Creative Writing: Prompt #1

*
*
Select ONE of the following options:

Option #1 (250-500 words):

Write a description of yourself from your mother, father, brother, sister, best friend, teacher, or pet’s point of view. Consider your appearance, actions, values, etc. In other words, try to see yourself as one of these people or your pet might see you (adapted from an exercise developed by Rose Kent, Cincinnati, Ohio, from Writer’s Digest online).

Option #2 (250-500 words):

Write a short short story that includes the sentence, “She took Marko’s pencil drawing of his late mother just before she died, ripped it into small pieces, and ate them.” Try to figure out what event or events that would lead up to such a shocking action by the girl or woman (you decide her age).

Option #3 (outside of class):

By yourself and with your notebook/journal, go to your favorite Skopje café (preferably outside and downtown, where it is busy) and order your favorite drink. Try to select a spot where you can observe the most activity. Then spend about 30-60 minutes observing (1) the other patrons, (2) the servers, and (3) the people who pass by. Write down your observations, including pieces of interesting conversations among groups of people. Also, note some details about your surroundings (in your details, include the five senses: touch, smell, sound, sight, and texture), the café itself, the outside of the café, weather, time of day (day or night), foliage around the café, background (mountains, other buildings, etc.). At this point, you are just taking notes, not writing an actual story, so don’t worry about organizing your thoughts. Just write in a way that will be understandable to you later on. To see how observing details might result in a finished story, see Ernest Hemingway’s short story Hills Like White Elephants.

Option #4, Starting with non-fiction (250-500 words):

Sometimes, it is helpful to begin with non-fiction writing, which can later lead to short fiction. In this exercise, write a letter to your future husband, wife, child, etc., and tell him/her about your life before he/she came into it. If that person is already in your life, write from your past perspective. (Exercise from Writer’s Digest online)

__________________________________________