Rosie Garland

Palace of Curiosities is Rosie Garland's debut novel. Without divulging too much of the plot, the events she writes about take place in and around a Victorian show of physically unusual people.  

The characters she has created are outsiders, different. They drive the story forward in unexpected ways and yet symbolise all people who find themselves on the margins of society.

Rosie Garland herself is an interesting person - a performer and poet and now novelist - have a look at her website  rosiegarland.com


How do writers create interesting characters? 
What constitutes an interesting character?

To start with they need purpose and motivation. A writer must decide what a character wants, and set them on the path of finding those desires - giving them flaws and situations that reveal how they behave when challenged, who they are, what they will and won't to to get what they want.

Think of memorable characters in books - Captain Ahab in Melville's Moby Dick - Miss Haversham in Dickens' Great Expectations. Both of them have strong reasons  for being as they are and behaving as they do.

It isn't enough to have a character. A plot and story and other characters are needed to make a piece of writing work. However, look through a piece of writing that you have completed but would like to improve. Could the characters be stronger?

Create a character based on someone you know. Give them a couple of dark characteristics that  aren't immediately apparent or that they usually manage to hide. See if the character you create inspires a story.
    

Large Cast Productions

I've been looking at the plays of Caryl Churchill, most of which have large casts - 16 parts being an average. In all cases these parts have been divided amongst 5 / 6 actors. This saves costs and it must be easier to co-ordinate 6 actors rather than 16. 

Large Casts enable multi viewpoints and brilliant challenges for actors. However, the costs involved with putting on productions often result in writers and producers opting for fewer roles.

There are some cases when a large cast is needed. My Story Quilt (The Horse's Quilt) has 20 characters. This figure could be swelled to include more people, in schools for example, by having stage crew and musicians. 

I'm thinking of writing another large cast drama piece for community settings and have looked at those produced by other companies and writers. They vary from the sublime to the banal.

What large cast plays have you seen. Who is known for writing plays with vast casts?

Have you any ideas for such a thing. Jot down some ideas and see if it inspires something you haven't thought of before.


Caryl Churchill

Ovid, Don Quixote and unfullfilled ambition.

I've mentioned translations before. Things lost as well as found when work is changed from one language to another. I'm reading Don Quixote by Miguel De Cervantes amongst other things at the moment and note that the translation by Edith Grossman took two years to complete and she was as nervous showing her work to the world as any author might be. 

Don Quixote is one of those books that you might read or you might decide, given its size, you won't bother with. I know parts of it that have been used to demonstrate points in writing classes. I'll see how  go on with reading all of it.

Speaking of translations, I have used In Summer's Heat In my classes over the past couple of weeks. This poem by Ovid, translated by Christopher Marlowe describes a sexy afternoon. Timeless and relevant in the time of Ovid as well as Marlowe and now. Do read it. 

Which brings me to my subject which is people who didn't shine as they might have done. Christpher Marlowe, clever, feisty peer of William Shakespeare was killed in an undignified fight. Who knows what amazing plays he might have penned or what other work he might have translated. Rupert Brooke, beautiful boy poet and soldier didn't live through WW1 and his war poems don't have the bite and bitter taste of reality contained in the poems of Owen, for example.

Imagine a character from any world, not just the arts, whose talent didn't materialize for any kind of reason. Write about them from the point of view of someone who knew them or still knows them. What talent did they have? Why didn't it materialize? 

A very interesting picture may emerge.

shakespeare reduced and other abbreviations

There's no way that all of Shakespeare's plays should be able to fit into a single average length perofrmance but the Reduced Shakespeare Company managed to do that at a performance at The Oldham Coliseum last week.

Humour, 3 male actors with wigs, costumes and props, a fairly simple set and a lot of energy gave an enteratining whistle stop tour of the Bard's output. 

Could you do that with your life? Make a descriptive list of key events and then develop that into a poem or performance piece. Could you do 2 separate accounts of your life? One that is known and you don't mind sharing, and a less known or inner life?

Think of the things you do regularly, your failings and successes and use them throughout to aid the structure of the piece. Try to create a story and not a list (or a CV)

Films plots.

Watching good films is one of life's great pleasures for me. I appreciate everything from the words spoken to the scenery chosen. Some films follow a fairly transparent route from start to finish while others ie Indie Brit Films and French Films take risks with plot. Others can be based loosley or closely on books with varying outcomes.

Have a look at books on writing films.  

One thing I like to do is consider the plot in its most basic form and then think of a story of my own that follows that plot. This isn't new. Plots are recycled all the time. I have a book about Silent Movies in which the business of recycling plots by changing settings and times was a big job for writers of the time.

Try this -

Think of a film you like

Write the plot out in a series of 10-15 sentences.

Use the plot line to construct a story of your own, set in another time and place.

Use a bit of writerly skill to make it difficult to see at a glance the film you got your idea from.

Novel in a month. NaNoWriMo

Hardly news but November is the month in which writers can join an international event that involves writing a 50,000 word novel. It's a tough call but thousands of people do it.

I have an idea that I'd like to work on and I'm going to give it a try. My life is busy enough and I don't know how I can write almost 2000 words a day but if other busy people are doing it I'm going to try.

For much more information go to nanowrimo.org where you'll find all the help and support you need.

Get that novel written. You know you want to.

Mystery and perspectives

Look at the untrimmed hedge in the above photograph. It is at the back door of a house owned by a man who teaches languages at a college.

Write a short story from three perspectives about this situation.

The first perspective could be that of a neighbour, the second from the man who owns the house and the third, a person of your choosing. 

What message does the untrimmed hedge give to the people involved? 
How does it affect them?

It should be interesting to write. Think of a few plot ideas before you start.

You can write each perspective in a first or third person voice, You can choose to write each perspective as

1. A short story in its own right with  a structure, start, middle and end.

or

2. Each story can follow on from the last to build up the whole. 


Have fun.