Homeless - 89

Sup, home skillets,

Continuing from last post...

I took a script writing class in '12. That is a way different animal from the way I write. There is a different pace and structure. If you've noticed, just before a commercial break regardless of the length of the TV presentation, there is a 'hook', a point in the storyline that attempts to secure your continuing viewing after the commercial. Of course, time has to be allocated so that the advertisers in corporate America can entice you to buy their products that promise more and greater sex, happiness and riches beyond your wildest dreams. Anyway,  as a script writer, you have to configure your script to those breakpoints. That class alerted me to the constraints and structures that script writers have to adhere to. But writers like me need a larger amount of canvas for the storyline that we are writing about.

For some reason, I don't cotton too well to being told how much to write and how to structure the storyline.  The creative aspect of me that is the source of everything I write doesn't specify structure and length; it just grabs me by the scuff of the neck and commands me to put pen to paper. One of the creative writing professors that I had mandated that all submissions to her was be less than twenty pages - double-spaced with Roman 12 font - 'keep sort stories short, the shorter the better'. When she said that, I had the feeling that she was trying to reduce her workload. She was in her sixties. I had thought that that directive was selfish, an attempt to curtail students' creativity to her standards and reduce her workload. A few of the students slipped in a comment or two that some writers need a larger space to express their story. A larger canvas  gives some elbow room to develop the characters enabling them a chance to grow and develop, providing a background so that the reader has an opportunity to identify with that character. For that you need forty to sixty pages - just for a short story - which is rendered to fifteen to twenty-five pages in published print. And I've read longer short stories.

I did wonder at the time that under those circumstances, how is creativity accurately evaluated? If we adhere to a professor's guidelines, does that really merit top marks in their class? If those that do that, does that reduce their creativity? I think so. I took those classes to develop/polish my own writing style, not to mirror the professor's writing style. For me, the best feedback comes from a workshop environment when your work is evaluated from all levels of writing experience. Granted, some of that feedback can be immediately discarded but the thoughtful analytics should be kept and considered. But if you are copying another's style, what use is the feedback?

One of the assignments in the script writing class was to develop a script based on a storyline of student choice. Yep, you guessed it; my script submission was from my main writing project. I evolved that five-minute scene from my acting class and turned it into a sixty minute script. Again, there were questions from the professor and students about the plot. Who is Jonathan Omega? What are his goals? Why is he so altruistic and free with some of the advanced technology at his disposal? Who are Sebastian Gage and Ethan Jared? Why are they following Omega's leadership? Such interest by readers doth stoke the fires of creativity within writers, letting them know that the fruit of their labors are worthwhile. Of course, I didn't answer their questions in a conclusive manner. What writer does except with the implication to read the story?

The other publishing effort that I accomplished in '12 was a compilation of all the short stories that I had written in '11 and during the first semester of '12. The following summer, I published  them in ebook and paperback formats. There are seven short stories within that work and all of them have an appreciable science fiction flavor. All of them have been edited by professors and classmates except for one - Detours. The feedback from the women readers has been overwhelmingly positive concerning that short story. I almost didn't include that one because it wasn't work shopped but I did anyway. The main character of that short story, Sarah Baron, was described by one reader as a mixture of Trinity, the Terminator and Mother Teresa, all rolled into one. Some of those short stories were centered on a strong female character that propelled the plot - nope, no fawning wallflowers are these ladies, expecting a male for rescue who is carrying explosive ordinance and testicle-activated firearms.

All of those short stories carry the common thread of my main writing project. That compilation can be found at Amazon.com titled Stories of New Genesis. Yes, looking at the online presentation one will conclude that it was an amateurish first try. I agree; didn't have the funds to hire professionals. Maybe next time...

Well, that takes care of 2012. And the world wasn't destroyed by evil in December which may be good thing.

Next post...let's see. Yep, I feel a rant coming on. Two events occurred in '08 and '12 that bears a fresh perspective. And I'm not talking about my bowel movements.

Till then...