Our March Flash Contest was based on Prompt #194 (provided by contributor Molly Torinus), which challenged participants to craft a frame narrative—like a story within a story—for their submissions. This delightful prompt readily invited experimentation with form, and we weren’t disappointed—one story went “Behind the Scenes” to show the editing processes and inner workings of the story itself! Others ranged from riffs on creation myths to campground misadventures to conferences wherein time travelers presented on their unique eras. As always, thank you to all who submitted, and please submit again next month! In particular, we congratulate our Winners and our Honorable Mentions, whose work you can appreciate below. Winners “The Element” by Kimberly Hu, 9 (Lake Oswego, OR) “Speakers of the Past” by Sophie Li, 11 (Palo Alto, CA) “A Way Out” by Lui Lung, 12 (Danville, CA) “The Last Chapter” by Savarna Yang, 13 (Outram, New Zealand) “Nightbear” by Melody You, 11 (Lake Oswego, OR) Honorable Mentions “Useless Sidekick” by Dalia Figatner, 11 (Mercer Island, WA) “Hope and Amelia” by Noelle Kolmin, 10 (New York, NY) “How the Skunk Got Her Stripe and the Kangaroo Her Pouch” by Nova Macknik-Conde, 10 (Brooklyn, NY) “Behind the Scenes” by Emily Tang, 12 (Winterville, NC) “Earthquake in a Book” by Karuna Yang, 11 (Outram, New Zealand) Kimberly Hu, 9 (Lake Oswego, OR) The Element Kimberly Hu, 9 Xi smiled at Ari. The Story begins once upon a time, a long, long time ago. “Isn’t that how all stories start?” Ari asked curiously. Yes, Xi minded softly. But this long time ago is special. Her growing wrinkles creased into a sincerely joyful grin. “How?” You will know when you’re all grown up and you’ve matured. “But I am!” Ari went on her tiptoes in an attempt to look serious and tall. Xi smiled again, breathing hard, summoning up all the energy of her cursed immortality to express her once-beautiful face, wishing she could chuckle, laugh, talk, like a real great-great-great-and so on-grandmother would to her great-great-great-and so on-grandchildren. Oh, not quite yet. “Humph.” Ari folded her arms and pouted. Let me begin the story, Xi minded. “Okay,” Ari said, brightening up. Long ago, there was an Element. The Element that created the five you know: fire, water, air, and earth. That time, the world was nothing. Just nothing. But the nothingness grew restless, impatient, and weary, despite it being nothing. Suddenly, something bursted from the nothingness, shattering it to nonexistence. Nothing did not exist. There is always something, Ari. Always. Some people may say, “Oh, there’s nothing there.” But that’s never true. Since the bursting shone over nothingness, there has always been something. And what was that something? That something was that Element. It shone, it glittered, it glowed, it gleamed, it shimmered, dazzled, twinkled, sparkled, glimmered. That element found itself in the midst of darkness without the knowledge that it had created the darkness itself. Darkness is always the substitute. The alternate. When something disappears, darkness takes over. Apparently, well, the nothingness transformed into darkness. But it wasn’t necessarily a bad thing. The Element was the only one that beamed into the darkness, laser-striking it to light. That was the second thing The Element created. Yes. Light. One does not need a wrench and some metals to create something, Arikalar. Nor a paintbrush and canvas or a pencil and paper. It’s cause and effect. It’s imagine and create. The Element’s birth had a purpose. Everything has purpose, Arikalar. Your home. Your trees. Your birthmark. Your sea. “Wow,” Ari breathed. Keep quiet, Ari. The Story is sacred. “Right. Right. Okay,” Ari cocked her head to one side curiously. From natural instincts, the one thing that came immediately when the nothingness held its breath for too long, like it was not yet powerful enough to overthrow the nothing nothingness, but it just would come on call. Nothingness…maybe you would consider nothingness as dreamless slumber, but you are wrong. In slumber, you still feel. You touch. You don’t realize it but you are almost painfully aware of your warm, safe bed. You don’t realize it is full of mindful and yet mindless danger. You don’t realize it but you are thinking, thinking. Maybe you would consider it not thinking at all but just resting your brain. You know that your brain is restless but your inner mind rests. You are wrong. Xi could tell from Ari’s expression that she was thoroughly confused; she looked as if she were being lectured, keeping scientific and knowledgeable thoughts in her mind for days. Maybe you’ll understand when you’re older. No, I’ll understand! I mean, I am understanding! Ari tried to say through her face. Xi shook her head, trembling, summoning her delicate spirit and soul, begging it to give her the last strength of her eternal painful, agonizing, and excruciating life. The Story must be passed on, she told herself. Mistakes of the past you learn from, old Xi. You forgive and forget. You must go on. Xi fought the urge to close her eyes and clear her innerly inner mind. She must pass the Story on. Going on was perhaps the most difficult of everything possible, which was almost impossibly great and vastly immense. Immortality was supposed to be a great gift and a great fortune, but she had led herself to its cursed power, she remembered. Let myself experience the pain of my selfish deeds, she told herself silently. Don’t be foolish. The greed for immortality is your most major mistake, and you must go on. Xi concentrated her mind and willed. She summoned the last of her curse ineffably. The inner mind. The nothingness. The somethingness. All utterly wordless. There are never enough words. Words are not for magic. Mind is for magic. Words are for survival. Suddenly a jolt of seeming unconsciousness struck Xi. Her expression faded abruptly, transformed into dull dead. So abruptly that Ari screamed incredibly high-pitched and gasped loudly, even though she knew that no one could hear. Dead. Her
Writing Workshop #60: Pseudowords
An update from our sixtieth Writing Workshop A summary of the workshop held on Saturday, March 5th, plus some of the output published below For today’s workshop, William built upon his previous workshop on stream-of-consciousness but taken in a different direction: nonsense words. William challenged the writers to focus on sounds, made-up words, saying the “unsayable.” We heard a poem of made-up words, the Klingon war song, and a poem in Elvish. Then the writers tried a 5 minute writing exercise in which they were encouraged to make up words. After, the writers watched some scat singing and double-talk comedy videos. The Challenge: Use pseudo words within a story or a poem to say something beyond words. The Participants: Agatha, Kelby, Peri, Lauren, Yueling, Rachael, Elbert, Liam, Iago, Anya, Kate, Stella Pelpesu Pelsoo (Five-Minute Writing Piece) Peri Gordon, 12Sherman Oaks, CA by Peri Gordon, 12 Pelpesu palei lepasu pepoo Perstali hofana hopsalli soo Pelmasu selfasu falelu falee Pesafa safa fipsifee Melsti melfopo pelmif sifa Pelpesu pelsoo Elefaso elwasu Pelpesu pelsoo Pelsa feeliofip Pelpesu pelsoo Lololefipfip celso Cesse Pelpesu leamell Deeper than English (Main Writing Piece) by Peri Gordon, 12 Lily tucked her laptop under her arm and headed outside into the Sunday morning fog. Her feet knew the way; they were so used to carrying her where she was going that it was barely a voluntary movement. Her legs walked calmly, allowing her mind to drift. Her English assignment was to observe nature, something she had already been doing every day for the past four years. But today was different. Today, she had to write about nature, and she wasn’t at all sure whether she was up to the task. Sure, she knew every nook and cranny of the forest. Sure, she could describe every detail by heart, but that wasn’t what she wanted. She wanted the reader to feel the forest, the way she did. Her piece needed depth, depth that the English language could not give her. She sat down on her usual tree stump, which was two feet high and the color of chocolate. She closed her eyes and let her instincts guide her. Her fingers began to type. She wrote: I see the tree stump: preet, sliff, cerlous. I feel it, grudie yet solseena. I listen to the air. It says, “Shee shee selsa shee sho seeeeeee.” It rustles the treetops with a shtet and a tibbletoo. Beneath my feet, the curusutu, bloi grass frimfoops, and a squirrel shutalets away with a yeep. The sky is cleepy and selfessen, and the sun is an oorious togopot. There is so much to explore, so much to willawave and croprast and yuptop and yerm. Yoo repsendin kee toom fwee! Monday did not go well. Lily held her breath, and her teacher read her report aloud—actually, it seemed more like she scukbeaded it. The other kids sleed at her from the other side of the plaso maso room. Lily’s teacher skudded and yued at her. So did her classmates. Finally, the teacher said, “What is this nonsense?” Lily sighed with impatience. “Mrs. Campbell,” she finally said, “would you please stop spleefing at me?”
Saturday Newsletter: March 12, 2022
Girl with Daisies By Jane Wheeler, 13 (Boxford, MA), published in the Stone Soup Blog March, 2022 A note from Caleb Happy Saturday! I’d like to begin by congratulating Abhi Sukhdial—Stone Soup contributor and winner of our 2019 Book Contest—whose novella Three Days Till EOC was recognized by the 2021-2022 Scholastic Art and Writing Awards in the novel writing category. As per the Scholastic Art and Writing Awards, “This year the Scholastic Awards received nearly 260,000 entries nationally; 20,000 entries were from the Remote Programs alone! In the Remote Programs, only 9 percent of all works received a Silver Key. And only 12 percent of all works submitted to our Remote Programs received an Honorable Mention. Receiving a Silver Key or Honorable Mention is an incredible achievement.” Weekly Writing Workshops There are two of (William Rubel’s) and three of (Conner Bassett’s) classes left in the Winter session. The Spring program begins after Easter. If you would like a free trial in one of the remaining classes this session, please send an email to tayleigh@stonesoup.com. Below, you can find a video of one our students—Zar, 11—delivering an incredible reading during the February 12th Workshop on Parables & Paradoxes. Summer School Registration On top of the inimitable Naomi Kinsman’s Design a Novel weekend workshop, which takes place Saturday March 26 and Sunday March 27 from 1-4 pm eastern time, you can now begin registering for the Young Author’s Studio Summer Camps offered by the Society of Young Inklings! A few members of the Stone Soup team—Book Club Facilitator Maya Mahony, Refugee Project Coordinator Laura Moran, and myself—are all offering classes. Maya’s class on Identity and Imagination takes place July 25-28 at 1-3 pm pacific time, Laura’s class on the Anthropology of the Everyday on June 13-16 at 9 am pacific, and my class on Literature in Miniature on June 27-30 at 9 am pacific. More classes will go live as we get closer to summer, so make sure to look out for updates! This week, I’d once again like to direct your attention to the Stone Soup blog, though this time my focus is on our fabulous COVID blog that we began way back in 2020. The purpose of this blog is twofold; it’s primary purpose is to allow children to filter their complex feelings about the pandemic through art, but it also acts as a sort of ongoing time capsule with which to capture the cultural zeitgeist of the COVID-19 pandemic. Jane Wheeler, 13, writes of her beautiful piece Girl with Daisies, “We have all used different styles of face masks throughout covid to keep ourselves and others safe. This art represents the way we can find beauty even when covering up part of ourselves.” And Graham, 12, writes of his stunning poem “Life in the Time of COVID-19,” “Because of my mom’s job, I was living in Peru when COVID-19 started. The country locked down because of COVID. I couldn’t leave my apartment for forty-eight days. It was really hard. Things deteriorated in Peru and we had to be evacuated back to the United States. I returned home to Montana where there was no lockdown and I could finally go for a walk and be outside. My poem tells this story in half acrostic form and half free verse to help show the isolation and then freedom.” Both Jane and Graham turned to art in order to represent their unique perspectives, and in completely different forms. This weekend, I’d like you to think deeply about the pandemic and how it is affecting you most in its current form. Then, think about how you might capture this unique moment in time through your art. Like Graham altered the form of his poem in order to express the nature of its content, try and come up with an art form that mirrors your feelings about COVID. For example, if your experience with the pandemic is too difficult to express in the second dimension, create a sculpture or some other form of three-dimensional art. Be creative, think outside the box, and if you like what you write, please submit it to the COVID blog for consideration. Until next time, Contest News Fourth Annual Book Contest Every year we recognize the top novel or poetry collection submitted to this contest. The first prize is for your book to be published by Stone Soup. Books by previous winners like Abhi Sukhdial, Tristan Hui, and Anya Geist, have garnered important national recognition. The deadline is Sunday, August 21, 2022 at midnight in your time zone. There is a $15 filing fee. The winning book will be published in September, 2023. To submit to this contest, please visit our Submittable page. From the Stone Soup Blog March 2022 Life in the Time of COVID-19 By Graham Kosnar, 12 (Billings, MT) I t started—the disease that just kept coming S taying in Peruvian lockdown O ften complaining about Zoom meetings L osing our minds A t home day and night T rees and parks are bare I t drove everyone into despair O bjects became our closest friends N obody outside walking, walking, walking, Walking in Montana Trekking through Yellowstone The sky is blue Trees sway. I smell wild sage and mint. I can follow Whatever trail I want Passing birch trees Traversing hills Hiking D o w n Into valleys Entering a stream, The water, cold on my feet Feels good. I am home. I am finally free. Click here to read more from the COVID blog Stone Soup is published by Children’s Art Foundation-Stone Soup Inc., a 501(c)(3) educational nonprofit organization registered in the United States of America, EIN: 23-7317498. Stone Soup’s advisors: Abby Austin, Mike Axelrod, Annabelle Baird, Jem Burch, Evelyn Chen, Juliet Fraser, Zoe Hall, Montanna Harling, Alicia & Joe
