Higher Writing Folio: Creative Writing 3

Higher Writing Folio: Creative Writing 3

The Perfect Short Story

• A world in miniature- it suggests a whole world by focusing on a tiny part of it.

• A satisfying look at someone else’s life or problems or personality.

GOOD PLOT IDEAS

Character is faced with a problem, a dilemma, a difficult situation, a conflict (within herself, with authority, with another character) – this is the catalyst!!

Starting Point

JUST BEFORE THE CRISIS ERUPTS!

OPENING

• You need to set a specific mood right from the outset.

• This will help with your character/plot!!

Creating AtmosphereCreating Atmosphere

• Atmosphere put simply is “the feeling in the space”.

• Use the weather (pathetic fallacy) to add atmosphere.

• Conflict between characters creates tension.

• Detailed description can make a room dark and mysterious etc.

Show don’t TellShow don’t Tell

When bringing a scene to life it’s worth remembering that good description (showing) rather than simple narration (telling) leads to a more satisfying piece of fiction.


“I came into the room. I saw Alan. I greeted him and sat down in a chair.”

Becomes

“I stormed into the room. I glared at Alan. I grunted at him and flung myself into a chair.”


The second version puts emotion into the story and leaves us wondering why the narrator is in that mood. If Alan deserves the narrator’s mood our sympathy will be with the narrator, if he doesn’t deserve it then our sympathy changes to Alan.


When bringing a scene to life try and put detail into your description. What is on a detective’s desk, or the music he listens to (Ian Rankin is a genius at this) will show you more about the character than the narrator can tell.

Opening a Short StoryOpening a Short Story

• The opening of a short story is a huge part of whether it will be successful or not.

• The first sentence of a short story doesn't just "hook" readers, it also sets the tone and launches the plot.

Opening a Short StoryOpening a Short Story

• The first sentence, or the first paragraph, often hangs over the rest of the story.

• Many short stories are really about one idea, or one situation, and that's what the opening sentences establish.

SettingSetting

1. What does the place look like?

2. What is the weather like? Does it reflect how you feel? (Pathetic fallacy)

3. What can you hear?

4. What colours can you see?

5. What feelings does it arouse in you?

SettingSetting

Time frame and place constitute setting of short stories. The setting is often decorated with descriptions of scenes such as super market, bedroom, crowded subway train, or drizzling evening… an unlimited list. These descriptions are very important to make reader immerse in the plot.

ExampleExample

The dark clouds hung low in the sky and the rain crashed against the windows. The school, a monstrous building with shimmering windows, stood on top of the hill like a general inspecting its charges. Alana was sure that she could hear the distant screams of terrified children as she trudged, like a war weary soldier, towards the entrance. Fear gripped her heart. It was now or never…

Using techniquesUsing techniques

Varying sentence structureChanging the length of your sentences, the way they start, the use of repetition and the punctuation used within sentences are all ways you can vary sentence structure. This makes your writing more interesting to read.

Using techniques Using techniques Sentence StructureSentence Structure

Always using the same structure of sentence will make your descriptions dull and robotic. The usual mistakes are:

1.too many sentences the same length

2.too many sentences structured the same way

Using techniquesUsing techniquesSentence StructureSentence Structure

I looked along the beach. There were groups of children playing. They splashed in the shallow water. They made sandcastles. They shouted and squealed. Their parents sat further up the beach. They knitted or slept in the sun. There were ponies which took people for rides. There were flies buzzing around. There was an ice cream van. People queued at it. Some of them were grown-ups. Some of them were children.


To make sentences more interesting and effective you can do the opposite:

1.vary the length of sentences

2.vary the structure of sentences


Looking along the beach, I could see groups of children playing. They shouted and squealed as they splashed in the shallow water or made sandcastles, while, further up the beach, parents knitted or slept in the sun. Flies buzzed around the heads of ponies which gave rides. People, grown ups and children, queued at an ice cream van.


the meaning is the same but the sentences are varied in structure.

varying sentences is an important technique in keeping your writing interesting.


By varying sentence structure your writing will seem fresh and stylish. It will not be robotic and boring. Another advantage of doing this is that you can use sentence structure to reinforce what you mean.

For example, describing a person who takes a long walk with a long sentence shows the sentence structure reinforcing the meaning.


Another example would be describing a swimmer in a pool with a lot of commas in the sentence - all these pauses would reinforce the idea of the breathing of the swimmer.

A further example would be a lot of short sentences together to describe something dramatic. The longer pauses would give it that drama.


The following slide is a description by Norman Mailer of the preparations made for the boxing match between Muhammed Ali and George Foreman in 1974 in Zaire.

In describing the fight Mailer uses sentence structure to reinforce the movement of Ali.


He jabbed with a right. He jabbed again. Another jab. Piling them on. He stepped back to avoid a big left. He jabbed a left. Again, another left jab. His mouth working. Foreman was getting angry. He started moving forward, head down, blindly. Ali stepped back onto his left, side-stepped the right, dropped the left shoulder, feinted to the left and then side stepped right, throwing a parting right and then withdrew into the space of the white canvas, shuffling right and left, staying in Foreman's middle, refusing to be cornered and leaving escape routes open.


The long and short sentences are used to reinforce the long and short movements of Ali.

Using techniquesUsing techniquesWord ChoiceWord Choice

Word Choice is critical in your writing. You must ensure you carefully choose words not for their denotation but for their connotations – suggestions/associations.

Effective word choice can create an atmosphere in your writing and by using it subtly you can even convey attitudes and tone.

Using techniquesUsing techniquesImageryImagery

A simile is used to create an image, feeling or idea in the mind of the reader that helps convey what the writer means, sometimes better than a wordy explanation.

Example:•Rebecca is like a walking dictionary.


Rebecca and a dictionary do not immediately appear to have anything in common.

•They do have a shared characteristic: they both know a lot of words!

•This shared characteristic can be used to create a comparison that conveys and emphasises a meaning.


• a simile is very useful to create an image (when the SQA use the word 'imagery' they often mean images created by similes, metaphors or personification)

• a simile is an indirect comparison


• A metaphor is used to create an image, feeling or idea in the mind of the reader that helps convey what the writer means, sometimes better than a wordy explanation.

Example:• Bob was a pig at the dinner table.


• Bob is not a pig. Why say he is one? They do not immediately appear to have anything in common.

• But, they do have a shared characteristic(s) - they both behave a certain way when eating!

• This shared characteristic(s) can be used to create a comparison that conveys and emphasises a meaning.


• a metaphor is a direct comparison and can create very powerful effects on a reader

• A more subtle form of metaphor is using a noun or verb to convey the shared characteristic(s) between one thing and another.

• Example: Bob stuck his snout into the dinner placed before him.


Example: The sun smiled on the village below. •The sun and a person do not immediately appear to have anything in common.•They do have a shared characteristic: a bright sun and a smile creates happiness!•This shared characteristic can be used to create a comparison that conveys and emphasises a meaning.


Personification compares one thing with a person that do not immediately appear to be similar but have shared characteristic(s). One of the things must be inanimate (a thing) and the comparison is always to a person/human being.

Developing Your PlotDeveloping Your Plot

Developing the plot is usually done by adding turning points. These turning points change the direction of the plot. A turning point can be:

•a new character appears•a new piece of information appears•a new action happens•a new emotion or idea occurs in a character


• Once there is a turning point in the story the plot follows the direction of the new turning point until a further turning point takes it in a new direction.

• Flannery O'Connor was a writer from the South of the United States. In her short story The Turkey, a young boy called Ruller is playing imaginary cowboys by himself. It is at this point there is the first turning point.


And then he saw it, just moving slightly through the bushes farther over, a touch of bronze and a rustle and then, through another gap in the leaves, the eye, set in red folds that covered the head and hung down along the neck, trembling slightly. He stood perfectly still and the turkey took another step, then stopped, with one foot lifted, and listened.

Developing Your SettingDeveloping Your Setting

Developing the setting

Developing the setting does not always mean a long paragraph of more details. Developing the setting can be as simple as adding a word or a sentence to adding a further detailed paragraph.

Developing Your CharacterDeveloping Your Character

Developing your character(s)

•Continuing to develop your characters is as important as continuing to develop your plot or your descriptions of setting. •As a story progresses we learn more about the characters involved.



•How you do this is important. Your description of character becomes part of the story. There is no point stopping the story to give updates about a character!•By paying attention the actions, words, thoughts and feelings of a character as the plot unfolds, a character is continued to be developed.



•In this example a boy and girl have just split-up.

•As she glanced at him, she noticed, with surprised worry, that there was a tear in his eye.



From the one sentence we can learn:

•she did not expect him to look upset.•she thinks he is not a person who to cry.•he was upset at the break-up.•he may not be the kind of person who cries easily.•there were feelings on both sides.

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Higher Writing Folio: Creative Writing 3