A response to cliches
Mil Millington’s writing advice:
If the dizzy female protagonist finally realises that she’s been wasting her time on a succession of stupid, self-centred men, and that her sweet ‘friend’ David is the person she’s really loved all along, then I will hunt you down and spit in your ears. Relatedly, turning up at a fancy dress party, but - Ah-ha! - it’s not really fancy dress at all! You/she/he is the only one there in fancy dress, due to a misunderstanding/a lie told by the your/her/his evil rival: no. No, no, no. Seriously, just how many tiresome times do we see these clichés repeated? Writing them yet-a-bloody-gain will succeed in nothing but making me angry. And while you might get away with making other people angry, if you make me angry by sloshing out that lazy drivel I’ll break both of your legs, and then return every day for the next month to kick at your crutches.
Back when I imagined I might some day be a creative writing teacher (har!) I knew I would have two rules:
1) If it was all a dream, you will receive a failing grade on the work.
2) If it was all a dream or was it? you will receive a failing grade in the class.
Posted by Dave Lartigue on October 15 2004 08:46
=v= Way harsh. Sometimes real life is just that way. Lord knows I've never been at a party where it was appropriate for me to wear a fancy dress. (A cocktail dress, perhaps, but ... oh, I do digress ....)
Posted by Jym on October 18 2004 15:10
An English teacher in middle school, who cited a couple of published papers as her literary cred, once gave the class a couple of unforgivable trespasses in creative writing plot points:
- "And then I woke up, and it was all a dream."
- "And then I died."
So, I later submitted a short story to her with the following opening line:
"I died, and then I woke up."
She forgave me for it.
Posted by CT on October 31 2004 18:34