Craft: Complete 2 of the 3 tasks and add them to your writer's portfolio.
Task 1:
Secrets of the Great Scene- Sheila Kohler
When we think back to our first and perhaps most lasting impressions of literature what comes to mind is often a moment from a fairy tale. We may think of the moment when the merchant sees the radish in the witch's garden and plucks it, only to be confronted by the witch herself who demands in return the creature who will greet the merchant first on his return home. Or we relive the moment when Sleeping Beauty, wandering alone through the dusty attics of the palace, comes across the spindle, only to prick her finger and fall into the deepest of sleeps; or the moment when the prince calls out, "Rapunzel, Rapunzel," who lets down her hair only to find, not the witch, but the prince, who climbs up the high tower and into her arms.
Later we may recall scenes from our favorite novels: Jane Eyre, in the novel of that name, perhaps, locked up in the bedroom where her uncle has died, and seeing what she takes for her uncle's ghost. Or Pip in Great Expectations wandering with the ancient Miss Havisham among the remains of her wedding feast under the stopped clock; or Rodolphe's seduction of Emma during the agricultural fair in Madame Bovary. All these vivid and indelible moments come to us in scenes.
Why do we remember them? What is it that makes them indelible in our minds? What is it that makes them indelible in our minds? What are the elements that render them unforgettable? And, if we ourselves wish to create something that will transport our readers and remain with them forever, how doe we go about it? What are the elements in the Great Scene? And what are the scenes we need for the story we wish to tell?
The Basic Elements of a Great Scene
I would suggest, very simply, that like the princesses in the fairy tale, these elements might be grouped into three categories:
1. Place: the witch's garden, sunlit with the radish shining temptingly; or the dusty attic where the dangerous spindle lurks; the tall tower where the witch has confined Rapunzel; Miss Havisham's wedding feast spread out on the table with its cobwebs and mice running in the rotting food; or the contrasts between the manure and the mundane cows and the terrace above, where Rodolphe woos Emma in Flaubert's contrapuntal and ironic scene of seduction at the agricultural fair.
2. People: the adventurous, reckless merchant/father; the young vulnerable princess; the lovesick prince; Jane, the poor orphan girl; Pip, the poor lower-class boy; Emma, the bored provincial woman looking for passion- all people who lack something; are looking for something, people desirous of something; people thwarted in some way by an adversary: the witch; the wicked fairy; Jane's selfish relatives; Emma's seducer, Rodolphe; or rescued or helped by a savior: the prince.
3. Plot: Something happens in these great scenes, something that changes the lives of these people in some way; a stone is thrown into the water which will ripple : plucking of the radish will mean the giving up the daughter who greets the merchant on his return; she will be relinquished to the witch; the fit Jane has in the bedroom will mean the arrival of Mr. Brocklehurst and Jane's banishment to boarding school; Rudolphe's deduction of Emma will ultimately bring about her downfall and her death.
Exercise:
This exercise gives us the opportunity to practice the art of writing an unforgettable scene, hearing in mind these elements and the fact that talent, as Maupassant says, comes from originality: an original way of perceiving, understanding, and judging the world.
1. When describing a place, use a place you know well with familiar, original, but significant objects, which may suggest what is up ahead: the radish, the spindle, the mirror, the manure, the rotting food.
2. People. Use original people from your own lives, those you know well or those you have observed from afar and dreamed about; people who need something or want like Oedipus to find something out.
3. Plot: remember that plot comes from the characters: it is from the characters' wanting that comes jeopard of some unexpected kind or, on the contrary, salvation or epiphany which may be granted to them.
Make a list for each of these parts separately. Then combine at random to write a scene.
Write Now p. 202-204
Task 2: What is your WHY? Explore it.
Why writing and fiction and stories matter...
Task 3: How to Own a Story
1. Find a story that speaks powerfully to you, but one that you have not really studied.
2. Photocopy it and reread it.
3. Read it again and underline the sentences that have something special to them- extra resonance or especially effective expression.
4. Read it again and circle the imagery that recurs in the story. (Mark also any special lines that you missed before).
5. Read it again and highlight the spots where a character's motivation is suggested or revealed. (Some lines may be underlined and highlighted)
6.Read it again and block the places where key character-actions take places.
7. Go back to the book and photocopy the story again.
8. Read it again and physically draw boxes around the sections of the story- boxing up the scenes and narrative passages that more or less stand alone. Box the scenes in one color ink and the narrative passages in color.
9. Read the first section and divide it up into beginning, middle, and end by boxing them off and labeling them. What determines the beginning, middle, and end? Think about them in terms of shape. The beginning suggests a shape, the middle forces a turn or expansion or compression that gives life to the shape, and the end shows or suggests the ramification of the beginning or middle.
10. Reread the first section and read the second section before dividing the second section into beginning, middle, and end, boxing and labeling as before. Do the same for all the sections of the story, going back each time to the beginning and rereading before moving forward.
11. Read the story again and underline the key sentences that make the story move forward within the individual sections and double score the lines that force movement among the sections. That is, underline the sentences that push a scene from its beginning to its end and double underline the ones that do that on the larger scale of the story (that don't just push forward the scene but push forward the whole momentum of the story.)
- Robert Boswell, Write Now, 208-209
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