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“You enter the extraordinary by way of the ordinary.” ~Frederick Buechner
THANK YOU!
I have so appreciated all your
interest and feedback over these past few years as I’ve posted my writing
workshops on the blog as a free version while I revised and edited and listened
to your questions and suggestions.
Since Words with Impact is the
final in the series I am going to close down the writing blog. Hopefully I will
be able to get the rest of the workbooks up on Amazon soon to join the three
that are now published.
In the meantime if you have any
questions please message me on Facebook or Twitter.
Happy Writing
Continue to Read Deep, marcy
Workshop: Discover
Words That Sing
“All this time the
Guard was looking at her, first through a telescope, then through a microscope,
and then through an opera-glass.”
Lewis Carroll
Alice does not change being Alice despite the various ways
in which she is being observed, but the perception of her is altered by the
method by which the Guard chooses to see her.
Just as images and word pictures feed our imagination
through metaphors, so can a study of map-making enlarge and enrich our
connections with the places we inhabit. In his book, the Geographer’s Art, Peter Haggett says that, “If the historian uses mirrors to look back and the physicist uses
mirrors to look forward, then the geographer’s use of the mirror analogy lies
in a different dimension—that of space.”
What exactly do we see in that space regionally and
historically? Are places mapped by linear distance as in a conventional map or
by spatial configuration?
Haggett gives an example from a vacation he once took at a
lakeside village nestled in the Austrian mountains. As he traveled back and
forth across the lake by boat he realized that the lakeside did not quite
measure up to the conventional map. Some routes he took were fast routes and
others slow. Which speed was taken would influence the map form or scale of the
lake. He put together four different sketches to try to determine how nine
locations reflected or related to the lake itself based on: distance, time of
journey, cost of journey and frequency of service. He concluded that each map
showed a “different aspect of the spatial
structure of this settlement.”
His experiment on vacation opened up a whole new outlook on
how maps can measure location and identity of place.
Today we can click our computers for directions and are
given a choice to find a destination by conventional map, or street view or
aerial. Why do we choose which version we do? How does your character approach
space in his world? Why does it matter what she sees?
Action Steps:
1. Visit a favorite place of your
own where you like to sit and watch the view. Take a pair of binoculars and a
magnifying glass. Pick one focused spot and look at it intently for a few
minutes each time using first your own natural sight and then each of these
lenses.
2. Write down the differences you
see with each one.
Share: Did you see something you’ve never noticed before?
Can you adapt the experience for your character?
Read deep, marcy
“On with dance, let joy be unconfined, is my
motto.” Mark Twain
Workshop: Discover
Words That Sing
“For some minutes
Alice stood without speaking, looking out in all directions over the country –
and a most curious country it was… ‘I declare it’s marked out just like a large
chessboard!’” Lewis Carroll
There is a geography app game for children (and adults) that
help to learn about world countries. Three sections ask questions such as
language or landmarks or capitals, and then there is another that is by shape
only. You have to identify the country by its image, like a puzzle piece.
Two things surprised me while playing with my five-year-old
grandson. One, how much I’d forgotten about world geography factually, and two,
that it was almost impossible for me to identify a country based on shape only.
However after playing the game only a few times, my grandson had almost instant
recall on all the shapes and a high percentage of recall on flags. Whenever it
was my turn he cheerfully showed me the right answers. The game had become a
mutual teaching opportunity, as I in turn helped share with the capitals. At
least I had one high area to succeed in.
The ability to step back and see the landscape through an
unexpected image opens up a flow of possible thematic and plot ideas that might
not have occurred otherwise. It gives us a chance to stop and play again with
our creativity, especially as we move deeper in the middle of the story, which
sometimes becomes sluggish and difficult to navigate.
Twists and turns, ragged edges and soft flowing lines turn
into new metaphors, new possibilities, and new connotations to explore. What
symbolism can we apply to a land that is shaped like a chessboard, or a stone
dragon, or a blue marble? How can we turn them into theme types?
Action Steps:
1. Take different portions of the
map you are using for your setting whether a full world or a small town. Make
copies. Then ignore all the names and usual details and instead find shapes
within in. Draw random lines around them.
2. Color-code them.
3. Or draw a shape over a section
of the map and then look closely to see what is highlighted within that
section. Color-code the new details.
Share: What
perspective or theme or metaphor did you discover in your map world by seeing
it as shape only.
Read deep, marcy
Workshop: Discover
Words That Sing
“Of course the first
thing to do was to make a grand survey of the country she was going to travel
through. ‘It’s something very like learning geography,’ thought Alice,…” Lewis
Carroll
Last week we looked at the image concept of a threshold as a
decision of choice. But a Threshold can also be
used as a typology for a crossing, which
can include walking away from a place, or a relationship, or choosing to no
longer be who we were a few minutes earlier. Often that moment of decision
become a life metaphor or signpost. A threshold
can also be developed as a Commitment.
Just as we plot out a map to a new location, this category requires
taking a deliberate step of faith. We are not forced. We choose with as much
insight as possible, even with an unknown outcome. Sometimes the decision is
plotted out ahead of time, and sometimes it’s spur of the moment. But we accept the potential
consequences before we act.
Alice follows the rabbit
down the hole even though the crossing feels as if she’s in a dream. Her
curiosity overrides the penalty she fully expects for wandering away.
Consider a character’s rationalization in a space movie when someone
who has never traveled through a time warp has to choose to get "beamed
up.” Their career is in the line and that desire to be a part of exploration
and discovery is strong enough to squash legitimate concerns.
Do you know anyone who manages to get into an airplane when terrified
of flying? What makes the person choose--commit to this action?
Or go backwards. A person refuses to cross the threshold and is held
in her immediate sphere, much like phobias trap people, such as agoraphobia.
How does a life get mapped out that is restricted by fear?
And yet sometimes choosing a restricted boundary line can be freeing creatively.
Emily Dickinson lived a reclusive life. The majority of her poems only became
know after her death when her sister discovered the extensive works.
Action Steps:
1. Make a list of your character’s
fears from childhood. Then put her
in a situation where she has the opportunity to change it.
2. What steps does she take?
3. When does she hesitate?
4. What gives her the ability to
push ahead?
Share: Which question was the most difficult to develop?
Why?
Read deep, marcy
Workshop: Discover
Words That Sing
“Thresholds are
necessary in the creative process in giving an idea somewhere to go.” Tim
Wynne-Jones
Themes
Earlier in Deepen Vocabulary we looked at some ways we can influence
our words with ambiguity like crossing a threshold. Here we’re looking at
thresholds as an example of conveying image symbols with almost silent
connections that undergird themes like the web threads without being as direct.
Themes can often become a silent and powerful tool for typology impact through
questions and choices and possibilities. Whether the purpose is for one scene
only or an ongoing thread it invites personal participation.
Do we open the locked
door at the end of the spider-coated hallway? Are we ready to hear the words
written in the old manuscripts found buried under the house?
When Eve saw that the tree God had forbidden, “was desirable to make one wise, she took from its fruit and ate; and
she gave it also to her husband with her, and he ate.”
Pandora
couldn’t contain her curiosity and opened the box. “Out flew every kind of disease and sickness, hate and envy, and all the
bad things that people had never experienced before. Pandora slammed the lid
closed, but it was too late.”
Both these
women were well warned before they succumbed to temptation, but what about the
times there are no clear directions. We have good reason to hesitate before the
unknown. When do we need courage
to resist a threshold, because the consequences are beyond our control and
could bring great suffering, or risk stepping into the unknown to bring light
into darkness?
If Lucy had
not opened the door at the back of the wardrobe and discovered Narnia, she and
her siblings would not have been instrumental in breaking the White Witch’s
spell. By willingly entering the Beast’s palace, Belle breaks the curse.
Hercule Poirot follows every lead possible until he can bring a culprit to
justice.
Change, no matter how small, can create mental and emotional chaos as
you turn into a different direction, physically or emotionally. To cross a
threshold though requires a choice, even if it has been forced upon you like a
refugee fleeing his war torn land. All sensory memory is heightened and
sharpened. It is not just the moment that is at stake, but the journey that
follows it. Thresholds become part of our soul shadows as much as our physical
bodies cast their shadow. And the question can linger. “Did I choose the right
fork in the road?”
Action Steps:
1. Look at the literal thresholds in
your character’s daily world and choose one to explore as a figurative
threshold.
2. Think of ways they could become a
life-changing threshold for your character: doors, windows, cupboards, gardens,
railroads, or books.
3. And/or put your character into a moment of choice. Overwrite all
the sensory details in the initial draft. Then write up the brief scene twice,
once for each possible decision: to flee or fight, or to submit the accepted
dogma either socially or personally.
Share: What main theme connection did you choose? Why?
Read deep, marcy
Workshop: Discover
Words That Sing
“The poet—when he is writing—is a
priest; the poem is a temple; epiphanies and communion take place within it.” Denise Levertov
Genre Typology
Threads
One definition of an epiphany is that it is a moment of
revelation or insight. As we saw earlier symbol webs can strengthen genres
through a variety of image styles. Readers often lean towards one or two genre
styles because of the insight they want to explore for themselves. We also have
our favorite style or depth within those choices as well. Both a cozy mystery
and a psychological thriller give insight into a murderous revelation, but the
details and the descriptions of each will be very different.
As readers we lean towards the subjects and styles where we
want to discover or understand the revelation the story unfolds. Symbols,
images, concepts, and themes can be expanded both in a genre style and or as a
thread borrowed from one genre to another to give a fresh view. And a very
ordinary situation can be developed into a very different perspective like the
shifting mirrors we saw earlier.
For example: sometimes we don’t need to search for mystery.
It can happen during an ordinary day. The unexpected happens, either positively
or negatively, shifting our perspective into a whole new direction. Suddenly
the ground shifts out and the familiar, the foundation, is cracked opening into
a world we do not know and cannot understand.
Choices follow. Do we get out a flashlight and investigate
the new terrain, however hesitantly, or hide away and hope the world tilts back
to normal in the morning? Perhaps a little of both enables ourselves, and our
characters, to cope with sudden change.
In the movie Larry Crowne,
when he is called into the office for a special meeting, Larry confidently
expects to receive yet another employee reward. Instead he is fired for a
supposed lack of education. Which is a total mystery to him. He grew up in an
era when high-school education was the only requirement and work experience
became the criteria for advancement and evaluation. Now none of it is
considered valid? When and how did the life rules change? Or did they really?
Although still in shock, Larry begins to build a new life
trying to adapt to a new culture for him—college. Like a young child entering
the world of kindergarten everything is a mystery. Some days are extremely
difficult and bewildering. However he also embraces the unknown with curiosity,
changing not only his life but also those around him—especially his worn out,
jaded instructor. He finds a way to blend his past and present into a rich
discovery.
Action Steps:
1. Even if you do not have a
mystery in your novel choose a situation to become a mini-mystery parable with
long reaching significance.
2. Pick a scene where your
character is pressed for time. Make a list of possible obstacles, such as a flat
tire. Have a good ‘helper’ come alongside to assist, but keeps making the
situation worse.
3. Then, when your character
finally reaches his goal, he realizes that the interference saved him in some
way—maybe from a huge embarrassment. How does that change his perspective on
his frustration?
Share: What common question became a typology thread? Was
there one word or concept that could be developed into several angles?
Read deep, marcy
Workshop: Discover
Words That Sing
“Chart how each symbol
you use changes over the course of the story.” John Truby
Character Typology
Does this character description remind you of anyone in
particular?
-on top of the power hierarchy but
his power is not boundless
-can be still be opposed,
deceived, and tricked although dangerous to do so
-in a long term marriage but has
endless affairs
-does not participate in petty
arguments and schemes of daily activities
-can be extremely vengeful
Based on familiar movies, my first response might be a
dictator or a CEO of a vast financial/business empire, or a James Bond 007
villain. But these are some of the characteristics given in Greek mythology to
Zeus. Somehow they still sound quite modern. Truby notes that the character
Tracy Lord in The Philadelphia Story
can be compared to a goddess, not only because of her beauty and grace but also her coldness and fierce sense of
superiority to others.”
Each genre also has its own special qualities for heroes. A
place to begin might be to list what you consider to be heroic qualities. Are
you looking for a Batman or a John Wayne, or is your hero a parent who shows up
every day. What do you consider to be the difference between a hero and a role
model? These questions will help you decide where to look for the ‘types’ that
will best flavor your novel with the right added depth whether you are looking
in characters, plots, or setting.
Action Steps:
Example: In New
Testament scriptures Peter was named the Rock, and the promise given that
Christ’s church would be build upon him. In ancient Israel a strong foundation
meant a rock foundation, both for the Temple of worship and for any military
protective walls. Peter’s new name as symbol echoed his past history and
bridged into his new character and role.
From modern
culture, Rocky Balboa does not seem to fit his name at the beginning of his
story but like Peter grew into it. What traits did he build upon to become his
name?
1.
Make a list of your character’s traits, positive
and negative.
2.
Note where the change points are. Choose one and
make a list of possible symbols that define that particular action or emotion.
3.
Then list as many variations of that symbol as
possible.
4.
Use John Truby’s opening quote and make a chart
of your choices.
Share: Did you discover more positive or negative options?
Did any surprise you?
Read deep, marcy
Workshop: Discover
Words That Sing
“That old fossil,
those old bones, walk again, and sing and dance and speak with a new tongue.
The old stories bridge the centuries.” Jane Yolen
Typology
There are several opinions as to how many plot patterns
there are for stories and how they can be interpreted. However the very basic
two are considered to be 1) the hero or heroine leaves town, or 2) a stranger
comes to town. It is quite amazing to see how many stories and movies fit into
these types.
But just as these two plot structures can be repeated
several times, and in several ways, they are not a formula. Yet they can be
considered a typology in that every reader or viewer has an immediate
connection to the premise. The frame might be an old story but it has the
capacity to bridge the centuries regardless of genre.
The characters, phrases and patterns we internalize through
our personal histories, literature, scriptures, folk-tales, songs and culture
continue to add mythic depth in our reading and our writing. We make ‘copies’
of the original typology and pass them on through the generations. Some become
so familiar that they enter into everyday language as common metaphors or
references, both across languages and within ethnic cultures, giving us
shortcuts.
Terrible sea incidents become tied to Poseidon allusions or
flood. Rainbows are considered a sign of promise around the world. Black holes
immediately spell danger. So does Godzilla, regardless of the language being
spoken.
We use a modern version of typology when we give social
references. “They’re calling her the new Marilyn Monroe.” The allusion of
course is toward the actresses’ public personae and probably has no basis in
comparison to either personality.
Or one friend introduces another at her party. She confides,
“Watch out for that one—he’s a flirt. Stay away from that one—he’s a wolf.” In
a shorthand version the explanations are clear. With the flirt type no one gets
hurt if you play by his rules, however, with the wolf type there are no rules.
One gives an impression of harmless fun whereas the other is a predator. Little
Red Riding Hood stories have grown cute over the years but the early versions
are quite disturbing with strong undercurrents of sexual danger. Were medieval
mothers trying to protect their young daughters from men in powerful positions,
lord of the manor types, and so used the metaphor of familiar dangerous, hungry
wolves that prowled their forests in the winter as the warning?
Action Steps:
1. Choose two of your favorite
movies and keep track of all the familiar and unfamiliar types you identify
with—whether setting or character traits or story plot.
2. Compare in what way they copy
something in your own life or experience or imagination.
Share: Did any particular image or reflection surprise you?
Read deep, marcy
Workshop: Discover
Words That Sing
“Imagination decides
everything.” Blaise
Pascal
Animator Tezuka Osamu’s images, themes and stories that he
worked with came from the heart. It showed through his choice of topics and the
manner in which he developed his films. Some techniques he had to let go of
because he couldn’t find enough people skilled in the process, but he kept as
close to the passion of creating film by hand because “I really wanted to keep the preciousness of the hand animation in the
work,” he said. At the time his industry was undergoing a metamorphosis of
its own and Osamu felt that the original work of Japanese animation was
becoming imitative instead of original.
The story was fueled by the techniques and the techniques
enriched his storytelling. For example in his short film, The Legend of the Forest with Tchaikovsky’s Fourth Symphony Op.36,
he divided the story into four parts. And then each movement he animated in a
different style beginning with a basic form and adding more details and
complications with each transition. So alongside the legend he also visually
showed a development of animation without speaking about it at all. He embedded
the metaphors naturally.
“Perhaps the animation
can be supported by the passion of the creators.”
It’s that passion that creates timelessness as well as
creativeness. Viewers today may find some of the imagery he uses odd or
old-fashioned; especially since now computer graphics have emerged in leaps and
bounds since his day. Which he also recognized as a growing field of
development. Yet we still can identify and relate to his metaphoric images because
he has grounded them in familiar circumstances.
Often we ourselves don’t recognize the metaphors in our work
during the early drafts but by nurturing the quality and technical craft of our
novels we will begin to recognize them. Then our use of image and metaphor,
allusion, theme, symbols, echoes will all have the naturalness of originality
instead of imitation too.
Action Steps:
1. Make a list of the words you’d
like readers to say about your novels?
2. Write down the themes you’d
like your readers to identify with in your novels.
Share: Which one would make your heart sing?
Read deep, marcy
Workshop: Discover
Words That Sing
“Celebrate what you want to see more
of.” Thomas
J. Peters
Last week we looked at how one word in a title, or as a
character summary, can be strengthened into a metaphor for a broader
understanding. But before you can even do that it’s important to know what are
your themes and your goals for your story. For example, one of Osamu’s goals
for his work was to include a touch of humor or irony, especially when dealing
with difficult topics. He felt that especially when he tried to show culture
out of control or present the idea that technology had the potential to become
unstoppable he would lean into irony.
In the Tales of a
Street Corner all the characters were developed with humor and pathos as war
came to their corner crashing into their lives. And showed those who remained
self-centered and those who grew into selfless actions, like the naughty little
mouse who tried to save the bear.
Another key word image for Osamu in creativity was joy and fun.
“The fun of experimental animation is the
different perspectives people saw.” He appreciated the unique insights his
audience had and in turn their comments often sparked new ideas for him to
pursue. He worked diligently to create quality work, but did not expect
everyone to see only his vision. Once his work released it went free. That is
the gift of metaphor in any work.
In his short
film Mermaid he explored potentially
closed thinking through “the story of a
boy from faraway lands that likes fantasies.” The boy saw a mermaid.
Everyone else only saw a fish and went to great lengths to blast his idea of
out him. He too eventually saw the fish, but with Osamu’s tilt of angle the
last line went, “But the boy did not
forget the mermaid.”
Like a firecracker a familiar image might start off in plain
wrapping paper and then explode into showers of light.
Action Steps:
1. Read through a picture book the
next time you’re at the library or a bookstore but don’t read the words. Look
only at the visual background first. Then go back and read the story. How do
they complement each other? Does each page have a one-word tag? Funny, scary,
curious?
2. Now do a reverse action. Take
one of your chapter scenes and mark it off as if it were a picture book. Can
you identify a main image on each “page”?
Share: Did you find an image that surprised you? Can you
develop it further as a thread without it being forced?
Read deep, marcy
Workshop: Discover
Words That Sing
“I never make work
that is careless.” Tezuka Osamu
While discussing experimental animation during an interview
he gave during the 1960’s, Tezuka Osama explained that he desired to introduce
the good parts of Japanese animation to the world. He wanted it to be
understood internationally or globally. “I
would like to convey big messages to the world,” he said. So he began to
make pieces for an international audience so that others would understand and
care.
To convey his messages of animation and life, culture, humor
and irony he worked with familiar images drawn from universal theme and
experience. He built upon common ground to engage his viewers, and then angled
the image or the expectation of the story in a way that it became a fresh
insight and a means of communication. He thoroughly enjoyed the different
perspectives that people saw after viewing his style of experimentation.
The titles he chose also provided an introduction to his
images and concepts: Jump, A Memory, Mermaid, and Legend of the
Forest, showing a wide range of topics and idea grist. Often we forget that
our titles are as valuable as the metaphor images themselves. Titles,
characters, music, and images all intertwined as metaphor in his animation.
Here is Osamu’s list of characters (images) for his short
film, Tales of a Street Corner.
According to the caption these are the people who live at
this corner. Note their variety.
:
a friendly girl and a teddy bear
:
a naughty mouse
:
a plant with seeds
:an
old street light
:
a street Punk “Moth”
:
a woman on a poster
:
a young violinist on a poster
Action Steps:
1. Choose two of these characters
and make up a sketch of them even if you are a stick figure artist. (Like me)
2. Then from your interpretation
choose a word image or metaphor as their main personality characteristic.
Share: Whom did you choose? Why? What is your word metaphor
for them?
Read deep, marcy
Workshop: Discover
Words That Sing
“That old fossil,
those old bones, walk again, and sing and dance and speak with a new tongue.
The old stories bridge the centuries.” Jane Yolen
Taking your basic threads and extending them throughout your
story can build strong web imagery regardless of genre. Some will be an almost
invisible backdrop and then there are some genres that build their stories
around a basic practical web that their readers will expect.
In addition to universal symbols, allusion and echoes, “there are also prefabricated symbols whose
meaning the audience understands immediately at some level of conscious
thought,” says Truby, and they are seen quite clearly in “highly metaphoric genres” that have
honed objects in their forms, such as fantasy, horror, and Western.
Even acknowledging that symbols are always ambiguous to some
degree the symbols in these categories also represent something within the
hero. Here is his example list for
a ‘Myth Symbol Web’.
Journey
Labyrinth
Garden
Tree
Animals
Ladder
Underground
Talisman
Think of a fantasy novel you’ve read. How many of these word
symbols do you recall being present—if not in common form, what about as
concept?
A Mystery Web is another category where readers have
specific expectations that they look forward to puzzling out.
Crime
Motive
Setting
Sleuth
Victim
Villain
Suspect Characters
Clues/Red Herrings
Every genre—every story—has its own web style whether seen
or hidden. Movies often explore deep underlying themes, which the viewers did
not necessarily notice at first glance. Ordinary images can create impact and
build bridges.
Action Steps:
1. Take your central theme for
your story and make a list of all the potential links where you could insert an
image that undergirds your premise.
2. Make up your own category web
for this particular story.
Share: Were you surprised by any symbol theme or image you
chose for your web? Why?
Read deep, marcy
Workshop: Discover
Words That Sing
“Natural worlds like
the island, mountains, forest and ocean have an inherent symbolic power. But
you can attach additional symbols to them to heighten or change the meaning
audiences normally associate with them.” John Truby
Just as we have a variety of traits for our character to
keep them from being one-dimensional, so we also need to build a web of
symbols, says John Truby, “in which each
symbol helps define the others.” The symbols can be attached to the story
overall, the world setting, actions, theme, and characters to name a few. For
example, the story symbol unifies the story theme under one image. So it helps
to identify a central story image, or the single line that then connects all
the main symbols to its premise, according to Truby.
“The Odyssey: The
central story symbol in the Odyssey is in the title itself. This is the long
journey that must be endured.”
Network: The network
is literally a television broadcasting company and symbolically a web that
traps all who are entangled in it. ”
Once we identify the symbol that best unifies our story
under one image, then we look for ways to repeat it by varying the details in
some way. Look for categories, Truby says. One example he gives is from A Streetcar named Desire.
“Stanley is referred to
as a pig, a bull, an ape, a hound and a wolf to underscore his essentially
greedy, brutal and masculine nature. Blanche is connected to a moth and a bird,
fragile and frightened.”
The variations may also be disparate actions but at the
heart all contain a common thread. For example, the movie Green Dragon has an abundance of metaphoric symbols that on the
surface are not at first recognized as connected. However the common ground is
creativity built into everyday activities.
The staff sergeant takes photographs throughout the camp
setting to keep a record of the historical circumstances and of the people who
have been impacted. But it is through the photos that he himself comes to term
with his own secrets and need for healing. A young refugee woman sews, and an
elderly general plants a seed. An
orphaned refugee boy and an American volunteer cook paint a mural and find hope
in death. Each one finds a place of healing in creative actions.
The movie Avatar
is an excellent study for the aspect of symbol connections within nature.
Within each of the natural settings is a combination of breathtaking beauty and
nail biting danger. Plus overlaying this exquisite world is a poisonous
atmosphere, at least for humans.
Another is the lovable WALL*E where instead of humanity
bringing rescue to a struggling world, they themselves are the ones in need of
rescue. Both these movies use familiar images that then turn viewer
expectations upside down and engage the audience into new perspectives.
Action Steps:
1. Choose a central story image
that undergirds your story theme.
2. Now write up a verbal word or a
visual image or music tone that could be a silent backdrop to the world
setting, specific actions, central theme, for both your main character and
another key character, whether they have a positive or negative purpose.
Share: What has become your main premise that links all your
puzzle pieces?
Read deep, marcy
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