Tag archives for Creative writing - Page 12
Creative Writing First Assignment Marked
Today I got my marks for my first assignment on the Open University course I am doing on Creative Writing (A215). I'm not allowed to post the question nor the feedback. However unusually this course has an exemption from publishing my own answer. Presumably this is because it is unlikely to help anyone else with the assignment were they to do it in the future. Creative Writing is quite different from the other academic courses that I have completed. For a start there is a limit to what you can get externally to answer the question. When I did strategy I was able to go and read loads of papers and books on the topic in addition to the course materials. For A215 the support of other people seems to take that place, along with copious redrafting. I went through…
A215 Short Fiction – Planting the Past
Art journal ideas1 - give away (Photo credit: ewian) This is a piece of short fiction written for the first online tutorial of A215 Creative Writing. It followed on from three exercises intended to spur some creativity. The exercises centred around thinking of a place that you love being and then asked questions about that place. The first was some descriptive writing about the place, things you could see, smell, hear etc. The second was to write about a flash memory in the present tense and the last was to list some facts about the place and then spin off some 'what ' questions related to those facts. This last one was what really got my 400 word piece of fiction going. So here it is, all 400 words of it. Planting the Past Hands resting on her heavily pregnant…
Notice: Trying to access array offset on value of type bool in /var/www/html/themself/wp-content/themes/mesocolumn/lib/functions/theme-functions.php on line 502
Writing Routines
This is inspired as a short piece from a question on the A215 (Creative writing) student forum about what discipline people apply to their writing. I write as part of my work, although mostly not for publication these days (I've had posts in the past where some of my output was made public). The last public work I did was a guest blog entry for the Government Digital Service on Learning from Service Assessments. On the other hand I also write for my own enjoyment, and lots of that is made public, mainly blog entries here, although I also write fiction and have published some of the Exodus Series recently. I joined in National Novel Writing Month last year (it runs every November - affectionately known as NaNoWriMo to its participants). That challenge of writing 50k words in a month got me…
Notice: Trying to access array offset on value of type bool in /var/www/html/themself/wp-content/themes/mesocolumn/lib/functions/theme-functions.php on line 502
A215 Creative Writing Starts Soon
The next course on my Open University degree is a departure from the Business Studies focus, I'll be studing Creative Writing (course code A215). I got the course materials the other day, a big red book (affectionately known to the students of A215 as BRB); some CDs with author interviews and a study guide. Controversially amongst those on the forum there is no list of TMA questions (all the usual guidance etc is there, but the core questions that tell you what is required are missing). Theories abound on whether this is to get us to engage first, or whether they are just still re-writing the TMA questions. I guess we'll find out soon enough. The course website and tutor group forums are due to open on Wednesday. I'm looking forward to this course, for what I hope are obvious…
The Old Terra Vitae by Paddy Green
The Old Terra Vitae is one of the best stories I've read this year. The story revolves around what happens to a troubled soul in the afterlife, and it contains some shades of Neil Gaiman in the approach. Well crafted as a story, and with plenty of clues scattered to the unexpected twist that give you a lightbulb moment when it happens. (more…)