from insight kellogg northwestern.edu
Writing is like any other art form. Talent is nice for ideas, but execution requires skill. And skill is acquired through practice under the guidance of a master.
Jacqueline Mitchard was the Guest of Honor at this year's Rose State Writing Short Course. 'Guest of Honor' just means she gets to speak at the opening ceremonies and she gets to teach in the auditorium which has more seats than the regular classrooms.
Mitchard is a New York Times Best Selling Author. Among her books is The Deep End of the Ocean, the first book featured on Oprah's Book Club. Maybe more importantly, she teaches Fiction and Creative Non-Fiction at Vermont College of Fine Arts. And teach is what she did at Rose State.
One of the exercises she gave us to do was to write twelve lines of dialogue. Dialogue only. We could not use attributions or other narrative. It was to be an argument between two people, one of whom has a secret. The secret could not be that they were pregnant or having an affair.
From the dialogue, the reader should be able to identify the relationship of the two people, their gender, their ages, and what the secret was.
Here's mine.
"Did something happen at school?"
"No."
"What happened to your glasses?"
"Nothing."
"How'd they get broken?"
"I dunno."
"Were the other boys at you again?"
"Sorta."
"What kind of mothers do they have?"
"I dunno."
"Do you want me to talk to the teacher?"
"No. Please don't."
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