Greetings, Nuovonians.
This is your entry portal to our creative writing unit. What are we writing, what are we creating?
I have a good idea of what I would like you to end up with: a great piece of writing that you have worked on over time, that has improved with each draft. A narrative pulsating with life and truth which speaks to your generation in your unique voice of seemingly impossible hurdles assailed, moments of clarity that illuminate the reader's soul, and rarely attained insight.
The possibility of any of us being able to write or even dream up such a profound literary statement such as this, or the Great Australian Story, or the Great Australian Anything is something we will explore here.
And where exactly is 'here'?
I have decided that our Decision to Write Creatively is the first step to beginning our creative writing journey.
We will gain some tips and ideas from skilled writers. A great memoirist and novelist, Mandy Sayer, suggests the process of collecting and scrapbooking. Meaning, you create a treasure trove of randomly assembled Everything which will eventually feed into your writing project: research, facts, phrases, objects, quotes, ideas for setting, sketches, song lyrics, recipes and other business.
We will be documenting our creative process here in a blog. So go make one, using mine (Tabula Jassa) as your model.
For your blog, you can adjust your audience settings at this point. You must have me (the teacher) as your specified reader only, OR you can make your blog open to the public, OR you can choose a select group of readers to be your readers, OR you can make your blog totally private except for teacherly supervision (i.e. Jassy as your reader.)
Your blog will be: digital scrapbook, knowledge well, idea garden, place to write drafts, site to explore fascinations and passions.
The reason your blog will be devoted to considering your fascinations and passions is because most experienced writers say "write what you know" in order to sound authentic, believable and enjoyable. So, where does that place science fiction writers? Or dystopian writers? Or historical fiction writers?
Hilary Mantel, were you around when Danton got his head chopped off? That was a particularly nasty but convincingly told part of your novel 'A Place of Greater Safety'. Now that we're onto this head-lopping business, I see you also covered the brutal death of poor Anne Boleyn in your novel Wolf Hall. Perhaps it was all those years you spend as a history lecturer at university. OK, right - that makes sense. So you don't need to personally know what it was like to witness capital punishment in Europe during the 1500-1790s, but it does help you write a believable scene if you have studied the history you are hoping to replicate through narrative.
As for science fiction writers, it is clearly the case that all of them were recently returned from alien abduction because the aliens couldn't stand anymore cliff-hanger chapter endings. Their oh so sophisticated alien minds knew that they were being manipulated to get hooked on just another series. They decided to return to existentialist novels in which one character ponders the apparent meaninglessness of existence while attempting to take cover beneath washed up NASA space junk from sudden meteor showers.
The point is, most writing will be convincing and will generate yet more and more sentences and scenes for your, once you decide on the world you wish to portray. Usually it helps if it is either a world you personally know well, or a world you can create substantially based on researched fact.
Summary
1. Decide to Write Creatively
2. Scrapbooking in an online format: blog (make one)
3. Devote some time to considering your fascinations and passions (write a blog post about these based on the example post provided.)
This is your entry portal to our creative writing unit. What are we writing, what are we creating?
I have a good idea of what I would like you to end up with: a great piece of writing that you have worked on over time, that has improved with each draft. A narrative pulsating with life and truth which speaks to your generation in your unique voice of seemingly impossible hurdles assailed, moments of clarity that illuminate the reader's soul, and rarely attained insight.
The possibility of any of us being able to write or even dream up such a profound literary statement such as this, or the Great Australian Story, or the Great Australian Anything is something we will explore here.
And where exactly is 'here'?
I have decided that our Decision to Write Creatively is the first step to beginning our creative writing journey.
We will gain some tips and ideas from skilled writers. A great memoirist and novelist, Mandy Sayer, suggests the process of collecting and scrapbooking. Meaning, you create a treasure trove of randomly assembled Everything which will eventually feed into your writing project: research, facts, phrases, objects, quotes, ideas for setting, sketches, song lyrics, recipes and other business.
We will be documenting our creative process here in a blog. So go make one, using mine (Tabula Jassa) as your model.
For your blog, you can adjust your audience settings at this point. You must have me (the teacher) as your specified reader only, OR you can make your blog open to the public, OR you can choose a select group of readers to be your readers, OR you can make your blog totally private except for teacherly supervision (i.e. Jassy as your reader.)
Your blog will be: digital scrapbook, knowledge well, idea garden, place to write drafts, site to explore fascinations and passions.
The reason your blog will be devoted to considering your fascinations and passions is because most experienced writers say "write what you know" in order to sound authentic, believable and enjoyable. So, where does that place science fiction writers? Or dystopian writers? Or historical fiction writers?
Hilary Mantel, were you around when Danton got his head chopped off? That was a particularly nasty but convincingly told part of your novel 'A Place of Greater Safety'. Now that we're onto this head-lopping business, I see you also covered the brutal death of poor Anne Boleyn in your novel Wolf Hall. Perhaps it was all those years you spend as a history lecturer at university. OK, right - that makes sense. So you don't need to personally know what it was like to witness capital punishment in Europe during the 1500-1790s, but it does help you write a believable scene if you have studied the history you are hoping to replicate through narrative.
As for science fiction writers, it is clearly the case that all of them were recently returned from alien abduction because the aliens couldn't stand anymore cliff-hanger chapter endings. Their oh so sophisticated alien minds knew that they were being manipulated to get hooked on just another series. They decided to return to existentialist novels in which one character ponders the apparent meaninglessness of existence while attempting to take cover beneath washed up NASA space junk from sudden meteor showers.
The point is, most writing will be convincing and will generate yet more and more sentences and scenes for your, once you decide on the world you wish to portray. Usually it helps if it is either a world you personally know well, or a world you can create substantially based on researched fact.
Summary
1. Decide to Write Creatively
2. Scrapbooking in an online format: blog (make one)
3. Devote some time to considering your fascinations and passions (write a blog post about these based on the example post provided.)
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