NILE 2017

Creative Writing

for

Students and Teachers

Alan Maley

yelamoo@yahoo.co.uk

Something to nibble on while you wait:

This lyfe so short, the crafte so long to learn. Chaucer.

Poetry is that which arrives at the intellect by way of the heart. R.S.Thomas.

A story is a candle lit against the dark.

…linguistic creativity is not simply a property of exceptional people but an exceptional property of all people. Ron Carter.

Poetry: ‘Dancing in chains’ Tang Chinese.

Poetry: ‘Articulate energy’ Donald Davie

What is Creative Writing?

• Self discipline

• Playful engagement with language

• Close/accurate observation

• Use of imagination,memories, dreams,

experiences, visualisation – associations

• Figurative language

• Sensitivity to sound patterns

Expository / Creative Writing

Instrumental Aesthetic

Facts Imagination

External control Internal discipline

Conventions Stretching rules

Logical Intuitive

Analytical Associative

Impersonal Personal

Thinking mode Feeling + thinking mode

Appeal to the intellect Appeal to the senses

Avoidance of ambiguity Creation of multiple

meanings

Some Ideas.

1. Hello / Goodbye

Hello paper.

Goodbye trees.

Hello honey.

Goodbye money.

Stem poems.

2. I love the way…

I love the way you do your hair.

I love the way you sit and stare…

Loneliness is…

I wonder why…

It’s funny how…

Some other possible stems/ starter sentences

If I could live my life over

again,

I’d talk less and love more.

I’d be less hygienic, etc.

When I get older I shall…

It is possible that…

It is not likely that…

I know what…

where…

when…

how…

why…

who…

But I don’t know…

3. Acrostics and such like.

(N) Ducks

(V) Dive

(Adv)Dangerously.

Try another animal.

*************

Living

Energy

Active

Force.

Try another short word.

Try a name.

4. 9-word story poems.

He

loved her,

then found out,

so he

left.

Try 16-words.

My

brother’s wife

ran off with

my sister’s first husband.

They all re-married-

playing Happy

Families.

A variation:

Tell your life story in 10 words.

eg.

Born,

Then remained a child

Had fun.

Had pain.

Died.

5. Strange partners. In pairs, student A makes a vertical list of 12 adjectives. Student B makes a similar list of 12 nouns. They do not show their lists. They put their lists together and make Adj-N phrases. They then combine these into a text.

A B

fragile cat

fast tree

open wife

painful handbag

etc.

6. Questions to Nature.

First each S formulates two unusual questions to nature. eg.

Do trees dream?

Can fish think?

In groups of 4 they try to combine their questions into a short poem.

Do fish sleep?

Do trees dream?

Can whales sing?

Can roses scream?

Do snakes blink?

Can horses pray?

Can oysters think?

Can worms play?

7. Giving orders.

Ss write orders to a natural or inanimate object. eg.

Rose, don’t die.

Nose, don’t blow.

They then combine their orders into a short poem. eg.

Rose, don’t die.

Hot dog, please fry.

Clock, go slow.

Nose, don’t blow…etc.

8. Rhyme time

a) Make a list of all the words that rhyme with

Pay.

Do the same for words that rhyme with – High.

b) In pairs or groups, write sentences ending with

the words in the lists.

c) Make a selection of 12 sentences: 6 for each

rhyme, and combine them into a short poem

rhyming a,b,a,b.

9. Names into Characters

a) Write out two names of people in the group in two columns.

b) Below each name write 2 nouns, 2 verbs and 2 adjectives.

These words should be connected with the person named and

start with the first letter of the name. eg

Alan Jaya

artist/author joke/jacket

act/analyse jump/ jerk

ambitious/ angry jealous/juvenile

c) Write a short text about the person using the words chosen. eg.

Alan is an author not an artist. He prefers to act rather than to

analyse. He used to be ambitious; now he is angry.

10. Bucket lists.

Make a list of all the things you want to do before you die. Then combine them into a short poem. e.g.

After getting rid of my books,

And making peace with everyone,

I shall lose weight

By becoming a hermit

(just for a while!)

On a Scottish island,

Return home to find my son has children –

Then re-read the whole of Shakespeare,(on my Kindle)

And die in my bed with a bottle of champagne,

And be forgiven.

11. Mini-sagas.

Write a story in exactly 50 words (excluding title)

Mistaken identity.

A hunter in Africa helped an elephant

by taking a thorn out of its foot.

The elephant lifted his trunk then ran off.

Years later in a zoo, the man noticed an elephant lifting its trunk.

He remembered Africa,

went towards it ~

it crushed him to death.

Wrong bloody elephant!

12. Cinquain

2,4,6,8,2 syllables per line. First and last word related.

Breakfast

All those fried eggs,

And gallons of coffee:

Cholesterol! Diabetes!

Lunchtime.

Grammar poem:

N, Adj + adj, vb-ing + adv., Like…., If only…

Eagle.

Strong and powerful.

Flying effortlessly

Like a leaf in the wind..

If only I could join you.

13. You are… Guided poem

You are mango ice-cream (food)

You are a cool breeze.(weather)

You are a shady palm tree.(tree)

You are dawn. (time of day)

You are a sailing boat. (vehicle)

You are comfortable shoes.(clothing)

You are jasmine. (flower)

You are a soft gamelan. (music)

You are light blue (colour)

You are a playful kitten. (animal)

You are my friend.

14. Metaphor poem

Hope a spoon

Life a knife

Marriage an egg

Love a brush

Anger a window

Disappointment a mirror

Work a banana

Happiness a rope

Time a bus

Hate a cup

Fear an alarm-clock

Ss make up 3 metaphors by randomly combining words from each column.

Anger is an alarm-clock.

Work is a rope. etc

They then choose ONE of their metaphors. They add 2 lines to explain the metaphor:

Marriage is a banana:

when you’ve eaten the fruit,

Only the skin is left.

Love is an egg.

Take good care

Not to break it.

15. Word Array

he in me

sent I most

parks anyway was

of never flowers

silence took wrote

it said what

letters restaurants how

to cannot love

spoke we remember

met but

16. Permutate the sentence:

Nobody knows the woman he loves

~ re-write the sentence in as many ways as possible simply by changing the order of the words:

eg. Nobody loves the woman he knows.

~ Arrange your new sentences into a poem. Three lines to a stanza will work well.

17. Anglo-SaxonAlliterative Verse.

Has to have lines in two parts. Four main beats per line. First 3 beats start with the same consonant sound.

eg. The wind wailing, wild the trees.

Try taking a theme word (sea, rain, night, dreams, etc.) and writing 4 lines in this style on that theme.

These heavy-hipped, heaving waves,

The salt spray, stinging the eyes.

The dark deeps, down under us,

Bottomless black, below our ship.

Variation: To lead up to the Anglo-Saxon form, start with a list of nouns. eg.

Milk, Books, Rain, Moon, etc.

Choose one noun and write a sentence related to it with 4 alliterating

words. eg.

Milk: Cool cups of creamy comfort.

Rain: Drizzling, dripping, dribbling drops.

Moon: Shining shyly with a shimmering sheen.

18. Mining a text.

Milmaq was a solitary person. He would spend hours in the forest, not hunting, simply sitting still, watching, waiting for something to happen. A spider would swing its thread across the canyon between two branches. A woodpecker would drum at the trunk of a chestnut tree, its neck a blur of speed. Above all, the trees themselves would speak to him. He would be aware of them creaking and swaying in the wind. He could sense the sap rising in them in the springtime; feel their sorrow at the approach of winter. If he put his ear to the trunk of a tree, he could hear it growing, very slowly; feel it moving towards its final, magnificent shape.

(The Man Who Talked to Trees. Alan Maley)

19. Hiawatha.

And the lovely Laughing Water

Seemed more lovely as she stood there

Neither willing nor reluctant.

As she went to Hiawatha,…

Use the metre of Longfellow’s poem to write a poem about something

mundane – making tea, writing a letter, etc.

First I take the pure white paper,

Think of words to send my message,

With my Parker shape the letters,

Make the first black marks upon it.

etc.

20. Old tune, new words

(to the tune of Frere Jacques)

Salt and pepper,

Salt and pepper

On my fries.

On my fries.

Add a squeeze of lemon.

Add a squeeze of lemon.

Nice surprise.

Nice surprise.

Humpty Dumpty)

Fatty the Banker.

Made cash on the side

Fatty the banker

Took folks for a ride.

All the poor women

And all the poor men

Lost all their savings

Again and again.

21. Same idea, different theme.

6 Ways of looking at a pen. (Homage to Wallace Stevens)

A black torpedo

Full of words

Aimed at your heart.

Her juices have dried up.

Now she waits for an organ transplant.

Gathering dust on a desk,

She has been passed over

For a newer love…

The sleek and seductive

computer.

She dreams of paper

To prick,

To stab,

To scratch,

To stroke

Into meaning.

This warm hand

Connects her

To my thoughts.

In the exam room

She suddenly dries up.

Some ideas for generating poems.

• Form poems: haiku, cinquain, clerihew, limerick, sonnet, villanelle, acrostic, quatrain, diamond poems. etc.

• Stem poems:

eg. I used to be…but now

When I …I always feel.

I remember what/

where/when/how

• Grammar poems (questions, exclamations, statements, comparisons, opposites )

• Function poems (apologies, praise, grief, disappointment, etc.)

• Poems based on rhyme schemes / rhythmic patterns.

• Poems based on pictures, music, sound sequences.

• Poems based on close observation (objects, buildings, people, trees, flowers, food, etc.)

• Poems based on the five senses (and synaesthesia)

• Poems based on the elements (rain, wind etc.)

• Poems based on memories, dreams, etc.

• Poems based on models (including songs)

• Poems based on stories.

• Poems based on random principle

• Poems based on pair/group work.

Writing Poems: What to Avoid.

• Sentimentality. (not greeting card poems!)

• Facile rhyme just for the sake of rhyming.

• Self-consciously ‘poetic’ vocabulary and syntax.

• Letting it all hang out!

• Flaccid language: make every word work.

Why are stories so important?

• They are universal.

• They are what makes us human.

• They help make sense of the world.

• They are a teaching tool.

• They offer a parallel world.

• They help develop life skills.

• They show us we are not alone.

• They bind groups together.

• They are intensely enjoyable.

Why are stories important for Language Teaching?

• Stimulate imagination visualization, inner voice

• Encourage love of language

• Facilitate memorization

• Focus on meaning

• Aid fluency in 4 skills

• Offer varied content

• Cultural input

• Affective engagement

• Socialization through shared experience

• ‘Natural’ (not like lectures)

• Cheap/easy to prepare.

• Exposure / Use /Motivation (Willis 1996)

The main components of stories

• Plot (what happens)

• Setting (where and when it happens: the background against which it unfolds)

• Characterisation (who are the protagonists in the story)

• Dialogue (what characters say and how they say it.)

• Point of View (through whose eyes / words do we see/hear the story?)

• Time (the period of time over which the story unfolds, and the sequence of episodes)

• Titles, Beginnings, Endings.

Very short story

It’s very hard to live in a studio

apartment in San Jose with a man who’s

learning to play the violin.’ That’s what

she told the police when she handed

them the empty revolver.

Richard Brautigan

Very short story 2.

The Reunion

September 11th: Diane boards the LA plane.

He reads her “Goodbye John” mail that morning. Staring blankly from his office window he sees a plane on the Manhattan skyline.

Though he is not a religious man, he prays that she’ll return to him. And in a twist of irony, even the prayers of city lawyers are answered sometimes.

Michael Lawrie

Hemingway story text In Our Times

• All the shutters of the hospital were nailed shut.

• When they fired the first volley he was sitting down in the water with his head on his knees.

• There were pools of water in the courtyard.

• They tried to hold him up against the wall but he sat down in a puddle of water.

• One of the ministers was sick with typhoid.

• Two soldiers carried him downstairs and out into the rain.

• There were wet dead leaves on the paving of the courtyard.

• Finally, the officer told the soldiers it was no good trying to make him stand up.

• They shot the cabinet ministers at half past nine in the morning against the wall of a hospital.

• It rained hard.

• The other five stood very quietly against the wall.

Why Creative Writing?

• Language development

• Fostering ‘playfulness’

• Self-discovery through exploration/risk

• Drawing on affect

• Increased motivation from confidence/self-esteem

• Creative writers = Creative readers

• CW helps improve Expository Writing.

Creative Writing for Teachers: Why?

• Keeps their English growing and fresh.

• Counteracts staleness. Brings them back to

life

• Makes them more interesting to be around.

• Feeds into their own teaching: a better

writing teacher.

CW Intersects with Current Issues

• Role of NNS teacher

• Importance of Affect (Arnold)

• Visualization (Tomlinson)

• ‘Noticing’ (Schmidt)

• Multiple Intelligences (Gardner)

• Motivation (Dornyei)

• ER (Day, Krashen et al)

• Teaching of Expository Writing (Maley)

• Creativity theory (Boden, Carter)

Creative Writing: some books.

• Fry, Stephen (2007) The Ode Less Travelled. London: Arrow Books.

• Koch, Kenneth (1990) Rose, where did you get that red? New York: Vintage

Books.

• Maley, Alan and Jayakaran Mukundan. (2011) Writing Poems: a resource book

for teachers of English. Petaling Jaya: Pearson Longman

• Maley, Alan and Jayakaran Mukundan (2011) Writing Stories: A resource book

for teachers of English. Petaling Jaya: Pearson Longman.

• Matthews, Paul (1994) Sing Me the Creation. Stroud: Hawthorne Press.

• Ayn Rand (2000) The Art of Fiction: A guide for writers and readers. New York:

Plume (Penguin)

• Spiro, Jane (2004) Creative Poetry Writing. Oxford: Oxford UniversityPress.

• Spiro, Jane (2006) Storybuilding. Oxford: Oxford University Press.

• Whitworth, John (2001) Writing Poetry. London: A and C Black

• Wright, Andrew and David S.Hill (2009) Writing Stories. Innsbruck: Helbling

Why I Write: A Personal View

• To give shape to confusion

• To sharpen observation

• To discover unexpected

connections/associations

• To explore the limits of my language

• To be more alive and alert.

Thank you

for

your participation.

Alan Maley

yelamoo@yahoo.co.uk

http://thecreativitygroup.weebly.com