help with my belonging creative writing!!!! (1 Viewer)

[littlej123]

i was thinking of a few ideas (trials are next week!) for my belonging creative writing.

something along the lines of; a chronically ill girl in a hospital ward writing diary entries on how herself and the other patients belong there, because she dosent fit in the outside world?

any other ideas? THANKS!!

 

[littlej123]

any ideas?!?!?!?!?

 

[Riproot]

any ideas?!?!?!?!?

Sounds shit and extensively long... good luck!

 

[mystery_meat]

Look, pretty much everything is cliched when it comes to creative writing. But I'd stay away from terminally ill stories unless you're confident you'll do it extremely well.

This is an extract from The Wounded Storyteller by Arthur W Frank. It's a quote from a woman, Gail, who suffered chronic pain.

"And all these people in pain . . . all these people with aches and all these people suffering. We walk in different dimensions. We have access to different experiences, different knowledges. And there are so many of us, too. What would happen if we all knew what it really meant and we all lived as if it really mattered, which it does. We could help the normals and the whitecoats both. We could help them see that they're wasting the precious moments of their lives, if they would look at us who don't have it. I'm convinced that only sick people know what health is. And they know it by its very loss."

The book doesn't directly relate to belonging, more so concerned with the concept of witness, testimony and commune. Not in the legal sense, but something entirely different that I won't delve into. But if you are going to write a creative writing piece about someone who is terminally ill, do a lot of wider reading. Use quotes like the ones above to develop central themes and add more depth.

 

[aphorae]

Nah, I've read quite a few really good ones... just have to think out of the box.

Yeah don't do sickness ones unless you're a really good writer + have done your research, or you know someone who has the particular illness, otherwise it comes off as 'cliche' and lacking insight or sensitivity... particularly if you get a marker who has known someone chronically ill (likely considering most of their ages). Illness, bullying and teenage angst are probably the most overdone (and worst done) ones - obviously there are some good ones, but most people who have 'no ideas' tend to go to those ideas first.

Marking Centre Notes from 2010:
Candidates presented responses in a variety of forms, though narrative was the dominant choice.

In better responses, candidates used language appropriate to their chosen form of imaginative writing. They explored the challenges of belonging and not belonging with insight, complexity and/or subtlety. These responses displayed originality and artistry and the mechanics of language were applied skilfully.

In sound responses, candidates tended to be more literal in their use of one of the quotations. They tended to be predictable, linear or clichéd in their examination of the challenges of belonging and not belonging. In these responses, the mechanics of language was controlled and writing structure was appropriate to form.

Weaker responses tended to lack structural direction, were simplistic and inconsistent in their exploration of the challenges of belonging and not belonging. These responses lacked credibility, with limited appropriateness to audience and/or purpose. Flawed mechanics of language were usually a feature of these responses.