Engl 226

From Kogs Happy Wiki

Bleachers

• by Alicia Zwicewicz

• Page Notes
  • "And now, back in the same kind of space, on the unfamiliar floor where the trusses hold boards and alternating levels up, and dust has collected because nobody comes here, now rests the blue mat." (5)
    • This can probably be rewritten better, but keeping the same words (more or less).
    • Like, "And now, back in the same kind of isolated space where trusses hold up boards and alternating levels, dust has collected around the blue mat resting on the unfamiliar floor."

• Intent
  • There are some sentences that don't seem to have any reason of being there. What I usually do on my first or second draft is go over the whole thing sentence by sentence and check if the sentence adds either to the plot or to character development. If it's only for mood, then there's usually a way to add plot and/or character development in it, or move that mood-making passage to one that will.
    • "She straightens up and I follow her to the shelf where our character gloves are kept. Standing next to one another in silence, we each pull on one glove, then the other." (3)
  • This happens a lot on our level of writing, from what I've seen from the other workshop pieces, so don't fret :)

• Structure
  • I feel that the story is very point-of-fact. It's a series of actions from which we have to infer the mood, rather than having hints here and there of the characters' psychology and the tone of the events.
    • This isn't necessarily a bad thing, I'm just saying you're expecting a little bit more from the reader than if you had given hints like that. If the reader can't do that, or hasn't caught that he needs to, it'll feel a bit dry, imo.
    • "The show ends. Joe radios the Quebecois locals to move the spotlights around the ice in a figure eight, and he flickers his own lights to the worldless concession music. The bright arena lights get turned all back on again, and they'll stay that way until an hour before the next show." (4)

• Character Psychology
  • This sort of relates to the point-of-fact structure.
  • How does she feel, being on the ice? How does it relate to her feelings outside of the show? We know she doesn't really care about the kids themselves, is it the skating she likes? Is it the relationships with the other characters?

• Questions
  • Have you been able to understand the characters' psychology? Was it particularly useful for the piece or did you feel it lacked some of it?