The Journey

[mbarker.livejournal.com]

original posting: Sun, 24 Apr 1994 18:35:01 JST

According to "Myths to Live By" (Joseph Campbell), one of the key mythical plots is that of the heroic journey. This consists, in outline, of:

1. Separation - the venture from the world of the commonplace and everyday into a region of supernatural wonder
2. Initiation - fabulous forces are encountered and a decisive victory is won
3. Return - the hero comes back with the power to bestow boons on others

In psychological terms, he also lays this out as:

1. Separation - the identification of oneself as a clown, ghost, witch, or other outsider
2. Regression - the descent into infancy, animalistic, or vegetative consciousness
3. Union - the expansion of the individual into a consciousness of all, an identity with all
4. Foreshadowing - realization of a coming dangerous task, opposition, and illusive help
5. Crisis - the crux, where the individual chooses, and the revelation that goes with that discovery

He suggests that the crises and revelations typically consist of four kinds:

1. union with mothering - which puts us in touch with our own tenderness and love
2. claiming fathering - with realization of our own strengths
3. finding a world center - with realization of our own importance
4. opening to light - with realization of ourself as god (sort of - I'm fudging on this one, because I'm not sure I understand his fourth category of crisis and revelation very well)

Anyway - today's exercise is:

1. Pick a character
2. Design/select/invent a "region of supernatural wonder"
3. Pick a method of getting from ordinary life to the region...

4. Now write up that moment when your character wins the raffle, steps through a doorway in time, is picked up by a UFO, gets trapped into going to an art museum, or whatever... show us the intersection, the bewilderment, the fear of the unknown and the excitement of breaking out of the now into the forever!

5. (bonus) For those who feel excited, go ahead and finish the story - what happens to your character in that forgotten land outside civilization, on the 13th floor, behind the bigtop, in Mrs. Robinson's house, or wherever? And what happens when the poor sucker, changed now and forever, comes back to ordinary life and times?

Let the journeys begin - the odysseys of writers, unending, unafraid of cyclopean terrors, lotus-eating drugs, circean spells, and all the rest of the piggish fears of the hogpen...

oink!

Mystery

[mbarker.livejournal.com]

original posting: Sun, 8 May 1994 18:35:02 JST

[GET READY TO...]

Not the big mystery, just the little everyday mysteries that keep a reader turning pages, wondering...

1. Pick an object - book, revolver, letter, knife, bottle of pills, etc., etc.

2. Pick a container - paper bag, drawer, pocket, briefcase, trashcan, etc., etc.

3. Take a character.

4. Two approaches

a. write the scene where the character starts to get into the container and show us the character getting the object out and revealing to us (the readers) what it is and so forth. Then go back and insert a pause (dialogue, narrative, flashback, whatever) making us wait, but keeping us aware that we don't yet know just what is in that container...

b. write the scene, showing us the character starting to get into the container. write the pause, with the dialogue or whatever. then finish getting the object out and revealing to us readers what the heck we've been waiting for.

Very simple - hook, pause, revelation. and if you overlap them so that the reader always has at least one and often more than one unfinished mystery to look forward to - they'll keep turning page after page, pulling themselves right up and into the ending.

[...WRITE!]

Jokes as Plot Seeds

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original posting: Sun, 15 May 1994 18:35:02 JST

Jokes have occasionally been referred to as "essential stories." Whether you believe they are or not, they almost always do have characters, some action, and a "twist" that you can use.

So...

1. Find a joke. (joke book, memory, rec.humor, comic strip, ask your friends, ask your enemies, look in a mirror...)

[WAIT! COME BACK HERE! FINISH THE EXERCISE WHEN YOU FIND A JOKE, DON'T JUST KEEP LAUGHING...]

2. Take it apart. Most jokes are short enough, you should be able to tease it apart pretty easily. What's the setup or situation? Characters? and what's the "twist" that makes the punchline?

3. Now, re-arrange it. Make the farmer a high-school principal. The daughter could be... Move it from the country to the city, or vice-versa. Can you add to the setup? Suppose there were THREE salespersons? (I know, I know, the sheep would be tired. old joke.)

Use the original twist, reverse it, enlarge it, or whatever fits the story you are building.

Anyway, try messing around with jokes. They often provide situations for starting a plot that can be very helpful in developing a piece of your very own. In a sense they are "pre-tested" foci of human interests - people don't tell jokes they aren't interested in (after dinner speakers and other politicians may, but people don't).

Incidentally, although you are starting from a joke, the final piece doesn't have to be funny. Sometimes bringing out the tragedy in a joke is very effective, too.

So - laugh, reflect, and write a tale...

[heck, even if you don't get around to writing a story, enjoy the jokes. and remember while you are laughing that you are doing RESEARCH FOR WRITING, not just ruining your mind...]

Sadistic Writing (Putting Stakes in Your Writing)

[mbarker.livejournal.com]

original posting: Sun, 22 May 1994 18:35:01 JST

You've got a problem - here's a character you want to write about, you know what s/he wants to accomplish (the goal, the motivation, that place they dream and scheme for), but you're not sure what to put in the middle.

The books say conflict. But today we're going to do it real simple - step-by-step, you might say.

Step 1. Pick a character and goal. While most goals are major, for this exercise it is all right if you just want the poor schnook to get to the other side of the road, buy some gum, or whatever.

Step 2. Now make a list of at least ten (10!) things that could get in the way of reaching that goal. Little things - somebody moved the road - or big - someone kidnapped the Pope, shot the dog and is threatening to blow up the world if your character achieves their dream... List them up. Don't worry about how the character will get over, around or through them yet.

Step 3. Pick five (5) things from the list (the classic number is three, but we're going to stretch a little). Now, put these in order by the size of the stakes involved - how hard is it going to be for the character to beat them? What is it going to cost to beat them? Pay attention to the possibility that non-material costs are "bigger" than material costs. The basic order should be cheap to expensive - start with some easy stakes, low costs to the character for LOSING.

For a comic relief, you might reverse the order - looking at loss of house and family, the boss threatening to take away executive parking privileges is a joke. Such reversals in the rising stakes can be effective, but be careful not to make a mockery of the character (unless that's what you really want to do, of course).

Step 4. Now expand your plot. At each block until the very last one, the character is going to LOSE (that means NOT win). Raise the price of getting to that goal every step of the way.

Step 5. Write that sucker up.

Step by step, slowly I turned... as the sadistic, cruel author turned up the heat, whipped me, rubbed salt into the lashmarks, crushed my toes in a press, and at last, long last, put me where I needed to be, racked between the pillars of the temple. With my last ounce of spinach-inspired power, I pulled the temple down on his head... well, I'm sure you'll do better than that.

He's off, and sliding back, being kicked, he's down, folks, he's down, and now he's on the ropes... and what a comeback!

That's the sadism that makes the character's victory meaningful - the writer put everything they could think of in the way, and that rascal just got better and better.

As will your story.
Be reading you!

And the SOB was a...

[mbarker.livejournal.com]

original posting: Sun, 29 May 1994 18:35:02 JST

1. Pick one of the following (no fair peeking ahead, pick one first!):

shapeshifter, were beastie, alien, sasquatch (big feet, I think?), devil, brujo, monster, ghost, demon, jinni, angel, telepath, mad scientist, elf, zombie, or other favorite critter from beyond?

If you went with one of the loose ones (like monster), fine it down - make a choice, note the slobbering teeth, elevated antenna, cute little dewlap claws polished in black or whatever points your choice has so that you would recognize your creation in an alley behind the gravestones during the dark of the moon...

2. Your character, in a moment of madness (okay, whatever reason you want to dream up), has married someone who belongs to the selected ethnic group. Without really understanding that they are really and truly a member of that grouping, you perceive? One of those little secrets that newlyweds sometimes keep from each other...

3. Your assignment, Writer, should you choose to accept it, is to portray the end of the honeymoon when your character realizes just what is sharing the conjugal slab. You may, depending on taste, continue with the descent into horror, either arriving at a final reconciliation, perhaps a somewhat grotesque compromise to stay together for the baby's sake, or even a separation. But work with it, make us feel the clash between the bonds of matrimony and the lash of terror... who knows, you might want to do a dark fantasy romance!

Incidentally, this exercise is based on a review of Bruce Boston's SF POETRY collection "Accursed Wives." I've expanded the list and let you pick whether the bride or the groom on the cake was taken from a box of animal crackers, but thought I should mention that responses to this do not necessarily have to be in story form...

WRITE!

Crisis!

[mbarker.livejournal.com]

original posting: Sun, 5 Jun 1994 18:35:01 JST

Okay. Your character is about to get in trouble.

1. Pick five (5) of the following synonyms:

Crisis, Emergency, Exigency, Conjecture, Crux, Trial, Turning point,
Decisive turn, Contingency, Pinch, Rub, Extremity, Entanglement, Stress,
Pickle, Perplexity, Kettle of Fish, Hot Water, Stew, Imbroglio, Fix,
Plight, Hole, Corner, Impasse, Difficulty, Gordian Knot, Maze, Coil,
Mess, Muddle, Botch, Hitch, Stumbling block, Sticking point

2. For each one, write down a situation that it brings to mind. What kind of problem does this kind of crisis make you think of? Try to come up with problems that reflect the differences in the kind of crisis!

3. Now expand at least one of these - why or how did your character get into this? How will it be resolved?

You might want to consider these points in picking the problem to focus on:

• is this a two-pronged (at least) turning point that forces a decision? if not, what needs to be added?
• is this the antithesis of what the character wants?
• is it emotionally saturated and significant?
• does it affect characterization?
• does it lead to the premise?
• is this the final culmination of a series of crises? can I build up to it, foreshadow, and so forth to build this one?

Anytime you need a crisis, small or large, try peeking through the different "lenses" of these synonyms. Just considering the different words is likely to make you think of different kinds of situations - and help get the perfect crisis for your story.

[and if you don't have the slightest idea for a story - pick five kinds of crisis, dream up situations for each one, then string those situations together... and try walking a character or two through the minefield you've just laid...]

Write!