Comedy Writing Draft

For those of you confused with the stories you were to have read for homework, here's a bit of an explanation.

• The Scrolls: A few years before the book was published, the Dead Sea Scrolls were uncovered. In the early 70’s this sort of thing caused a lot of controversy between religious scholars and scientists. They wondered if these scrolls were part of the Bible. Allen is also Jewish, so the humor relates to this fact as well.
• Lovborg’s Women Considered: The playwright Henrick Ibsen is the bane and love of many literary scholars and theatre students. Woody Allen is poking fun of the field of literary criticism (scholars who write about books, authors, and their “private” lives).
• The Whore of Mensa: Allen is parodying the hardboiled detective novel made popular by writers like Dashielle Hammett (The Maltese Falcon). Think of Humphrey Bogart as the narrator and you’ll have the idea. Mensa is a national program/club – entry into which is based on I.Q. The idea then of whores who intellectually stimulate their johns is a very funny idea.

Today in the lab, choose one of these activities:

1. Write a draft of a comic story for your portfolio (this is required, but you may opt to do this at home if you wish. Length and subject matter is up to you.) Use the comic techniques discussed last class to create a parody or funny story. Hint: choose a non-fiction format of writing and lampoon or make fun of it. For example: write fictional funny cookbook entries, a zany how to manual, a zombies guide to dating, a review of a fictional author who is similar to Charles Dickens, etc.
2. Read the homework (pages 107-127)
3. Study for the test on Thursday
4. Workshop your fiction with a friend.
5. Revise one of your drafts (a requirement for the portfolio)
6. Prepare your portfolio

HOMEWORK: See post below.

Workshop/Revision; Fiction Portfolio

We have arrived at the end of the marking period. So, what major projects are due?

Your portfolio is due Thursday. In your portfolio you should have these items:

• --5-10 Hint Fiction pieces (March 18)
• --At least 1 Micro Fiction/Dribble or Drabble Fiction piece (March 21, March 25)
• --1 Sudden Fiction fiction draft (March 26)
• --1 Bradbury Project: 3 Interconnected Stories (April 8, 10, 11, 16, 18, 22)
• --1 revision from your fiction workshop. You should add length (for example to a hint or micro fiction story), plot, character, etc. to one of your pieces. Arrange plot in a different way from the first draft (consider using a different beginning or narrative structure (April 26), use stream of consciousness and/or flashback as a narrative technique (April 16), change the ending to a different kind of ending (April 22), use advice from famous writers to strengthen your work (April 26, April 8, March 21, March 18). Your second draft should be labeled and should LOOK and READ differently from the original draft.
• --A comic story draft (see above)

Because of poor test scores (class wide), we will also have a test on the following material:

• Fiction techniques: stream of consciousness & flashback (April 16)
• Fiction techniques: different narrative techniques (April 26)
• Fiction techniques: different endings (April 22)
• Fiction techniques: Beginnings and middles (handouts)
• Kurt Vonnegut, Jr.'s advice for writers (April 26)
• Damon Knight's advice for writers (April 8)
• Information about Hemingway, Bradbury, Woody Allen
• Comedy writing techniques (April 26)
• Martian/Sci-fi history in literature (March 21) 

HOMEWORK: Please study for the test and prepare your portfolio. Please read: "The Early Essays", "A Brief, Yet Helpful, Guide to Civil Disobedience", "Match Wits with Inspector Ford", "The Irish Genius" (pp. 107-127)

Narrative Structure & Revision

EQ: Are you aware that we have some choice in narrative structure? What advice does Vonnegut give young writers? Who is Woody Allen?

Period 7:
We could write a story:
1. Chronologically - the story is told from beginning to end

advantages: It's easy; Moving a story ahead chronologically is linear and less complicated, often avoiding literary traps and convoluted plot devices; it's simple (we are used to telling stories like this)
disadvantages: It's difficult to tell a complete textured story without shifting time; Without flashbacks--a technique in which you interject a scene or scenes that happened prior to the current action--your storytelling options are limited; it's so familiar it's boring; We often don't know when to stop or where to begin, feeling like we need to cover everything that happens within the characters' lives and histories.

2. Total flashback: starting in the present (for the character), you flashback to a previous scene or event in the character's life and write back up to the present. This can also be called a frame story because the beginning and ending start and finish in the same time.

advantages: Opens up the story and allows the writer to include information that would be absent in the chronological tale; a flashback allows the opportunity to add critical backstory or commentary from the character/narrator, comparing past with present--this adds texture and depth to a story; After the frame (when you flashback) the story is just like a chronological story.
disadvantages: It is possible for a reader to be confused when the switch in time occurs; it is more complex to pull off than the chronological story.

3. A combination of the two (the Zigzag method): the zigzag allows for a back and forth structure utilizing the strengths of flashbacks AND chronological sequences and scenes.

advantages: allows for complexity and texture in the story; needed background can occur at any time; it is intellectually more compelling; it can increase suspense; it can create layered and developed characters
disadvantages: It takes some skill to tell a story both back and forward in time; it is a more complex narrative form; readers may become confused as to events.

Lab Activity: Select a fiction piece that you originally wrote as a chronological narrative. Switch the narrative by placing the ending sequences at the beginning (and then again at the end), (i.e., use the flashback or zigzag method.)

Writerly Advice: Vonnugut’s Advice On Writing

On pages 9 and 10 of his book Bagombo Snuff Box: Uncollected Short Fiction, Kurt Vonnegut, Jr. listed eight rules for writing a short story:

1. Use the time of a total stranger in such a way that he or she will not feel the time was wasted.
2. Give the reader at least one character he or she can root for.
3. Every character should want something, even if it is only a glass of water.
4. Every sentence must do one of two things — reveal character or advance the action.
5. Start as close to the end as possible.
6. Be a sadist. No matter how sweet and innocent your leading characters, make awful things happen to them — in order that the reader may see what they are made of.
7. Write to please just one person. If you open a window and make love to the world, so to speak, your story will get pneumonia.
8. Give your readers as much information as possible as soon as possible. To heck with suspense. Readers should have such complete understanding of what is going on, where and why, that they could finish the story themselves, should cockroaches eat the last few pages.

Vonnegut qualifies the list by adding that the greatest American short story writer, Flannery O'Connor, broke all these rules except the first, and that great writers tend to do that.
Look over your own writing and see if you are following any of Vonnegut's rules. Go back to your hint, flash, or micro fiction and add to it. Perhaps start in a new spot in the plot or add details to flesh out your characters, settings, and themes. Add dialogue where none existed before. Create scenes.

Period 8: Learn a little about Woody Allen here. Take some notes using the graphic organizer-side one (to hand in as participation credit). Let's pick up Woody Allen's book Without Feathers and in small groups of 1-3 read "Selections from the Allen Notebooks", "Psychic Phenomenon", and "A Guide to Some of the Lesser Ballets." As you read, identify the comic techniques on your notesheet (side 2).

The title of this collection of short stories and humorous pieces is an allusion to Emily Dickenson's poem. You can read her here. 

HOMEWORK: Begin to prepare your fiction portfolio. Read the stories: "The Scrolls", "Lovborg's Women Considered", and "The Whore of Mensa" (pages 24-41). As you read identify comic elements in the stories. See post above for more details and notes.

Comedy Techniques in Writing

Why do people laugh?

• Incongruity or Non sequitur. Humans are rational (supposedly) and laugh at anything that breaks a pattern or does not logically follow.
• Farce or physical humor (often pratfalls, slapstick, hurting people, etc.) What doesn't kill us makes us laugh.
• Superiority vs. inferiority (we laugh at those weaker or in a worse situation than us)
• Mistaken identity (using aspects of feeling superior or inferior, when the true identity of a character is revealed, this also includes surprise--so we laugh)
• Absurdity (if it doesn't make sense, and we are logical people, we laugh)
• Surprise: humans may laugh when startled to release adrenaline. It's part of our monkey brain.

How can writers use these techniques in their writing? Like everything else, choice allows us to skillfully craft our work for a desired effect. You may want to try a few of these techniques in addition to the ones listed above:

Hyperbole: an exaggeration
Understatement: Often used at the end of a paragraph or idea, an understatement reverses the importance of the subject matter.

• Selections from the Allen Notebooks & The Early Essays: Both these essays parody the publishing industry’s love affair with memoir, creative non-fiction, and publishing a well-known author’s private writings after they have died. Hence, the humor of these weird insights into the famous “Woody Allen” journals. Traditionally, creative essay form always used the same form: the word “ON” and then the subject of the essay.
• Examining Psychic Phenomena: The supernatural is always a good subject to parody. In this case, a review of a newly published “non-fiction” book on Psychic Phenomena. Look up Psychic Phenomena on the internet to see the sort of thing Allen is parodying.
• The Guide to Some of the Lesser Ballets: When you attend an opera or ballet, inside your program you often get the story synopsis. Since opera is usually in another language, and ballet is hard to follow if you don’t know the story, these sorts of program notes are helpful in interpreting the performance. Allen, of course, is poking fun.

In the lab: Try writing something funny using the techniques described above. You can combine many of these elements to make your writing funnier.

HOMEWORK: Begin to prepare your fiction portfolio. Read the stories: "The Scrolls", "Lovborg's Women Considered", and "The Whore of Mensa" (pages 24-41). As you read identify comic elements in the stories. See post above for more details and notes. (see post below)

Fiction Workshop & Revision

Please get into the following workshop groups today and workshop your fiction pieces. Please note that you are part of a class and should be able to work with all members of your class. It's good practice for real-life, where you may have to work with people you don't know well. i.e., no complaining! Keep an open-mind. Help each other!

Group 1: Frances, Isaiah, Damarys, Kayli
Group 2: Gena, Khamphasong, Diamond, Ben
Group 3: Nicole, Branden, Alexis, Carly
Group 4: Ethan, Thiery, Imani M., Shayozinique
Group 5: Imani G., Grace, Jahni, Nathan

For credit, you will need to fill out a response sheet for each piece of writing that you conduct a workshop for.

In your comments, please try to be as specific as possible. It can be very helpful to a writer to have specific advice and/or commentary from another reader. Vague responses are often misunderstood and not worth the time it took to write the comment. Check this handy rubric if you have questions:

5: Excellent comments: Comments are helpful specific, insightful, accurately pointing to errors or weaknesses in the peer's writing. Peer reviewer has spent an excellent amount of time and energy in helping his/her peer. Offers comments and questions that make the writer think.

4: Good comments: Comments are mostly helpful, specific, and somewhat insightful, but the peer reviewer may have missed commenting on something minor. Peer reviewer has spent an appropriate amount of time and energy in helping his/her peer. Offers comments and questions that are appropriate.

3: Fair: Comments are somewhat helpful, somewhat specific (some comments are more specific than others), accurate, but may not be insightful. Peer reviewer has spent limited time and effort in helping his/her peer. Does not offer comments or questions that help or assist in pin-pointing specific problems in the peer's work.

2: Poor: Comments are general, non-specific, inaccurate or vague. Comments are not really helpful in improving a writers' work. Peer reviewer spends little time and little effort in helping his/her peer. Does not offer comments or questions.

1: Abysmal: Peer reviewer did not comment at all; may have been a distraction during the workshop, and was, otherwise, unhelpful or uncooperative in the workshop setting.

After conducting your workshop, please use the time in the lab to revise, restructure, and rewrite (craft) your fiction. A fiction portfolio will be required for all students. Due Thursday, May 2.

HOMEWORK: None.

Endings

As you revise and prepare your portfolio, consider how you ended your stories. If you are unsatisfied with your endings, look below for some advice regarding new endings:

Endings can be:

Circular: The beginning and the end reflect upon one another, often using the same situation, setting, characterization, or even repeating the same line or idea presented in the opening. This provides a sense of parallelism in your story structure. It is best used when suggesting that the past and future of a character/story is similar.

Matching vs. Nonmatching: similar to a circular ending, the first image is transformed, and is repeated at the end. This is most like the pattern in music: theme and variation. The first image of the story foreshadows or suggests the last image. Sometimes this is obvious, othertimes the image is subtle.

Surprise ending: Often an ironic ending, or an ending that surprises the reader. The American writer O.Henry was a master of this kind of ending. It is often found in horror/suspense or mystery fiction. The "surprise" needs to be planned by the writer, who should include details that prepare the reader for the surprise, instead of "shocking" the reader, who usually resents this strategy.

Summary ending: A summary of the outcome of the story – this kind of story wraps the plot up very tightly, suggesting the future for the characters. No loose ends. This sort of ending has fallen out of favor lately, so use it at your own peril.

Open ending: used largely in contemporary fiction, the story doesn’t end nice and neatly (like the summary ending). Instead, it leaves an important question posed to the reader, so that the reader must interpret the ending. Caution: this can sometimes confuse a reader. It is best used for subtle effect.

Ending with an image/idea: ending a story with an important detailed image or idea that reflects the theme of the story can "stain" the idea or image in the mind of the reader.

Hemingway Quiz; Bradbury Project & Preparing a Fiction Workshop

After our quiz and essay on Hemingway and the short story collection: The Snows on Kilimanjaro, please complete your Bradbury project today in the lab.

• Rearrange the three stories in any way you deem necessary to create ONE longer story made up of the three shorter stories. 
• You want to consider the structure of your placement. In other words: what story should be read first, which story should be read second, and which story should conclude your interlocking story? Generally we want to end a story with a climax, or thinking about the theme, message, or point. It is often good to end a story with an important image--hey! Just like a poem! 
• Title your story. No story should be nameless...

See previous posts for further details.

If you finish early, please either read the article handout on endings, dramatic structure, and narrative authority, the blog post above on ENDINGS, or prepare one of your stories for next class' workshop.

What is possible to revise and revisit?

--Hint fiction drafts
--Micro fiction draft
--Sudden fiction draft
--Bradbury Project draft

LAB (AFTER THE TEST)/REVISION: Add a FLASHBACK or steam of consciousness scene or two to one of your already written drafts. This will essentially change the draft number and style of the work. That's okay. Add the details necessary to incorporate the technique.

HOMEWORK: Please read the article handout and the post above on ENDINGS. As you read, consider your own work and how you ended your stories. Are there other options you could have chosen? Which endings would you like to try?