Okay class, if you did your homework yesterday--and if you didn't, how dare you come to my class unprepared :P --if you did your homework, you now have a free-write to work from.
Today's assignment is to go through your free-write and pick out three details: The sky was blue, her lipstick was red, Engineering is hard, accounting is fun etc.
Now, take one of those details and practice creating what we in the trade call "expanded details" ie. Whispy horsetail clouds streaked a baby-blue sky filled with the white glare of a sun so bright it seemed to be more a white-hot explosion than a disk.
Or, People imagine accountants as skinny little men with pocket-protectors and ink-stained fingers hunching over battered desks with green-shaded table lamps illuminating pinched features and coke-bottle glasses necessitated by years spent squinting over faded receipts and forms with microscopic print.
Yes, the examples above are so elaborate as to be a little silly. That's okay. This is just an exercise.
The goal of this exercise is to learn how to give the reader details (obviously, ha ha). Early writers often don't realize how much detail a reader needs to get a clear picture of the scene or idea the writer is trying to convey.
Now do the same exercise with the remaining two details.
Gold sticky-star! Or if you're not completely exhausted, see how many expanded details you can do. Take each of your expanded details above, take out one piece of that detail and expand on that! Or do another free-write on a new scene or subject.
Get inspired, everybody!
Tomorrow, Compare and contrast!
No comments:
Post a Comment