Writing-Related Ramblings

Last month, I gave my students a frightening assignment: Write a story. 

I provided them with a few guidelines—mainly that there must be some sort of conflict, big or small—and let them go. I was curious to see what they’d come up with.

Many stories involved hockey or car chases, time travel or plane crashes, exotic animals or long-lost twins. Several plots classically concluded with the main character waking up... it was all a dream; whew! A handful of stories straight-up didn’t make sense. But for the most part, I was impressed by the creativity, cohesiveness, and humor found in my students’ work. 

A few of my kids ended up writing longer pieces of text and met with me after school to edit and develop their work. Over cinnamon brownies and juice, we started talking about what makes up a good story, and if those qualities are the same across different languages.

Searching for some outside sources to contribute to our discussions about good writing, I came across a column by Jhumpa Lahiri published in the New York Times. Here’s an excerpt:

“When I am experiencing a complex story or novel, the broader planes, and also details, tend to fall away. Rereading them, certain sentences are what greet me as familiars. You have visited before, they say when I recognize them. We encounter books at different times in life, often appreciating them, apprehending them, in different ways. But their language is constant. The best sentences orient us, like stars in the sky, like landmarks on a trail.”

I like the idea that a sentence can orient us. We talked about how not every sentence is great, and not every sentence is valuable enough to end up in a story. But the only way to create a story is by building sentences, so experimenting with their tone and variety, and sometimes writing silly or pointless or powerless sentences, is how we find our way to the worthwhile ones.

“They remain the test, whether or not to read something,” writes Lahiri. “The most compelling narrative, expressed in sentences with which I have no chemical reaction, or an adverse one, leaves me cold. In fiction, plenty do the job of conveying information, rousing suspense, painting characters, enabling them to speak. But only certain sentences breathe and shift about, like live matter in soil. The first sentence of a book is a handshake, perhaps an embrace. Style and personality are irrelevant. They can be formal or casual. They can be tall or short or fat or thin. They can obey the rules or break them. But they need to contain a charge. A live current, which shocks and illuminates.”

One novel that jumps to mind is The Secret Life of Bees by Sue Monk Kidd. Her sentences stirred me to the point of feeling as though I was reading the book more for the words than for the plot. Kidd's beautifully-composed sentences challenged the ways I think about death, motherhood, bees, even the act of lying down:

“Every human being on the face of the earth has a steel plate in his head, but if you lie down now and then and get still as you can, it will slide open like elevator doors, letting in all the secret thoughts that have been standing around so patiently, pushing the button for a ride to the top. The real troubles in life happen when those hidden doors stay closed for too long.” 

What sentences orient you?

A Narnia-esque lamppost at the cottage where I stayed with my parents last month. Also: More photos of their wonderful visit to Sweden will be posted soon!