressed any of your suggestions or gripes— awaits!

For my amusement? Okay. No pressure.

 

...but in the case of this story, and the announcer specifically, I don't really know how to get that same information across in a way that is both humorous and descriptive visually. It is a play script, and not a screenplay, and so you really can't demonstrate too easily events that make up an action movie—car chases and the like.

A play script is meant to be acted. And there are any number of ways to express action (such as peoples reaction to observing the action). My point about the Announcer was that he was (presumably) off-stage reading an entire Act. This doesn't (necessarily) mean you eliminate the Announcer but rather (for example) make him a concise clarifier of what had happened in the previous (unwritten) Act.

 

I suppose you could have the men with the horse-headed crotch poles and go with representational acting, but I feel that the imagination does a better job at portraying events. (As far as reading and listening goes.)

I suppose you could but (again) there are better ways. There is nothing wrong with leaving some things to a audience's imagination (e.g., sex) but leaving an entire Act for them to visualize is overkill. To your credit, this would have worked just fine in a novel but not a play.

 

I'll read your new piece now.

-Thoth.

[Steakpirate]

SP, if you only wanted compliments in response you should have said so. We can do that.

 

I didn't because I don't. Most habits are subconscious, until you notice them.

 

I suppose you could but (again) there are better ways. There is nothing wrong with leaving some things to a audience's imagination (e.g., sex) but leaving an entire Act for them to visualize is overkill. To your credit, this would have worked just fine in a novel but not a play.

The hard thing to do is find one of those better ways without entirely changing the substance of what it is that you want to deliver

[Steve E]

I didn't because I don't. Most habits are subconscious, until you notice them.

Ah, then you wanted it subconsciously. And now that you've noticed what will you do?

 

The hard thing to do is find one of those better ways without entirely changing the substance of what it is that you want to deliver

I have faith in you, SP.

 

Try more cowbell.

-Thoth.

[marguerite]

Character realism is an avenue down which I have very little driving experience; something I really need to look into and work on. One of these days I'll plan an outing just to observe how people really interact. The biggest issue with my literary development is simply the way I'm handling it. If I'm writing, I'm not reading, and vice versa, and often, I'm not doing either. A focus would help

Really though, I think my generation is a lot better at being distracted.

Well, don't beat yourself up over it. It takes time—and even when you've had lots of time, people will still haul off and surprise you (characters, too ). But at least if you keep writing you probably won't turn into one of those folks who manages to hit 80 without ever considering what makes him-/herself or anyone else tick.

 

Not that there's anything wrong with that.

Best,

M