Everything comes together in the Capstone. You will draft a complete story, narrative essay, or memoir of 8–15 pages. With the advice of your peer readers, you will revise, rewrite, and complete it. The skills you’ve learned of plotting, setting, physical description, characterization, and stylistic clarity and innovation will culminate in an original work of art all your own. We’ll discuss the steps that professional writers take to bring their work into the public world. Along the way you’ll learn the patient habits of revision that make up the writer’s life.
Workshop Demonstration, pt. 2
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Capstone: Your Story
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Peer Review
Now that you’ve finished your first draft, it’s time to get ready for the first big peer review. This week we’ll talk about how to give good critique, and we’ll present a sample story and sample workshop. At the end of the week, you’ll write critiques of three of your fellow students’ work while they are busy critiquing yours.
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Salvatore ScibonaFrank B. Weeks Visiting Professor of English
Table's open.
>> I think that something Brandon said that interested me
was about what Bo wants, like his motivations in this.
And I think that Mateo is right in that Bo [INAUDIBLE] kind of that is with this
discussion with George with all that, what?
George wants money, that's what this thing is.
But I don't really know what that boy wants and
it seems like maybe he just wants to stop working.
All the time since he had this nice life with Marsha but
if that's the case I kind of want see to Marsha more in that section.
Because the line on page six, yeah, yeah, whatever,
people making real money are one of two things, unhappy or
are entirely eager to the fact of their unhappiness.
I thought that was a really big line and
it seems like it's trying to teach the audience a lesson almost.
And I thought that if it's going to stay there,
I kind of want to see Bo interact with that idea in what he wants in life.
So that I can understand why he would throw everything he has away at the end.
>> Yeah, I agree, I don't know why Bo wants to be a chief.
I want to know what type of chef he is, if he specializes in Italian.
He seems to know how to cook really well but technically with all the chopping and
julienning but I don't have any idea how he got into cooking or why.
And I feel like that really be really good back story because then maybe like if
there was this dream and now you are an illusion.
That would make sense why he so bitter but I think that is an important thing.
He talks about not remembering Marsha's favorite food, doesn't always seem
really realistic as they have been together for over two years.
I think it would be important to know why [INAUDIBLE] just a line or two or
what he likes to cook for himself on a Sunday morning, something like that.
>> I think getting back to what Haley said about Sam's description,
I noticed something as I was reading because I found the description
in this piece was by far the strongest part.
I think.
>> The physical description?
>> The physical description and like, the use of verbs and adjectives are exquisite.
Like, the julienned red pepper, the quickening click of the blade,
like it's all just so- >> Click is a very nice word.
>> Yeah, it's all just so exact, like yes, that's exactly how that is and
especially say the food's going to viewer will think it is.
How would they know?
Like that's the number one issue I have with food shows and I was just like, yes,
put it in the words and I think that's the same strongest point.
So put these visions into words in such that there's
like an exact way, I think it's exquisite.
>> I think like on that point sense does a really
good job of like convincing us that he really
knows somehow what it's like to be a celebrity chef.
And or at the very least watch some food channel but like.
I think it's like kind of indicative of what comes off as research but
or doesn't come off as research but it comes off as inside knowledge.
>> I do think though that like that, the way that it relates to the plot,
like George being an evil like, not just bad producer.
Who says things people making real money want to do things blah, blah, blah.
And it's a little too easy for me, that he thinks all these gross things about money.
And so, of course he would cheat on someone's wife.
>> Yeah, it's some snappy Hollywood guy.
>> Yeah, it's like we were talking about before with to have a very clear
antagonist.
Is I think which I mean is fine in certain sense but
I think George can be a little more multi-faceted.
>> I'm interested in this idea that Hailey seems to be
suggesting along with what you're saying that
the question of an antagonist is very important.
And there needs to be some I would like to understand better
what things are in conflict in this story.
And I guess the way we have it now Beau is in conflict with George his producer for
the affections of the wife which is someone earlier.
But in the absence of a vibrant sense of what
the character wants, which I hear a couple of you say.
It's very hard to really get a hold on what the price of failure would be.
Right now, we see that he is humiliated by the loss
of the affections of his wife, and we see him
Do things maybe anybody might do in response
to a sort of a psychic blow like that.
What makes him, what would make him really particular would
be if we had a clear sense of what he particularly wanted and
how this particularly the effect of this affair
collapsed those or challenged those desires.
I think in some ways like in the absence of those particular things,
we end up falling back on our general notion of all of the time.
We talked the other day in a class about a manuscript
where something took place in a fantastic world.
And I felt in the places where things had not in detail,
I fell back on my notion of Batman and movies and comic books.
In this story, to some degree,
it's should the extent that it's particular I don't fall
back on any cliche notions to the extent that it's blank, I do.
So I feel, I'm with you guys that the beginning,
especially, where I find this guy totally in his zone and
controlled, doing his knife work.
I feel like I'm in the presence of a real human being but
then later on, when I see him meeting a women who he basically finds foxy.
I don't actually, somehow I don't feel like I'm in the presence of somebody
actually attracted to a woman because he doesn't quite [INAUDIBLE].
>> The way it's described is like everything else fades away and
he hears the.
>> You like that.
>> I liked it.
>> [INAUDIBLE] I feel like the impression that I got from that was it
was superficial a cliché but I like that because this is a guy on television.
And this is a guy who, like the whole first page after every single person talk
it's like someone talks, then they smiled and it's just like so
television [CROSSTALK] >> More like,
it's more Beau's influence on the scene rather than Sam's writing of the scene?
>> I think that if you keep it like that, then I think that if Sam keeps it like
that, then he has to be aware of what he's doing.
>> But okay, I- >> I didn't find that at all.
I find him like someone who doesn't actually want to be on TV and
doesn't care for his fans, self in this position.
And I think that at the end, he knows that he's been a really negligent boyfriend,
fiance, husband, and he hates himself I think for it.
And we don't really know why he likes Marsha that much but he projects,
he is acting out but actually really hates how he's done this before.
>> [INAUDIBLE] >> I was going to say that maybe that
scene does or can work with the sort of superficial like spotlight thing,
we've just been talking about because of Beau's character but I think regardless.
It's not sufficient, right?
I think we still,
I'm convinced that we really need to see their relationship, actually.
>> I agree with what you said about not, I mean,
I feel like it's more important to see their relationship and
them in love and what went wrong versus them meeting, I think.
I agree with that.
Although I do like seeing them meet, I don't think it needs to be one or
the other but you need the other.
>> [INAUDIBLE] Well, I kind of wanting to just work
on something you were saying that maybe it
is an important question for this story.
What attitude this guy has toward the superficial nature of his job and
the world that he's having to live in.
Because two people I think both of you reading pretty carefully have come
to pretty contradictory notions about whether he's actually sneering at TV or
totally captivated by it and unable to see out of his TV cell.
That seems like a really important thing for the story to understand about itself
and maybe the answer the way into that, is indirect style.
In other words, like one thing I noticed that was really good on page.
On the bottom of page three, going to page four.
It says, flat plane in front of her throat repeatedly signalling kill, kill.
Morning review with Vera Davies,
cut to a fast food commercial where a guy bites a cheeseburger and closes his eyes.
Safe in the knowledge that his order is truly is.
I thought that was so good and it was,
I mean there's a sort of slightly ironic like look that's going on there?
And I didn't know to whom to attribute that look and that's what style can do.
In other words, if the story wasn't made in such a way that we knew that that
was that Beaus's seeing that on the screen.
Then we could safely say, Beau, reads it that way and Beau is going,
this guy believes this safe, knowing that this hamburgers really [INAUDIBLE].
What Sam does that's really successful I think,
he's here in the use of free and direct style.
Is that he doesn't say the man bites a cheeseburger and
Beau thought watching the person close his eyes
that he was safe in the knowledge that this thing was truly his.
He does the much more subtle thing of trusting us to read the point of view
into the language but it's not quite enough yet.
It needs to be, more of these things need to be ascribed to him, so
that maybe we might get to Jeffrey to your concern and
your desire that Matteo shares, or that you guys are relationship guys.
You want to [LAUGH] >> [LAUGH]
>> You guys want the relationship to be
built up, which I was with you, and then I was thinking,
well what if I was the writer of this story going, why?
I'm not interested in the relationship.
>> [LAUGH] >> This guys is a fool, like what if he's
just a fool and he falls stupidly in love with the person superficially, and
then responds grandiosely, partly because he's a fool, well, maybe.
But one way if he wanted to sort of have it both ways, and it might be possible to
elude to the nature of their relationship with free and direct style more.
So we didn't have to go through like say whole domestic scenes of peace and
tranquility.
I don't want to watch these two people canoodling on the couch with my friends.
>> [INAUDIBLE] sentence that eludes
to it when times are good right?
>> The only- >> There are three somethings.
>> [INAUDIBLE] [CROSSTALK] >> There's not going to be a scene.
[CROSSTALK] >> I think you're right because of
the following things because unless change happens in the story,
the story has no reason to exist.
So because the story sort of starts off in disaster and ends at basically disaster,
I mean it's not, we haven't seen the person unfold or unravel.
And I think what some of the workshop is reporting to
Sam is that we've like come to an exciting conclusion for
a person who has not convincingly been portrayed to us yet.
And part of the way of doing that would be showing us, instead of treating this as
the A term in the sequence, treating this as the Z term in the sequence and
then showing us other things that have preceded it.
>> Yeah.
>> You were going to say a second ago.
>> I was going to say, the only time we get a kind of scene of Beau and Marsh
at home is on page seven and this was like one of the most striking paragraphs.
I just didn't know what to make with it, so Marsha had once brought home Wendy's
and he had laughed and said honey mustard was the Madonna of the condiment world.
[LAUGH] He threw out the chicken nuggets and
made a carbonara while she went into the other even read.
[SOUND] like that's really, there's a lot going on there.
And I thought that a scene like that,
I would like to see more of it because first of all, it's so specific.
I'm going to remember that about honey mustard and
Madonna now next time I go to Wendy's.
And it would've been great to have more scenes like that where you don't have to,
and it's so short, but it says a lot and I don't.
>> Madonna.
>> i was thinking, is it the Virgin Mary?
>> Yeah, exactly, I was confused.
>> Because the singer is also fabulous.
>> I thought he was saying, it's the Holy Mother,
it's the most thing of fast food but no one's using.
It's the cheap.
>> I thought it was a- >> But he likes hot dogs, so
I didn't buy didn't like honey mustard.
>> Jesus.
>> [LAUGH] >> [CROSSTALK] What does that mean it's
I don't understand.
>> She makes intense and so many people love her.
>> [CROSSTALK] >> We've just
gotten scrambled for too many people.
>> Yes, and because we don't get any more of it I don't know what to make of this.
>> Kylie Mnough like someone who doesn't.
>> Okay, but also on the subject of scrambling,
if he's making a carbonara, I thought he's going to replace their meal.
>> With something better.
>> Yes, so why is she going into the bedroom a carbonara takes.
>> She's offended.
>> Takes two minutes, she should stand there and she should watch him and
she should go through.
>> Chicken nuggets from Wendy's, mistake number one.
>> Well, if you're going to make a carbonara sauce,
there's nothing to dip the sauce into since you threw out the chicken nuggets.
>> But it's not [CROSSTALK] >> Yeah, I just didn't buy that he likes
New York hot dog and didn't like the Wendy's chicken nuggets.
>> Everything that is about food with this guy the more
the more convincing everything else gets, yeah.
>> I was also thinking there's a little bit of a weird thing about New York in
here because we are getting all of these different places all over.
A lot of section headings are about him being abroad.
But there's a few different times where he, I feel,
he doesn't quite commit to this idea, but I can't find it now.
But In, it's literally right there.
Okay, so Egypt was hot,
New York was nice because there was always shade somewhere and then the hot dogs.
So he a few different times he kind of brings things back to home and
I thought that was really interesting.
Okay, yeah, so and then Rome.
Rome was riddled with tourist, New York had more but
it was easy to get away from them.
So he clearly wants to be at home and what I kind of wondered there was
he's talking about the city and not Marsha, who is in the city I think.
I assume? Maybe he's in LA?
But he wants something at home, while he's abroad and I don't really know if that's
like a place or that's like a different lifestyle or if it's her?
>> Yeah, or if he's-.
>> Is he a native?
That's important to me?
>> Or if he possibly unable to admit to himself that it's her that he wants and
instead tells himself that it's the.
>> Well, she's a shell why would he care about
being with her apartment [INAUDIBLE] from the fact that she's pretty and stuff.
I don't see why he likes her it's not like she's brilliant and
they read the same weird books.
>> That is a glowing absence in this story.
>> [INAUDIBLE] I don't care.
>> She Marsha, Marsha, Marsha she needs to be I
think backstory's not the way to do this.
I don't want, this story wants to go top speed forward.
It's possible for her to just walk onstage and speak to us in a way that's
distinctive and singular and makes compelled to love her.
We're about out of time, unfortunately, I'm sorry, but
we've got a minute to ask, you if you have any questions for us.
Thank you for subjecting yourself to our.
>> Of course, of course.
I was curious a little bit, we did touch on George and
I think I got some good direction for George.
But I'm wondering about the space he occupies in the story because
other than that one scene,
he's really just kind of meant he's more an object than anything else.
And I was wondering if you think that should be blown up and
he should become more present throughout or if I should cut him down, or
if the space he occupies doesn't matter, as much.
>> I think, right now he sits as kind of this flat stock character
kind of like this tool for Beau's ultimate demise.
>> It depends what we're going to say that Beau really wants.
>> Yeah. >> And what Beau wants is something that
he's the obstacle preventing him from getting it, then yes.
But at this point, the reason it's hard to answer I think is
because Beau's shame is clear, but what his desire is.
We talked about the passive protagonist,
the story flirts with that problem a little bit.
Namely, that the protagonist needs to push the action, and
so far he is in someway the object of the action from forces outside of himself.
>> I can say, that I don't think George actually needs to exist necessarily and
that's because he's contributing forces to the story
that we don't need a person or a character to do, right?
He needs to work, he has an opportunity to make a lot of money, but
he also wants to be home with his wife, right?
We don't need a person to instigate that and similarly,
we don't need a person for Marsha to cheat with.
It doesn't really matter, it could matter.
That could make it worse, but it's not necessary that it be a character we know.
>> And along with that, there's an issue of plausibility of George.
If he's the producer, I would think he'd be going with.
>> He's the agent I think.
>> The agent?
>> So they sent like interns or something.
>> Last question for us Sam.
>> I guess, I mean it was mentioned briefly, but actually, no,
I think I'm good I was thinking about the thematic
connection with titles and I think I'm going to.
>> I think people want there to be a, there's just enough
relationship between the titles, that they seem to imply a coherence that they don't,
a categoriness together that they don't have.
So I would say,
that either that they should be very distinctly different kinds of language,
like phrases or different kinds of words or a very consistent ballad.
The thing is you see them, there's Marsha and
then there's those are both names.
That means that's the organ beneath as if there's one that isn't and then, so
that we get confused.
>> Yeah.
>> All right, thank you guys.
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