Writing Ideas

Writing and Healing Idea #19: The Good Part in Other People’s Stories

Posted by Diane Morrow on January 5, 2007 in Writing Ideas

When I was in graduate school, taking a writing workshop, one of my teachers told us that we would probably learn more in the workshop from looking at other people’s stories than we would learn from our own. The notion, I think, is that sometimes we can become too close—too attached—to our own stories, and that sometimes it’s easier to see other people’s stories because we can see them from a fresh perspective. So—the writing idea: Consider a story, any story as long as it is not your own story. It could be from a book, a newspaper, a movie. It could be from a recent conversation with a friend. Now consider the good part. It could be that very, very difficult things happened. But . . . still . . . was there a good part? Some good thing, however small? Of course it may happen that you might not know at first what the good part is—in fact I think that might be the best way to begin. I have no clue what the best part of this story is. . . But then say you keep writing—say you keep writing I don’t know. . . I don’t have a clue. . . And then maybe you write, I don’t know but I wonder if maybe. . . Or, I don’t know but I’m beginning to think. . . Say you keep writing like this. Then—it could happen—something could jump off the page—your own words—and they could surprise you. (I didn’t know I thought this. I had no idea. . . ) There’s a writing teacher, Donald Murray, author of A Writer Teaches Writing, who says that we become writers when we are surprised for the first time by our own writing—that that in fact is the kind of thrill that can bring us back to writing again and...

Writing and Healing Idea # 18: The Things We Carry

Posted by Diane Morrow on December 17, 2006 in Writing Ideas

A list can be a kind of form. A list can be a way at getting at something that might be hard to get at in another way. Consider this list from Tim O’Brien’s story about Vietnam, “The Things They Carried,” from his incomparable collection by the same name. Perhaps you are already familiar with the story. Here’s the second paragraph. A list of the tangible things that the men carried: The things they carried were largely determined by necessity. Among the necessities or near-necessities were P-38 can openers, pocket knives, heat tabs, wristwatches, dog tags, mosquito repellent, chewing gum, candy, cigarettes, salt tablets, packets of Kool-Aid, lighters, matches, sewing kits, Military Payment Certificates, C rations, and two or three canteens of water. Together, these items weighed between 15 and 20 pounds, depending on a man’s habits or rate of metabolism. Henry Dobbins, who was a big man, carried extra rations; he was especially fond of canned peaches in heavy syrup over pound cake. Dave Jensen, who practiced field hygiene, carried a toothbrush, dental floss, and several hotel-sized bars of soap he’d stolen on R&R in Sydney. Here’s a paragraph from later in the story (20). They carried all the emotional baggage of men who might die. Grief, terror, love, longing—these were intangibles, but the intangibles had their own mass and specific gravity, they had tangible weight. They carried shameful memories. They carried the common secret of cowardice barely restrained, the instinct to run or freeze or hide, and in many respects this was the heaviest burden of all, for it could never be put down, it required perfect balance and perfect posture. You can make a list of the things you carry or that you have carried. You can write about the balance and posture required to carry...

Writing and Healing Idea #17: Steps for Making a Written Collage or Mosaic

Posted by Diane Morrow on December 4, 2006 in Forms for Writing and Healing, Writing Ideas

[steps adapted from instructions in the text, A Community of Writers, by Peter Elbow and Pat Belanoff] 1. Write on only one side of the paper. 2. Choose a point from which to start. Like a word. December. Snow. Wind. Or an image. Broken plate. Fractured bone. Mirror. The more a word or image resonates for you—calls to you—and the more it calls up emotion inside you—the more fruitful and deeper the writing is likely to be. But you don’t have to start with the deepest or most fruitful word. You can start with any word or image that feels promising. 3. Write first thoughts about this word or image—whatever comes into your mind. Write for five minutes or ten minutes or twenty minutes at a time. 4. Find lines of poetry or song lyrics that speak to this word. Or newspaper headlines. 5. Write moments and stories and portraits. Notice if a particular moment comes into your mind. Or a person or a landscape. Describe these as if you were describing them to a person who does not know you at all. Describe a moment or a scene as if you were trying to recreate it for a movie. 6. Write dialogue. Between two characters. Between two images. Between you and a friend. Between you and an adversary. Between you and a broken plate. The possibilities are endless. 7. Try exaggeration. Write in superlatives. The plate doesn’t just break—it shatters. It was the most important plate. It was a singular plate. It can never ever be repaired. And there will never ever be another like it. 8. Collect all the fragments that you’ve written. If you’ve written on a computer, print the pieces and gather them together. Print or cut them so that each piece is separate and not connected to another. 9. Choose the pieces you like best. You can also choose a part of a piece. You can choose three sentences that you like—or three words. 10. Take several days in which you don’t look at the pieces at all. 11. Then come back to the pieces. Lay them out on a table or on the floor. Move among them and try to sense a kind of order. Try different things. 12. Consider a title. 13. If you like, write one or two more short pieces. Linking pieces. One way to do this is to ask the question, “So what?” or “What does this all mean?” and then write to try and answer the question. A title can also help guide these linking pieces. 14. Put the final pieces together in the order you choose, and with spaces between and around them. 15. Save your...

Writing and Healing Idea #16: A Walk on a Strange Street

Posted by Diane Morrow on December 1, 2006 in Writing Ideas

In a visionary and rather brilliant book, Becoming a Writer, this first published in 1934, Dorothea Brande, offers this advice for writing: It will be worth your while to walk on strange streets, to visit exhibitions, to hunt up a movie in a strange part of town in order to give yourself the experience of fresh seeing once or twice a week. I think this fresh seeing can be of particular benefit when thinking about forms—whenever we begin (again?) to think, about what kind of form(s) we might like our writing to take. A journal? A list? A conversation? A series of poems? A tale of quest? And I would suggest, in light of Ms. Brande’s advice, that one way to foster this process of discovering form is to take a walk on a strange street—or to visit a place where you do not ordinarily go. A place if possible that has visual interest. A museum? A garden? A wood? A downtown landscape? And while you are taking this walk—or drive—you can draw your attention toward forms. You can, if you like, bring a camera with you. This can, sometimes, be a way to frame particular forms—a way, perhaps, to pay heightened attention. After your walk—you can write about what you saw. You can write this as a list or in paragraph form. You can write, in particular, about forms and patterns that you like. What forms and patterns do you find pleasing? What forms in nature? What forms in architecture? Or gardens? Do you like soft rounded forms or sharp clean edges? Do you like formal gardens? Wild gardens? The appeal of particular forms can change over time, so as you write, you may want to focus, in particular, on that which appeals right now. With what forms right now do you feel a particular...

Writing and Healing Idea #15: Listing What Remains

Posted by Diane Morrow on November 21, 2006 in Healing Resources, Writing Ideas

This writing idea springs directly from the passage by Andre Dubus that I posted. Because it occurs to me that before embracing what remains it might sometimes be helpful, simply, to list it. You can make a list of what remains. And then you can, if you like, take this list and carry it with you. You could carry it with you through the holidays. You could carry it in a wallet—or in a purse—or in your pocket. You could, I suppose, write it in tiny print and fold it and place it in a locket. And then you would always have it there with you—like a reminder—what...

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