Ah, the life of a writer. I felt the pain, suffering, and involvement with my work and this class acutely over this semester. I even had an emotional arc and a progression in my writing and style. When starting our creative writing journey, I was confident in wanting to take this class despite threats and my aged status as a junior. I want a creative writing thesis and according to the underground campus gossip network, Ganley’s creative writing class was the best. Though my sources mentioned work, they forgot to include the blood, sweat and tears involved.
My previous existence as an oblivious critical thinker was obliterated in the onslaught of creative writing exercises, consuming my life and thought. The assignments couldn’t tangibly pile up, being on a blog, but their looming presence was felt. I did the work, and I liked it. It started worrisome but okay, dipped to overwhelming in conjunction with my other classes, slowly climbed to manageable, and finished with my disregard for other classes in favor of writing poetry. And it wasn’t my time management issues that had me stressed, just the course-load from my initial bad decision to take other classes that actually gave homework. No matter what exploratory exercises were assigned, the creative writing coup d’etat on my time was worth it.
As for the writing itself, it was glorious.
I found the creative recesses of my brain that had been lying dormant since I started writing papers for English instead of poetry about rainbows and my Australian godparent’s new babies (titled, I believe, “I am knowledge”). The audiovisual creative realm, which I thought I knew from learning powerpoint and excel, made me feel even more unprepared for the intense creative focus. I didn’t know what to do, and my competency with creating a working experience was on shaky ground. When we explored the short piece of writing that we had turned into a digitalized story I found out how to get beneath my writing, what was working and that a story needs some action to keep things interesting. Saving me from being frightened from my computer was the grounding presence of the hundred word exercises. They were something I could play with, and start moving an action and memory with words. Taking pictures was fun, with nothing for a reader to go on besides my title, it was cool to think of all the emotions and thoughts of the photo I had beneath the surface that I didn’t explain, being all dark and mysterious. No one would realize the extent of my brooding over my teapot picture unless I created an explanatory plaque like in a museum. My writing took on a new tool; you don’t have to explain the entire picture.
Moving into creative non-fiction, I learned what non-fiction really was, and the license allowed with the truth. Non-fiction is truthiness, An exaggerated story that focuses on something besides the general plot movement. Everything I learned was until then unexplored territory. My favorite literary device, if you hadn’t realized, is the braided essay. A brilliant invention that I hadn’t thought of before, and employed in different ways to varying degrees of success. It wasn’t even limited to disparate subjects, a braided essay could also be blending authors, such as in the workshop at your house; it was my first real introduction to Katie, and we made an interesting story out of it. The journey of non-fiction let me focus on memories that I had no idea would pop up as source material, why I chose one memory over another. Many of the stories are half developed, but there is definitely a progression in my writing, and the short “Mental Capacity” gives a great indication about how much fun frustration I was having coming up with stories I needed to tell; “the brain stem should really impart more literate information”. I never knew that there were stories I wanted and needed to write down. That I could find stories that had to be written out to be sorted through, though they are carefully chosen and pruned so I feel comfortable with others aside from myself digesting them.
Fiction was a genre I had been waiting the entire semester to explore. This was a childhood dream, a fantasy of the great American novelist. Before I could start on exposing Tolkien as an amateur in comparison to myself, I wrote some precursors to my future undeniable genius. And fiction was a tough nut. At least with non-fiction I had a basic storyline to work off of, fiction started with nothing, and sometimes went nowhere because I didn’t know what was going on. I know the characters take us a long for the ride, but I think they were slightly lost too. Now that I think about it, several of my characters were at turning points, and they weren’t sure which way to turn. Which is the point, giving that in the situation they experience a change. It still meant that it was sometimes a little hard for myself and others to follow though. I am partial to what I came up with though, it was more workable once I got going, but I stared at a blank screen and page for long periods of time. “Animal Love” was spur of the moment and I really used discussions in class to further how I was writing, It turned out what I need for my stories is a spark of obtuse inspiration to make a good fiction. Like for “Animal Love”, reading a children’s book about having a no good, horrible, very bad day.
Poetry was a breath of fresh air. It changed the makeup of my writing, after getting longer and longer and more explanatory throughout the semester, suddenly it was short and communicating feeling through much smaller numbers of words. Poetry is the usurpation of experience into rhythms. Unlike the other genres, I did experiment with poetry as a kiddie. But I knew nothing. Nothing of why things sound right, of form, of turns and narrators and length and specific subjects. Now my grand Adventure into poetry is getting somewhere. The unit began with varying the tone to produce different feelings with the help of the tutors, and from there I found new ways to write poetry, and realized subjects can be taken from life and not comment explicitly on the biggest pictures. Easy end rhymes went out the window, though I cling to the abab structure at times. Through the exploration of poetry, I slowly incorporated more than the love of alliteration. And that critiquing amateur poetry is going to take more work than I realized, if you read great poetry, there is never anything you can point out as wrong, and who knows with the new-fangled modern poetry these days. I now can bring strength and not shame to the English sonnet, and accept poetry as more versatile than my childhood rhyme scheme would suggest.
My writing, my style and my concepts of creative writing have gone from ugly caterpillar to emerging butterfly from the transformative chrysalis of this class. Each unit was a shock and a lot to take in and create, but the progressive body of work gives a lot to work with, an entire pile of paper purely the product of my own making. Reviewing this testament to my creative powers, I would give myself an A- (feel free to suggest an upgrade). Risk for myself I give an A. I tried things that were uncomfortable and rolled with it, like my long fiction. I experimented with different forms even when I had done the required assignment in poetry, endeavored to find new narrators and voices I had only dreamed of using, from men to old men, to young children. All kinds of narrative distance were employed, and I made a mixed media story that held together. On the group side of the risk spectrum, I talked up in class and tactfully told my opinion in workshop. Embracing the group exercises, we made some awesome work, including the picture projects in class near the beginning. Effort I give an A-. For myself, I give an A because I made the time and I did everything. I worked at even as I struggled with some of the projects and put 100% into each of the pieces, laboring over them even if they didn’t come out right. Where I feel deserves a B+ is group effort. I talked in workshop, I gave my opinion, I wrote on the blog, but I could have written and said more. Too focused on finishing my own work until it was a little too late, some of my group participation on the blog faltered. Improvement only deserves an A. This class was one tough cookie, and it took a while to get the ball rolling, but what I did think up and immortalize in the beautiful medium of literature changed with each week. Taking some risks and listening and reading the assignments came a long way from talking about a road trip away from school. Quality, quality is tricky because I can’t decide how to assess myself and my work; it takes me weeks to relook at a paper I’ve handed in. That being said, I give myself an A-. What I created for the most part I liked, and what I didn’t I really stretched my neck out to do. What deserves the minus is that I haven’t been able to rework any of my pieces to a substantial degree yet. So I can see the improvement waiting, but it hasn’t yet been edited even though I have the workshop comments, so there the quality has suffered. Group quality if that means for group work, I am proud of what we accomplished, some of those stories are great, and some are hilarious. If quality as a group means did I play well with others, then yes.
