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Week Six: organizing a compelling post structure
Please welcome back guest editor Deb Williams who tweets as @mannahattamamma and blogs at MannaHatta Mamma. If you have any questions or need any clarification on today’s topic, please feel free to begin a discussion in comments.
If you’re here just to hang out, the yeah write #69 hangout grid opens Tuesday.
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Beginnings. Also, middles and ends
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- Throughout history, man has questioned the nature of his existence.
- Shakespeare once said, “to thine own self be true,” and I think this is very good advice.
- It was a warm day a long time ago.
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Did any of those sentences make you want to read further?
I didn’t think so.
But the students who wrote these sentences thought that’s how they should begin their essays. They thought they should offer a general statement instead of getting to the heart of things right away.
Where to start a piece of writing is a tough question, and the only question harder is where to end a piece of writing. But before I say any more, let’s clarify something: writing well is hard. Yes, we’ve all been “writing” since we scrawled on the walls with crayons, but this blogging stuff? It’s tough. You’ve got to be concise, sharp, punchy, specific. Anyone who says that’s easy is probably lying.
Open with a hook
To begin: Ask yourself how you can put us in the action; how can you grab us, bring us you’re your piece? “So I was pumping gas the other day when Brad Pitt pulled up next to me and asked for directions….” I’m with you already. I don’t need to know where the gas station is, who was in the car, where you were going or what you were doing, unless Brad decided to join you on the journey.
Keep in mind, however, that “action” doesn’t have to mean movie star encounters or some other form of drama. Action can be “I read Kim Kardashian’s autobiography the other day and realized that reality TV is how god has decided to punish the world.”
Okay, so you’ve got a hook. Kim Kardashian as a latter-day plague. Great. I’m with you.
Then what? After you’ve established your opening, think about what readers need to go forward. Parcel out your details carefully, my friends. Words are like money: get as much as you can from every syllable, keep in mind the “so what.”
It’s drafty in here, and that’s a good thing
Let me say, however, that I believe in drafts. I write an overblown first draft (and frequently second, third, fourth), then carve it down to what I want to say. The answers to “so what” emerge as I work; they’re not there in draft one.
Eventually, though, no matter how long you stall, you’re going to have to grapple with the ending. Sometimes we get lucky—sometimes the closing sentence already exists in our heads and so we just have to write our way to that place.
Sometimes.
Don’t hold your breath.
It’s about as rare as Brad Pitt asking you for directions.
Connect the end to the beginning
Think about how to connect the ending to the beginning, not in a way that creates a closed circle but a spiral: we’ve moved from where we began, but haven’t lost sight of the starting point.
This wickedly funny essay from Arnebya of What Now and Why demonstrates what I’m talking about. The beginning of the piece starts with wanting to eat at Chipotle and ends with never wanting to eat again. The middle shows you, in excruciating detail, how she arrived at that final statement.
So to conclude: On a warm day a while back, a woman questioned her existence (and the nature of Chipotle), was true to herself (and her experience), and wrote a kick-ass essay in which the beginning pulls us in, the middle shows rather than tells, and the ending connects to the beginning.
Looks easy, right? I don’t know how long it took Arnebya to write her essay, but writing what you’re reading right now has taken me all day.
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yeah write #69 badges
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- Click in the upper right corner of this page on the plus symbol and the hidden widget containing the button badge codes will drop
- Copy the code of your favorite badge, then paste that code into the HTML view of the post you’re planning to submit to the grid
- If you’re having problems accessing those, feel free to grab the one in this post. Your backlink will be yeahwrite.me/69-open-summer or yeahwrite.me/69-open-hangout
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all your story are belong to you
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- Read the summer FAQ page for other details: the grid is being moderated and if you’re missing an element outlined in the summer FAQ, your post will not be published on the grid
- Let the prompt lead you, but do not include the prompt in any way in your post, not at the beginning as an intro, not at the end as a footnote. If you reference the prompt in your post, your post will not be published on the grid
- Remember: no more than 500 words. If your post exceeds 500 words, yup, you guessed it—no publish for you
- If the prompt takes you from thunderstorms to watching TV at your grandma’s house to how much you love Pat Sajak to the oldest person you’ve ever kissed, we want that story the furthest away in your imagination from the original prompt. Let your imagination loose
- Keep your writing style! Do you tell stories with humor? Prose? Verse? Photos? Illustrations? Keep doing that. We’ll read Shakespearean drama on our own time
- Cut away at everything unnecessary to your story
- Don’t forget to badge your post
- The grid now opens on Tuesdays
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[divider_header_h3] This week’s prompts [courtesy of Tom Slatin] [/divider_header_h3]
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- Describe an odd or unusual writing habit or ritual you have
- Name something you’ve given away that can never be replaced
- Do you have any irrational fears?
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Draft, draft, edit, toss, draft, edit, rework, refine, step away, come back, read aloud, edit, refine: the yeah write #69 summer challenge and hangout grids open Tuesday.
I can’t find Arnebya’s blog post. I knew I should not have left it until later. Gak!
I just now read all of these after I have already written my post, and I realized that a portion of my post, if you use your imagination, COULD also reference this yeahwrite number.
I rule the world.
It is a kind of magic number, isn’t it? So nice of Erica to offer *that* number to me as guest editor. I look forward to the post…
I love the idea of the post as a spiral. Makes much more sense than a circle. A circle does describe the idea of the end touching back to the start — but a spiral is really more of what a good piece of writing does.
I’m so glad you like that image, because sometimes I think the spiral confuses people. I can’t figure out a better way to say that the end needs to connect to the beginning – but not exactly, because then where has the piece of writing taken us? Thanks.
Deborah, you rock. I’m sending this link in comments to a student paper I’m reviewing at this very moment. Much better than draft comment to her: “Be more interesting.”
A small rubber stamp that says “yawn” is something I’ve always thought all teachers should get when they get their first jobs.
I think the whole “drafts” thing is where I often get frustrated and give up. Back in school, I would work on one piece of writing over an extended period of time with multiple drafts until I felt “good” about it but with blogging, the time frame is so attenuated and if you spend that much time working on each post, you’ll never post anything. So that is my complaint for the day. Blogging seems to require that you frequently put things out into the world that you wish you had a few weeks to mull over and revise and revise some more… .
That’s a tough one I think, because yes, blogging seems more immediate. My revisions with blog entries happen more as I write–I write a few paragraphs, go back and fiddle with the openings, keep going on, go back…it’s like writing as a loop-de-loo, actually. I also think there are posts that warrant more percolating than the post about the nutty lady on the bus with her dogs in a baby bjorn carrier. I mean…you don’t have to revise anything, it’s just life’s gift to the writer. I also have notebooks full of “write about this,” and great first lines/closing lines (great in my mind, anyway), and so forth.
Deb!!! I love you and your golden clogs!! I am going to write the greatest first line you have ever read. But first I need to stop moping around about the end of the conference and the 80 lbs of chocolate I ate. This is an awesome point and I can’t wait to try. oxoxoxo
tessaclogs.com it’s where all the great clogs live. frequently on sale (because really, who on earth would buy gold clogs? CLEARANCE!) I too am paralyzed by all teh great writing I heard at the conference and was thanking my stars and garters that I’d started to work on this post pre-conference (wow. foresight. huh. my mother was right, AGAIN. dammit). And then Arnebya’s fantastic chipotle post became the perfect example. whew. fantastic to meet you, outlaw. fantastic.
oh good lord I just got the joke, Kristin. slooooooow, c’est moi.
Trying to match the exquisite “What Now and Why” post will be tough. And I use “exquisite” here in the sense of “oh dear god I’m so glad that didn’t happen to me.” And also in the sense of “if I could just once be that funny…” Can’t wait to read your post, Unique Weblog Lady.
I just want to say that all three prompts can be related to the number of this grid. That’s what I wanted to say. Now I said it.
And this advisory essay is about as clear as they come. Great points, fantastic examples. I’ll start working on my hangout grid submission ASAP.
Haha about the relation to the number. My husband was begging me to make a joke about the week number but I didn’t want you all to think that I was anything short of a proper lady.
I think I love the fact your husband even knows what week we’re on.
He’s a pretty good guy, but don’t tell him I said so. He’ll expect me to be nice all the time.
You *are* a proper lady…but we’ll keep that fact a secret. And the fact that you just publicly complimented your husband!