Reed and Editing

Yes. I love having my work ripped open like a ripe banana and peeled apart to get to the sweet center of what we are really looking for. Reed has a different style of editing than most people who I have come across in my life as a writer. No only is he careful about what he says, he does his best to preserve the work while getting the editee to learn what looks good and what does not so that the self-evaluation process happens along with the writing. Having us read aloud to our peers, each and every one of us, our unfinished product was something that felt good. No one had anything particularly much. Jared, Ashley and I were the only ones who had written and Jared had not brought his work in, but just the who discussion of my work in general really gave me more of a drive to get more done with my work. Ashley did happen to argue a lot with Reed over the point of view of her story. She wanted to break the fourth wall repeatedly with her character and was rather stubborn upon the idea despite Reed trying to explain that it turns the reader off because it distances them from the story and does not allow them to get caught up in the writing. I'm not saying she was wrong to argue her point, actually it was very informative because it got Reed to read something of his to show her the use of first person. There was a lot there, just hearing his writing explained so much about Reed as a person and I thought that I rather liked that. The fact that he was able to pour so much of himself into the small section that he showed us was really something that we could all learn from. For next week he wants 1,500 words. Hell will probably freeze over before I stop at 1,500. I really am loving this workshop. It really is starting to feel like more and more of a reward.

Let's unpack that

Working with Rob Gioia again was a wonderful experience especially because the material we are working with (King Lear) is something I have already plot and character wise deconstructed in my AP literature class. The work I think is going to be difficult because of trying to display the entity of King Lear in a 5 minute abstract performance. It going to be hard but is also going to be rewarding. It is a good group of people wooing together. It's people with experience, it's people who know what they ate doing and want to work with this material. We did a lot of working with the actual text of Lear, learning how to read it and interpret it in order to make it easier for us to work with the text. I'm excited tag this is going to culminate in a performance because it pushes us just that much harder than it would if we were just going to show it to STAC. Rob's grade depends on this so I think that makes us want to do more than do well, we want to get him the highest grade possible. I cannot wait to go back to this workshop.

Read Reed

The workshop yesterday could not have been better. I haven't been so excited to work with someone since Steve came in for the first workshop that I did last year. I think this will be something that is really going to help me in life because of the fact that I want to write novels, I've always dreamed of writing a novel and now that it is time go off into the world of people who do this for a living, I feel that my ideas are changing, my intentions for my characters are changing, and the stories I write are maturing before my eyes. From the moment he told us that we were going to be writing the first chapter of a novel I was beyond excited. This was my chance to really branch out like I had not had the opportunity to before. When I worked with Steve it was on play writing, with Mr. Semerdjian it had been more about poetry, I've yet to really work with someone who writes novels, full lens stories that I have been wanting to dive into. I couldn't care less that he doesn't write the exact genre I do, I know that it is probably a huge advantage that he doesn't and I feel that when I get further into the workshop my ideas are going to expand even more, adding to my repertoire of writing.

We were given the assignment to work towards the first chapter of a novel, and next week are to present him with an idea. I already have one. I am going to be writing from the criminal's point of view. I want to write a story about a team of hackers who stumble upon the coding for a missile guidance system and now the government (of which country I am not yet sure) is chasing after them. Each of them with go by only their hacker handles in order to dodge this chase. It feels to me more of the thriller side of the crime novel but that excites me, action, seeing as I am used to things being very steady and unmoving in my work with a lot of scenery I will need to adapt to fast dialogue. movement and cityscape environment that I feel will help me learn.

I've started typing at home and despite the fact that Reed has asked us for one chapter, I don't know if I will be able to stop at just one. I feel like I have a burst of creative energy and could use this one chapter to jump start a whole novel that may unfold itself in front of me. 10-15 pages in six weeks. That seems so little in grand scheme of things and I will probably wind up writing more than that. All I really know is that this is going to be probably the best workshop I have ever been in. I am confident from the start that this is going to be something that I will remember for a long time and will be a great advantage for me when I get to college. The only thing that I am sad about is that this is only going to last six weeks with only one day a week. Something like this I wish I could do for long periods of time each day. I don't think I have ever been this enthusiastic about workshops. I think that over the next six weeks I am going to do a lot of writing, and hopefully past that, all the way into college because I think that when I get to college if I can have continued writing from now until then on this one project I will be able to do something with it there and who knows, maybe I'll find a professor who will help me get it published. That is really what I have always wanted, to see the paperback copy of my own words with my name printed boldly below the title as if to say, "Hell Yeah I wrote this!"

It's a long arduous journey ahead of me but I think that working with Reed is one hell of a start to it. Thanks Luke, for this workshop. Thank you so much for putting me into it. I feel like all of the waiting for something like this and all of the writing I did last year has really paid off. This doesn't even feel like work. This feels like more of a reward. I cannot wait until Monday.