Blog for Meeting #6

This meeting's theme was Criterion-Based Feedback. First, we read through the handout and the criteria for both nonfiction and fiction writing. We focused primarily on discussing the criteria we each thought was important for fiction writing, since all three of us have fiction pieces in the works. We also discussed the non-fiction criteria briefly. We looked at the "Power of Sprinkles" story, and disagreed with the sheet's evaluation of the criteria. For instance, we weren't sure that the story was "ironic and witty" in tone (although that's just our opinion). We agreed with your statement that the criteria could be somewhat limiting but we decided that we could also create different criteria to accomodate what we wanted specifically from each piece.
We began to go over our own pieces. Elizabeth read her short story, to which she had just given an ending. Having been wondering where the narrator's life was going to go in relation to the tree, we were thrilled to find out the ending...which I'll let anyone who is reading this find out for themselves. In terms of the "character" criteria, we found the narrator very real and believable. Another criteria we focused on was language. Sam and I noted that we especially liked the personification that Elizabeth used with the tree, and Elizabeth noted that she had focused on personification in the past.
Sam then read an addendum to her story, which was meant to fill the "meaning" and "character" criteria by giving motivation to her central character for the decision she made to stay on Earth after everyone else left. We discussed the decision of the character, and different potential motives for staying on a decaying Earth, but decided that the motive Sam chose was easily the most intriguing. We're looking forward to seeing the character develop further.
I read the revised version of the essay that I wrote, focusing on the coherence and focus on task. I had attemtped to hone my focus on task since last time, in part due to a comment Maida had made about why it mattered that the views of humanism change, which I incorporated into the thesis. I plan on attempting to hone the clarity of language next. I also took out the handwritten notes I have for the end of my short story and we discussed the narrator character and his motives for the character criteria. Elizabeth's and Sam's responses were extremely helpful.
With a few minutes remaining, we called Barbara and told her get well from the ladies. :)

writing group meeting #5

(edit: sorry guys! I had thought I'd posted this, but I only just realized I'd pressed 'save' instead. This is what happens when I rush.)

The subject of our fifth meeting revolved around voice. We began as we did in our last meeting: by drafting questions we wished our groupmates would respond to. It was easier this time, now that we had more experience and generally knew what to expect. We didn't have to rely on each other as much, and the whole process went quicker.

Our next step was to determine each of our five-star quotes. This took a bit. Picking a passage from our own pieces that would stand as the perfect example of what we each thought our own voices to be was a bit of a daunting prospect. In retrospect, we all agreed it would almost have been easier if we each shared our pieces and had our groupmates agree on a quote that they thought best portrayed our individual voice. It's more difficult to choose ourselves, since we are all so familiar with our own personal writing styles. Sometimes a different perspective.

Yet, in the end we still managed to select passages we felt did us justice and then presented them to our group. It was actually incredibly interesting seeing the differences in all our styles when presented in such a straight-forward way. This concept led us to a small tangent on how voice is something like a writer's fingerprint: each one individual. Which in turn, led to a tangent off a tangent in which we all compared our fingerprints.

We got back on track though, when we decided to each take a turn reading each of our "voice-filled quotes" aloud. We went in a circle, the person whose quote it was being the one last in line to read, so as not to influence the other groupmates. This process was beneficial as well as fun, since we took the advice of the sheet given to us and played up our reading, over-dramatizing the voice but still doing our best to portray what we get from the quote. By the end, we were all sore from laughing yet still left with a much broader view of the voice in our piece.

The last fifteen minutes we spent discussing the questions we had drafted at the beginning of our meeting. Most of them actually directly addressed voice, so we spent the remainder of our time comfortably tossing ideas back and forth in regards to each of our questions, lightly discussing the changes we've made to our pieces and how we thought it all was going, sometimes slipping off into minor digressions but bringing ourselves back every time.

Once again, another victorious L.A.D.I.E.S meeting. Huzzah, sisters. Huzzah.