Make a list. Write about things you have learned. Today’s Prompt: Things I’ve learned. . .
Tag: The Write Spot Blog
Writing as an organic process. . .
“Think of writing as an organic, developmental process in which you start writing at the very beginning – before you know your meaning at all – and encourage your words gradually to change and evolve. Only at the end will you know what you want to say or the words you want to say it with.” –Peter Elbow
See your story and tell it.
Relax into your chair. Escort your inner critic . . . your editor out the door. Shed your ideas about what perfect writing means. Give yourself permission to write the worst stuff possible. Writing isn’t about talent, it’s about practice. Creative writing is an act of discovery. Take a deep breath. Relax into your breathing. Rather than write for an audience, write from an instinctual level. Immerse yourself in writing. Let go of your worries. Just let go. Write to satisfy an inner desire and to go to a meaningful place, that’s all your own. Go deeper into the recesses of your mind and really write. Write to get to a powerful level – not for an audience. If you notice thoughts and feelings that cause discomfort, take a deep breath and exhale. Look around the room. Get up and walk to a window, or get a drink of cool,…
Brevity publishes extremely brief essays.
Brevity is an online journal, publishing short narrative essays (750 words or less). Employing strong verbs and using sensory detail increase chances of your writing being selected. “There is no room for throat-clearing in search of a point. . . You need each sentence to do more than one thing . . . provide setting, forward the action and give insight into character, all at once.” Founder and editor Dinty W. Moore, interviewed by Kerrie Flanagan, The Writer August 2015 Information about using sensory detail can be found in the Just Write section on The Write Spot Blog. Good Luck!
Random Words + Photo . . . Prompt #184
Today’s random words writing prompt: honey, drunk, fast, feet, power, languid You can also use the photo below as a writing prompt. It will be fun to see what you do with this!
What does “show rather than tell” mean?
Writers have been told to “show” rather than “tell.” Do you wonder what that means? Barbara Poelle, “Funny You Should Ask,” Writer’s Digest, September 2015 says this about that: “Telling supplies information while showing explores information. In order to expand a narrative into more showing, think about the complete sensory experience of a scene.” If you rely on narrative, you run the risk of an “information dump,” where you give all the facts in a few sentences. Poelle suggests, and I agree, “Don’t fall into the trap of quickly getting information ‘out of the way’ so you can ‘get to the story.’ . . . Take your time to explore [the facts] through action, dialogue and the senses of the characters involved.”This way, you set the scene with a “kinetic feel.” All well and good, but what does this really mean? I played around with some scenarios: #1: I set…
Change. Prompt #182
Writing Prompt: Change Or: Changes or Change is coming or Change is about to happen. What do you have to say about change? Do you like change? Hate it? What about that change jingling in your pocket or purse? Write about change.
Tattoos . . . Prompt #181
What do you think about tattoos? Do you have a tattoo? What is it? Where is it? Why? If you don’t have a tattoo, would you ever get one? If yes, what do you envision it will be?
Imagine you are . . . Prompt #180
Imagine you are on a tropical paradise vacation. Sitting on the lanai, hearing the waves lap against the shore. Smell the ocean breeze. Feel the soft wind on your face. See the light curtain billow in the gentle breeze. Settle back in your rattan chair, cool refreshing drink nearby. Hear the ice clink against the side of your glass as you sip your refreshing drink. Hear the gentle wind chimes. Breathe deeply, enjoying the fragrance of fresh, tropical flowers – the heady scent of orchids, plumeria, roses. Perhaps pink, climbing roses. See a piece of fruit. . . an orange. Feel the bumpy, heavy skin. Peel it. Feel the texture of the orange free of its heavy skin. See the uniform sections connected into a symmetrical arc of segments . . . .a globe. Carefully, slowly pull on one of the segments. So slowly that you see the burst of…
There was a smell of Time in the air . . .
Excerpt from The Martian Chronicles by Ray Bradbury:There was a smell of Time in the air tonight. What did Time smell like? Like dust and clocks and people. And if you wondered what Time sounded like, it sounded like water running in a dark cave and voices crying and dirt dropping down upon hollow box lids, and rain. Time looked like snow dropping silently into a black room or it looked like a silent film in an ancient theatre one hundred billion faces falling like those New Year balloons down and down into nothing. That was how Time smelled and looked and sounded. Marlene’s Musings: I love the idea of writing what Time smells like. . . sounds like . . . looks like. . . Your Turn: Choose an item, an object, a thing, that interests you. . . what does it smell like? sound like? look like?