Think of a scene from a piece of writing you’re working on or want to work on. If you don’t have such a piece then daydream an interesting dramatic scene, or pick one from a TV show or movie you watched very recently or a book you’re reading. Now pick a “still frame” from that scene–imagine that you’ve taken a photograph of one single moment in it. Write up that image in a way that conveys as much as possible about the scene–through description, not telling.
Although I’ve taken the idea for the above exercise from something I put in my old blog a long time ago, I created the new “structure” category for the Epiphanies blog partially because none of the others really fit this exercise, and partially because of Brian Kiteley’s book, “The 3 A.M. Epiphany,” which I’m reading for review right now. I’d forgotten until I read that book how much fun exercises based on structure can be, and I think I’ll have to introduce more of them here in the future!
It’s an odd bit of synchronicity, don’t you think, that I happened to name this blog “Epiphanies” before receiving that book? As it happens I’m quite enamored of the book, and look forward to reviewing it.
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