“Critters”Hand-Colored Zoological Photomicrographs by Ernst Heeger, courtesy of Hans Kraus Gallery An update from our forty-first Writing Workshop A summary of the workshop held on Saturday May 15, plus some of the output published below We started this week’s workshop with a visit to New York! Photography expert Hans Kraus showed us around his Park Avenue gallery, sharing a selection of the beautiful nineteenth-century photographic drawings composed from insect parts, microscope magnifications, and even prints made from living material in the gallery’s current exhibition, called “Critters.” One of the key images from this show was William’s jumping off point for this class. We looked at the photograph – composed of wing scales from a Hawk Moth – considering how the similar but slightly different shaped and coloured objects in the image relate to each other, or not; how groups and sub-groups might form and interact depending on how we look at or think about it. We moved through examples of writing from a previous class by Georgia Marshall, as well as Virginia Woolf and Jane Austen, and listed to a quartet from Fidelio, all of which presented multiple characters in different, sometimes parallel, interactions with one another in different group formations. The Challenge: Write a piece from the perspective of 3-5 characters. They might appear in a single group, multiple groups or alone; they could be interacting, avoiding interaction, moving away from one another. The Participants: Peri, Lena DN, Maddie, Gia, Madeline K, Pranjoli, Reese, Margaret, Wesley, Julia, Rachael, Chelsea, Jaya, Lena A, Mia, Delight, Lina, Helen, Hanbei, Peter, Sage, Sierra, Mahika, Anna K, Audrey, Angela, Jonathan, Grace, Charlotte, Iago, Nova, Madeline, Nami. Lina Kim, 11Weston, FL Alone in the Wind Lina Kim, 11 As I walked home from school, I glanced at the kids outside, playing basketball and soccer and baseball somehow all combined into one game. They called it ‘basketbasesoccball’. For a second one girl saw me watching and I quickly shifted my gaze away, looking down at the sidewalk covered in chalk drawings. I pretended to be interested in them, trying to push the girl’s attention away from me, but instead she walked up to me. “Hey, do you wanna join us?” she asked. I stood there, paralyzed. I’d always tried to hide in the shadows—but here, there was no shade, not a single tree. The only shelter from the beating sun was on the bench with the covering—which was inside of the basketbasesoccball court. With people sitting on it. I shuddered at the very thought. Sweat trickled down my forehead, but not from the heat. “Robin?” she asked. I flinched at my name. “No thanks,” I managed quietly. She stared at me for a minute, then shrugged, getting back to the game. I watched as they laughed and played, shooting hoops and kicking balls into the net and making home runs. I’d always been invisible. I looked around at the barren earth around the school. There wasn’t a single plant—not a shrub, not a blade of grass, not even a weed. I’d always wanted to do something about the lack of nature. Instead of staying any longer and risking someone talking to me, I headed straight towards my house. It wasn’t exactly home. Nothing felt like home to me. It was just a house. My house. No, my mom and dad’s house. They cared about me, but they just didn’t go about it the right way. They tried to get me to be out in the world, out in the sunlight, when I’d rather be sitting in the shadows of a large redwood tree in the middle of the forest, drinking in pure nature. I reached a small forest. It wasn’t exactly a forest, just a place full of grass and trees, and it was really small. Still, I made a split second choice. I looked both ways and ran into the wilderness. I decided to climb a tree. I hadn’t done that in years, ever since I fell from one at four years old and broke my right arm. But that was seven years ago. I put my foot in a small dent in the bark and pulled myself up into the middle, where the trunk split into several branches. It was a nice hidden place. Suddenly a large gust of wind swooped around me, somehow grabbing me and throwing me into the air. A tornado? A hurricane? I reached wildly, trying to grab a branch to hold onto, but I was too far. The wind swept me into the sky. I felt myself dissolving into the wind, becoming part of it. I scrambled desperately in the air, but soon I was only wind. No one would remember me. I was invisible. And I still am. Forever. Sometimes I still wish I could go back, make friends. But I know I will always be part of the wind. Immortal. But sometimes I didn’t want to be. What was the point of never dying when there was never anyone to keep you company? Even if I could be seen, if I was still immortal, they would just move on and I would be left, friendless once more. Alone in the wind. Anna Ko, 11Saint Louis, MO The Midnight of our Friendship Anna Ko, 11 They were happy and content. They had all they needed. Three friends together. But their bond wasn’t that simple. Their bond had its ups and downs, like the tide. Sometimes, they would click. They would understand and know just what to do. But sometimes, they were annoying as the squirrels and rabbits which continued to terrorize their garden, always huddling around to see how they could help the other. But never, never, had they ever had such a situation. When they were young, they had first met. But as they grew up their interests started to differ, and they argued more. They had their moments, but slowly, over time, it just started to collapse like a half-demolished unkempt structure. No one noticed
writing workshop
Writing Workshop #40: Ghosts (Part Two)
An update from our fortieth Writing Workshop A summary of the workshop held on Saturday May 8, plus some of the output published below This week, William completed the journey to the spirit world that we started last week. Inspired by the Victorian-era spirit drawings of Georgian Houghton, the group considered ways of using the idea of the inspiration of spirits in writing, as a way of communicating between the living and the dead. We thought about various means people use to stay in touch with their ancestors, from home shrines to seances, and the different ways spirit manifest themselves in stories. We watched a video of a Hawaiian storyteller telling a story about a haunted condominium, ending with the classic words “and the story is true”, and discussed Augustine the Samburu blacksmith’s story of a baby that turns out to be a ghost. We read a section from Dickens’ A Christmas Carol, as Scrooge sees the strange, form-shifting spirit appear before him; and considered the role of the haunted house in many traditional ghost stories. We watched a beautifully animated (with shadow puppets) performance of Schubert’s setting of Goethe’s ErlKonig by the Oxford Leider, and looked at one of the earliest recorded zombie stories (Ishtar). Finally, with a woodcut from Hokusai, William reminded the group that spirits can take many forms… The Challenge: Write a scene, story or poem with a connection to ghosts, spirits or the spirit world. What does the spirit world bring to your story? OR, try some spirit writing. The Participants: Peri, Lena DN, Maddie, Gia, Leo, Madeline K, Pranjoli, Reese, Margaret, Wesley, Julia, Rachael, Chelsea, Jaya, Lena A, Mia, Delight, Lina, Helen, Hanbei, Peter, Sage, Sierra, Mahika, Anna K, Audrey, Angela, Tilly, Jonathan, Grace, Charlotte, Iago, Nova. Peri Gordon, 11Sherman Oaks, CA My Shame By Peri Gordon, 11 Whistle, whistle. They inhabit me like I am some sort of haunted medieval fortress. Whoosh. One of them darts through one of my walls and into the well-furnished but dust-covered room where the young girl once spent her time making beautiful sketches before her death of sickness in that same room. Another ghost haunts the stairs, where the girl’s father met his own end in a fatal accident. And yet another lurks in the former office of the girl’s mother, where she privately ended her own life. Whiz. Each spirit was once alive. One of them was the girl. One was the father, one the mother. They all died too soon, and that thought keeps them here, passionate grief scorching their minds and hearts. They are each so caught up in their own misery that they do not notice each other’s ghosts, only their own. I was once a place of happiness, the cheerful, stylish, modern home for a family of three. Now I am a place of despair, a ghost habitat. People come outside, snapping photos and gossiping about what went on inside me. Even those who do not believe there are ghosts are prevented by others from coming inside me. Most of them know that the ghosts are, indeed, here. There is a mansion across the street, looking more old-fashioned than I ever have. That would make a good haunted house. But no; I am the haunted one. The home across the street is filled with happy people, happy rooms, happy memories. But I am desperate. Whistle, whistle. I summon all the energy that being haunted provides me. Whoosh. Power and adrenaline build up inside me like fuel for a car. Whiz. I send the spirits soaring out of me and into the home on the other side of the road. I am free from being haunted. Let the suffering be transferred to somewhere else. I have held the burden of being shunned and isolated for long enough. It is another home’s turn. It only takes a few days for the family to move out. Hope rises inside of me. But they do not come here. People don’t know I am no longer haunted. In fact, they believe I have spread the ghost disease, and that now both the other house and I are haunted. Most people leave the neighborhood, never to return again. And the ghosts, missing their old spaces, return to me. Well, that backfired. Perhaps I really am haunted, not just because of the spirits I contain but because I have a wicked soul. Maybe seeing the deaths truly changed me, for I have become immeasurably evil, so evil that I would try to inflict my suffering onto another to free myself. I am despicable. And now that the neighborhood’s inhabitants have left, I am even more lonely than I was before. Lina Kim, 11Weston, FL Stars By Lina Kim, 11 That was the last thing I saw before I faded into the darkness, the dust of those who have fallen. But then, how am I still in the world of those alive? My country has changed much since the war. My people are no longer enslaved. But at times, we are mistreated. There was an incident with a man named George Floyd nearly a year ago. I’d lived with these people for over a century, watching as our society changed. Everything is so advanced now. I had scoped out the woods for a perfect resting place. There, I would not be disturbed. Until the day I was. As I hovered, formless, above a fallen log, I saw a flash of light and heard a short click. Without thinking, I rushed towards it. “Wow, this is a perfect place for—” started a voice. It was a girl, holding what I had learned was called a smartphone. “What are you doing here?” I asked in my deepest, most threatening voice. She jumped in fright and whipped her head around. “W-what?! Who’s there?” she stuttered. “Leave,” I growled. She took off running in the other direction. I sighed. Finally, peace again. I decided to explore the woods. After several hours of aimless floating,
How Stories Work-Writing Workshop #3: Lightness
An update from the third Writing Workshop with Conner Bassett A summary of the Workshop held on Saturday May 1, plus some of the output published below Lightness is a “lightening of language whereby meaning is conveyed through a verbal texture that seems weightless, until the meaning itself takes on the same rarefied consistency.” -Italo Calvino “My working method has more often than not involved the subtraction of weight. I have tried to remove weight, sometimes from people, sometimes from heavenly bodies, sometimes from cities; above all I have tried to remove weight from the structure of stories and from language” -Italo Calvino For this week’s Writing Workshop, Conner first asked us to consider his original lecture of Good vs. Evil (now split in to two parts) as “Lightness vs. Heaviness,” this week’s focus being Lightness. In order to introduce the two modes, Conner offered a primary juxtaposition of Don Quixote and Hamlet Don Quixote being the quintessential example of Lightness, and Hamlet the quintessential example of Heaviness. “Heavy” characters were noted to be brooding, philosophical, intense, opaque, emotionally closed, and characterized as scheming and calculating; on the other hand, “light” characters were noted be agile, quick, cunning, witty, lighthearted, whimsical, emotionally open, and characterized by action. At this point of the lecture we moved into strictly discussing lightness, first focusing on the character of Perseus, who “moves according to the pattern of the wind and clouds” as an embodiment of lightness. Peter Pan and Robin Hood were also discussed as iterations of Perseus. Next, using Milton’s funny and charismatic figure of Satan in Paradise Lost, we discussed how a quote on quote “evil” character could embody lightness, too. Another example of a character embodying lightness was Scheherezade from A Thousand and One Nights, as we noted her ability to think quickly on her feet and tell stories, and the fact that the stories she told were in themselves examples of Lightness—stories about flying carpets, winged horses, genies, magic, love and romance, and about characters like her: witty, smooth, fast talking characters of action. Following our discussion of Lightness in characters, we moved into a discussion of Lightness in painting, music and literature, beginning with three paintings: Magritte’s The Castle of Pyrenees, Malevich’s White on White, and Turner’s Norham Castle, Sunrise. We also listened to Mozart’s “Piano Concerto No. 21 and Stan Getz’s “The Girl from Ipanema” to set a mood of Lightness. Finally, we discussed the Lightness evident in the haikus of Japanese poet Kobayashi Issa, William Carlos Williams’ “The Red Wheelbarrow,” and Gertrude Stein’s poem, “A Dog.” The Challenge: First answer what “lightness” means to you. Write one of the following prompts: 1) Write about a character who exemplifies lightness; 2) Write a story that makes the reader feel “light;” 3) Write a description of a place that uses all the elements of lightness we discussed in class (lighthearted, whimsical, effortless, or emotionally open). The Participants: Emma, Josh, Svitra, Georgia, Liam, Helen, Sophie, Anya, Simran, Jackson, Sena, Sinan, Olivia, Aditi, Lucy, Harine, Isolde, Audrey, Alice, Sasha, Noa, and Julia. Emma Hoff, 9Bronx, NY Fear of Drowning Emma Hoff, 9 I was flying. It felt like I was floating on the water, but this time without sinking in, without coming up coughing and spitting. I didn’t know how to fly, but I didn’t know how to swim either. Flying was easier, though, because when the wind lifted me up, it didn’t feel like a hurricane. It didn’t feel like a menacing and strong wind, because it was lightly tossing me onto the fluffiest air ever, and suddenly I was floating. I was hoping somewhere my family would be floating. And I knew they probably were somewhere, flying, feeling the most comfortable they had ever felt. And as the wind carried me away, I fell asleep. I woke up, and there was no more soft air. I was in the hurricane again, and I was being swirled and tossed, like fruit in a blender. Somehow, I was enjoying it, because while I was floating, a tiny pocket of my brain had been thinking, This isn’t right. This isn’t real. And when I stopped floating, when I just started being tossed around in the hurricane I realized that if the flying wasn’t real, then my family was probably gone. Helpless. Scared. And here I was, unable to help them. And then I was falling. The hurricane tossed me towards the ground and I was sailing down… until I stopped. And I realized I was with the sun. And it was real, even though it seemed like it wasn’t. And the sun said, “Are you lost?” And I wanted to scream. I wanted to tell the sun that I wasn’t lost, that a stupid hurricane had taken me away from my family. But I couldn’t speak. The sun somehow tossed me inside of it, and when I was inside I saw infinite space. And a lot of people. Everyone. My family, my friends, people I didn’t know. And then we were pushed through the other side of the sun, and we seemed to be in our world. I suddenly forgot about the trials of the hurricane, and how I was just tossed into the sun. I didn’t care, because at that moment I was happy. And I felt like I was floating… for real. Isolde Knowles, 9New York, NY 10 Days Isolde Knowles, 9 10 days. That was how long I’d been in heaven. Heaven was just like people thought of it as. The whole area is up in the clouds above all the souls still tethered down there. Yet still I yearn for the sense of unpredictability you have on earth. And now I start to wonder if I’m thinking about this wrong. Maybe that tether that keeps you down there isn’t stopping you but saving you. Heaven is a beautiful hell. Aditi Nair, 13Midlothian, VA Fly Aditi Nair, 13 Bouncing off the white fluffs, she went into the air. Gliding and soaring with the expressionless winds. Gliding
