I Want To Write A Short Story Just Confused As To What! (1 Viewer)

[elegantly_patty]

i new.. starting yr 12 next term
i love english and already do ext 1 and im hoping to pick up ext 2...
i have a story idea to expand on... its i guess Jane Austin style including some other aspects besides social issues in the 19th century...

i originally wanted to do a history war story but my teacher told me to try and work on something along the lines of the themes of the topics studied in Ext 1...
thus Jane Austin inspirition came to play...
any how... my idea is in ways evolved but im worried as to whether it might be too complex to develope in a short story...

if im wanting to do a story containing ideas of social discrimination, politics and births of feminism... im choosing the Shakespeare trade mark of disguise... however do you guys think it might take to long to develop? not wanting to give too much away as to avoid a copy cat lurking in here for ideas...

 

[fuckfoot]

if you're very worried about word limits i would suggest a lot of planning. your work will inevitably change and evolve though, so these will be rendered useless...

word limits are tough things. i had a problem making it into the 6000-8000 but most kids suffer the exact opposite. perhaps you should write out a few pages in the next few weeks to see what sort of pace develops. if it's impossible, then change your ideas around. otherwise, you can do what everyone else does. write the whole thing out and then cull, cull, cull.

your work doesn't have to revolve around the english courses though. it's preferred that you 'extend on your knowledge' and at the same time allow this to 'evolve independently'. (i think i'm quoting the marking notes.)
i ignored this aspect, but it was easy to worm in some sort of connection in the end.

 

[AsyLum]

I dont think it is too short, you just have to employ a lot of subtleness and be sucinct if you want to continue with it.

 

[elegantly_patty]

your work doesn't have to revolve around the english courses though. it's preferred that you 'extend on your knowledge' and at the same time allow this to 'evolve independently'. (i think i'm quoting the marking notes.)
i ignored this aspect, but it was easy to worm in some sort of connection in the end.

iwas thinking of the issues and themes drawing from my own knowledge but the genre being 19th century....

 

[Sheehan :)]

hhhhmmmmmmmmm........word lims givin me a hard time at tha time

 

[glitterfairy]

I remember when I first started that I thought it would be so hard to "make my story work around Eng Adv and Ext Ext" but when i talked to my teacher she told me that it's english, "we can twist it and make it work!" You can find links in everything... and besides, even when you do have to draw links in your reflection statement, you'll find that it's really really easy to find at least one thing in common...

When I first started my story I had an idea of where I wanted to go and what sort of things I wanted to do but putting it to paper was an entirely different story. As I recall, I did 7 or so drafts and one full re-working of the entire story :O Not the highligh of my life.

But you'll find that as you keep typing away your story WILL go somewhere. Perhaps not in the original way you intended - my "concept" was forced to change numerous times and I realised what I was trying to do could not be achieved within the word limit - but it will end up somewhere. you have to actually write something before you get to that point though

So the moral of this story is: As much as people like you and me like to get everything "perfect" before we start, it just doesn't happen. The only way to really test things is to write. And re-write, and re-write again.

finally, I remember that when I started i didn't think I'd even REACH the word limit... a few weeks prior to it being handed in, it was about 2000 words over the limit :S strange stuff happens...

Best wishes!

 

[jhakka]

If you're worried about linking to the other course, it can be something as simple as applying your knowledge of genre gained from the Extension 1 course (assuming you did genre) in working out the conventions you chose to use in your own work.

 

[glitterfairy]

You can ALWAYS link it back somehow... postmodernism is always a good one

 

[jhakka]

"You see the spelling errors on page 7? That's postmodernism."

 

[glitterfairy]

HAHAHAHA very true... honestly, anything can be linked back to postmodernism...

 

[elegantly_patty]

wat would you you call the genre austine writes in? post-romanticism? romanticism? realism?

 

[jhakka]

I'd call it boring, however others would call it comedy.

 

[horace walpole]

Research

I understand your problem, I suffered working with a huge story and a word limit of 8000 in my ext 1 minor. What I did is talked to my teacher about the idea and word limits. I think for you it might be a good idea to write a series of short stories, by short I mean 1000-1500 words, and in each address one of your issues.

I don't know that much about your idea, and I understand that you dont want copy cats stealing it, fair enough-don't worry I'm the same about my idea. Talk to your teacher, coz there is always a way. And they can be really useful sometimes.

 

[elegantly_patty]

lol my teacher thinks jane austine is like bloody murder rofl...
personally i love the subtleness and simplicity in her writings... lol if past lives existed i probably came from that time period rofl anyhow...

besides the nice insight on call her genre boring... what could i classify it under besides comedy and satire??? i mean as in the 'isms' so many people use to make themselves looks smart rofl

 

[jhakka]

Pre-modernism?

 

[elegantly_patty]

thanx heaps!

 

[glitterfairy]

Hmm... before Modernism is Liberal Humanism, isn't it?

Meh, Lynn cannot remember...

 

[jhakka]

Let's call it Pastism for simplicity's sake.

 

[glitterfairy]

ROFL

You're just as bad as my english teacher... he encourages (encouraged, I should say) to quote him as a critic, and had the 'David Eldridge Reading" aka Narratological, which I believe many people are using nowadays.

 

[goldendawn]

Haha, your English teacher encourages you to use HIM as a critic? Hehez. That's classic! I have this image of all the students in the class attentively, nervously, copying down his every word as he speaks and gesticulates in an arty way. He has a very self-impressed look on his face.