An update from our seventeenth Writing Workshop with Conner Bassett A summary of the workshop held on Saturday October 16, plus some of the output published below This week we pivoted to discussing more concrete individual themes—in this case “the body” in four distinct forms: the monstrous body, the transformed body, the body in pain, and the body in motion. We began with the monstrous body, looking at various depictions—Paul Rubens’ Medusa, Joos Van Crassbeack’s The Temptation of Saint Anthony, and Domenico Ghirlandaio’s Prometheus—of its form in art. We found that depictions of the monstrous body were often exaggerated as in the main subject of The Temptation of Saint Anthony, a giant’s head. Next, we discussed the transformed body, as depicted in artistic portrayals of the myths of Apollo and Daphne, as well as that of Narcissus and Echo. Then, we discussed the body in pain, as brilliantly shown in Picasso’s anti-war painting, Guernica, which in turn inspired Dostoyevsky’s The Brothers Karamazov. From additional examples ranging from Tumor a la Muerte by Goya to Frida Kahlo’s Without Hope, we discerned that the body in pain is often distorted, twisted. Finally, we discussed the body in motion, with Magritte’s The Blank Signature and Gertrude Stein’s prose poems—”A Long Dress” and “A Blue Coat”—serving as the primary examples. The Challenge: Write a story/poem about the body. Focus more on what happens to/inside the body than what happens around the body. The Participants: Simran, Alice, Sinan, Emma, Lina, Olivia, Audrey, Ellie, Ethan, Josh, Shilla, Svitra, Emma Hoff, 9(Bronx, NY) Stories Emma Hoff, 9 The dark, we are celebrating everything, we are stretching and writhing and becoming. People dot their i’s with hearts but we do not work this way. We are standing tall and speaking, saying, “we walk the Earth right with you, and if you do not appreciate colors, appreciate us.” We can make your life hell. We tell you hello, but what we really want to say is goodbye, we would like to fly away, we could own bat wings but we have no allowance. We scratch ourselves, and you scratch yourself, we have forgotten to reach out of your mouth, your ear, and sprayed mosquito repellent on us. This is how you began to believe that mosquito repellent doesn’t work. We tell you stories and we dance to our voices. We tell ourselves stories, we touched the world, and the world touched us back. The rest of the story goes onIt needs courage to build a school ! to explain how we will dominate, take over. I tell this story with such rich description. I am vivid in my movements, just like you. Svitra Rajkumar, 13(Fremont, CA) Window Cleaning Svitra Rajkumar, 13 Where is the building? It’s so tall, it shouldn’t be that hard to find I looked up to see a tall apartment looking down at me. They can’t be serious I wanted a job quickly, but they wouldn’t give a new cleaner something this tough, right? A grumpy looking man sat inside the building. He had an untended beard, and looked as if he hadn’t had his morning coffee. Or maybe he had too many. “Here, start immediately, you can have a break in an hour-thirty,” he commanded in a gruff voice. He turned his eyes back to the glowing screen, which was making strange sounds. I glanced out of the corner of my eye to see he was playing a video game. Ugh. He expects me to clean a fifty foot tall apartment while he plays games? “Well what are you waiting for?” He grumbled. Sheesh! I walked outside to find a tiny spray bottle and a cleaning rag. This is all they give me to clean all these windows? If I wasn’t getting paid I wouldn’t have come. The spray reeked of a lemony clean scent, and the rag wouldn’t last five minutes in the sweltering heat. I could die out here from dehydration. People working on the great wall of China died due to the heat. No one would come looking at the top of the building to find me. Much less the grumpy, video game guy. I started to climb the metal ladder, which felt slippery against my sweaty hands. I reached the first window. And started spraying the lemon cleaner. I wiped the rag furiously, trying to complete the job quicker. It didn’t matter anyways; there were around thirty more windows left. For such a big building, why didn’t they hire someone more experienced? They’re probably cheapskates.
Stone Soup Magazine for young readers, writers, and artists
How Stories Work—Writing Workshop #15: Veering
An update from our fifteenth Writing Workshop with Conner Bassett A summary of the workshop held on Saturday October 2, plus some of the output published below For today’s Writing Workshop, Conner decided to tweak an old lecture on veering and give it a new spin. To begin, Conner had us choose an object—any object—from the room we were in to write about later. The core concept with which we began the workshop was that “veering” should be seen as a break in the pattern, as any sort of change in direction, a thing we understood to be aesthetically pleasing. To enforce this concept of veering, we looked at a few examples, the first of which being the “I am your father” plot twist from Star Wars and the second being Kafka’s The Metamorphosis. We also looked at examples of narrative veering in A Midsummer Night’s Dream, Harry Potter, and The Sword and the Stone. Then, for an example in visual art, we looked at Goya’s The Sleep of Reason Produces Monsters. From there, we reinforced the idea that “veering” represents the moment in which a story or poem breaks its most characteristic habit through a reading of one of Shakespeare’s sonnets whose final line completely changed its trajectory. We also looked at the poem “I Know a Man” by Robert Creeley, two haikus by Basho, and examples from Ovid’s Metamorphosis. The Challenge: Write a poem or story that veers off its intended path. Change direction. Change your mind. And use the object that you chose at the beginning of class. The Participants: Clara, Josh, Emma, Lina, Ellie, Simran, Ethan, Alice, Audrey, Shilla, Olivia, Nova, Svitra Emma Hoff, 9(Bronx, NY) Or Rather, the Shape Emma Hoff, 9 Or rather, it was the shape that interested me the most, spin like a top, no, trap it, the base is on the other side. You must understand, dear reader, that there was something that curved (that curved!) in unnatural ways. The black was only a shield, a protector of the young and old, the little. The big were never protected. They had feet. We look inside and we wonder, how do we eat out of this? How do we put food in this and stain it and put it in the dishwasher and torture it, when it was truly meant to be held, not breaking the shield, but held nonetheless, and the patterns and colors make you want to touch cool. I think it is rather beautiful. You touch, you are hot, and it makes a sound. Ring is the sound. But this does not interest me. There is something else that interests me. Or rather, the shape. Ethan Zhang, 9 (McLean, VA) Two Poems Ethan Zhang, 9 The Sound of the Wind I was holding it, An ocarina, An ancient Chinese Instrument. Suddenly It was gone Vanished Replaced magically With a French Horn. Unreal Unrealistic Yet I believed the magic Until The waking Sound of the wind. A Rosy Carpet Outside my window A rosy carpet hovered. It was unreal Absurd And even insane Was what I told Myself. Yet I was convinced It was anything But a fantasy. Carefully I stepped on it Into the misty clouds I rose. The wind brushed my face And I flew, high, high Up and over The steely house The buzzing town
Flash Contest #36, October 2021: Write about someone writing a story—our winners and their work
Our October Flash Contest was based on Creativity Prompt #172 (provided by Molly Torinus, Stone Soup contributor), which asked participants to perform the meta task of writing about somebody writing a story. The result was a wave of submissions unlike we have ever seen, making the selection process this month even more difficult. We read stories that anthropomorphized bananas, that projected protagonists’ lives far into the future, that literally wrote out entire stories within stories, and much, much more. In the end, we wound up with five winners and five honorable mentions whose fantastic and distinct work gives shape to a bright and promising future! 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 “With Great Power…” by Jack Liu, 13 (Livingston, NJ) “Words” by Lui Lung, 12 (Danville, CA) “Myrtle and Sage” by Pranjoli Sadhukha, 11 (Newark, OH) “Rejection Miracle” by Alexandra Steyn, 12 (Greenwich, CT) “Coffee Mates” by Emily Tang, 12 (Winterville, NC) Honorable Mentions “Crumpled Papers” by Anushka Dhar, 12 (Hillsborough, NJ) “Charlotte’s Unusual Story” by Hannah Francis, 11 (Stanford, CA) “Writer’s Block” by Nova Macknik-Conde, 10 (Brooklyn, NY) “It Should Bother You” by Violet Solana Perez, 13 (Scarsborough, ON, Canada) “Behind the Counter” by Eliya Wee, 11 (Menlo Park, CA) Jack Liu, 13 (Livingston, NJ) With Great Power… Jack Liu, 13 George slammed his fist onto the table, staring at his screen. He stared down into his lap, feeling the immense pressure that he was in. He sighed as he spun around in his old chair that was on the verge of breaking and took a bite of his sandwich that was on the damaged fold up table. It tasted the same as always: the sad taste of bologna and lettuce. Ever since his family hit hard times 3 months ago, he’d only been eating sandwiches with various processed meats. He got up to check on his family and found that they were all sleeping soundly on the floor on the ancient air mattress behind him. He heard the breathing of his mother, father and younger sister and was entranced for a bit, reflecting on better days. He snapped out of it once his stomach rumbled again, shook it off, and stared into the bright computer screen. He stared at the text that was written and started writing. “Lucas sat in his chair, staring up into the ceiling on his warm comfy bed…” Suddenly, out of nowhere there was a loud thud. George turned around; his whole family was sleeping on a giant bed instead of an air mattress and there was enough room for George to sleep there as well! George froze in shock; there was no possible way that this was real. All he did was write in his story. He shook his head in utter disbelief, spun back in his chair, and started typing “Lucas got some steak.” Again, just like the last time, a loud thud, and a plate was in front of him, with the most scrumptious looking steak he had seen in a long, long time. There were also utensils for him to eat with. George snatched them up and started cutting and devouring his steak so fast that within 5 minutes he was all done. He licked his lips as he felt the taste of the steak leave his tongue. Now, with his newfound power George contemplated all of the possibilities: he could be rich, famous, he could bring his family out of poverty. Everything he ever dreamed of could become reality. What would he do with all this power? George slipped into his spot in the bed and closed his eyes. The next morning he woke up, groggy, as his parents and younger sister gawked at the presence of their new bed. “Where did this come from?” They all asked in unison, looking at George with deep interest. “Last night I discovered that I can summon things if I write it in my story,” George said, scratching his head. “Then all our problems are solved! We can go back to life the way it was before! Before all of the hardships and pain.” His father had that glowing look in his eyes that George had seen before in happier days. George thought long and hard about what his father said. There was no way that such a wonderful gift could come without its consequences. Soon he would learn that there would be dire consequences for using this power too often. Lui Lung, 12 (Danville, CA) Words Lui Lung, 12 To be educated was to be a threat. It was dangerous for us to read, to write, to learn what no one else would tell us but ourselves. It was wrong. We were not born free, we did not live free, and we did not die free. This was what they told me, and I believed them. When I was young, I thought that my mother was dangerous, for she knew the forbidden ways. Someone had taught her. And when night fell, she taught me, too. With the speckled silver of the stars above us and the verdant green of the leaves by our side, she gave me the most valuable gift I had ever known. Words. Words were my sanctuary. Traced against the black canvas of the sky with my mother’s long, deft fingers. Spelled out in the earth with a branch. Spoken aloud in tales passed down for generations. Words became a place I could retreat to each night when I was so often warned to keep my mouth shut. I treasured every letter my mother offered me, held it near so it wouldn’t abandon me until I was sure I knew it well. I whispered my words to the stars, and the stars listened when no one else would. But come morning light, the stars would leave me and so would my words. The hazy
