Journal 12?

Jeeze its been a while since I've been here! This semester really just flew by. Anyways, as far as play writing is concerned...

I'm still working on making believable dialogue, and making my characters sound like different people. So far the only real way I am accomplishing this is by having one character use more contractions than the other; which is working, but my one character sounds far too proper to be believable. Also, I think I'm going to write my play in such a fashion that it is never really clear if my main character has super strength; but that is can be argued effectively for both cases. I feel this will make the story a bit more interesting as well as more "realistic", (as realistic as super strength can be anyways). The more I think about it though, the more I feel if I take this path, I will have to end up killing my main character to keep the wonder going. I mean lets face it, the longer he is alive, the greater the odds of his super strength becoming more apparent. For a moment I thought I could make him mysteriously disappear in some accident, but I feel that's too hard to work in without being too cliche.

Journal 8?

I have mixed feelings about this current unit. I love poetry and have always admired it. I think this may be because poetry can have a set structure or formula, which is a step closer to my comfort zone of scientific writing. In my first poem of this unit I did not take advantage of any particular structure however. Rather I tried to have it be a bit more free verse and expressive. I was slightly influenced by this particular poem, http://vimeo.com/9526797. The second poem I thought I would enjoy writing due to the requirement of structure and meter; boy was I mistaken. In my head I was hoping to make a beat poem, as inspired by http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=V0W7Jbc_Vhw. So much for that! My goal was to write at least a page of iambic pentameter, but it didn't take me long to realize that writing even 5 successive lines was a near impossible feat. Even once I had done that, I realized I was losing the message I was trying to convey by trying to keep the correct emphasis and syllable number. I thought I would sleep on it and read it the next day; that was a mistake. When I reread what I had, the way I read it I realized I had reversed the stressed/ unstressed pattern I though I had. Not only that, I realized that for many of my lines, I had ended with 2 stressed syllables. One thing is for sure, I could really use that divine intervention from the god whom this blog is named after!

Journal 5

Wow... I can't believe I've missed two of these entries. Well I guess I'll just continue the "journal" count with where it's supposed to be; journal 5. Anyways!

Man, and I thought creative non-fiction was hard. I’ve spoken in my first journal entry about how I felt out of my comfort zone in this class, but then after a few classes I more or less acclimated to the environment; or so I thought. Having to write a fiction piece I found myself once again knocked on my ass. Not so say that the reading did not help me out with getting started, but keeping the momentum going as far as writing is concerned was very difficult. I kept finding myself thinking, “Ok… what do I want to happen next…” After extensive thought I would type something down, only to reread it, shortly followed by deleting what I had just typed and cursing at myself for writing something so dumb. Even the next “chapter” I’m writing seems to be just as hard as the first. I’ll probably find my niche right before we move onto the next unit. HA!

Journal 2

It was interesting to see how everyone else treated the personal narrative assignment. Each person who presented seemed to take it in a different direction as far as style is concerned. My favorites of those who presented were My First Funeral, First Cigarette, and My First Drink. My First Funeral did a great job with telling a story believably form the perspective of a 6 year old child. Hearing that narrative made me think more critically about my own narrative which is supposed to occur around the same age. I enjoyed First Cigarette because many of the descriptions took me back to moments in life. I always appreciate it when a writer can evoke a flood of memories or emotions. My First Drink does a great job at telling a story, without actually telling too much of what actually happened. Overall, these stories have qualities which I myself want to incorporate into my own work.

Journal 1

Never before have I experienced so much terror over a class. I am so far out of my comfort zone with this class, I actually believe jumping out of a plane would be less stressful. Let me explain, I identify myself as a man of science. That being said, I view the world around me through the lens of formulas and logic. The world of science communicates and writes in a very structured manner. Creative writing? No formulas? No charts? No data? What am I left with?!

Now right around now your probably thinking, "If he's so terrified, why did he take this class to begin with?"; and that's a fair question. Truth is I've always wanted to be a better writer. I'm pretty well versed in many sciences, as well as have, (had), some artistic talent- but my ability to write and even speak is shaky at best. Even as short as this blog is- I've been working on it for far too long just to make sure my thoughts are flowing in a way that people can understand them.

P.S. In case you were wondering, Bragi is the Norse god of poetry. In fact, some tales regarding him say that he spoke in poems all the time. Who better to ask divine intervention from!