Monday, October 27, 2014

Week 9

Learning Journal Activity -- Flash Fiction

"Not that the story needs to be long,
but it will take a long while to make it short."
-- Henry David Thoreau

There are two options for this week's activity, one creatively oriented, the other critically oriented. The creative option asks you to write a flash fiction, while the critical option asks you to do a short analysis of a piece of flash fiction of your choice. In the write-up below is a brief description of flash fiction and links to some sites where you can find lots of samples and stories for analysis.

If you opt for the critical option, be sure to provide a link to the story you are working with. Your write-up should be two or three paragraphs. Some questions you may want to consider for your analysis include, What is the theme (or themes) of the story? How is the setting important to the story? What sorts of characters does the story have (who is the protagonist, the antagonist, any important minor characters)? Are there any significant symbols in the story? Does the story have a moral?

As always, if you have questions about this week's activity, send me an email or leave a comment on this post.

 About Flash Fiction

Including any story less than one thousand words, flash fiction is primarily distinguished by its brevity. Sometimes called the short-short story, the prose poem, the vignette, or the sketch, flash fiction has become increasingly popular in recent years. A brief prose work can create certain effects and concentrations of suggestiveness that a longer piece of writing cannot, and often in flash fiction the impact on the reader is more immediate and more intense than in a longer work. With this comes the challenge of telling a complete story while being spare with words and details. As Thoreau tells us in the quote above, by making the story shorter it may become more difficult to write. For a bit more background on flash fiction, check out this write-up by G. W. Thomas. Other websites you may like to visit to find some examples are Shortbread and Flash Fiction Online.

Because of the brevity of blog posts (or the brevity of attention span of blog readers) many bloggers have taken up flash fiction as a way to work expressively and connect with their audience. One blogger friend of mine who likes to work with flash fiction and is an excellent practitioner of the form is Pisces Iscariot. Below, is a sample by yours truly -- a piece of flash fiction I wrote a couple years ago. It's only 400 words long, but I tried to make every word and detail count. In your own writing, try to focus on a single event or remembrance, and you may be surprised where a brief story can take you. Your story does not need to be long, and one of the most famous short-short stories, by Ernest Hemingway, is only six words long ("For sale, baby shoes, never worn").


Flash Fiction Sample -- The Bus Ride

He looked at her, standing there in a fluorescent windbreaker. It hung from her body as though draped over a broken umbrella frame, the pockets weighed down, the left side white from the snow. She fumbled in her pockets, searching for change.

"Go on," said the bus driver.

She went past him and took a seat near the front, setting her Nike gym bag beside her. She had close cropped hair and dark eyes. Her face was swollen and red. Her hands looked coarse and hardened, and everyone on the bus could smell the heavy punge of living in the same clothes, of urine and booze and open fires. No sooner had the bus started moving than she closed her eyes and her head nodded to her chest.

That winter was especially cruel in Edmonton, and it wasn't unusual for the temperature at night to hit 45 below. After every cold snap the story was repeated in the newspapers: homeless person found dead under bank of snow. Some days they were found in backyards or in the seats out front of the Greyhound station. Sometimes they weren't found until spring. One story emerged of a man burned to death in a dumpster because the candle he lit to keep warm had fallen over, igniting the garbage in which he slept.

Some said it was their own fault, that there were shelters and organizations to go to for help. Others said it was the responsibility of the government and that more should be done. Still others said it was drugs and social decay and a loss of religious values. But all the talk and fine words amounted to nothing on a cold night in one of the richest cities in Canada.

The bus banked around a corner and her head bumped against the window. She shot up.

"Stay away from me!" she yelled as she jumped to her feet, pulling a hunk of stone from the pocket of her windbreaker. "Don't touch me!"

The driver hit the brakes and she fell in a heap in the aisle. He got out of his seat and started towards her. She struggled to her knees, then threw the rock at him. It landed well short on the floor with a dull thud.

He grabbed her by the hair and dragged her to the front. He pulled the bar to open the door and booted her into the snow bank.

"That's what I get for trying to help you, eh!"

As the bus pulled away the passengers wiped the condensation from the windows, saw her lying face down in the snow. One of them noticed her gym bag, still sitting on the seat.

Monday, October 20, 2014

Week 8

Learning Journal Activity -- Open Letter

This week's writing prompt asks you to compose a letter to someone or something. You don't necessarily have to send the letter, and it doesn't have to be written to anyone you know. In fact, you might have some fun writing a letter to an inanimate object, or to your favorite artist, or your least favorite politician.

One example of open letters you will probably be familiar with are letters to the editor, as found in most major newspapers. You might also be interested to have a look at a blog site called The Open Letters Blog. Some of the letters on this site are addressed to Martha Stewart, toilet paper, the state of Arizona, and many others. Of course, these kinds of letters don't necessarily have to be funny, and sometimes a letter is the best way to express the thoughts and feelings you may have about something serious or an important issue of the day. 

Assigned Readings and Overview for Week 8

This week, we will be reading and discussing two stories, Kate Chopin's "The Story of an Hour" (172) and Alice Munro's "Boys and Girls" (149). This is the beginning of our unit on short fiction, and so this is a good time to do a refresher on some of the important literary terminology for fiction (see assigned sections for week 8 on the course schedule). Although all of the stories we are studying are relatively short, these stories are more time-demanding than poems, and you should make sure to read the stories in advance of in-class discussions.


Monday, October 13, 2014

Week 7

As your second essay is due this Friday, and as the beginning of this week is lost to mid-term break, there is no learning journal activity assigned. I hope you will spend any extra time carefully editing your paper and come prepared for the third of our essay writing workshops this Wednesday. Remember, this second paper needs to conform to MLA guidelines, which you can learn more about in our course text or through the links listed in the toolbar on the right under "MLA." Please feel free to send me a draft of your paper or your intro paragraph if you'd like some feedback.

This Friday we will also be introducing some of the concepts and terminology that will be important for the section of the course on short fiction. If you check the course schedule for the next two weeks you will notice a number of small sections of the text are assigned that will provide a good refresher on fiction.

I hope everyone is having a nice break and a happy Thanksgiving!


Monday, October 6, 2014

Week 6

Learning Journal Activity -- In The News

Do you ever notice when you look in the paper or turn on the five o'clock news it's always stories of things going badly? It's always violence, crime, scandals, and corruption. And while I think it's a good idea to be informed about world events and to know what's going on in your own town, I sometimes wish there was some humor in reporting, something to lighten the otherwise gloomy and dismal mood. This writing prompt asks you to help address this shortcoming by writing a spoof news story. You can make up your own story from scratch, or use a news item you find in the mainstream media, or use one of the spoof headlines suggested below.

For the last few years I've been reading the satirical news site The Onion (I'm sure some of you will be familiar with their high-quality, hard hitting investigative journalism). The writers on this website often take a story from the mainstream media and twist it into a joke, or sometimes they just flat out make up ridiculous stories and pass them off as news. Following this lead, here are a few headlines for news stories that never made the front page. You might use one of these as a prompt for writing if you're stuck for an idea.

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ALIEN SPACECRAFT GIVEN $250 PARKING TICKET
BALMATRON SAYS "I'M NOT PAYING"

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GLOBAL WARMING LINKED TO BURPING
BEER DRINKERS OF THE WORLD REACT WITH SHOCK

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STEPHEN HARPER SAYS CIGARETTES "ARE JUST FINE"

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NEOLITHIC MAN FOUND FROZEN IN GLACIER
REVIVED AFTER DEFROSTING
CAN'T GET ENOUGH HOT CHOCOLATE

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SCIENTIST DISCOVERS ULTIMATE SECRET IN FORTUNE COOKIE

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GERBIL SAVES MAN FROM SHARK ATTACK

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ZOMBIE OUTBREAK REPORTED IN TORONTO

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MCDONALD'S GOES VEGAN
COWS BREATHE SIGH OF RELIEF

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LOST ISLAND OF ATLANTIS FOUND NEAR GREENLAND
PRESIDENT: "WE WERE HERE ALL ALONG"

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ANIMALS ESCAPE FROM ZOO
LAST SEEN IN LAS VEGAS

Overview for Week 6

This week we are studying some unconventional forms of poetry, such as spoken word, sign-language poetry, and digital poetry. The "readings" for this week are available on this blog (scroll to the top and click the page tabs). Although there are no assigned readings from our text, this is a good opportunity to take a look at the sample essays and related sections on essay writing in the book, as well as the guides to essay writing linked on this blog. Of specific interest, for anyone seeking more information on essays, is the OWL Academic Writing resources. As always, if you have any questions about this week's activity, or any aspect of our course, please leave a comment on this post or send an email to my mun.ca address.