What’s in a name?

Open a newspaper or an on-line report. Take the first four names you encounter and make them into characters in a story.  Write a scene that takes place between them.

Creating the character

You might assign the characters roles:

Which ones is which?

The friend?

The mentor?

The enemy?

Think carefully about each character.

Way are they like physically? Intellectually? Emotionally? What is their greatest fear? What do they most want? What do they need?

Find a scene

Choose a scene from:

Inciting incident

Growing complexity 1

Growing complexity 2

Growing complexity 3

Crisis

            Climax

Resolution

 

See what happens

Put your two characters together and see what happens. Show your work to a writing buddy. Do they get what your mean them to get?  And do they understand more about your characters than you show them here? (They probably do – which is a little bit spooky!)   

 

Tip Sheet: setting out dilaogue

 

“Do you know what? I get really stuck on setting out dialogue[GJ1] ,” said the Creative Writing student.

“It’s not really all that difficult,” replied[GJ2]  the teacher. “Do remember to start a new paragraph when a new person speaks[GJ3] .”

“Oh, is that when you start a new paragraph in the middle of a conversation?” The[GJ4]  student looked as if a light bulb had gone off in her head. “And what are the rules about where the speech marks go?”

“They always go around the speech[GJ5] , with the normal punctuation marks inside it[GJ6] ,” said the teacher[GJ7] , “although you use a comma instead of a full stop at the end, if you are assigning the speech. And if you put the assignation in the middle of the sentence, you don’t start the second bit with a capital letter and you put another comma in front of it.”

“Pardon[GJ8] ?”

“Look. Like this.” The[GJ9]  teacher showed the student this document. 

“It’s actually a good idea to have this in front of you when you’re working on a dialogue in a piece of fiction.”  Now it was the teacher’s turn to grow a light bulb[GJ10] . “Or, even, have a well written book open as you work. You can see the pattern. It’s easier than trying to remember[GJ11] .”

“How often should you put “said”?”

“As little as possible. But actually you must use it if otherwise the reader wouldn’t know who was saying what.”

“Okay. But doesn’t it get a bit boring for the reader?”

“Actually they tend not to notice[GJ12] .”

“What about other words – like expostulated, screamed and so on?”

The teacher shook her head. “Best not to. They draw attention to themselves. “Whisper”, “shout”, “asked” and “replied” and sometimes “reply” are all right[GJ13] .

“And you can always use a bit of body language to let us know who’s speaking.” The teacher winked.  

“You can’t do that all the time, can you?”

“No, but a lot of the time you don’t need to put anything – you can tell who is talking by the way they talk and what they’re saying. Especially if there’s only two of them. You only need more tags or body language if they go on for more than a page, if they’re very similar to each other or if you’re writing for younger people.”       

“Okay. Thank you for your help.”

“My pleasure. That’s what we’re here for.”              

---

 [GJ1]Note: normal punctuation within the speech marks EXCEPT comma instead of full stop. 

 [GJ2]“replied” is just about all right for assigning speech.

 [GJ3]And of course, there is no new paragraph here because the teacher is still talking.

 [GJ4]We have used no word to assign.  We have reconfirmed that this is the student speaking by telling you something else about her.

 [GJ5]See, a normal punctuation mark.

 [GJ6]But a comma here and note that it is inside the speech marks.

 [GJ7]The teacher has not finished her sentence so we have a comma here and no capital letter at the beginning of the remaining speech.  

 [GJ8]We don’t need “said” here because it’s clear it is the student speaking.  

 [GJ9]We know it is the teacher speaking because we see her do something else.

 [GJ10]And here we know that it is the teacher.

 [GJ11]This really works.  Try it.

 [GJ12]Indeed.

 [GJ13]Note, we haven’t closed the speech marks because the teacher continues to speak. But has started a new paragraph.

Family inspiration

Is there a physical characteristic that runs in your family? For example, very dark hair, freckles, long legs?   Write an article, poem story or script that centres on this.

Article ideas

What about something on genetics? Do we try to get rid of unwanted characteristics? Is this ethical? Can you find some case studies?

Poetry ideas

What about an ode to body part you love or hate? E.g. ‘To my beautiful crooked nose’?

Script ideas

Is your main character really the sibling or child of one of the other players? To what length do they go to prove this? Does a physical characteristic help to establish this?  Or does it uncover something else?

Story ideas

Is some physical characteristic bothersome? Does your character do something about it? What are the consequences?

Revolution

 

People in your world are unhappy. They have taken to the streets. The mob raids the shops.  Energy services are failing.  What happens? Is law and order restored?  Does a new form of society emerge?

 

Article ideas

Find out about a country that has had a revolution in the last century. Look at news reports.    Can you find an interesting angle? Maybe a more human one? How has this affected ordinary lives?

Or, why have we not had a revolution on the UK? Or have we? What did Cromwell do?

Can you find out what are the catalysts of a revolution?

 

Poetry ideas

Project forward; the revolution has happened. What is the immediate aftermath like? Write with the senses.

Create a dramatic monologue in poetry form from the leader of the revolution.

What happened during the revolution? Can you use the rhythm of your poem to show that?

 

Script ideas

Bring a bunch of people together. They plot a revolution. Does it succeed or fail?

Show the story of the power that is about to be dethroned by the revolution. Can you make your audience sympathetic towards them?

Tell the story of a protagonist for whom the revolution is merely a way of boosting their own ego.

 

Story ideas

Tell the story of a revolution from the point of view of a child.

Maybe the revolution is a new invention that changes lives completely. Show its progress. Does it lead to Utopia or Dystopia?

Look up the word “revolution” in a dictionary e.g., https://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/revolution Use one of its less obvious meanings as the basis for your story.

Three ideas for today

Social Media

Open your Facebook, another Instagram, Twitter, Pinterest feeds and look for a trending hash tag. Use that to inspire you to write. 

by Amanda Jones

Can you write an article about what you see in the hashtag?  Can you set a story or script in that context?   

 

National Make a Gift Day

Make someone a gift based on your writing. What about a poem? Or a short story? Maybe you could make these limited editions.  Perhaps only “publish”   a limited edition – say about ten and present them in a can, a photo frame or an attractive box.  

 

By Gill James  

Volunteering 

Write an article, poem, script or story about volunteering. Why do people volunteer? Why are volunteers necessary? Who volunteers? What do they do? What do they achieve?

 

By Gill James