Please turn in your first draft of your baseline piece. Make sure you write DRAFT ONE somewhere on the heading. Each time you add/edit or revise your work this year, you will change the # of the draft. It is important that you keep track of each draft and its development.
Where to find ideas? Let's have a discussion.
A note about beginnings:
Beginnings can be daunting to a writer. There's that blank page and a whole lot of potential. Just like a baby, your writing (story, play, poem, etc.) needs encouragement; it needs nourishment in the form of lots of words, character development, description, and ideas that help it grow. If you don't spend time with your baby, it'll never grow to be the "adult" piece. It will grow up needing therapy, and never get a job (i.e., published), sitting in your bedroom drawer or computer folder until its in its thirties. Not a good start.
Sometimes the first few lines or pages of a longer work is really just the scaffolding that holds up the idea. The REAL beginning might happen in another draft.
Don't worry: once you work with a piece, you'll ultimately find the right opening. In any case, an opening for a poem or story is a reader's "entrance" into the piece. Just like your home, you don't want your front hallway or foyer to be cluttered with furniture and junk that guests have to risk breaking their neck over. It should be an inviting space, promising lovely new sights and people to meet who dwell inside.
Enough with that metaphor.
The most important thing to remember is that writing is a process. It is a promise you are making with your reader. An opening should hook or grab a reader's attention. Poetry and fiction and scripts alike.
Today's class:
After reading this advice and taking that nasty quiz I just gave you, please get into groups of 2 or 3. Together read about Gwendolyn Brooks. She was a Pulitzer Prize winning poet. She knows what she's doing, so she's a good role model for us as young poets.
Please read the poem: "A Street in Bronzeville." OMG! This poem is made up of eleven poems! Taken together it is what we in poetry circles call A POEM CYCLE. The poems are thematically linked. In some cases, dealing with the same characters or personas.
Brooks based this poem on her own experiences and those of her family. Here's a little help with references and lines:
The Madam: Beauty schools or colleges were run by women. It was one of the standard occupations for women in America before 1980. The others were secretary, teacher, nurse, and housewife. Not a broad (forgive the pun) occupational list. Madam, by the way, also is a term used for a woman who runs a brothel.
Hunchback girl: bad posture indicated bad behavior. One's carriage, especially for young women, should be proper, straight (yes, there's another meaning there for Gwen), and appropriate. All things in their place.
Charity children: the poor. Bad woman: a 'ho. A tramp. A...you get the idea. Makeup or "paint" was used by women who wanted to attract men for some reason.
Hosanna is a prayer, a praise to God.
Lincoln: Gwendolyn Brooks was from Chicago. The community of Lincoln Park includes Lincoln Cemetary (and Lincoln Park Zoo). The cemetery is on Blue Island. It was a "black only" cemetery in Chicago.
After you read these with your partner and discuss them, let's talk about the cycle as a class.
Then: Poetry.
Write a poem. Write a poem centered around a specific character or person. Real or imaginary. Write. Create a draft. Complete the draft. Call it draft #1.
HOMEWORK: Complete your poem draft. Please read the article handout on "preparing poetry" for next class.
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