anti
aww.. baby raccoon ^^
There are two approaches to Creative Writing: quiet confidence or utter terror. If you fall in the latter category, never fear: here's a collection of hints gathered from the forums and personal experience; hopefully it will help you in what can be the most painful part of the Area of Study paper!
For those of you who are Quietly Confident about your Creative Writing skills, feel free to add to this thread!
Keep It Simple
Remember you only have forty minutes to do this entire section (if you've planned your time properly). Give yourself five to ten minutes planning and about half an hour to write. A concise, well-planned piece is much better than a long, rambling idea that doesn't go anywhere.
Choose a single idea and work its guts out. Many masterpieces revolve around a single idea - think about Titanic. It's a three hour epic about a ship sinking. Having a single idea also lets you keep coming back to this idea if you lose focus or start to panic. "What was I talking about? Oh yes, a dog who runs away from home."
Vocabulary
This is an important aspect of any creative piece. Because it is short and imaginative, it is IMPERATIVE that your language reflects two things: your grasp of the content (what are you writing about) and your grasp of the language (how are you writing it). You don't have a lot of time to prove to the marker that you know what you're talking about.
Vocabulary improvements are not impossible, so don't discount this point as moot. A single word a day for a week means you have seven new words to put into your creative writing piece. They don't have to be heptosyllabic (that's not a word): you simply need a more descriptive word for something everyday. Compare:
Structure
I said simple before. This goes for structure as well. Yes, it's possible to write a postmodern chef d'oeuvre with sentences running perpendicular to the traditional top-to-bottom structure but.. no. You are not e.e. cummings. Your words should do the talking. (Feel free to disagree with me.)
If you are stressed, the hardest thing in the world is to be creative with structure as well as content. Don't forget your sentence structure, paragraphing, and punctuation such as speech marks and commas. You'll be practising this with your essays anyway, but remember that the basics apply to creative writing as well.
Perspective
Point of view is an easy way to show change. Writing in the first person ("I") means you can write about the narrator's thoughts without batting an eyelid. Writing in the third person ("He") is good for showing a broad range of elements - it's also the easiest form to maintain.
Writing in the second person ("You") is fiendishly difficult to maintain, since you have to often second-guess the reader.
If in doubt, third person is the way to go: it is natural to write in and it avoids nasty pitfalls like making assumptions about context and character.
Characterisation
You're writing a short story, not Ulysses. Unless it's integral to the plot to know that your protagonist's name is Charlie and he has a twelve year old sister who's currently studying Biology, Chemistry, Physics and French, and that his favourite pop idol is Weird Al although he doesn't like to admit it to his friends because they listen to Kelly Osbourne and think that Weird Al is, well, weird - then don't mention it. It bloats your story AND it wastes your time.
Many short stories don't even need anything more than a first name for the main character(s). If you're talking about animals, you often don't even need to go that far.
Generally, only the protagonist in a short story will develop. You don't have time to explain how other people have changed - you need to get your point through and the most obvious changes will occur to the main character or characters in your story.
In fact, creative writing doesn't require more than a single character to carry the plot. Don't get weighed down in details.
Gather Ideas NOW
So, you still have some time before the Big Day and you'd like to prepare a little? Great, sit down with a piece of paper and a pencil and start writing down thoughts. What are you thinking about? What's on your wall, on the TV, what are you listening to on the radio?
Once you get those creative juices flowing you can start developing plot ideas. What would that goldfish say if he suddenly found out he could breathe out of water? What would you do if you won a million dollars on Temptation? Be brief - you should write a sentence or two maximum about each idea, and focus on the flow of the story and the ending.
Although you may never use these ideas, it's good to have something to come back to if the question surprises you. If you sit there for long enough and doodle you'll come up with less everyday ideas, which are infinitely more fun to write about and generally get more attention from markers too.
If you like pre-preparing before exams, it's also possible to prepare a standard creative writing piece beforehand, but I've never done so so I won't try to explain how to do it.
Endings
The end is everything. It's the last thing a marker will read and hence the most likely part of your story that they will remember.
Twists are nice, but unless you have a twist in mind, don't stress yourself trying to turn your story inside out and upside down. A nicely wrapped up straight ending is so much more pleasant than reading a struggle with where the story wants to go and where the author wants it to go.
Have the ending in mind even before you write your first sentence. Spending some time thinking about an ending should go into your planning time - a conclusion is part of your whole plot / idea and you shouldn't avoid it just because thinking of an ending is hard!
A final word of advice from me: DO NOT FORGET THE ENDING. Regardless of whether you are writing a feature article or short story, poem or letter, not finishing is almost as bad as not writing anything at all.
In the Exam...
I like to leave Creative Writing til last - firstly because I find it the easiest and secondly because it gives me all the time in the world to finish it (provided I can answer my other questions).
Some people like to do it first, so you make sure you have an ending (creative writing is useless without an ending, whereas you can quickly wrap up essays).
Either way, you should ensure that you give yourself enough time to write your piece in its entirety AND give yourself time to proofread it at least once. For some reason commas generally get misplaced a lot in creative writing, so check your grammar as well as the general plot flow.
Write down ideas - if you think of one during reading time then write it down as soon as you can in sentence or dot form. Think about features that you'd like to include - quotes? conversations? characters? any language techniques such as metaphors? - and make sure you have a conclusion before you even begin writing.
Finally - don't forget the title, particularly if it's a short story or feature article.
Speeches
The idea behind a speech is to convey an idea to the audience; it is sometimes persuasive but usually it is used to inform.
It’s important to remember that somebody would be expected to read this speech (probably you!) – this is why you can’t just whack a few attention-catching jokes to the intro and end and call it a speech.
Construction
Like a feature article, your speech has to catch the attention of the audience. A lot of the techniques used in feature articles for creating repartee, making an impression etc. can be used in speechwriting – anecdotes and rhetorical questions, for example. The idea here is to make an impression so everybody sits up and says ‘hey, this guy is interesting’. Later in the body of your speech you want them to say ‘hey, he’s not just interesting, he knows what he’s talking about!’. Finally you want them to remember what you’ve said.Your conclusion should be more memorable than an essay conclusion, or even a feature article conclusion. It’s pretty much a fact that people will probably only take away about 10% of a speech; let that 10% include your conclusion!
Planning
So again I’m going to mention the dreaded Plan. Why don’t people plan? It’s the simplest thing you can do which will keep you on track and help you regain your train of thought if you lose focus.
Before writing down exactly what points you want to talk about (for example, ‘Huxley context vs Scott context’, ‘how globalisation in Clueless is exposed – commercialism, fashion etc’) you want to read the question and decide what it’s asking you to do. Is it asking you to inform? Is it asking you to analyse, debate, criticise, discuss? If you’re asked for something a lot more analytical you could probably assume you’re giving a lecture on the texts of your choosing. If it’s asking you to ‘write a speech about’, you can choose the level of language to suit your audience. (see below)
Then you can write down your arguments / points of discussion and how they relate to one another. If you’re asked to discuss your texts, you might want to show both sides of the discussion and then resolve the discussion in your conclusion. Make sure you plan out your conclusion so you know exactly what you’re going to write in it. Don’t just leave it to ‘when I get around to it’.
Language
Write your speech for your audience. If you are requested to write for “people your age”, you don’t want to be using four syllable words and long sentences. To get their attention you need to be snappy and to the point. Nobody can read over your speech a second time – once you’ve said it, that’s it. I’ve heard that the best way to get your point across in a speech is to say it three times in three different ways. People your age don’t want to hear about things not relevant to them or their times. A great skill of speechwriters is being able to connect with their audience.
Speeches are allowed to be emotional: you are talking to an audience and putting forth your perspectives, but avoid the sentimental. The line you have to draw is having enough wit to keep the audience’s attention without them thinking that you’re just appealing to their softer side, not to their intellect.
Avoid being too general. It’s not enough to say “it is not the journey which matters but the process” (for example – I know you’re sick of journeys!); you need to elaborate and go into some detail as to why and how you think that way. Facts are good, you’ll probably be referring to additional texts so quote them, feel free to reference bored of studies too (for extra bonus points)
Writing it down
There’s a few other things I want to mention about speechwriting in an exam situation.
Firstly, keep your sentences and paragraphs short. In a real speech nobody sees those paragraphs and sentences all seem to flow together (at least, they should) but it will assist markers who are trying to follow the flow of your speech. Eg.:
“The opening scenes of Blade Runner give rise to a number of questions: where are we? What are we doing here? If this is Earth, how did it end up this way? Scott emphasises his vision of the future with panoramic shots of plumes of fire and smoke rising up through the ruins of ‘Los Angeles’ in the near future.
This vision is then starkly contrasted with whatshisface’s pyramid rising out of the ruins like some kind of monument to a deity. Capitalism has taken its toll on the city, it seems. Scott asks us: is this the future?”
(I really have to watch BR again.)
You CAN include stage tips, but I think it’s bad form to include “(laughter)” – c’mon, if they’re meant to laugh they’ll laugh regardless.
For some people it’s hard to write ‘funny’ during an exam so figure out some generalised openings maybe and adapt them in the exam. I’ve never done this and I don’t know how effective it is. Maybe a “God is dead” quote for BR/BNW or something. (Nietzsche, if you’re wondering).
Avoid retelling the story. Assume the audience knows the plot, who the characters are – although you could probably include something about ‘Deckard, a rebellious officer of the law..’ – and focus on telling them the themes and techniques.
I’ve always found telling the audience situations is a lot more effective than stating things to them – allow them to draw their own conclusions, and then back it up at the end of your point. Then again I think this is a lot harder to write than a conventional speech.
And as I said at least twice up there (three times, remember?): don’t be too funny. Make sure you get your point across, whether you’re trying to persuade or inform the audience. If you’re having a mental blank dump the corny jokes and just tell them what you know about your texts – you won’t get full marks for style, but you’ll do better than writing superfluous barrels of nothing.
NEW! The Conclusion
Concluding your speech is probably the most difficult part (once you've figured out what to write) because you're probably running short on time, getting a little stressed, and you have to be certain you've covered everything! And those damn examiners are saying "ten minutes left' LIKE YOU DON'T KNOW (sorry.. getting a little edgy here I think )
Okay. Here's a quick overview of what your conclusion should achieve.
* Remind the audience of your topic material.
What were you talking about?
* Cover your points again
What were they AND what relevance did they have to your topic material? If you're trying to use an analogy, mention it again, and state why it's relevant to your topic. It's a very blunt technique, I know, but it ensures that the marker will be able to link your little childhood stories to your actual subject (eg. inner journeys)
* Catch the audience's attention for the last time (especially if you think your speech bombed).
A final joke works if you're a funny person, or another witty story. In a written speech it's not a good idea to 'cool down' like an actual speech-giver would do (eg. moving away from the microphone) because it's hard to implement that on paper. If you want to include actions, try to keep them to a minimum and make it really obvious why they're important (I can't think of an occasion when you'd want to do this.. but the idea is always there for you)
If you had no idea what to write about and you think your speech was a bit too much like an essay, this is where you can remind the marker that they're reading a speech. Keep the tone casual in your conclusion (unless you're talking to a conference or something which requires a formal tone) - not slangy, but maintain a connection with the audience ("As you all know.." "Maybe you'll go home today and think about this.." "If there's one thing you take from my speech today..").
* Give the audience something to clap about
In my opinion there are two really easy speeches to write: the funny speech and the motivational speech, mainly because concluding both is a piece of cake.
For a funny speech (which has no substance) you can just crack another joke (see any of Wil Anderson's ramblings in the Good Weekend for example). For a motivational speech (eg. "The journey is all in the first step") you can really punch your points in. Think patriotic. Think 'this is the most important thing in the world'. And then use that vocabulary of patriotic terms.
For those of you who are Quietly Confident about your Creative Writing skills, feel free to add to this thread!
Keep It Simple
Remember you only have forty minutes to do this entire section (if you've planned your time properly). Give yourself five to ten minutes planning and about half an hour to write. A concise, well-planned piece is much better than a long, rambling idea that doesn't go anywhere.
Choose a single idea and work its guts out. Many masterpieces revolve around a single idea - think about Titanic. It's a three hour epic about a ship sinking. Having a single idea also lets you keep coming back to this idea if you lose focus or start to panic. "What was I talking about? Oh yes, a dog who runs away from home."
Vocabulary
This is an important aspect of any creative piece. Because it is short and imaginative, it is IMPERATIVE that your language reflects two things: your grasp of the content (what are you writing about) and your grasp of the language (how are you writing it). You don't have a lot of time to prove to the marker that you know what you're talking about.
Vocabulary improvements are not impossible, so don't discount this point as moot. A single word a day for a week means you have seven new words to put into your creative writing piece. They don't have to be heptosyllabic (that's not a word): you simply need a more descriptive word for something everyday. Compare:
with
Get a thesaurus. They're cheap (or free: http://www.thesaurus.com) and whenever you want a synonym, just look it up.
Structure
I said simple before. This goes for structure as well. Yes, it's possible to write a postmodern chef d'oeuvre with sentences running perpendicular to the traditional top-to-bottom structure but.. no. You are not e.e. cummings. Your words should do the talking. (Feel free to disagree with me.)
If you are stressed, the hardest thing in the world is to be creative with structure as well as content. Don't forget your sentence structure, paragraphing, and punctuation such as speech marks and commas. You'll be practising this with your essays anyway, but remember that the basics apply to creative writing as well.
Perspective
Point of view is an easy way to show change. Writing in the first person ("I") means you can write about the narrator's thoughts without batting an eyelid. Writing in the third person ("He") is good for showing a broad range of elements - it's also the easiest form to maintain.
Writing in the second person ("You") is fiendishly difficult to maintain, since you have to often second-guess the reader.
If in doubt, third person is the way to go: it is natural to write in and it avoids nasty pitfalls like making assumptions about context and character.
Characterisation
You're writing a short story, not Ulysses. Unless it's integral to the plot to know that your protagonist's name is Charlie and he has a twelve year old sister who's currently studying Biology, Chemistry, Physics and French, and that his favourite pop idol is Weird Al although he doesn't like to admit it to his friends because they listen to Kelly Osbourne and think that Weird Al is, well, weird - then don't mention it. It bloats your story AND it wastes your time.
Many short stories don't even need anything more than a first name for the main character(s). If you're talking about animals, you often don't even need to go that far.
Generally, only the protagonist in a short story will develop. You don't have time to explain how other people have changed - you need to get your point through and the most obvious changes will occur to the main character or characters in your story.
In fact, creative writing doesn't require more than a single character to carry the plot. Don't get weighed down in details.
Gather Ideas NOW
So, you still have some time before the Big Day and you'd like to prepare a little? Great, sit down with a piece of paper and a pencil and start writing down thoughts. What are you thinking about? What's on your wall, on the TV, what are you listening to on the radio?
Once you get those creative juices flowing you can start developing plot ideas. What would that goldfish say if he suddenly found out he could breathe out of water? What would you do if you won a million dollars on Temptation? Be brief - you should write a sentence or two maximum about each idea, and focus on the flow of the story and the ending.
Although you may never use these ideas, it's good to have something to come back to if the question surprises you. If you sit there for long enough and doodle you'll come up with less everyday ideas, which are infinitely more fun to write about and generally get more attention from markers too.
If you like pre-preparing before exams, it's also possible to prepare a standard creative writing piece beforehand, but I've never done so so I won't try to explain how to do it.
Endings
The end is everything. It's the last thing a marker will read and hence the most likely part of your story that they will remember.
Twists are nice, but unless you have a twist in mind, don't stress yourself trying to turn your story inside out and upside down. A nicely wrapped up straight ending is so much more pleasant than reading a struggle with where the story wants to go and where the author wants it to go.
Have the ending in mind even before you write your first sentence. Spending some time thinking about an ending should go into your planning time - a conclusion is part of your whole plot / idea and you shouldn't avoid it just because thinking of an ending is hard!
A final word of advice from me: DO NOT FORGET THE ENDING. Regardless of whether you are writing a feature article or short story, poem or letter, not finishing is almost as bad as not writing anything at all.
In the Exam...
I like to leave Creative Writing til last - firstly because I find it the easiest and secondly because it gives me all the time in the world to finish it (provided I can answer my other questions).
Some people like to do it first, so you make sure you have an ending (creative writing is useless without an ending, whereas you can quickly wrap up essays).
Either way, you should ensure that you give yourself enough time to write your piece in its entirety AND give yourself time to proofread it at least once. For some reason commas generally get misplaced a lot in creative writing, so check your grammar as well as the general plot flow.
Write down ideas - if you think of one during reading time then write it down as soon as you can in sentence or dot form. Think about features that you'd like to include - quotes? conversations? characters? any language techniques such as metaphors? - and make sure you have a conclusion before you even begin writing.
Finally - don't forget the title, particularly if it's a short story or feature article.
Speeches
The idea behind a speech is to convey an idea to the audience; it is sometimes persuasive but usually it is used to inform.
It’s important to remember that somebody would be expected to read this speech (probably you!) – this is why you can’t just whack a few attention-catching jokes to the intro and end and call it a speech.
Construction
Like a feature article, your speech has to catch the attention of the audience. A lot of the techniques used in feature articles for creating repartee, making an impression etc. can be used in speechwriting – anecdotes and rhetorical questions, for example. The idea here is to make an impression so everybody sits up and says ‘hey, this guy is interesting’. Later in the body of your speech you want them to say ‘hey, he’s not just interesting, he knows what he’s talking about!’. Finally you want them to remember what you’ve said.Your conclusion should be more memorable than an essay conclusion, or even a feature article conclusion. It’s pretty much a fact that people will probably only take away about 10% of a speech; let that 10% include your conclusion!
Planning
So again I’m going to mention the dreaded Plan. Why don’t people plan? It’s the simplest thing you can do which will keep you on track and help you regain your train of thought if you lose focus.
Before writing down exactly what points you want to talk about (for example, ‘Huxley context vs Scott context’, ‘how globalisation in Clueless is exposed – commercialism, fashion etc’) you want to read the question and decide what it’s asking you to do. Is it asking you to inform? Is it asking you to analyse, debate, criticise, discuss? If you’re asked for something a lot more analytical you could probably assume you’re giving a lecture on the texts of your choosing. If it’s asking you to ‘write a speech about’, you can choose the level of language to suit your audience. (see below)
Then you can write down your arguments / points of discussion and how they relate to one another. If you’re asked to discuss your texts, you might want to show both sides of the discussion and then resolve the discussion in your conclusion. Make sure you plan out your conclusion so you know exactly what you’re going to write in it. Don’t just leave it to ‘when I get around to it’.
Language
Write your speech for your audience. If you are requested to write for “people your age”, you don’t want to be using four syllable words and long sentences. To get their attention you need to be snappy and to the point. Nobody can read over your speech a second time – once you’ve said it, that’s it. I’ve heard that the best way to get your point across in a speech is to say it three times in three different ways. People your age don’t want to hear about things not relevant to them or their times. A great skill of speechwriters is being able to connect with their audience.
Speeches are allowed to be emotional: you are talking to an audience and putting forth your perspectives, but avoid the sentimental. The line you have to draw is having enough wit to keep the audience’s attention without them thinking that you’re just appealing to their softer side, not to their intellect.
Avoid being too general. It’s not enough to say “it is not the journey which matters but the process” (for example – I know you’re sick of journeys!); you need to elaborate and go into some detail as to why and how you think that way. Facts are good, you’ll probably be referring to additional texts so quote them, feel free to reference bored of studies too (for extra bonus points)
Writing it down
There’s a few other things I want to mention about speechwriting in an exam situation.
Firstly, keep your sentences and paragraphs short. In a real speech nobody sees those paragraphs and sentences all seem to flow together (at least, they should) but it will assist markers who are trying to follow the flow of your speech. Eg.:
“The opening scenes of Blade Runner give rise to a number of questions: where are we? What are we doing here? If this is Earth, how did it end up this way? Scott emphasises his vision of the future with panoramic shots of plumes of fire and smoke rising up through the ruins of ‘Los Angeles’ in the near future.
This vision is then starkly contrasted with whatshisface’s pyramid rising out of the ruins like some kind of monument to a deity. Capitalism has taken its toll on the city, it seems. Scott asks us: is this the future?”
(I really have to watch BR again.)
You CAN include stage tips, but I think it’s bad form to include “(laughter)” – c’mon, if they’re meant to laugh they’ll laugh regardless.
For some people it’s hard to write ‘funny’ during an exam so figure out some generalised openings maybe and adapt them in the exam. I’ve never done this and I don’t know how effective it is. Maybe a “God is dead” quote for BR/BNW or something. (Nietzsche, if you’re wondering).
Avoid retelling the story. Assume the audience knows the plot, who the characters are – although you could probably include something about ‘Deckard, a rebellious officer of the law..’ – and focus on telling them the themes and techniques.
I’ve always found telling the audience situations is a lot more effective than stating things to them – allow them to draw their own conclusions, and then back it up at the end of your point. Then again I think this is a lot harder to write than a conventional speech.
And as I said at least twice up there (three times, remember?): don’t be too funny. Make sure you get your point across, whether you’re trying to persuade or inform the audience. If you’re having a mental blank dump the corny jokes and just tell them what you know about your texts – you won’t get full marks for style, but you’ll do better than writing superfluous barrels of nothing.
NEW! The Conclusion
Concluding your speech is probably the most difficult part (once you've figured out what to write) because you're probably running short on time, getting a little stressed, and you have to be certain you've covered everything! And those damn examiners are saying "ten minutes left' LIKE YOU DON'T KNOW (sorry.. getting a little edgy here I think
)Okay. Here's a quick overview of what your conclusion should achieve.
* Remind the audience of your topic material.
What were you talking about?
* Cover your points again
What were they AND what relevance did they have to your topic material? If you're trying to use an analogy, mention it again, and state why it's relevant to your topic. It's a very blunt technique, I know, but it ensures that the marker will be able to link your little childhood stories to your actual subject (eg. inner journeys)
* Catch the audience's attention for the last time (especially if you think your speech bombed).
A final joke works if you're a funny person, or another witty story. In a written speech it's not a good idea to 'cool down' like an actual speech-giver would do (eg. moving away from the microphone) because it's hard to implement that on paper. If you want to include actions, try to keep them to a minimum and make it really obvious why they're important (I can't think of an occasion when you'd want to do this.. but the idea is always there for you)
If you had no idea what to write about and you think your speech was a bit too much like an essay, this is where you can remind the marker that they're reading a speech. Keep the tone casual in your conclusion (unless you're talking to a conference or something which requires a formal tone) - not slangy, but maintain a connection with the audience ("As you all know.." "Maybe you'll go home today and think about this.." "If there's one thing you take from my speech today..").
* Give the audience something to clap about
In my opinion there are two really easy speeches to write: the funny speech and the motivational speech, mainly because concluding both is a piece of cake.
For a funny speech (which has no substance) you can just crack another joke (see any of Wil Anderson's ramblings in the Good Weekend for example). For a motivational speech (eg. "The journey is all in the first step") you can really punch your points in. Think patriotic. Think 'this is the most important thing in the world'. And then use that vocabulary of patriotic terms.
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