Creative Writing DeMYSTiFied | DeMystified

Creative Writing DeMYSTiFied

Authors: Sheila Bender

Published: December 2010

eISBN: 9780071737005 0071737006 | ISBN: 9780071736992

Contents

Preface

Acknowledgments

Introduction

Part 1 Building Your Creative Writing Muscle

Chapter 1 What Are the Elements of Good Creative Writing?

Show, Show, Show

Avoid Using Clichés

Figure Out What Has Urged the Speaker to Speech

Make Sure Something Is at Stake

Listen to Your Writing to Make It Sound Good

Remember the Key Definition: Writers Are People Who Write (And Read)

Training Is Key

Exercises to Build Your “Good Writing” Muscles

Lyric Techniques in Your Language

Onomatopoeia, Alliteration, and Rhyme

Vary Sentence Length and Subject-Verb Positions; Use Parallel Construction

Employ Locution

Use the Epistolary Form

A Note on Voice—It Will Come When You Employ the Elements of Good Creative Writing

Be Patient with Your Writing

Chapter 2 More Avenues to Keep Yourself Writing

The Key Again: Writers Write

Part 2 Poetry

Chapter 3 What Is Poetry?

Why Do People Write Poetry?

The Three Main Subgenres of Poetry: Lyric, Narrative, and Prose

A Few More Contemporary Poetry Subgenres: Language, Performance, and Cowboy Poetry

Chapter 4 Practice for Writing Poetry

List Ordinary Objects to Find Poems

Another Listing Exercise

Extending Metaphor: After Pablo Neruda

Start with Prose to Find the Poem—A Lesson in Compression

Write Thanks for True Wealth

Wake Up Cooing

Scandalous Pleasures

Create a Prose Poem

Exaggerate, An Exercise by Poet Susan Rich

Enlist Poets Who Came Before You, A Second Exercise from Susan Rich

Haiku: An Exercise by Margaret D. McGee

Tanka: Exercise with an Older Japanese Form by Poet Michael Dylan Welch

The Villanelle—Circling Around What Haunts Us

Ekphrastic Poetry—Writing Poems from Paintings, an Exercise from Holly Hughes

More Help Exploring and Writing in Forms

A Word on Tone in Poetry from Poet Jefferson Carter

Part 3 Creative Nonfiction

Chapter 5 What Is Creative Nonfiction?

Why Do People Write Creative Nonfiction?

Creative Nonfiction Subgenres

Coda on Creative Nonfiction

Chapter 6 Practice for Writing Creative Nonfiction

Eight Rhetorical Patterns and How to Use Them to Create Essays

Writing an Oral History, an Exercise from Kit Bakke

Writing Historical Events in Memoir, an Exercise by Linda C. Wisniewski

Just Add Water: An Experimental Mini-Essay in a Can by Dinty W. Moore

I Just Don’t Understand You, Another Exercise from Dinty W. Moore

Worth 1,000 Words, an Exercise by Judith Kitchen

Let the Holons Do the Work

Putter Inners and Taker Outers, an Exercise from Jack Heffron

Learning Words by Heart

Journal Writing as Finished Creative Nonfiction—Three Days and Three Nights

More Ideas on Getting Started Writing Memoir

To Create Memoir from Fragments

Part 4 Fiction

Chapter 7 What Is Fiction?

Why Do Writers Write Fiction?

Literary versus Genre Fiction—What Do the Labels Mean?

Fiction Subgenres

Chapter 8 Practice for Writing Fiction

Finding a Story Idea

Creating a Narrative Line

Figuring Out a Time Frame

Focus on the Protagonist, Your Main Character

Drop Your Protagonist into an Emotional Moment That Will Demand an Action

On Plot

Point of View

On Building Strong Characters

Writing Good Dialog

Using Setting, Building Scenes

Revising: Check Your Scenes for Action, Wants, and Subtlety

Working on Subplots

Setting the Tone of Your Story

Endings

Epilogue: A Juncture! More Travel Ahead!

Contributors

Index