The following explanation is also found in your books: "The Creative Writer's Craft" on pages: 154-158.
Using ONE of your three best openings/leads, write the first draft of a new short story.
Step One:
1. Introduce a character with a flaw and explore a dramatic situation in which that flaw or error is apparent.
--Choose an ordinary and natural situation
--Include action, dialogue, and your narrator's thoughts and feelings
--Write the story in present tense; Use first person POV.
Write the first draft quickly; do not hesitate or worry too much about its structure or incomplete elements. These will be smoothed over in the next draft. Simply write the story - from beginning to end. Try not to hesitate. Don't discard anything yet. Don't judge your work. Just write. See how much you can get with the time remaining in class. When you have this draft, name it DRAFT ONE, then move to the second step.
Step two:
2. Cut your sentences down and combine them. Try to cut about 1/2 of what you just wrote. Keep only the most important information.
--Compress a string of actions into a sentence or two with a series of verbs
--Reduce dialogue to one or two important exchanges. Try to propel the action forward.
--Insert commentary, the internal self-talk of your character. Get inside the character's mind. This is the benefit of 1st person POV.
--Call this second step DRAFT TWO. Make sure you change the draft # and save BOTH copies: draft one and two.
Go no further with this exercise. If you finish early in class, go back to your other short stories and work on these.
HOMEWORK: Please read pg. 149-159. Pay close attention to the information about how to write effective DIALOGUE.
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