Creative Writing

Today in our creative writing lecture, we were taught more about how to approach screenplays, and were given the exercise above, which was to cut up words from a newspaper and create a story or at least make some sort of sense with it. 

For those of you who may not be able to read it, it reads: 'Police advise Viv Groskop you can trust flat-lining balls. Your future could make a lasting sex chamber. An incredible response! David Nieper invites you to get ready for an x-citing expert service at Aldershot's beautiful bachelor pad with a Chinese musical legend.' Overall I found this exercise very comical, but I can see how it would be useful in a practical sense as well.

We were also given another exercise to take a newspaper article and pick a word at random. Once we have done this, write down the word and the three words either side of it to have a seven word phrase. Then, using this phrase we should write freely for five minutes. This is what my phrase was:

'I was left gutted, because I had' and this was my response:

'I had hoped that perhaps in some fantastical and impossible way that I would be remembered and even perhaps saved. However, I was left gutted of all feeling in the dark corner of an angelic room. Is such a thing possible? I'm not sure. Perhaps it is just in my mind. Though I don't have much time to think about that now. I hear footsteps, and real or not they are coming for me. My stomach drops and that gutted feeling recedes and is replaced by something even less desirable. Fear. The handle I can just glimpse twitches. My eyes widen. What happens now?'

As you can see, I created a kind of narrative through free writing. It doesn't all make sense but I could develop it into something. The next stage of this exercise was to take a phrase from this free writing piece and turn it into something a little more concise. The phrase I chose was:

'I was left gutted of all feeling in the dark corner of an angelic room.' Again, this was my response:

'Throbbing in an indistinct area cause me to wake. Still with unopened eyes I reach up with heavy arms to touch my head. Wetness I needn't look at makes the severity of my situation more evident. Bruised, broken I lift myself into a seated position, shuddering as I lean against the icy wall on my left. My eyes flutter open, and blurs of colour focus into a crystal image. Stark white sunlight cuts through blood soaked, rose white curtains. Following the trail of red on to oak and dazzling marble, I begin to wonder why I am in a beautiful room such as this, only to stain it with my impurity? Then I remember. Welling up, I realise how forgetful I am. I had hoped that perhaps I would be remembered, or even saved. However I was instead left, gutted of all feeling in the corner of an angelic room. I hear footsteps, my stomach drops, and all my hopelessness recedes into something worse. Fear. The handle I can just glimpse through the tainted flowing fabric twitches. My eyes widen. What happens now?'

As you can see I added a lot more description and creative language. You get more of a sense of place and character, and this is now something I could develop into an actual story. This exercise was especially useful for coming up with ideas, and may actually help me develop a film idea.