Write Drunk, Revise Sober
Friday, August 31, 2007 . 11:39 AM
Hair of the Dog - 8/31/07 Write about a food that you or your character loves. What's so great about it? What does it taste like? Describe its look, flavor, texture, etc. Why is that food so special? How do other people feel about it? 0 comments0 Comments:
Wednesday, August 29, 2007 . 4:48 PM
Hair of the Dog - 8/29/07 Write about something infamous that one of your character's family members did when they were young. It can be something from the distant past, or from a close relative. Your character knows nothing about this story, but it affects how some people in the know perceive your character. For example, neighbors might treat your character suspiciously because the character's great-uncle killed a local police officer, but the character has never even met that great-uncle. 0 comments0 Comments:
Tuesday, August 28, 2007 . 6:09 PM
Hair of the Dog - 8/28/07 Write about a time when you or your character did something out of the ordinary. If you're shy, write about a time you yelled at a stranger in public. If your character is afraid of heights, write about their daring rescue of a trapped kitten on the roof of a tall building. If you usually play it safe, write about the time you took a chance and acted on an impulse. It can be something minor or something drastic, but it must have a profound effect on the events of your story or poem. 0 comments0 Comments:
Monday, August 27, 2007 . 5:10 PM
Hair of the Dog - 8/27/07 Write about a time that you or one of your characters experienced deja vu. Try to make this either significant to the story or a way of developing the character. Is there any difference between the remembered moment and the actual one? If so, what is different, and why, and how is it important? 0 comments0 Comments:
Friday, August 24, 2007 . 4:34 PM
Hair of the Dog - 8/24/07 Go to http://images.google.com/ and type your name into the search box. Pick one of the pictures that the search engine finds and write about it. You may use your full name, just your first name, or a nickname that you usually go by. 0 comments0 Comments:
Thursday, August 23, 2007 . 3:14 PM
Hair of the Dog - 8/23/07 Write about an argument. This can be an argument that occurred in the past, or is currently occurring in the present, or is expected to occur in the near future. It can be autobiographical or fictional. You can make it entirely in dialogue or have no conversation at all.An interesting way to approach this would be to have some important underlying issue that is not being addressed, while the argument is about something comparatively insignificant. 0 comments
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Hair of the Dog Archive Here are some of our previous daily writing prompts. Enjoy!7/26/07
Your favorite possession has climbed to the top of the Empire State Building and is threatening to jump. Talk your beloved item out of jumping by expressing your love and letting it know why it's so important to you.
7/27/07
Write a detailed description of someone at work. For example:
Old Florist
by Theodore Roethke
That hump of a man bunching chrysanthemums
Or pinching-back asters, or planting azaleas,
Tamping and stamping dirt into pots,--
How he could flick and pick
Rotten leaves or yellowy petals,
Or scoop out a weed close to flourishing roots,
Or make the dust buzz with a light spray,
Or drown a bug in one spit of tobacco juice,
Or fan life into wilted sweet-peas with his hat,
Or stand all night watering roses, his feet blue in rubber boots.
7/30/07
Write down an actual overheard telephone conversation - it might be someone in your family or a stranger on the train on his cell phone. After you've written the observed half of the conversation, write again, making up what the second person said.
7/31/07
Think of three characters or pick ones you are currently working with in your writing. Imagine that they all visit the zoo. Which animals will which characters want to see? Not care about? Watch intently? What will they say about their favorite and least favorite animals? How will they behave while visiting their cage/ enclosure?
8/2/07
Write about a visit to a fortune teller of your choice. This can be fictional, involving characters you create or are currently working with; or it can be nonfictional, involving you or someone you know; or it can be a mixture of the two.
8/3/07
Write a poem or story using the opening line: "It was the wrong house."
8/6/07
You or one of your characters receives a note/email/voicemail that simply states: "We need to talk." Who is the message from and what is it about? Does your character know (or think s/he knows) or is it a mystery?
8/8/07
All of us do things as a matter of necessity -- sometimes consciously, sometimes unconsciously, and sometimes consciously but against our wills yet still as a matter of necessity. Write about a time that you or your character acted out of necessity for whatever reason.
8/9/07
Write about the death of a famous person that strongly affected you or your character. Why is that famous person so important to you/the character?
An example, about the death of Billie Holiday:
The Day Lady Died
by Frank O'Hara
It is 12:20 in New York a Friday
three days after Bastille day, yes
it is 1959 and I go get a shoeshine
because I will get off the 4:19 in Easthampton
at 7:15 and then go straight to dinner
and I don't know the people who will feed me
I walk up the muggy street beginning to sun
and have a hamburger and a malted and buy
an ugly NEW WORLD WRITING to see what the poets
in Ghana are doing these days
I go on to the bank
and Miss Stillwagon (first name Linda I once heard)
doesn't even look up my balance for once in her life
and in the GOLDEN GRIFFIN I get a little Verlaine
for Patsy with drawings by Bonnard although I do
think of Hesiod, trans. Richmond Lattimore or
Brendan Behan's new play or Le Balcon or Les Nègres
of Genet, but I don't, I stick with Verlaine
after practically going to sleep with quandariness
and for Mike I just stroll into the PARK LANE
Liquor Store and ask for a bottle of Strega and
then I go back where I came from to 6th Avenue
and the tobacconist in the Ziegfeld Theatre and
casually ask for a carton of Gauloises and a carton
of Picayunes, and a NEW YORK POST with her face on it
leaning on the john door in the 5 SPOT
while she whispered a song along the keyboard
to Mal Waldron and everyone and I stopped breathing
8/10/07
Take the song you are listening to right now or the first song you think of and write a story or poem using it as your template. Do not use any of the actual song lyrics, either verbatim or paraphrased, except as dialogue that is also dialogue within the song. For example, you cannot use "up ahead in the distance I saw a shimmering light" as dialogue for the main character, but you can use "you can check out any time you like but you can never leave" as dialogue for the night man character.
8/13/07
Write a scene from real life or in fiction when an ordinary person has an interaction with, or at least sees from a distance, some famous person.
8/15/07
Rewrite something you are unsatisfied with by changing the gender of one of the central characters. Consider how this changes the dynamic between your characters and the way they would approach certain conflicts. This may even lead to a different outcome to the events of the story; it's up to you.
For a greater challenge, take something autobiographical and give it this treatment. What would you be like as a member of the opposite sex?
8/16/07
In some movies, you see a news report that refers to something happening in the movie, only it gets the facts wrong or only scratches the surface of what actually occurred. Pick a recent news story and write about what REALLY happened.
An example: http://www.reuters.com/article/domesticNews/idUSCOL43279620070814
"U.S. troops care for Iraqi baby rescued from garbage"
8/17/07
Write about a moral dilemma. Try to write it from the perspective of a character who has a different moral code from your own, or choose a topic about which you are unsure of your position. Please don't write about abortion because everybody writes about abortion; it's too easy and too obvious.
8/22/07
Write about alienation. This can be autobiographical, about a time you felt alienated in some way, or it can be fictional. The alienation can be based on cultural or religious differences, personality conflicts, internal perceptions--anything that would make someone feel separate
from other people. You can also write about alienation as presented in a particular work of literature, if you want to try a research paper or close reading. 0 comments
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I swear to drunk I'm not god "A drunk man's words are a sober man's thoughts." - Oliver Reed"Is there anything more beautiful than a beautiful, beautiful flamingo, flying across in front of a beautiful sunset? And he's carrying a beautiful rose in his beak, and also he's carrying a very beautiful painting with his feet. And also, you're drunk." - Jack Handey
"Drink moderately, for drunkenness neither keeps a secret, nor observes a promise." - Miguel de Cervantes
"Always do sober what you said you'd do drunk. That will teach you to keep your mouth shut." - Ernest Hemingway
"Often people display a curious respect for a man drunk, rather like the respect of simple races for the insane... There is something awe-inspiring in one who has lost all inhibitions." - F. Scott Fitzgerald
"If you ever reach total enlightenment while you're drinking a beer, I bet it makes beer shoot out your nose." - Jack Handey 0 comments