As you leave:

Here are the top seven things to take with you:

FIRST AND FOREMOST: YOU ARE NOT READING ENOUGH FICTION.  Start reading. Read whatever you want, the good stuff eventually shows up anyway, but start reading for pleasure and for an understanding of craft.

ALL FICTION WRITERS HAVE READ EXTENSIVELY, AND ACROSS GENRES AND MARKET NICHE.

A side benefit: Reading makes you a deeper, more empathic, soulful person. Reading fiction improves your life by making you smarter about the human condition. It will change you.

(P.S. Watching movies is not reading.)

Okay. Now:

1.) The “context” in which you live counts for something. The more you understand your own context, the more you will see be able to understand the context of others. Understanding your own context comes from self reflection and analysis of your own situation—how you got where you are, and how you are going where you’re going. Understanding the context of others comes from close relationships based on shared experience that results in a deep knowledge of others. How does this relate to you? You can’t write fiction without inventing a context.

2.) The “world view” of your characters is what makes them do awful, awful things. Their world views aren’t necessarily wrong or right. They just are. But two world views in opposition make conflict—conflict is at the center of the story. If you are confused about world view, read as much as you can about various religions, philosophies, cultures, “contexts”, and travel.

3.) If your reader doesn’t care about your characters, the story hasn’t done its job.

4.) Films have the benefit of visuals. Writing prose requirse you to conjure up what things look like using only the alphabet. In more than any other area—this is where early work fails. Writers can get a situation sparked with a conflict, and they can put characters in motion, and they can even make a reader feel a little for all of the drama, but we still have to “see” it for it to be meaningful.

5.) The bomb doesn’t have to drop on Washington D.C. for a character’s world to blow up. A knife doesn’t have to twist through the chambers of a character’s heart for someone to die.

6.) Those of you making worlds, keep making them. Play in them. Live in them as often as you can. They will help you understand reality.

7.) Those of you making characters, let them be your closest confidant. When something happens to you, let it happen to them to. They will help you survive reality.

8.) Change the names to protect those you love, as well as yourself, from lawsuits and hurt feelings.

9.) Experience. Experience. Experience.

10.) It all belongs to you.

Advanced Workshop

For this particular workshop, I want you to act as editor—considering with full disclosure what works and what doesn’t work for you as a reader in the story. I also want you to pull out all you’ve learned in this class about plot, character, scene/summary, dialogue, point of view, emotional distance, world view, and tangible and intangible wants and desires. A two-page critical assessment of the work should result (You will do TWO—due Monday, November 29—this is Assignment 24.)

Though each story will require different assessment criteria, and have different concerns and successes, here are some basic questions to ask yourself when evaluating someone else’s work:

1.) What are the character’s world views–and how to do they advance the stakes of the story? Are the character’s world views clear and intact, are the world views developing, are they in clear (or secondary) conflict?

2.) What is the Point of View of this story, and how does using this Point of View serve the purposes of the story—is the writing making use of all the advantages available to him/her with this P.O.V.?

3.) What happens in this story? Is the action of the story propelling the story forward, or are any points in the action dead, irrelevant, or distracting?

4.) Is the dialogue alive? Is doing two or more things at once: illuminating character, advancing action, heightening conflict, revealing secrets, or any other heavy lifting? Or is it redundant, boring, and unbelievable?

5.) What is the balance of scene and summar in the story? Is this balance working for the story, or is it off-balance? Does the author’s choices of scene and summary usage seem controlled and intentional? Are there any places where you would like more, or where a section of summary could serve the story better if it was in scene?

6.) Describe the setting. Does it feel like a real place to you? Is the setting fully realized? How does the setting serve to advance the telling of the story? Is it used effectively?

7.) How is time handled in this story? How is the balance of flashback and current action working in the story? Is there enough developed here to make sense of a time scale in the story? Do you need more context about previous occurrences to understand the story?

8.) What is the essential conflict, including any concrete and abstract desires (tangible and intangible desires) as they present themselves? Are the stakes at which the character must exercise their agency to achieve these desires high enough? Are the characters drawn in a way that we care about them and their achievement of their wants and desires?

9.) Who wants to be right in this story? Who wants to be good? What does that mean here for your consumption of the story?

10.) What does not makes sense to you as a reader in this story? What are your barriers to understanding/enjoyment of this story?

What is a story?

A story has a beggining, a middle, and an end, as well as a change and/or awareness within a character and/or the reader.

A story, in some way, almost always includes the following elements:

• character(s) • action (something happens) • dialogue • summary (the author tells us what happened) •  scene (the author shows us what happened) • setting(s) (the place(s) where things happen) • time(s) when things happen • conflict (two opposing forces working for power/control) • both concrete and abstract desires (tangible and intangible desires) • morality (a question of wanting to be right, or wanting to be good) • the common elements of grammar, punctuation, and style

When assessing (workshopping) a story, a good place to being is in asking yourself what the story has working to its advantage in regards to the above elements. Then ask yourself which of these elements is working against the story. Another approach, which of these things are working together well in the story; which are in conflict in a way that doesn’t make sense or meaning.

A quiz for your characters

http://quizfarm.com/quizzes/new/eddxii/what-is-your-world-view/

Second Person: Mini Workshop

1.) Describe the characters. Judging from their actions–how would you describe the main characters’ world views? (Choose the primary two characters.)

1a. Though this story is written in “You” (Second Person), who is the “main character” of the story. Who is the story really about?

2.) What happens in this story? Is the action of the story propelling the story forward, or are any points in the action dead, irrelevant, or distracting?

3.) Is the dialogue alive? Is doing two or more things at once: illuminating character, advancing action, heightening conflict, revealing secrets, or any other heavy lifting? Or is it redundant, boring, and unbelievable?

 4.) What is the balance of scene and summar in the story? Is this balance working for the story, or is it off-balance?

5.) Describe the setting. Does it feel like a real place to you? Is the setting fully realized? 

6.) How is time handled in this story? How is the balance of flashback and current action working in the story?

7.) What is the essential conflict, including any concrete and abstract desires (tangible and intangible desires) as they present themselves?

8.) Who wants to be right in this story? Who wants to be good?

9.) What does not makes sense to you as a reader in this story?

Midterm Meetings

Here is our sign-up for Midterm Meetings. Individual Midterm Meetings are a requirement of this class. Most students find them hugely beneficial to their work and their development as an artist.

Nick, Priyam, Jim, and Katlyn—email me right away. We’ll have to get times for you, and we’ll have to get your papers switched up with each other….

—Steph

smash@stcloudstate.edu

For Thursday, September 30

1:45 Brittni Parish

2:00 Scott Schwandt

2:15 Kaylie Hudek

2:30 Heidi Brinker

2:45 Dan Hoffman

3:00 Anne Mueller

3:15 KC Artley

3:30 Jason Demee

3:45 Bigya Pradhan

For Thursday, October 7

1:45 Mike Hirl

2:00 Laura Olson

2:15 Liz O’Brien

2:30 Jackie Silseth

2:45 Ryan Peterson

3:00 John Skalitzky

3:15

3:30 Roman Johnson

3:45 Erin Gerber

What is a “story”?

A story has a beggining, a middle, and an end, as well as a change and/or awareness within a character and/or the reader.

A story, in some way, almost always includes the following elements:

• character(s) • action (something happens) • dialogue • summary (the author tells us what happened) •  scene (the author shows us what happened) • setting(s) (the place(s) where things happen) • time(s) when things happen • conflict (two opposing forces working for power/control) • both concrete and abstract desires (tangible and intangible desires) • morality (a question of wanting to be right, or wanting to be good) • the common elements of grammar, punctuation, and style

When assessing (workshopping) a story, a good place to being is in asking yourself what the story has working to its advantage in regards to the above elements. Then ask yourself which of these elements is working against the story. Another approach, which of these things are working together well in the story; which are in conflict in a way that doesn’t make sense or meaning.

Assignment 1: Questionaire/Inventory

For Thursday—and please remember to both bring a copy to class AND turn in on D2L.

Also: Get the book!

—See you soon—

Steph

Answer these questions (two or three sentences each)

Name

Year

Major

1.) Goals you are trying to achieve here in this class. What are you doing here?

2.) What are you most looking forward to?

3.) What are you most concerned about or fearful of in this class?

4.) Describe your writing experience.

5.) Talk about the book that melted your face off/changed your life/made you think about yourself or the world differently.

6.) How do you see this class working? What are some elements that you’d like to see built in to this class?

7.) What is the place art has in your life?

Welcome to Fiction

This class is Creative Writing: Fiction.

Seriously!

—Steph