I've been kicking a few ideas around. I could ask people if they think there are only a few basic types of story, and what they are. After we've compiled a list I could suggest people write a story that doesn't fall into one of those categories.
I could ask them to write about what they did on their holidays.
I could do the old trick of saying 'tell a familiar story from a different perspective, i.e. Snow White from the Wicked Queen's viewpoint'.
These ideas seem a bit lame, to be honest. Can anyone help?
2 comments:
In all of my creative writing courses, I do extensive imitations. We read work and then write as closely as we can in that style. This is easiest to do with poetry, but no less valuable with fiction. You can vary how strict you are about how closely the work is imitated. Ideally, this forces writers to read very closely, and examine choices a writer made. I usually tell students that this is how painters learn--copying the masters.
What's also good about this is that you can claim you're not teaching--the author being imitated is teaching.
Now that's what I call using the old noddle! Thanks, I will definitely give that a try. 'Imitate the action of a writer', as the Bard may have said.
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