[Prompt] May 26 – Dramatic Monologue

Aren’t there times when you wish you could just say your piece without anyone interrupting you? Well, today’s the day — for your protagonist, at least.

Write A Dramatic Monologue

Have your protagonist tell their story out loud, in a self-aware way. Make it clear that they know they have an audience – whether or not you spell out why. (Perhaps they’re telling their story to the first police officer on the scene, perhaps they’re talking to a grown-up grandchild, or recording their story for StoryCorp’s National Archives project). You can have them refer to the reason, or simply ramble on.

Make it clear that this is their story and that no-one is going to interrupt, then let them go.

  • Will your protagonist be scrupulously honest, or portray herself in a good light, her enemies in a bad light? Will that be subtle or blindingly obvious?
  • Will your hero use humor? What emotions will he betray?
  • Does the language your character use tell us something about their personality, their upbringing, their age?

Go!

[Prompt] May 25 – Shifting Perspectives

Today’s prompt is a little different. It’s going to show you just how much difference Point of View can made.

Rewrite A Story From A Different Perspective

Take a story that you have written (either this month or at some other point) and rewrite it from a different point of view. If it was third person, limited, try making it first person, or third person omniscient. What new avenues of empathy does that open up for you? What new language can you use (see this article for useful examples).

You can choose to rewrite someone else’s story for this exercise (as long as you promise not to try to get it published and get yourself — and me — for breach of copyright for producing unauthorized derivative works) but it’s better to try this with one of your own. I’m not actually terribly worried about us getting sued. It’s just that rewriting one of your own will show you just how much the same story, written from a different point of view, changes even when written by the same person.

I strongly suggest choosing a story you are already happy with, for this exercise. If you already love the story, you’re much more likely to enjoy playing with it from a different point of view. Or you might hate doing it, but remember: you’re not deleting anything. You’re just doing an exercise.

Go!

[Prompt] May 24 – Epistolary

Not quite a POV today, but still playing with character and point of view, today’s prompt is a secret love of mine:

Write an Epistolary Story

I’ve always loved stories played out through letters  – though now you can tell these stories in emails, phone texts, even Facebook updates and Tweets if you want to update the form. (Here’s an example from the very first StoryADay May, written by Amanda Makepeace).

You can write this as a series of exchanges between two or more people, or as letters, diary entries, or text messages from a single person (as in Amanda’s story).

  • What if you discovered a cache of letters in the attic of a house you just bought. What would be in the one-sided conversation?What would be missing?
  • What if you were a 13 year old who has finally got  on to Facebook?
  • What if you were an increasingly-enraged citizen writing letters to the editor of your small-town newspaper?
  • What if you were caught in a flame war in an online forum and all we, the reader, get to see is what goes on the screen?

Go!

[Prompt] May 23 – Third Person, Omniscient

Continuing this week’s theme of POV prompts, here is today’s prompt:

Write a story from the Third Person, Omniscient perspective

This is the perspective you know from all the classics (Dickens springs to mind): the author can say anything, pop inside any (or all) character’s heads, travel backwards and forwards in time, insert herself and her own commentary onto the page…

Have some fun with this. Take an episode and tell it from one character’s perspective, then leap into another character’s head and give their read on the situation. Try out your authorial prerogatives and make a comment about what’s going on (think of that moment when a TV character turns to the camera and talks directly to us, the audience).

This can get quite complicated (which is why it works so well for novels) but give it a bash and see what you come up with.

Go!

 

[Prompt] – May 22 – Third Person Limited

This week’s prompts are all about point of view and narrative voice.

Write a story from the third person limited POV.

“Third Person, Limited” means that, unlike yesterday, your narrator never says “I did this”, rather you talk about “he went to the door”, “He opened it.”

The ‘Limited” part means that all the judgements and assumptions, all internal thoughts are limited to those of the character through whom you are telling the story. No popping out of Dave’s head to jump across the room and tell us what Mandy is thinking as she looks at him. The only thing we’re privy to is what Dave thinks Mandy might be thinking about him.

Within this framework you can still play with the form: your limited persona can be like Nick Carraway, reporting on Jay Gatsby’s life, rather than telling us about his own adventures. You can give your limited persona the ride of her life through a whitewater canyon and let us see it all from her perspective.

Third person limited is great for short stories, because it lets us – the readers – identify with one character, and ground the story somewhere. You don’t have much space in a short story and the last thing you want is to confuse your readers (unless, of course, the whole point of your story is to confuse your readers!). Letting them get to know a character by showing their reactions to events, puts you half way to rooting for (or against) the protagonist.

Go!

 

[Prompt] May 21 – 1st Person

This week’s prompts are all going to focus on Point Of View.

 

It’s easy to get stuck in a rut, writing in third-person, or first person, or inside or outside your character’s heads. So this week we’re shaking things up. Ready?

Write A Story Using The First Person Voice

The whole thing should be told in the “I” voice, and preferably should be a story about something that happened/is happening to the person telling the story.

Go!