Use Loneliness
In this section, Goldberg is talking about using writing as a way to feel less lonely. Everyone gets lonely at times, but he says if you write that down, it's a way of sharing your story to feel less lonely. Someone out there will want to read it and be able to relate to it. And even if no one does, then you have been able to get some things off your chest.
Blue Lipstick and a Cigarette Hanging out your Mouth
In this section, Goldberg talks about ways to get inspiration to make your work less boring. He says you have to put yourself in someone elses shoes to to get inspiration from another world. Goldberg says he's not a smoker but when he writes he hangs a cigarette out of his mouth to feel like he's someone else.
Going Home
Goldberg says it's important to go home when writing, even if just for a little bit. Going home is a way to "complete the circle." good writing has a little bit of "you" in it, and what better place to feel most like "you" than at home? Going home also may help you to not hold anything back. At home you will feel more comfortable so you are more likely to spill your guts.
Of these three techniques, i think the one about putting yourself in someone elses shoes would work best for me. For me to write, i need good inspiration. Playing dress up or something could help me feel like i am actually there and help to get more in character.
Goldberg also talks about how writing takes time and how you should put down your writing and pick it up later. I think this is a good idea. When I sit down and write and try to come up with something good, it never happens. The only times I ever come up with something good to write about is when I'm not thinking about writing, but doing something completely random.
Thursday, December 1, 2011
Thursday, November 17, 2011
Yesterday's News- Taylor Brady
Ships Flat
Once again, like all of Taylor Brady's poems, this one makes no sense. In the first stanza he talks about the afterlife, so I had that in mind throughout the whole poem. I thought maybe he would write about what he thinks the afterlife will be like. He talks about a man coming up a hill, tied with twine. He says he is quiet. I think maybe this man is coming into the afterlife. Brady says, "Here you hear the slow trash burn." I think maybe he is trying to say that everyone brings some kind of trash to the afterlife. Like all of your problems from the real world come to the afterlife, and there, they slowly burn.
Overhearing Eminent Domain
After reading the title, I looked up to see what eminent domain means. Eminent domain is the state's right to seize one's property without their consent. Keeping this in mind, I tried to figure out the rest of the poem.
The first few lines goes like this, "through a whole head a length of leak. This is my rifle. This is me rifling through my drawers. Had the memory been purged in time." I think he is talking about memories leaking out of his head and they are like a rifle. They're firing out and they won't stop. The last line of the first section is, "stand-up guy jumps lake." My first thought about this was suicide. That someone was trying to kill themselves by drowning. I think when he goes on to talk about the barrel bottom and the flipping fish, he is talking about hitting rock bottom and he is like the suffering, dying fish flipping and flapping at the bottom of the lake. Kind of depressing. He talks about being out of it and never missing the water.
I tried to figure out the last line, "set your clothes back," but i couldn't come up with anything. After reading the whole poem, I tried to relate it to the title, and I got nothing.
Once again, like all of Taylor Brady's poems, this one makes no sense. In the first stanza he talks about the afterlife, so I had that in mind throughout the whole poem. I thought maybe he would write about what he thinks the afterlife will be like. He talks about a man coming up a hill, tied with twine. He says he is quiet. I think maybe this man is coming into the afterlife. Brady says, "Here you hear the slow trash burn." I think maybe he is trying to say that everyone brings some kind of trash to the afterlife. Like all of your problems from the real world come to the afterlife, and there, they slowly burn.
Overhearing Eminent Domain
After reading the title, I looked up to see what eminent domain means. Eminent domain is the state's right to seize one's property without their consent. Keeping this in mind, I tried to figure out the rest of the poem.
The first few lines goes like this, "through a whole head a length of leak. This is my rifle. This is me rifling through my drawers. Had the memory been purged in time." I think he is talking about memories leaking out of his head and they are like a rifle. They're firing out and they won't stop. The last line of the first section is, "stand-up guy jumps lake." My first thought about this was suicide. That someone was trying to kill themselves by drowning. I think when he goes on to talk about the barrel bottom and the flipping fish, he is talking about hitting rock bottom and he is like the suffering, dying fish flipping and flapping at the bottom of the lake. Kind of depressing. He talks about being out of it and never missing the water.
I tried to figure out the last line, "set your clothes back," but i couldn't come up with anything. After reading the whole poem, I tried to relate it to the title, and I got nothing.
Thursday, November 10, 2011
Bird By Bird Response
Plot
In this chapter, Anne Lamott describes what makes for a good plot and some tips on how to write it. The plot is like the backbone of the story. Everything in your book revolves around the plot. Anne stresses the importance of a kind of natural writing. You can't force anything in your book. You have to let your writing guide you. She gives the example that the characters are the ones actually writing the book, they just need you to write it down because they have bad handwriting.
Everything that Anne taught us about characters is important while developing the plot. She says, "...plot is: what people will up and do in spite of everything that tells them they shouldn't, everything that tells them they should sit quietly on the couch and practice their Lamaze, or call their therapist, or eat until the urge to do so passes." If you know what your characters care about most and what their true beliefs are, then you have a basis to write a story. Because a good plot will risk those things that they care most about. The characters come first. If you pick one fixed plot, and never sway from that, your writing will come across fixed and fake. You can't force anything. Every English teacher I have ever had has taught the class to never title your work until it is completely written, because you never know what the story will be like until the end.
Anne tells us about the necessities to a good plot: setup, build up, and payoff. The set up sets the scene. It's where we learn about the characters and their backgrounds and learn about their interactions with each other and the world. The build up is where shit happens, or as Anne Lamott says, "where you get all the meat off the turkey." And the payoff answers all the questions and ties the entire book together.
In this chapter, Anne Lamott describes what makes for a good plot and some tips on how to write it. The plot is like the backbone of the story. Everything in your book revolves around the plot. Anne stresses the importance of a kind of natural writing. You can't force anything in your book. You have to let your writing guide you. She gives the example that the characters are the ones actually writing the book, they just need you to write it down because they have bad handwriting.
Everything that Anne taught us about characters is important while developing the plot. She says, "...plot is: what people will up and do in spite of everything that tells them they shouldn't, everything that tells them they should sit quietly on the couch and practice their Lamaze, or call their therapist, or eat until the urge to do so passes." If you know what your characters care about most and what their true beliefs are, then you have a basis to write a story. Because a good plot will risk those things that they care most about. The characters come first. If you pick one fixed plot, and never sway from that, your writing will come across fixed and fake. You can't force anything. Every English teacher I have ever had has taught the class to never title your work until it is completely written, because you never know what the story will be like until the end.
Anne tells us about the necessities to a good plot: setup, build up, and payoff. The set up sets the scene. It's where we learn about the characters and their backgrounds and learn about their interactions with each other and the world. The build up is where shit happens, or as Anne Lamott says, "where you get all the meat off the turkey." And the payoff answers all the questions and ties the entire book together.
Thursday, November 3, 2011
Bird By Bird Response
Character
In this chapter, Anne Lamott talk about how to develop characters in a story. She stresses the importance of knowing every aspect of each character. Know everything they would think and do from their political beliefs to what they would eat for breakfast. She says that some of your characters you will love and some of them you will hat, but that's what makes a good story.
As with everything in writing, it takes time to get to know your characters. You should let your characters develop as the story does. A character that plays a small role in the beginning of the story may end up being the most important character in the book. You have to just let it happen how it happens and not force anything. Anne quotes a good line at the end of the chapter that Fredrick Buechner wrote: "...Just as in the real world it may take you many years to find out that the stranger you talked to once for half an hour in the railroad station may have done more to point you where your true homeland lies than your priest or your best friend or even your psychiatrist.
I think that really knowing each character is the most important part of a story. It shapes the story and makes us feel like it's real and like we really know these characters. It also gets us emotionally involved. A good story plays with our emotions. If something sad happens to our favorite character, we will feel bad.
Anne describes a few ways to get to know the characters that you will be writing about. She says you can think about different aspects of your own personality and play on those. You can turn each aspect of your personality into a character. Another thing you can do is to base characters off of people that you know. Using these to strategies helps because it gives you a better idea of what these characters would think and do.
In this chapter, Anne Lamott talk about how to develop characters in a story. She stresses the importance of knowing every aspect of each character. Know everything they would think and do from their political beliefs to what they would eat for breakfast. She says that some of your characters you will love and some of them you will hat, but that's what makes a good story.
As with everything in writing, it takes time to get to know your characters. You should let your characters develop as the story does. A character that plays a small role in the beginning of the story may end up being the most important character in the book. You have to just let it happen how it happens and not force anything. Anne quotes a good line at the end of the chapter that Fredrick Buechner wrote: "...Just as in the real world it may take you many years to find out that the stranger you talked to once for half an hour in the railroad station may have done more to point you where your true homeland lies than your priest or your best friend or even your psychiatrist.
I think that really knowing each character is the most important part of a story. It shapes the story and makes us feel like it's real and like we really know these characters. It also gets us emotionally involved. A good story plays with our emotions. If something sad happens to our favorite character, we will feel bad.
Anne describes a few ways to get to know the characters that you will be writing about. She says you can think about different aspects of your own personality and play on those. You can turn each aspect of your personality into a character. Another thing you can do is to base characters off of people that you know. Using these to strategies helps because it gives you a better idea of what these characters would think and do.
Wednesday, October 26, 2011
Wreckage of Reason Responses
Cottage Life
Cottage Life is a very interesting piece of writing to me. In the first few paragraphs she sets a scene without specifically describing it. I pictured the cottage i used to go to in the summer. I got the feeling that they had wonderful, lazy summers. As she is looking through all of these possessions she is remembering. Each piece triggers another memory and she describes them. Some of the descriptions are short and vague, like when he took a photo of her with the white face mask on and others were very drawn out like when she remember the first time her lover saw her breast in the attic.
I think it is interesting that most of the lines in this story are short and choppy; just like a flashback, which is often short and choppy. I liked the line where she says, "When did I lose the right to my free time?" I think what she means by this, is that her life has gotten so busy, it's like she's lost the right to those free, lazy summers.
She seems like she may be a little bit insecure. She mentioned how she would only like to make love in the dark, and how she was self-conscious about the birthmark on her chest.
The last line says this, "Maybe there was one night of him possibly hearing us fuck and stir and fight and whisper and distrust and smother and Cherish, and wake up together." It sounds like a run-on sentence and doesn't make a whole lot of sense at first. But, the whole story is kind of like a run-on memory. I think what this means is that although they had been through so much together over these summers, they still loved each other, and woke up to each other every morning.
Cottage Life is a very interesting piece of writing to me. In the first few paragraphs she sets a scene without specifically describing it. I pictured the cottage i used to go to in the summer. I got the feeling that they had wonderful, lazy summers. As she is looking through all of these possessions she is remembering. Each piece triggers another memory and she describes them. Some of the descriptions are short and vague, like when he took a photo of her with the white face mask on and others were very drawn out like when she remember the first time her lover saw her breast in the attic.
I think it is interesting that most of the lines in this story are short and choppy; just like a flashback, which is often short and choppy. I liked the line where she says, "When did I lose the right to my free time?" I think what she means by this, is that her life has gotten so busy, it's like she's lost the right to those free, lazy summers.
She seems like she may be a little bit insecure. She mentioned how she would only like to make love in the dark, and how she was self-conscious about the birthmark on her chest.
The last line says this, "Maybe there was one night of him possibly hearing us fuck and stir and fight and whisper and distrust and smother and Cherish, and wake up together." It sounds like a run-on sentence and doesn't make a whole lot of sense at first. But, the whole story is kind of like a run-on memory. I think what this means is that although they had been through so much together over these summers, they still loved each other, and woke up to each other every morning.
Thursday, October 13, 2011
Wreckage of Reason Responses
The Blue Girl
The first time I read this story, I was confused by the first two paragraphs. The story starts out in the present, flashes to the past, then goes back to the present. I thought this was an interesting way to present the story because it makes you wonder what happened and how the characters got to where they are.
This story is also very mysterious. You never really figure out who the blue girl is or what happened to her. She isn't given a name and neither is the old woman she lives with. The feeling in this story is kind of dark and creepy. I t reminds me a little of a horror movie.
I think that part where Audrey saves the blue girl is very significant. None of the other older women try to but Audrey doesn't seem afraid. Audrey also is the only one who never seemed to be freaked out by the blue girl. Audrey saving the blue girl shows that sometimes kids are the strongest ones. They are the least judgemental. Their slight ignorance allows them to be non-judgemental. Audrey's mom was so worried that the blue girl had a disease or something wrong with her, but Audrey just accepted her for who she is. This is how people act in real life sometimes. We think that just because someone is different there is something wrong with them. But everyone needs love, just like the blue girl. This also goes to show how parents can learn from their kids. Audrey's mom learns from Audrey and goes to see the blue girl to bring her moon pies.
I still don't quite understand why the mothers go to see the blue girl or what the significance of the moon pies are. They say the blue girl is eating their secrets in the moon pies. This seems kind of abstract and must be a metaphor for something. The women never speak to the blue girl. They only go visit her. The women go in one at a time. You get a creepy sense of the house from the language used to describe it. They walk through the dark woods with no flashlights and it always seems chilly. The house is dark and empty. It all seems very mysterious.
At the end, the blue girl licks the narrators hands clean of the marshmallow from the moon pie. The narrator seems to always have held herself back from the blue girl even though she has changed her life so much. The narrator is holding onto some dark feelings and she says she has felt the cleanest she has ever felt after the blue girl licks her hands clean. This describes a weird relationship. It's like non-verbal communication between the two. The narrator bakes her secrets in the moon pies, and the blue girls eats them clean and it makes the narrator feel better.
The first time I read this story, I was confused by the first two paragraphs. The story starts out in the present, flashes to the past, then goes back to the present. I thought this was an interesting way to present the story because it makes you wonder what happened and how the characters got to where they are.
This story is also very mysterious. You never really figure out who the blue girl is or what happened to her. She isn't given a name and neither is the old woman she lives with. The feeling in this story is kind of dark and creepy. I t reminds me a little of a horror movie.
I think that part where Audrey saves the blue girl is very significant. None of the other older women try to but Audrey doesn't seem afraid. Audrey also is the only one who never seemed to be freaked out by the blue girl. Audrey saving the blue girl shows that sometimes kids are the strongest ones. They are the least judgemental. Their slight ignorance allows them to be non-judgemental. Audrey's mom was so worried that the blue girl had a disease or something wrong with her, but Audrey just accepted her for who she is. This is how people act in real life sometimes. We think that just because someone is different there is something wrong with them. But everyone needs love, just like the blue girl. This also goes to show how parents can learn from their kids. Audrey's mom learns from Audrey and goes to see the blue girl to bring her moon pies.
I still don't quite understand why the mothers go to see the blue girl or what the significance of the moon pies are. They say the blue girl is eating their secrets in the moon pies. This seems kind of abstract and must be a metaphor for something. The women never speak to the blue girl. They only go visit her. The women go in one at a time. You get a creepy sense of the house from the language used to describe it. They walk through the dark woods with no flashlights and it always seems chilly. The house is dark and empty. It all seems very mysterious.
At the end, the blue girl licks the narrators hands clean of the marshmallow from the moon pie. The narrator seems to always have held herself back from the blue girl even though she has changed her life so much. The narrator is holding onto some dark feelings and she says she has felt the cleanest she has ever felt after the blue girl licks her hands clean. This describes a weird relationship. It's like non-verbal communication between the two. The narrator bakes her secrets in the moon pies, and the blue girls eats them clean and it makes the narrator feel better.
Thursday, October 6, 2011
Fiction Short Stories Responses
Survivors
This story was very sad. Just like in poetry, each story has its own vibe and feeling to it. This story felt sad and depressing. Also, just like poetry, you had to read a little deeper and between the lines to understand what is going on. There are two gay men who are dying, and the narrator wants to die first. He doesn't want to have to deal with his partners family, who doesn't seem supportive of their lifestyle and he also doesn't have to have to take care of his partners things after he's gone.
This story was not only sad because it is about death, but it is sad because it is about the unsupportiveness of the gay community. The narrator talks about how his family would disapprove of the Gay Freedom Day in their loft and how his partners father tried to beat his sexual orientation out of him.
I thought of what we talked about in class, how a fiction story has a characters, in a place, where something happens. In this story, the main characters are the two gay men, they live on Doloress Street, which must be somewhere warm and near a bay, and their story is about how they are dying. The story does not mention how they are dying though. My guess is that they are dying of AIDS because they have few T cells left, which are cells that help fight disease and AIDS suppresses your immune system.
Morning News
This short story was also a little depressing, and about illness. The story describes everything that this man is thinking and feeling after he is told he has a short time to live. Right after he learns he is dying, he says, "What do people do next?" This is an important line because it shows how he is scared about the future and how he doesn't quite know how to handle the situation.
I like the ending of this short story because he talks about how most people would go do something crazy if they only had a short time to live, but he just wanted to spend it with the person he loves most, his wife. Not doing anything crazy, but just loving each other. You can tell how much he loves her because he says it would be much harder if she were as sick as he was because he doesn't want her to have to go through that pain.
This story was very sad. Just like in poetry, each story has its own vibe and feeling to it. This story felt sad and depressing. Also, just like poetry, you had to read a little deeper and between the lines to understand what is going on. There are two gay men who are dying, and the narrator wants to die first. He doesn't want to have to deal with his partners family, who doesn't seem supportive of their lifestyle and he also doesn't have to have to take care of his partners things after he's gone.
This story was not only sad because it is about death, but it is sad because it is about the unsupportiveness of the gay community. The narrator talks about how his family would disapprove of the Gay Freedom Day in their loft and how his partners father tried to beat his sexual orientation out of him.
I thought of what we talked about in class, how a fiction story has a characters, in a place, where something happens. In this story, the main characters are the two gay men, they live on Doloress Street, which must be somewhere warm and near a bay, and their story is about how they are dying. The story does not mention how they are dying though. My guess is that they are dying of AIDS because they have few T cells left, which are cells that help fight disease and AIDS suppresses your immune system.
Morning News
This short story was also a little depressing, and about illness. The story describes everything that this man is thinking and feeling after he is told he has a short time to live. Right after he learns he is dying, he says, "What do people do next?" This is an important line because it shows how he is scared about the future and how he doesn't quite know how to handle the situation.
I like the ending of this short story because he talks about how most people would go do something crazy if they only had a short time to live, but he just wanted to spend it with the person he loves most, his wife. Not doing anything crazy, but just loving each other. You can tell how much he loves her because he says it would be much harder if she were as sick as he was because he doesn't want her to have to go through that pain.
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