/lit/ - Literature

Well, can you?

>>11689716
Bump, someone do this
It seems rather interesting

>>11689792
>Are you up to the CHALLENGE?!?!?

Well, I assume you can show the character's feelings through syntax and particular details in a b and d. Like, using a broken syntax and showing how restless and uneasy are the waves in b, idk. For c I'd describe everything from a POV that lies above everything and changes rapidly, because I assume birds have no feeling.

I wrote to all the prompts but it was so good I decided to save it for myself.

whats this from?

>>11689989
If this is true, good for you anon

>>11690019

>>11689974
Describing how is easy, can you actually do it though?

42. the landscape looked free of the possibility of being beaten and raped

4.a She shifted the french door aside
and tread through with a perculiar weightlessness marking each stepped; like a
heavy damask cowl suddenly catching on an outcropped doorknob or stray chair
and pulled from around its wearer, it fwumps greyly to the ground.
She stopped and breathed in and felt the sear of the cup in her hand against
the breeze that streaked past. Each bit of sensory information another
sword-in-her-chair, peircing and lacerating as she naturally shifted into
old-age. Pulling the door closed behind her, she descends slowly and sits,
wrapping a throw from the back of the couch more snugly around her. Looking down
the christmas-light bedecked street, Esther hears a well-rehearsed group of
carolers a street over and imagines at a whim strolling the aisles of snow
and covered hedges with this troupe. Surely if she was fast she could put on her winter boots and be ready in time to and catch them as they made it to this side of the street.

>>11689716
>4a. The cock-carousel is back in action, boys!
>4b. Oh God, I'm so fucked up.
>4c. Tweet Tweet Twittery Screeee
>4d. A husk of God. *scene changes to a fag who still has his fag-lover's spittle on his lips* I bet there's a gloryhole in there, oh how fun that would be!

>>11691333
I'm working through these, but I don't feel like traslating into english the ones I've done right now

>>11691465
I think the point of the excercise is to show the feelings of the character through the description of a landscape, not a narration

>>11691710
eh, creative writing is unpredictable. Its what I had. Still contributed my time and effort. I'm more on topic than most and not shitposting so i'm not going to sweat it.

>>11689716
4c. is retarded. It would literally amount to 'tree - grey - blue - brown - stick - descending - worm.'

>>11691393
I unironically like this

>>11691754
I agree. My answer to 4c was an essay on quantum mechanics.

>>11691768
Mental retardation is in the eye of the beholder

>>11691932
U r bad person

Dark green conifers steepling toward a vast pale plane. A smear of clouds defused with mid-morning light. Some warm pinprick of life screams to meet him as he carves his way toward it. Blurs of wild grass flank his trajectory before a chill blast of blue. The earth rebounding downward as he arches toward the tip of some great pine.

>>11689792
no

>>11689716
>4b

I knelt at the bank to wash my hands, and though I scrubbed for what seemed like hours, they felt filthy and stained. I felt filthy and stained. The lake itself had seemed pristine and beautiful before, but now glistened with an off-color hue. I looked around. The previously lively fish seemed still. The birds no longer sang. In the trees by the edge of the water I swore I saw something. Watching. Looking. Seeking.

At that moment I became aware of the racing of my heart. It seemed the water itself seemed to peer right through me. I wanted to jump in. I wanted to walk right into the lake and never have to face the world again. But I was a coward. I am a coward. Even now, in my veins the will of self preservation runs strong. I looked around, keenly in all directions, keeping my head low. I watched the woods again. Nothing. Or, something. No time to tell. I had to leave. I had to get away. I had to escape from this infernal filthy mire of a lake.

And I ran.

>>11689716
4a. The apex of each hill, painted by the Western sunlight, seemed to her as green as the word itself; the valleys, flowing over with autumn's crimson leaves, violently appealed to her state of mind. None of those valleys had whored themselves out for twenty years, none of those valleys found themselves without a benefactor during their final years, and none of those valleys were so far in debt that they were reminded by nature itself. There was a knock at a door, the lawyer her husband had retained.

4b. The waves gently broke against his small craft, as if to whisper "Let us in!" to that stalwart hull. He cast his eyes over the water, the last rays of the setting sun reflecting directly onto his face. He squinted; the water was too bright, blocking his view of the beyond. He fished around for a pair of binoculars, but realized that he had forgotten them a few hours earlier. He swore and unzipped his bag; he jumped in surprise as something wet landed on his neck.

4c. The hills were beautiful, but gone in a moment. More than a few mice in the following fields, but I didn't pursue. Over another house, the door hanging open, and gone again.
Now a lake, seemingly empty save for the fish. The color of the water changes as I head over the deeps, and I see a man holding the body of an old woman. I take a shit.

>>11689716

It's a tone exercise in empathy. They work. Good, unless all you wanna do is puke exposition.

It was the first time she'd seen her backyard. A native to the holler, she'd never looked up in forty years. The bluegrass was, and would always be, vital — but it rested lightly today. The mud puddles were caking and flaking as the sun crept over the nearest hill, and the deer damn near fell off the cliff. A single white cross was already stained from the now-past storm. The air was fresh, and carried the scent of her laundry alone.

>>11691768
Alan Moore?

4a. I'm looking at bushes outside the starship, and the bushes are blue as my skin. Blue is typical for a bush. I was unflabbergasted, not that I could be while hooked to the machine. What sort of bushes are they I wondered, as a bush can be a specific kind, but I'm not Dave the talking toilet. Yes, the machine does allow us to wonder.

4b. This here lake would've been a great spot to hide Dave if he were a normal-sized human, but unfortunately my friend was literally the size of Lake Superior. Sometimes you should ignore the gum underneath tables. I expected a superior lake.

4c. While moving my appendages somehow I'm able to move across the New York sky. How brilliant is this. I can see the tops of trees when those who are unable to fly can only see the bottom.

4d i. That crap World Trade Center was jutting out like a erectile penis. I hate penises, and I hope one day it goes soft.

4d ii. Mr. Boss, I was just thinking how aftly skyscrapers symbolize the state of my penis. Do I have to pack my bags now? There's someone I must see.

>>11694297
Fantastic job desu

>>11694371
Yes. But can you do these without mentioning the character's action or thoughts? Maybe that is not required, but I'm still curious.

>>11690664
Yeah, it's true. I'm not going to use them for anything, but I've posted so much good stuff on this site over the years that I never want to make the same mistake again. I often write a post in the middle of a debate on here, and realize its great, and save it without offering a response. It's selfish, but oh well.

>>11694354
ree do not mention the husband

also >Leaves violently appealing

I like it though.

>>11694297
Too melodramatic.

>>11695846
he just murdered someone, do you want a musical number

>>11696123
>melodrama=drama with music
It feels corny. And redundant. Like a soap opera.

>>11689716
4B)
Tommy skulked out of the dark forest onto the bank of a large lake. It was Lake Elizabeth, boasting the most scenic sights for miles. Tommy surveyed his surroundings. All was still, bar the gentle breeze through the trees. The water was quiet.
Tommy breathed a loud sigh. It was peaceful here. He sat on his haunches, and closed his eyes. He took a deep breath.
And another.
After several minutes of this he opened his eyes. Lake Elizabeth still sat peacefully in front of him. He was still dirty.
He rose, and walked towards the blue water. As he got closer he could see that it was in fact tinged brown with silt.
He knelt, dropping his large, heavy rucksack beside him, and felt his hands be lovingly enveloped by the lapping waves. He smiled. He removed a bar of soap from his jacket pocket and scrubbed his hands, he scrubbed his fingernails, he scrubbed his knuckles. In front of his eyes his hands were cleansed. The grime was gone. The waves had washed everything away. The waves always wash it away.
Upon regaining his focus, Tommy quickly emptied his rucksack and scrubbed the contents before returning them to his bag. He stood, and traced the shore before disappearing into the treeline on the opposite bank.
Now, Tommy was clean too.

>>11694297
When he was washing his hands, he should have looked at himself in the reflection

>4b
The water rose and fell against the rocks and sand, as it has done again and again. The lake was unchanged. Two faces in the lake. One at the bottom laid still. One at the surface, shimmering. Both faces were empty. Devoid of all thoughts and emotions.

The face on the surface moved his lips. "Am I even human?"

The apperance of the lake was eternal and unchanging. The water always rises and falls, the shore glistening, the trees spreading their shadows over the water. Unchanging. But the feeling the lake gives, has changed.

Bump

>>11694297
>Even now, in my veins the will of self preservation runs strong... I had to escape from this infernal filthy mire of a lake.

Pretty good. I liked how you hinted at the context of the murder with the first line

4b. Lovely and still, the lake. It was circle-ish in shape, so the whole perimeter and far end sprawl out in front of you at when you stand at its edge. The cedar trees formed a nice bristling ring around it, above and below in the reflection, the lip of a near-brimming glass. The soil at its bottom was loose and soft, stirred all up into the water by my feet. Little gusts and falling seeds made its surface jitter and wobble as if it were excited to be so left alone.

>>11689716
>4b.

The water shimmered rather beautifully, he thought. Splashed out over the bludgeoned horizon in a crimson sunset pool, the view was truly to die for. He could see a small boat, tranquil stainless steel carving through the soft waves, spilling spurted currents in its wake.
The lake was so calm and so pure he felt it could wash away a lilfetime of sin.

>>11698204
>lilfetime
Fuck's sake. Obviously meant to put lifetime.

>>11695010
You are a glorious kind of autist my friend.

>>11698204
>truly to die for
ugh

>>11689716
no longer did i see a mirror of that fairer plane, not the once parted red sea nor the holy aegean, i could not glimpse neptune, not the faintest murmur of the lady. that shimmering greyblue field, drained of all its magic that i was not aware i once knew, now bled of life, frigid, uncaring, a sheet steel breaking its motion on my as lifeless hand. where once the world had being, now it has none.

Bump

>>11691768
>there’s Becky
>lemme smash

>>11691393
based

LONG POND. NOT TO GO PAST LONG POND. HOME AT CLUMP FOREST, TREE AT FIRST ROAD BEND. BENCH WHERE YESTERDAY SEEDS. NO SEEDS TODAY AT BENCH. NO SEEDS UNDER STICKS. STRONG WINDS, TAKE UP. TWO BUMP TALL MOUNTAIN. TALL MOUNTAIN TOO FAR HOME, NEAR LONG POND. CIRCLE BACK. BIG FIELD GRASS. BENCH. CLUMP FOREST END, CLUMP FOREST MIDDLE. FIRST BEND.

>>11689716
4c. Birds.. ah shit I failed

Bumping with an attempt at 4b. Looking back I should have described the lake more instead of waxing poetic.

I should have done this some place else. I came here so I can be calm. Calm people don't make mistakes right? I used to love this lake. I fished here every saturday since I moved here. In fact it was the reason I moved here. The water is always calm and shade of blue that has a harsh gradient from clear to almost black at the center. I never went to the middle, not until today when I was ready to face what is almost certainly an abyss at the center. I typically fished somewhere inbetween the two extremes, calmed by knowing I was so close to a possibly dangerous pit and the saftey of the shore. Now I know its dangerous. It will swallow anything above it, creating ripples like a mouth opening and shutting before closing one last time and looking calm as ever.
I used to swim here as well. The thought of a pair of hands grabbing me never came to me like others, now I can see it haunting me even before I leave the crystal clear shore. I know it can't happen. Its impossible and just a childish fear. How many times have I been unjustly afraid, or what if every fear is justified just a bit? It only needs to happen once.
I used to love this lake. Now I won't be able to step a foot into it.

4b
After a time, he came to a lake the color of dishwater. Stepping to the muddy bank he peered down and saw himself reflected back in a thousand distorted ripples as the wind brought the smell of decaying plants to him. Mud flecked minnows danced in the crazings of his face and bits of moss floated where the orbs of his eyes should be, as If pagan nature had prepared a portrait for him with fetid palette. He kicked a branch into the pool and left without looking at the result.

4A
The mall at the rear of the house had closed down for good some two years prior. It’s great heaving bulk loomed still over her home as it had for most, but not all, her time in it.
Once it had been a wooded lot with wild apple and chestnut trees dotting amongst the blackberry creepers. Wildlife, not yet foiled in it’s competition with specie and commerce, would forage there. She would watch their simple and sweet ways in those days gone hazy with the soft focus lens of memory; an Eden before the coming Nod.
No trace of it remained outside the internal lands she tended through the years, on which the sun seemed to be setting.

>>11689974
Ok bud. No one's trying to say you can't do it. It's not supposed to be an impossible rule. It's just a guideline to keep your writing from jumping to the obvious.

The plains called to her. The beckoning blades of grass too little for the mountain she had endured, too late for the years that had suppressed the spring calm that they embodied.

>>11689716
4b

Blue like an eye, like an iris. Ridges, descending continually, to the cornea.
This disk, before and after, the ceiling. Cathedral of non-sky, slate or sapphire.
Waves gently pulsing on the shore. I am calm, so calm. In and out.
Blue like an eye, like an iris. Black in the middle.

>>11699907
I narrated this aloud. Quite liked it.

>>11689716
>4b
Perched upon the edge of the lake, I gaze into minnow infested depths. I am reminded of Narcissus, for a face looks back handsomely, with an easy smile slipping softly onto plush lips. Golden hair hurdles down to cradle a jaw of heroic chisel. Lovely. I might fall in love.
There is blood on my hands. The water looks cool and good for washing, but I do not wash. I slip my massive cock from its denim cage. I masturbate furiously, the still damp viscera aiding my pleasure, and ejaculate shortly after in silent, rapturous shivers. The minnows swarm curiously about my cum, like faithful at an altar. It is the best orgasm of my life.
I stand and head back to my truck, back home, forgetting now the bundle stowed in the bed. I do not wash my hands.

>>11692561
>>11698181
>>11698300
>>11698963
>>11699108
>>11699373
>>11699484
>>11699907
Only posts itt that didn't just indirectly talk about the thing they weren't supposed to talk about

>>11689716
two trees, one wilting
still body of water
large green toilet
house with one bedroom
home with one bedroom

>>11700070
Yeah I was two of these. Disappointed so many just talked around it without alluding to it through atmosphere.

>>11698963
He can recognise what a bench is: that's one smart birdie—I'm impressed!

>>11700057
Good. Why does everyone one else assume that the killer feels sad or uneasy after the murder?

>blood on my hands
>viscera
This probably spoils the fun, but technically you're not mentioning murder. (?)

Since we're talking about Gardner's excercises, what is the difference between a novel's opening and a shot story's one? Is it just a matter of pace? And what pace would a short episode in a long novel have?

>>11689716
where is this from?

>say lewd things without mentioning sex, persons, body parts or fluids, cliché innuendos

>>11700702
>>11690711

>>11700713
searched for "where" on the thread and didn't see that post heh
ty anon

is it worth the read? the exercises seem good

>>11689716
>c.
>Tree. Tree. Tree. Lake. Lake. Field. Tree. Field. Ooh, a tasty rabbit! *swoops down*

The vast, deep lake stood immovable and undeniable. It's glistering surface slowly oscillated between green and blue, an ever-changing painting by the great master. Fish swam around aimlessly, just being happy to live in this monumental masterpiece of nature.
Overwhelmed, I ran back home.

>>11689716
>b
>The view from the edge of the cliff would have been breathtaking, instead it frightenend him with a beckoning call to cast himself down into the immaculate silver mirror lake. No ripples, no waves, nothing seemed to exist than that perfect oblong shape beneath his feet staring at him like a giant eye. Did it cast judgment or offer salvation this angel eye in ecstasy so blank and unwavering.
The lake eye grew vaster and vaster touching the horizon in all directions while the cliffface jutted out ever higher, past the cloud and finally past the atmosphere. The view he had had did not change but the scale of it was much larger.
He dropped to his knees, shaking, taken by a vertigo of insignifance in the whole of the cosmos, took hold of the grassy edge of the cliff and observed the huge mirror. In it he saw, impossibly large, filling the whole field of his vision, his own distorted silvery face in a grimace of terror.

>>11689716
name ONE good author who has ever taken a creative writing class or uses "prompts"

>>11700793
me

>>11700793

David Foster Wallace

>>11700829
HAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAAHHAHAHAHAAHAHAHHAAHAHAHAHJAHAHAAHJAJAHAAHHAH
HAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAH
HAHAHAAHAHAHAHAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAA

>>11700793
Each writer has developed his unique style by spending hours writing, keeping journals, studying other people's works. I fear as well that spending time on creative writing manuals could undermine my spontaneity and my artistic integrity. Probably I should just learn how to write and read by writing and reading. A period of social isolation could help as well. My mental sanity would suffer, but my art would become more genuine.

>>11700833
>le much despise dfw because everyone on 4chan says he's a meme

>>11700727
Yeah we get it. Birds are stupid. Try something creative for a change.

>>11700929
In my defense I did not read the whole thread.

What is the source of the image in the OP? seems cool

>>11701077
>>11700713

>>11700850
>A period of social isolation could help as well. My mental sanity would suffer, but my art would become more genuine.
Excellent, I should be a master of the craft by now.

>>11700970
>I murdered a person, but in my defense I didn't know it was wrong

>>11701077
this is like the 3th time somebody asks this I wonder how many others will come

>>11701102
Social isolation is a necessary condition, but not a sufficient one.

>>11689989
Remember to copyright your own poop so you can sell it when you become famous

>>11694297
>It seemed the water itself seemed to

I cringed

>>11701134
>extreme false equivalency

>>11702894
Ignorance is not an excuse, senpai. That's the point.

>>11702874
i would say that it was written that way to jar and disquiet the reader, but in reality i crapped it out in two minutes and didn't proofread

>>11689716
4a. Out the window, the same old sight. Yet, the field seemed wider, the road seemed longer, the shadow cast by the old oak tree in the yard didn't seem to want to block her vista, rather, it seemed to invite her to walk outside and take a seat in that cool shade, to see that broad, open world closer, then to walk past that tombstone and not look back to this old house, this old pit.

4b. The man, frantic, spots that outer darkness of the night sky on a pool below. Maybe if he dove deep enough he wouldn't be found out. Maybe if he stayed there in the water he would come up clean. Or maybe he wouldn't come come up at all. Wouldn't that be fair?

4c. The canopies below these passing wings are folding screens in the wind. The gaps between the dancing leaves, betray the modesty of the troves of scurriers there.

4a

b. Adrenaline had propelled him until now, but as soon as he stood at the water's circumference, his muscles suddenly slackened. He fell to his knees, blood drained, whether for shock or exhaustion, he wasn't sure. He couldn't think. He felt as though there were many people talking, although no sound met his ears save for the rock of the rowboat. High was the moon that outlined the black surface. If it had been cloudy, he would not be able to see where he was. He crawled through the damp grass until the ground gave way a few inches, then dipped his arms into the water, neglecting to remove his jacket. He waded his hands in a few circles. It was not cold. When he took his hands out, they would be clean, he thought, and he broke into a muffled cry, resigning to lie face-down and partially wet for the rest of the night.

>>11689716
4a. A landscape
4b. A lake
4c. A landscape
4d. A building / A building

Concision.

>>11689716
The lake spread before me like a gigantic pool of bloo...oh no never mind that, haha, no big pools of blood on my mind, that's for sure, haha, hahahahah!

>>11689716
42. Once upon a time there was a lady who saw a landscape and she was really sad because somebody important to her had just had something really bad happen to them... somebody she may or may not have had sex with in the past and who may or may not have a metabolic disorder that causes your fucking metabolism to outrightly stop forever. Now I'm not saying they had a funeral for this "condition" (*wink*) and for this "totally random stranger and event" (*wink wink*) I'm just saying you can probably guess what I'm talking about without me telling you that her necropedophile rapist husband bled to death after a jar of pickles cracked open inside of his anus and caused him to die of blood loss.

>>11689716
4b Kyle looked at the lake and saw the dismembered, decapitated body drifting away. He wished there were weights on it so that it would sink but he forgot to put them on. Now, I'm not saying Kyle did any particular action to cause this situation, just that he was there with a decomposing body and that he wished he could now weigh down the drawn and quartered corpse with something that would make it sink to the bottom of the lake... you know... so he could maybe just not have to see it and probably NOT because he thought he would get in trouble if anybody else saw the body. Gnome sayin'? But only probably not.

>>11689716
4a.

"I'd forgotten how romantic this is" she thought to herself, watching the sun slowly fade from certainty. Hues of violet and pink, yellow and red rays poured over the fence of earth that defined the valley she called home. As the warmth left her body, hope and clarity made its way in. Tears ran down her cheeks and formed drops along the crease of her lips where a smile slowly formed. The taste of salt made the experience even more pleasant. It's as if she knew there was a universe on the other side of those mountains; behind her, a book was closing. In front of her, she could see only a chance of happiness. That's all she ever wanted.

>>11689716
As her daughter took a step to embrace her, Alice bristled slightly but opened her arms. She tilted her head to rest on Nora's left shoulder and stiffly held her body. Nora whispered in her ear, mustering as much warmth as she could, "I know how lonely things can get, so I'll try and call when I can, ok?" Alice did not hear a word; she stared ahead at a young man in brown pants and a grey coat, laying in the grass. In one hand was a small bouquet, cluched to his chest, while the other stretched along the ground. He traced his finger along the cool stone, a lover's touch searching through the mist. Alice could feel his words "Though now I can only know in part, feel in part, love in part, one day . . ." As his voice broke and trailed off into quiet sobs, she felt another rise from within, a faint echo from younger days. "Tis better to have loved and lost." And then for the first time in many years, Alice shed a tear, as she replied, "than to realize we never loved at all."

>>11704587
Right. Tell, oon't show.
>Tecto
>Tarto
That is a big boy word.

>The olo woman laugheo to herself
And then what happens?

>>11699907
Good