An update from our twenty-second Writing Workshop! A summary of the workshop held on Saturday September 19, plus some of the output published below Dragonflies have amazing eyes that refract and can see in multiple directions all at once. The images they see are thousands of times more complex than what other creatures can see. This workshop, devised and brought to us by Jennifer Rinterknecht and Denise Donnio, both educators based in France, was designed to get us thinking about how our minds and our writing can be more like a dragonfly’s eye: can we capture simultaneously different voices, different narratives, and the extraneous thoughts that are going on while we are writing? Can those random distractions become part of the narrative, like the texts or notes we pass in class become part of the story of the class being taught or the chat in Zoom becomes part of our Workshops? They presented a few examples of this idea of layered narration, and suggested a simple way of trying to capture this as we wrote–by using two columns, one for the narrative that obeys the conventional rules (Grammar A) and one for the stray thoughts and seemingly irrelevant other thoughts that occur (Grammar B) while writing in the first column. As always, our workshop participants rose to the challenge, with some innovative and impressive work. In some, the distraction became the narrative; in others the layers were in many dimensions, from different voices, media, forms and perspectives. Congratulations everyone who read, wrote and took part, and thank you Denise and Jen for an inspiring workshop! The Writing Challenge: Write a parallel narrative–one in standard form, one in whatever form it comes. The Participants: Nova, Rithesh, Katie, Charlotte, Georgia, Peri, Anya, Simran, Scarlet, Liam, Maddie, Jonathan, Olivia, Tilly, Samantha, Janani, Helen, Madeline, Ella, Chloe, Ma’ayan, Keyang, Dana, Charlotte, Cassandra, Ava, Jayden, Maggie, Sophie, Enni, Juniper, Sierra, Elbert, Hera, Nami, Dhesh, Sophia, James, Ever, Emma, Gia, Sophia, Eden. Liam Hancock, 12Danville, CA All That They Know Liam Hancock, 12 All That They Know I heard the idiot was messing w/ u again today. 🤨 Yeah, and? Lol, idk. Just saying, I heard. Lol. Ok. Want to video chat? Idk if I have time, but I can check. If not, me and the boiz are heading to the park later. Wanna come? What ⏰??? 10:30, 11:00, something like that. 🤷♂️ If I can sneak out, sure. Ok. Ok. Hey, Little Mikey just told me he tried beating you up???🤜 The idiot? Who else would it be? Idk. Did u put up a fight??? Sure I did. And? And what? And did u win? How do u define winning? Ummm…. winning? It’s pretty self explanatory. Well then I guess I did. Are u coming to the park later? Why’d u ditch us last night? If I can sneak out I’ll come. Lol. Lol, try to see u then. 😂 All That They Need To Know I heard he was fighting w/ u again today. 🤣 Like it was a fight at all. He grins, leaning back on his bed. The phone is propped haphazardly in his hands. This kid, right? I can’t believe he honestly thinks I like him. Yeah, and? What do u mean, it wasn’t a fight? He frowns, massaging the crimson red scar painting his neck. What the heck? Lol, idk. Just saying, I heard. And I heard that he beat u into a pulp. He laughs softly to himself. Stop it. He tries shutting off his phone, but the next text comes too quickly. He can’t not read it now. Want to video chat so I see how fast I can send u running back into ur room again? His old record is just seconds No, and I won’t go to the park either. I’m done w/ u and ur stupid friends. He bashes the phone on the side of the couch and shoves his head into the pillow. Hey… sry about that the other day. Idk what got into me. A stupid grin plays across his face. Back for Round 2. I’ve had a bad day. Please. He lays listlessly on the floor of the basement, the phone tangled in blankets. The idiot fought u again? Little Mikey told me. On the other end of the video chat, the idiot feeds him lines. Little Mikey’s an idiot too. But yeah. Yeah, the idiot fought me. The box of Band-Aids lays overturned and empty on the mangy carpet in front of him. And did you win? Lol 😝 like u would Somehow, he isn’t laughing this time as the idiot does on the other line. No. And I never do. Congrats on ur victory. He gulps, watching as the other end of the text goes silent. Hello? Hello? Hello? Are you there? I’m sorry. Hello? Scarlet He, 9Scarsdale, NY Japanese Food Festival Scarlet He, 9 Grammar A: The streets were filled with people swarming to get food from the brilliant, bright and beautiful carts. Smells of onigiri, a yummy rice ball with seaweed, ikayaki, a grilled, salty octopus on a stick, and sushi, rice wrapped with seaweed and topped with seafood fill the air. I bite into a piece of pickled radish from my bento. A salty, sour taste fills my mouth with joy. I take a sip from my bottled ramune soda, a spicy type of soda that gets its spice from a ramune ball. My arms are piled with towering food bowls. The smell is so delightful that I want to take off my nose and make it grow wings to fly around and smell the food. Then, I hear a rumbling. Time seems to stop as the bowls all came crashing down. A miso soup bowl splatters on my head, leaving my hair a miso mess. My clothes are splattered with ikayaki sauce. Everyone is looking at me now. What a great day. Grammar B: The smell of asari miso soup fills my nose! I jump
Saturday Newsletter: September 19, 2020
“A Man’s Friend” by Hanna Gustafson, 13 (South Burlington, VT)Published in Stone Soup September 2020 A note from William First of all, thanks to all of you who signed up for the Saturday Writing Workshop and Book Club. The shift from a free class on Fridays to a paid class on Saturdays went without a hitch. Last week, the first Saturday class, had 42 students! In terms of geography, they ranged from Saudi Arabia to the West Coast. It really is the miracle of Zoom. This Saturday, 9am Pacific, the class was taught by guest teachers, Denise Donnio and Jennifer Rinterknecht. Their workshop, “Dragonfly Narratives,” was fabulous. They were Zooming from Strasbourg, France, where they teach. You can still sign up for the workshops at EventBrite. Registration is week-by-week from now through December 16, which will be a performance reading via Zoom for all of you. The last week of each month is the Book Club for Writers session, so that is what you could join next week. We need your help! Please consider joining our new Outreach and Marketing Committee. This is a call for adults, but if you are a student, and think that you have some ideas and skills that could help us bring Stone Soup to more people, then you are free to attend the organizational meeting, as well. Addressing our adult Newsletter readers more directly, if you have the skills and the time, please join the organizing meeting. The first meeting is Saturday, October 2, at 11 am Pacific. It is a Zoom meeting. You will receive the link when you express interest in coming. We need a ton of help! Stone Soup has always been strong on good programs, and weak on marketing. Please fill out this questionnaire. Thank you! We need help with marketing and promotion to a wide range of audiences, and through a wide range of media. Obviously, we will need to focus. What we focus on will, in part, depend on the skills you bring. In addition to help with marketing ideas, and with the nitty-gritty of carrying some of them out, we also need help managing this committee. So, if you don’t have marketing skills and are a brilliant organizer and people person, and have the time, then please come to the meeting on October 2. Please visit our website to look at the new blog posts that are linked, below, and to explore. Blog authors always appreciate comments, so if you like what you read, please take the time to let the author know. We give everyone a few free views per month, and unlimited viewing if you take out a digital or print subscription, starting at $4.99. It does take money to run Stone Soup, so all subscriptions are appreciated. Thank you. For this Saturday’s project I’d like to refer you to the 117 writing prompts that are posted on our website. There are so many fabulous prompts written by Stone Soup staff and by Stone Soup writers that I am sure that you will find something to inspire you this weekend. As always, if you are super happy with what you do, please submit it to Stone Soup so editor Emma Wood can consider it for the magazine. Until next week, Monthly Flash Contest Deadline tomorrow, Sunday September 13 Congratulations to this month’s Flash Contest winners! Flash Contest #23: Create a piece of flash fiction written from the perspective of the first object you saw when you woke up this morning. Your narrative should be no longer than 250 words. For our first monthly version of our regular Flash Contest we decided to request a piece of flash fiction from an unusual perspective: that of a random object. Given that we asked for the perspective of the first thing the writer saw when they woke up in the morning, we gained a lot of insight into the inner lives of lamps, pets, curtains, toys, clothing, bedding, books and magazines, desk items like pens and pencils, and many other stalwarts of the bedroom. It was so much fun to read the various lively and perceptive voices you gave to these inanimate (or non-human) objects. Many of them seem to take a very dim view of the humans they have their silent eyes on most of the day (or night), especially all the things they witness that they would rather not see . . . Congratulations to our Winners and Honorable Mentions, listed below. You can read the winning entries for this week (and previous weeks) at the Stone Soup website. Winners “The Silent Stalker” by Chloe Chan, 12, Bellevue, WA “Worst Fear” by Scarlet He, 9, Scarsdale, NY “Travails and Humiliations of a Cotton Shirt” by Iago Macknik-Conde, 13, Brooklyn, NY “Wanted” by Daniel Wei, 13, Weddington, NC “Woes of a Blanket” by Lacole Yang, 13, Irvine CA Honorable Mention “Story of the Bed” by Vaishali Andukuri, 10, Oakland, NJ “Day of a Pencil Box” by Judah Davidoff, 9, Brunswick, MD “The Proud Life of a Blanket” by Lucy Kershen, 13, Norman, OK “The Life of a Lamp” by Chloe Mancini, 9, Glenside, PA “New and Improved” by Sanvi Patel, 11, Midland, MI “Morning from the Eyes of a Doll” by Joycelyn Zhang, 10, Oakland, CA Remember: the next monthly flash contest will be based on the first weekly prompt of October! Highlights from the past week online Don’t miss the latest content from our Book Reviewers and Young Bloggers at Stonesoup.com! We published a pandemic-themed poem from Luca, 12, called “The Invasion.” Simran, 9, wrote a powerful poem about Black Lives Matter called “Why are we so silent?” Does your room represent you? Julia Marcus, 11, writes a poem about her room and how it is “embedded with her personality.” “The Tyrant Virus” by Benjamin, 11, is a hopeful poem about the pandemic. Read about last Saturday’s writing workshop here and join us next time! Here’s a link to our Eventbrite page. Check out Pragnya’s review of Gordon Korman’s book The Unteachables, which she says is full of “twists and
The Tyrant Virus, a poem by Benjamin Wu, 11
Benjamin Wu, 11Baltimore, MD The Tyrant Virus Benjamin Wu, 11 The Coronavirus shows no intention of going away Bulking up and gushing out day by day Huffing and puffing and doling out dismay Tossing disease around like confetti everyday. Flooding the nation with desperate despair Death toll so high, Cases erupting Spreading fear across the globe. Rampaging across America in a destructive way But . . . The doctors out there will keep it at bay And with scientists making new medicines, nothing will stand in our way! When a vaccine comes, Coronavirus will pay!
