In class today we talked about character, dialogue, and how to write a scene. We talked about how Engkent was able to give us a good picture of his mother not only by providing us information or her background but also by showing her en scene. Hearing her dialogue and seeing her reactions to various situations helped to characterize her better than any expository paragraph could. The same thing happened in Sedaris's piece. We were able to see how obnoxious the teacher is by observing her interactions with students throughout the narrative instead of simply reading a paragraph that says she's obnoxious. When you're writing your literacy narratives, you should have characters and you want to try and find ways to show us how a person is instead of telling us.
Make sure when you're writing your narrative to not forget about the most important character of all, yourself. Sedaris's voice and tone help us to realize that he's a funny and sarcastic person. Try to find ways to use voice and tone to characterize yourself. Make sure that we leave the piece knowing who you are as person.
I also had you rewrite your Where I'm From Narratives. Your task is to tell the story of a specific moment and to write a good scene. Scenes are moments of action in a narrative where the reader is given a chance to see an event exactly as it is occurring or exactly how it occurred. It's more detailed, often includes dialogue and is basically the slowing down of a moment. The moment is usually something significant, something extremely important to the story line. It can be the beginning of something or the end of it. The moment when something changed or the moment when something could change but instead ended up staying the same. Your literacy narrative should include scenes.
Homework
- Come to class with a good idea of what your literacy narrative's going to be about. (Due Wed. 9/26)
- Finish Part One of The Immortal Life of Henrietta Lacks pgs 1-86 (Due Wed 9/26)
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