An update from our forty-first Writing Workshop with Conner Bassett A summary of the workshop held on Saturday, September 17th, plus some of the output published below To kick off the his workshop of the fall term, Conner taught a class on beginnings. We read the beginnings and opening sentences of works such as The Handmaids Tale, Catcher in the Rye, The Metamorphosis, Pride and Prejudice, A Tale of Two Cities, The Stranger, and Moby Dick. What we learned from these beginnings is that even though it is often impulse to begin a story with exposition, stories and novels are often much more exciting when they begin in medias res, or in the middle of the action. It was clear that these openings hooked the reader by not revealing everything—a technique known as withholding—and oftentimes by introducing the novel’s “center,” or major themes. These openings set the tone for the rest of the work. Based on these openings, Conner told us that we use our opening sentences/paragraphs to reveal something: the central object/desire/conflict in the first sentence. The Challenge: First, write 6 opening sentences, each in a minute and a half, in which the first sentence must include an image, the second sentence must say something specific but utterly ridiculous, the third sentence must contradict itself, the fourth sentence must use the word “and” at least ten times, the fifth sentence must use the words “yes,” “no,” “and,” and “maybe,” and the sixth sentence should include a metaphor or use an example of synesthesia. Then, in twenty minutes, choose one of your opening sentences and expand it into an opening paragraph. The Participants: Anushka, Emma, Allie, Arjun, Aditi, Savi, Josh, Alice, Madeline, Benedetta, Tate, Samantha, Russell, Sofia, Anna From the Sky Emma Hoff, 10 A shadow loomed over the hills, coming closer and attacking the delicate red roses that danced on the grass — all of a sudden everything shivered, and the sun fell in the sky, landing in a mixture of red, orange, and pink on the ground in front of a small house. Along with the sun landed the graceful cloud — eventually a curious human came out of the dwelling, and, with a tentative hand, touched the sun and was burned — they hurried back inside and never came out. The sun, knowing it was not wanted there, alighted upon yellow wings and flew away, for though the sun seemed like a clumsy and broken down car, it could fly quite beautifully if it wanted to — which it often did not. A little girl with blonde braids and a blue sweater waddled like a duck into the welcoming white cloud, and she was the sky which the cloud missed. She slept inside the warm place for a few days and then explored deeper caverns to take shelter from the rainy season. She found a forest and in that forest was a beautiful melody — and all the birds alighted upon her shoulders. A tree waved at her, and she was delighted. The tree took steps towards her, and she took steps towards it, but they were both rooted to the ground. But then she found another room which caught her interest, leaving the forest in dismay. She stepped onto a cold hard floor which spun and danced until she could do nothing but begin to sing, and other explorers entered and watched her notes slowly appear and fade on the wall. And then, all of a sudden she was outside — eventually snow began to fall, and she waited for the cloud to appear again to give her shelter — but it did not, for it had run away, and all she could do was spread her arms out, waiting for warmth.
writing workshop
Writing Workshop #68: Sense of Place
An update from our sixty-eighth Writing Workshop A summary of the workshop held on Saturday, September 17, plus some of the output published below In this workshop, we covered the idea of ‘sense of place.’ The students learned that sense of place is a literary device that not only evokes physical, objective descriptions, but also uses vivid imagery to capture the thoughts and feelings of a character about a certain place. We studied numerous example of sense of place within literature and music, including Jack London’s Call of the Wild and an excerpt from Claire Rinterknecht’s story featured in the March 2020 issue of Stone Soup. Students participated in a brief 5 minute write in which half of the class described a place as a neutral narrator and the other half described a place through the lens of a character. Pearl, Greta, Nami, and Peri all shared their incredible work before we moved into our half-hour writing period, during which Peri, Yueling, Pearl, and Ava read. Overall, we had a blast kicking off this fall semester and look forward to more great work yet to come! The Challenge: Describe a place or a setting in which a story will take place. 1) Describe as the omniscient narrator, like the art director for a movie set description including lighting and mood. OR 2) Write from the point-of-view of a character. This is the skeleton vision of the place (lighting, sound, feeling, etc.) as appropriate to your vision. The Participants: Anya, Ava, Celia, Cora, Greta, Nami, Pearl, Peri, Reethi, Sofia, Yueling Arctic Winter Pearl Coogan, 10 Cold howling wind whipped through my fur, blowing endlessly. The deep snow crunched under my paws, stretching as far as my keen blue eyes could see. Snow-covered mounds that were once grey cliffs rose out of the white sea, not a hint of rock visible on them. Farther beyond the once-cliffs were the towering mountains, also covered in snow that was continuously piling higher and higher. The streams that ran and pulled in spring were now completely frozen over with ice. Everything was beautiful. But like many things, the looks of the tundra didn’t say much about the tundra. I couldn’t see or smell any other animals except the six other wolves in my pack, all of them my relatives. The prey, even the caribou, had disappeared like all the other animals, having hidden in their snow-covered burrows or migrated south. To make it even worse, the falling snow prevented me from seeing far. I was an Arctic wolf living in my Arctic habitat with a thick winter coat, but I was still shivering. The snow, though beautiful, covered up all of the hare’s burrows and even rocks that I could fall and hurt myself on. Hunger, as ruthless as ever, gnawed at my stomach. But I had survived one cruel Arctic winter before and could live through another, even if I wasn’t thriving. “Taiga!” My cousin Icicle called, standing on top of one of the snow-mounds, clearly trying to find prey like me and the rest of my pack. But, unlike me and the pack, she wasn’t a good hunter. At all. “Leave her alone, Icicle! She’s a much better hunter than you,” Icicle’s mother and my father’s younger sister Snowclaw growled. Icicle bowed his small head and padded down from the mound he was standing on. I couldn’t help but feel sorry for him. He was still young with plenty of room to improve his hunting skills and Snowclaw didn’t seem to like him at all. Smelling a wisp of deeply burried hare, I started digging into the endless sea of snow. The smell grew stronger, more vivid, as I dug. Crackly brown grass started to appear, a hole in the middle of it. Lighting up, I started digging in the hole. Surprised yellow eyes glared at me. The snowshoe hare leaped up and started sprinting away from me, but he was tired from his hibernation and wasn’t use to running in such deep snow. My paws pattered on the ground, barely touching the snow before they lifted up. The howling wind was even louder and stronger as I ran, flurries snaking down faster. Suddenly I wasn’t cold anymore. Suddenly the Arctic winter wasn’t as menacing anymore. My sharp fangs sank into the hare’s neck, sinking deeper and deeper. I knew my teeth, once gleaming white, would be stained with blood for days. But I didn’t care. Once I had thought that in the winter, the tundra was a cruel place. A menacing place. An evil place. But now I knew that it wasn’t so terrible. There was still prey but you had to work to find it. There was still warmth but you had to rely on other wolves for it. There was still water but you had to break through the ice to drink it. After all, why would nature make the tundra so cruel that the only good things about were the looks. Holding my head high, I trotted back to my den with my pack following me. My aunt and uncle had brought down a caribou and my brother had caught a bird, so combined with my hare, there would be plenty of food to go around. Maybe not as much as the bounty of prey in spring, but enough to thrive through the not-so-cruel arctic winter. To Let Go Aditi Nair, 14 And I let go. It happened to be a fall much similar to the ones I’ve seen on T.V, and I was ready–well, sort of ready. The adrenaline came to me like a lightning bolt, but I know that this was the best scenario, if any at all. It felt like the world was racing to greet me on all sides, and everything
Saturday Newsletter: September 17, 2022
Homepage Redesign A note from Emma W00d If you haven’t visited our website recently—we’re thrilled to announce that our homepage has had a major redesign! Sophia, William, and I have been working on the design for the past few months and are so happy it’s now live. It’s elegant, streamlined, and best of all, allows us to feature some of the best artwork we’ve published over the years. As many of you know, we are making a big push to get Stone Soup back into school classrooms and libraries and we hope this beautiful new homepage will help. We are also eagerly awaiting the launch of our redesigned magazine page, which will make the digital subscription a much more satisfying experience. It’s currently in development, so stay tuned! Relatedly, this year, we re-evaluated our privacy practices and ended up making some privacy-related changes to the digital and print magazines. First, we decided to remove all contributor headshots from the digital issue so that they would no longer be available to the casual internet browser. However, we knew from talking to some of our contributors that seeing the faces of their peers was powerful, so we ultimately decided to keep these headshots in the print issue. Digital subscribers will also find them in the PDF version of the magazine (which is always behind a paywall). Second, we’ve removed specific location information from both the print and digital versions of the magazine. Whereas we used to include the name of the city or town each contributor was from, you will now just see the state, province, or country listed for each contributor. We’d love to hear your thoughts on these changes and if there are any others you think it would be valuable to implement. My best, Fall classes have begun! Both writing workshops start today and will run weekly through December 3rd. Book Club’s first session is Saturday, September 24th, 2022 and meets on the last Saturday of each month through November. If you are new to our creative programs, our classes are for motivated readers and writers ages 8–14. Attendees will find a community of like-minded peers that share an enthusiasm and passion for writing and literature, and will develop writing and critical thinking skills at a more sophisticated level than you are likely to get in school. You can learn more about each class below or by visiting our Eventbrite page. All Stone Soup subscribers get a 20% discount on our courses, applied at checkout, and you can sign up for as many or as few sessions as you would like! You may additionally try classes at no risk. If, after attending a few sessions you want to drop, write to education@stonesoup.com, and we will give you a full refund. Please also write to us if the classes present a financial difficulty for your family. We want to make it possible for any student to participate in our programs, regardless of situation. William’s Group: At 9 a.m. Pacific Time the first three Saturdays of each month, our founder William will teach his normal workshop. This leaves the last Saturday of the month for attendees to be part of the Book Club. He will continue to teach his conceptual approach to writing. Conner’s Group: At 11 a.m. Pacific Time every week, Conner Bassett will teach a workshop focusing on the nuts-and-bolts of writing. Conner teaches writing at Albright College and has experience teaching younger writers—he is a poet and translator in addition to being a brilliant instructor. Book Club with Maya Mahony continues to meet on the last Saturday of the month at 9 a.m. Pacific Time, so that those enrolled in either writing workshop can attend. You must sign up separately for Book Club. The books being discussed this term are: The Time of Green Magic by Hilary MacKay, Front Desk by Kelly Yang, and Flora and Ulysses by Kate DiCamillo. 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.
