English 221: Intro to Creative Writing
Agenda: February 14
- (a) There are many people in my life that I have lost touch with.
- (b) I have lost touch with several people in my life.
- Abstraction: The five-year-old boy's need to pee was overwhelming.
- Re-write the above sentence (1) avoiding abstraction, (2) using active verbs, and (3) using concrete details that appeal to the senses and create a vivid image in the reader's mind. (You can write up to three sentences.)
- In-Class Writing: What's the most striking thing I heard, saw, smelled, touched, tasted today? (Or yesterday.) Write about it. Try to describe whatever it was in specific, concrete terms.
- Individual Work: Read "Sticks" by George Saunders and answer the following questions:
- How does the story characterize the father through image? (This question deserves a pretty long, complex answer.)
- How does the story characterize the father through speech?
- Through action?
- How does the story characterize the children through image?
- How does the story characterize the children through action?
- How does the story characterize the narrator through thought? Through telling?
- What does the father want? What is contradictory about the father's wants? How is he consistently inconsistent?
- What does the narrator want? What is contradictory about what the narrator wants?
- What significant choices does the father make?
- How does the father change?
- What significant choices does the narrator make?
- How does the narrator change?
- Group Work: Break into the following groups.
- Nicholas, Amanda, Emily, Daniel
- David, Emma, Colleen, Jean Louise, Tamar
- Kristin, Erica, Ian, Ryan
- Sarah, William, Erin, Elicia
- Confer on your notes to the questions above. Report back to class.
For Next Time: 2/19
READ: IW Chapter 4 131-153. (All of Ch. 4 except the Drama reading). Take notes on each reading. In your notes, pay attention to: Setting as the World, Setting as a Camera, Setting as Mood or Symbol, and Setting as Action.
Quiz on Chapter 4 on Tuesday.