Author Archives: sdgibson
The shrunken draft
I’m not sure where I first heard of it, but creating a “shrunken draft” can be a way to get to know a long draft. Ask yourself what specific element of fiction writing would you like the next draft of … Continue reading
Planning characters
One way to characterize is for your character to make a plan. The kind of plan the character makes, the level of formality with which it is made, how the character responds when things go according to their plan, how … Continue reading
Saving the Cat
Consider this structure for plotting from Blake Snyder’s Save the Cat and Publishingcrawl.com: Opening image An image/setting/concept that sets the stage for the story to come. Long ago, in a galaxy far away, a controlling government called the Empire takes control … Continue reading
2250 Words and metaphors
Consider these two additional pages from Kooser.
2250 Details
We’ll talk about Ted Kooser’s discussion of details in class.
2250 Syllabics
Consider this example of syllabics from Ted Kooser’s The Poetry Home Repair Manual.
2010 Toward the project proposal
Answer these questions: What problem am I addressing? What tentative solution am I proposing? Why might the problem be important to the person who can fix it? Who is that person? How will I contact them? What question will I … Continue reading
4420/4425 Planning
Here is an example of some of the planning of a book you’re probably familiar with.
The point of poetry
From Kenneth Koch and Kate Farrell’s Sleeping on the Wing: Suppose you want to get an experience into words so that it is permanently there, as it would be in a painting—so that every time you read what you wrote, you reexperienced … Continue reading
412r final exam Fall 17
The final exam is worth twenty-five points. For the final, read your secondary text as a fiction writing textbook. You picked your secondary text early during this semester. Identify a fiction writing technique taught by the text. Your identification should … Continue reading
Metaphor by Metaphor 