James Joyce's dirty letters - Old Love Letters - Robin McKinley. Kurt Vonnegut explains drama. I was at a Kurt Vonnegut talk in New York a few years ago. Talking about writing, life, and everything. He explained why people have such a need for drama in their life. He said, “People have been hearing fantastic stories since time began. The problem is, they think life is supposed to be like the stories. Let's look at a few examples.” He drew an empty grid on the board, like this: Time moves from left to right. He said, “Let's look at a very common story arc. It starts with her awful life with evil stepsisters, scrubbing the fireplace. “People LOVE that story! He wiped the board clean and said, “Now let's look at another popular story arc: the disaster.”
It's an ordinary day in an ordinary town. But the problem is, life is really like this... Our lives drifts along with normal things happening. “But because we grew up surrounded by big dramatic story arcs in books and movies, we think our lives are supposed to be filled with huge ups and downs! That's why people invent fights. Kurt Vonnegut -- troubling.info. Eight rules for writing fiction: 1. Use the time of a total stranger in such a way that he or she will not feel the time was wasted. 2. Give the reader at least one character he or she can root for. 3. Every character should want something, even if it is only a glass of water. 4. 5. 6. 7. 8. -- Vonnegut, Kurt Vonnegut, Bagombo Snuff Box: Uncollected Short Fiction (New York: G.P.
Kurt Vonnegut: How to Write with Style. Kurt Vonnegut at the Blackboard. Voices in Time I want to share with you something I’ve learned. I’ll draw it on the blackboard behind me so you can follow more easily [draws a vertical line on the blackboard]. This is the G-I axis: good fortune-ill fortune. Death and terrible poverty, sickness down here—great prosperity, wonderful health up there. This is the B-E axis. Now let me give you a marketing tip. Another is called “Boy Meets Girl,” but this needn’t be about a boy meeting a girl [begins drawing line B].
Now, I don’t mean to intimidate you, but after being a chemist as an undergraduate at Cornell, after the war I went to the University of Chicago and studied anthropology, and eventually I took a masters degree in that field. One of the most popular stories ever told starts down here [begins line C below B-E axis]. There’s to be a party at the palace. And when she shows up she’s the belle of the ball [draws line upward]. Now there’s a Franz Kafka story [begins line D toward bottom of G-I axis]. Douglas Adams. How to make a famous SF/Fantasy writer happy.