Posted by: rainwriters on: December 28, 2008
We, the rainwriters critique group, would like to talk about the craft of writing.
For example, the rainwriters suggest that I should use more sense data in my scenes, more visual, more of all the senses. While I agree with this suggestion and I’m working to get better, I think there must be a limit some place. If I go on and on with details, the story might lag. I’m open to suggestions as to a limit and as to how to use sense data better
Ed
3 Responses to ""
December 29, 2008 at 6:44 pm
“The boy is mad,” she said one day as we were snapping beans in the kitchen.
(From Sweet Summer by Bebe Moore Campbell)
This tell us: Location (the kitchen), era(a time when people had their own gardens- that’s rare in the city, so it’s probably a country place), time of year ( late summer). Enough info to put and keep us in the time frame and surround us with what our senses cause us to remember.
January 7, 2009 at 9:27 am
Ed:
Your first draft — get the story down. Your second draft add the senses…that won’t bog down the action…
I can still recall the sequence in Veto where Pilar is being chased down a mountain — I think you involved all the senses really well in that piece.
Also, the scene in Beyond the Vows where the father-in-law dies listening to the World Series.
The emotion was real; so were the senses…review these pieces…
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Loreena, Carol, Ron, Bob, Larry, Ed, Karin and Marlene
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December 29, 2008 at 6:35 pm
For some writers story comes first; as the telling progresses, descriptions emerge. For other writers a physical, sensory detail is the starting point. Still other, particularly poets, find within the words themselves–the sounds and rhythms and shapes–the route to description. The order in which these processes occur is not important. What is important is that somewhere along the way we give full attention to each of these matters: eye, word and story.
from: Work Painting by Rebecca McClanahan