The New York Times



Art Imitates LifeArt imitates life, and art also imitates other art. Artists, musicians, and writers draw inspiration from each other’s work all the time.Now you’re going to try the same thing. Using an Edward Hopper painting as a jumping off point, imagine that the scene depicted is in some way related to a crime that is about to be committed, or has already taken place. Who are the characters involved? What’s their back-story? Will they be caught? Let your imagination run free…What??You are now the author of a crime story inspired by an Edward Hopper painting of your choosing.?Like all good writers, before you begin you must have a clear idea about where you want to go with your story and what you want your reader to take away from it.?That is, your story must have a POINT, a lesson, or a central idea.?All narrative fiction contains other essential elements, like well-developed characters, conflicts, settings, and a clear plot structure. Will your story follow a typical chronology, or will it jump around using flashback? From whose point of view will the story be told? Will you use a first person narrative, or third person? These are all decisions that you need to make before you begin. The end product should be something YOU would enjoy reading.Why??As students of literature, you are expected to identify and analyze the many strategies authors use to draw us into their work. One of the best ways to learn about these techniques is to use them yourself. A major requirement of this project is to skillfully insert into your story as many different writing strategies as you can. Another is to tell a really great story with believably fascinating characters. And finally, we will use this project to reacquaint ourselves with the full writing process.How??It is not only vital that you have a clear plan before writing your story, it is required.Step 1:?Use the story outline that follows to work out the major details of your story. Like all writers, you can always change your mind as you go, but you have to start?somewhere.?You must submit both pieces for approval by __________________.Step 2:?Decide which strategies or literary techniques you will use to spice up your story. Remember, as a reader, you are an expert on what makes a story boring and unappealing, so use that knowledge to make your piece vivid and lively.Step 3:?You will have 3 days in class to work on this project. You can and should enlist feedback from classmates throughout the process, but you will be required to bring a working rough draft for peer feedback on ____________Step 4:?Turn your rough draft into a final piece by making and highlighting a minimum of 7 substantive changes on both rough and final copies. Minimum length is 500 words. All stages of writing (outlines, rough and final drafts) due on _________________. ................
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