Week 3 Who knows where or when? Creating past, present, and (sometimes) future.
Read “I Am Holding Your Hand,” (Myfanwy Collins, from The Rose Metal Press Field Guide to Writing Flash Fiction), “Almost Over: Separate Bedrooms,” (Lydia Davis, from Collected Stories), and “Reunification” (Steve Almond, from Vestal Review). (The Lydia Davis story is quoted, in full, in the article about her that the link points to, and it has some interesting background about the author. She likes fruit smoothies. And cows.)
Discuss: How does time define, pressure, thwart, or support story? If a flash fiction story takes place in a single moment (as many do), how do we give characters the weight of a fully lived past? Can flash support flashbacks? What other techniques can writers use to reveal background? How do we choose the right tense for a micro story?
Exercise: On a sheet of paper, write the following phrases:
The first thing he(she) remembered was __________.
Years before he was born, his mother(father) had __________.
Once, he knew, this had happened.
It was not until ____________ that he understood ___________.
Now, when he remembers his father(mother), he sees him(her) _________.
Years from now, he will be __________.
Use these to generate ideas for a new character, or to fill out an existing character. Change tense, gender, and person as needed. Set the timer for 15 minutes and write a story or scene that takes place within a finite, measured amount of time—as long as it takes to bake a cake, say, or escape from a burning building. While your story should have a “ticking clock” element that drives the motion forward, these phrases can provide the back story.
Take-home read: “Cicadas” (Lynda Barry), from One! Hundred! Demons! (Best seen in color; borrow the book or read online at Salon.com.)
Homework: Continue the piece you began in class or start a new story in which, as in the Lynda Barry piece, a “now” and a “then” story exist side by side. The ongoing action should be somehow informed by what came before. Use a concrete physical image as the bridge between the two timelines.
