Tag archives for Open University A215 Creative Writing - Page 3
Poetry – Bloom by James Kemp
Bloom “Splash!” A roar over my head closes from behind and drowns the radio. Binoculars brought to bear, I observe the seed embedding. It grows a small orange blossom. Morphing into a larger, darker flower climbing from the point of impact. Rain patters over the iron roof as sods and stones strike sonorously. The flower is gone, dissipated in a cloud of dust, and silence returns. Notes Bloom was the first full poem that I wrote, and this is the fourth draft, which may not be the final version. It was prompted from my memory of watching artillery shells burst when training as an artillery forward observer at Warcop training area in Cumbria in 1991. On the FOO course I gave an incorrect map reference and the first ranging shell burst about 150m in front of me (the wartime safety distance is…
How I write poetry
Before I started studying the Open University's A215 Creative Writing course I had never tried to write poetry, even though I've written several short stories and novellas. For TMA3 of A215 I had to write 40 lines of poetry. How I write poetry With one exception, which was my first attempt, all of my poems start as a freewrite on the subject, title or prompt. Normally I discard the first paragraph of the freewrite because it is overly literal, I use words and phrases from the remainder to form the basis of the first draft of a poem. Unlike my prose, where I typically draft in scrivener, the poetry starts on paper or a basic text editor. Subsequent drafts use the track changes feaure in a word processor. This allows me to see how each poem develops. Each draft is its…
Poetry Station
my desk for writing poetry I am busy crafting poetry for the third assignment of my Open University course A215 Creative Writing. Or rather I am indulging in a little displacement activity right now. However I will be back to work in a few moments. You will see from the picture of the table I'm using as my desk a number of things. Most useful being Stephen Fry's The Ode Less Travelled which is a very good introduction to poetry that I heartily recommend. Next is the video camera that I've been using to record myself reading the poetry out loud so that I can listen back and refine it. This is my own take on poetry being about the sound of the thing, much more so than prose. I think that's what makes poetry harder for many people…
A215 – Meta Poetry
The third online tutorial is now on the go, following a poetry day school last weekend (where I read out some Burns since it was the 25th). Anyway the exercise is to write a poem based on the model of Amanda Dalton's How to Disappear. So this is the second draft of my meta poem, a further draft (poetry as a process) will be posted later on when I've had some feedback and had time to let it rest a wee bit. How to write poetry How can an ordinary person like me possibly do it? How am I supposed to get all those words arranged on the page? How do I learn to write beautiful poetry? Recognise that poetry doesn't appear ready to read. Like a block of stone, it needs careful chiselling, chip by chip, into shape. What goes…
Wattpad and a new beginning for Perfects
In reading through my blog feed I came across a very interesting article by Ian Sutherland on using Wattpad. It was so interesting that I thought I might give Wattpad a shot myself. One of the things that I have done as a consequence of learning much more about creative writing is to write a new beginning for Perfects (as well as re-write bits in the middle and what comes after the parts published so far). So if you would like to see the new beginning of Perfects, then it is on wattpad. When I finally have time, likely to be in the summer when A215 is finished, then I will complete the re-write and publish is both as an ebook and paperback. Related articles That Perfect Pitch How to: Make Wattpad Work For You Wattpad Half of Wattpad Writers…