Creative Writing Directions 2010

Creative Writing Genres for the Gloucester Project 2010

(On Friday June 11, 2010 you will pass in three poems and either a one scene play or a dramatic monologue that are proofread, typed, and adhere to the directions.)

1. Spontaneous Poem

To activate your subconscious mind, do the following:

·         Free write about your topic for five minutes. (This is stream of consciousness writing.)

·         Pick ten vivid, interesting, revealing words from your stream of consciousness free-write.

·         In five minutes write a ten-line poem in which each line contains at least one of the ten words and in which each of the ten words is used at least once.

·         Make a title using a phrase from your stream of consciousness free-write.

·         The point of this poem is to emphasize spontaneity, whimsy, seeming randomness, linguistic daring, absurdity, surreality, etc.

2. Metaphor Poem

·         Start with your topic. Brainstorm aspects of the topic (for example, Fitz Henry Lane=schooners, house atop Harbor Loop, oil paint, crutches, apple-peru, etc.) as well as feelings and concepts associated with the topic (for example, Fitz Henry Lane=luminism, beauty, realism, observation, etc.)

·         Then create metaphors for items in either list. (From the F.H. Lane list of concepts: Luminism is a painting with a light bulb inside. Or, a bit more vivid: The sky in the painting swallowed a light bulb. From the F.H. Lane list of objects: Crutches are legs Lane shed to sit and paint.

·         String the metaphors together. Edit them. Revise them. Expand them. Contract them. Use your ear, your mind’s eye, and your sense of the language of images to guide your revision.

·         Your poem should include at least three metaphors*.

*This doesn’t mean that the whole poem consists of just the three metaphors. Build a poem around the metaphors. If you find this difficult to do then you could do the older version of this assignment: write a poem that consists of seven metaphors.

3. Ekphrastic Poem

·         Choose an object or work of art (a photograph, statue, song, film, poem, story, painting, etc.) related to your topic.

·         Write a poem in which you respond to the work of art as if you were speaking directly to it, or as if you were an outsider (a newcomer, a tourist, a foreigner, an alien) seeing it for the first time without context, or as if you were inside the art, or as if you were the art/object.

·         In the title of the poem let the reader know what object or work of art you are responding to and from what perspective you are responding to it.

4. Poem-based-on-another-Cape-Ann-poem Poem Write a poem in response to one of the poems in the Cape Ann poet packet. (In the poem, in the title, or in a note, let the reader know to what poem you are responding.)

5. Traditional Form Poem (Italian sonnet, English sonnet, villanelle, sestina, tanka): Write a poem about your topic using a traditional poetry form.

6. Create-Your-Own-Form Poem

·         Choose a form (tanka, haiku, acrostic, mesostic, double acrostic, sonnet, villanelle, limerick, sestina, etc.) and revise the rules so there are at least three constraints* (rules), or invent a form of your own with at least three constraints (rules). The poem or poems you write should be at least twelve lines long.

·         Use the constraints to write a poem in response to your topic or some aspect of the topic.

·         In a note below the poem write down the three rules.

* Constraints can refer to rhythm and sound: rhyme scheme, alliteration, syllable count, stressed syllable count, etc. Constraints can refer to words and concepts: a particular word has to be in each line or stanza, a particular word cannot be used, a particular type of word (a color, a season, a name, etc.) must be used, etc. Other constraints: no words with the letter “e” or every line must have one word than the line previous or the words on the page must be arranged to look like the object being described.

 

7. Someone Else’s Form Write a poem using a form one of your classmates created.

 

8. Visual-Found poem using your research  

• Take five sentences directly from your research and/or from anything you’ve already written for the Gloucester Project.
• Make the sentences into a poem by using a title, arrangement, line breaks, spacing, and font size and type. The purpose of this activity is to emphasize the visual aspect of poetry.
• Create a title.

9. One-Scene Play  

• The play must be at least one page in length.
• The play must conform to script conventions.
• Your one-scene play may dramatize a true life event that you discovered while conducting your research. Or, you may imagine a fictional dramatic situation related to the aspect of Cape Ann culture that you have been exploring.
• Don’t forget a title.

10. Dramatic Monologue Write a dramatic monologue in which a character presents a point of view on your topic that is different from your own point of view. Use playwriting format. Use italics for stage directions; use bold, capital letters for names of characters. Don’t forget a title.