Cynthia,

This is great. There’s so much more here than the last week, and I like how you took the first two pages and altered them and continued from there. One thing—I wouldn’t start with L’s POV as this is obviously Michelle’s narrative. You throw off the reader in the first couple paragraphs, and L is much more interesting from Michelle’s perspective anyway. Wasn’t she sitting on a bench two weeks ago observing L?

And does Michelle ever find out who L is talking about when she speaks of “fire under her belly”? If not, it seems like something she should find out… Also, I’d like to know if Michelle got her vanilla vodka on the rocks.

For subsequent drafts: it seems that the narrative is now launching into an exploration of the mother. Using L. as a comparison, how does the mother live up? L. is pretty fantastic; can we get more of a hint how Michelle feels about her? So far, it seems she is observing, amused, and I’m not sure how they met (randomly in the park?) Who approached who first? How long have they been friends? What role does L play; what role will L play in Michelle’s life?

My in-line comments: Jimes P2P Course Assmt 2 – JP comments.

Lee,

This second week’s narrative was much more concrete. I liked the opening reference to the temperature of the car and the background noise (podcast) that prevails throughout the car ride. I can see the dilemma she has on her hands–on the one hand loving her job and loving her family, but struggling to transfer happiness/passion from one to the other. It isn’t so clear-cut as that she is a better teacher than mother, or vice versa, but it is clear that she has doubts in both areas. I liked the relegation of each kid to a state, a place, almost as if she needs to compartmentalize her life even more. I think the line of thought to trace in subsequent drafts is the “She’s still not so sure about being a mother.” It would be worthwhile exploring this, why she does not doubt her happiness in any other role in her life. What is it about being a mother that is so wholly different?  You might try drawing a parallel between her trying to teach her students to fish and her trying to teach her children to fish… Why “She thinks the kids are thriving in spite of her, not because of her” ? In addition, she thinks so much of Don Quixote–what scenes from that novel can we interpret and insert here–can she use as metaphor, to draw out her feelings of motherhood, teacherhood, wifehood? I think there’s a lot here that you don’t have to even plumb that deep for. I would suggest expanding, expanding, expanding in the next iteration of this.

Comments in-line here: Lee Week Two – JP comments.

Hi everyone,

Welcome to Week 4 of the course! You have two more weeks after this, which will be devoted to revising your two drafts from Week 1 and Week 2/3. Week 4, however, will be devoted to critiques of your work.

Things TO DO for this week. Note: Your new small groups are noted below!

1. Please read through your small group’s manuscripts from Week 2/3 and critique them on your blog. This includes general response and in-line comments, like before.
2. Read through blog posts from last week, and be sure to comment on at least your small group’s.
3. Then coordinate a real time meeting, either via Skype conference call or online chat. I will email the groups separately again so you have each other’s contact information. (Again, if this proves too difficult to coordinate, emailing with questions about one another’s critiques is okay. You can also comment on each other’s posts.)
4. In your small group meeting, discuss each other’s work and the discussion questions, listed on Week 4.
5. Respond to the meeting and discussion questions in your blog.

Critiques and blog posts are due by the end of the day Tuesday, October 6.

I will connect the new small groups in separate emails:

Group 1: Cynthia, Nicola, Bob

Group 2: Dineh, Lee, Susan

Group 3: Dominique, John, Aileen

Aileen,

I love this narrator; she’s funny. She combats things with a sense of humor—maybe a learned sense of humor through the years, which makes it all the more genuine and deep. I love the litte interjections of thoughts—though the italics are driving me crazy! You don’t need italics for most of these things—the reader gets it just fine, and works even better when it’s just a natural part of the narrative without the glaring directive of italics.

What an ingenious idea! Capturing your time at the gym—brilliant! All the detail about the gym is good; would be good also to pay the same attention to detail of the gyms’ characters—but maybe that’s for next time. Maybe the people become more real to narrator after successive visits. You’re very brave to write about your struggles. What makes it work as a narrative right now is the honesty of the first person narrator and her sense of humor. In this case, I might not encourage writing in third person (only if it will help you, would still be a nice experiment, to switch back and forth and see what you are most comfortable with).

Some ideas, or rather questions, for the future: You mentioned very clearly what narrator wants—not goals, but her youth back, her body back. Is that all? What has happened to her husband? She knows she can’t have her youth back, so what is her purpose in going to a gym? To keep alive? To feel alive?

Looking forward to more about the gym, and narrator’s experiences with it, in it… My comments in-line: Week1 – Aileen – JP comments.

Nicola,

I thought this was really lovely. The images you evoked were subtle—my favorite was the wind lifting the fringes of her scarf. This piece exudes subtlety, and subtle wanderings of the mind. It reminds me of writings by Amy Hempel; have you read her? I would recommend her; she has a way of turning a phrase—everything she writes is exquisitely crafted. She is known for short, fictive pieces that relay moments in time.

For you, I would encourage revisiting this cemetery, continuing with the quiet observations you have spelled out here, and to continue spelling out more. This time, maybe interjecting with some background of the narrator’s intentions. Why is she here? Why does she visit the graves that are not her ancestors’ each week? What connection does she have to this place? What has happened to make her so unafraid of death? And which group is she a part of—the East Berliners, the West Berliners, neither of these? What significance does the Berlin wall have for her?

I think it would also be helpful for her to go on a little excursion, around the stream maybe, or explore one specific aspect of the cemetery. Does she imagine out the lives of those dead? Why does she think no one will care enough to place ceramic angels on her grave? Who is the most important person in her life?

Thanks; I look forward to reading more. Here are my in-line comments:CNF Week 1 – Waldfriedhof Pankow – Nicola Caroli – JP comments.

(As requested, an extension from last week.)

Basically, you’re going to spend this week writing more, new material, based on your peers’ feedback. You first week’s work was rich with potential–so many different avenues for you to explore. Write four to six more pages. Revisit the place, whether physically or in memory. See Week 3 for details.

Since there are no small group meetings this week or critiques, please use this time to catch up (for those of you who haven’t had a chance to meet yet or finish your critiques). Also don’t forget to:

1. Respond to Farber’s video on the “struggles of writing nonfiction” on your blog. What are your current struggles?

2. Respond to the other discussion questions on your blog. See Week 3 for details.

Susan,

Wow, I had never known about Preventoriums before! This was fascinating–you definitely did a great job of just laying it all out there, getting everything you could remember down. It felt like that while reading, like I was lapping up memories of this phenomenon that happened to you when you were so young.

I think one way you might approach this place/memory/period in your life is to think about how you would frame it in the context of your current life. So, for instance, starting the story with a conversation you may have had with a friend, or with another scene from everyday life, and then delving into these memories. Or thinking specifically of the intended receiver of these memories—a series of letters to someone or some set of people. I definitely think you’ve got a lot here, though, and would encourage you to keep writing more of whatever comes to mind until it is all recorded, before worrying too much about the technical structure.

I’m really interested in the setting of the Preventorium; I would love more  concrete details in terms of the smell of the place, the texture of the clothes she had to wear, etc. The devil is in the details… and I feel like you have a well of riches here just waiting to be described and shaped.

Also, the perspective here is a bit distant–it is definitely from the perspective of someone who is looking back and trying to remember, rather than being again in the same shoes as the child. Is this what you are going for?

I guess for the future I would suggest attempting to fully capture one of the myriad moments you have run through in this draft, or a new one, before moving on to the next. There is a lot of material here, and each scene deserves to be fully fleshed out.

My in-line comments: Preventorium week 1 Currie-1 – JP comments.

Bob,

I loved the opening, and I loved how you deftly weaved in the history before writing yourself in that scene with the “sprucy” woman in the car. That scene painted an apt image of the narrator, and I would like to see more like it. After that scene, the narrative rolls with a lot of fascinating background–but I think this history can be slowed down a little, and the narrator’s visit in late spring be continually described. What more did the narrator do there? Which places did he revisit; which people did he talk to?

I think you analogies are on the button, and your prose is wonderfully vivid. I would like more scenes from the past to accompany the history. The narrator mentions “daddy”, reverting back to a childhood perspective. What specific memories does he have of his father? Why is it so seemingly painful for narrator to go back, or to never want to go back? Or can’t go back? What happened during the twenty years after he was four on Jefferson street–why is that street so significant for him? What did he do there? He must have come of age there, must have fallen in love for the first time, must have broken his mother’s heart for the first time, must have experienced loss for the first time… I can’t wait to read about all of this in your continuing story…

My comments in-line: Jefferson Street 1 – JP comments.

John,

I think this is great in terms of material–you have Reggie, and I think you should really tell us more about him. Use him as a foil for insights into narrator’s own character, history, why he ended up in Kensington of all places. How is he different from or like Reggie? Right now the piece wraps up nicely as an essay on a place, but I’d like to see it go beyond musing on the  place and why narrator chose to settle there compared to other areas of Calgary. I think you can delve into scenes now, get into specifics, like when you mention the interaction between the barista and the homeless guy–describe it, with dialogue! Who is she? (Has narrator ever flirted with her, for instance?) Who is the homeless guy? How is he connected to Reggie? What are the narrator’s own intentions for living here, in Kensington, seemingly alone. What does the narrator want? Where is he headed?

Look forward to reading more. Here are some in-line comments: CNF Week 1 – A Village in the City – John Lewis – JP comments.

Lee,

I read this as protagonist’s respite from life. A car ride to flesh out narrator–what a wonderful idea! I want more of the concrete here though, and less of the jittery turns of mind (though it is good, just less of), and by concrete I mean—what is her occupation? Where is she driving to? How old are her children? What did her daughter do in school that embarrassed her–how will her husband be waiting for her at home? What games will they have played? How does this affect her? Is she stifled by them? Drawn to them? Both?

On the car ride back from work, or what have you, next week, it would be good to see her other life–the career life in comparison to the home she has thus far painted. How does she juxtapose the two? It would be great to see specific instances–scenes of interaction from both lives that she remembers while driving. Maybe she could grab onto a concrete object in the road; this would serve as a nice background tension as she muses in her head. Perhaps she curses at a driver or makes a wrong turn, or notices a squirrel scampering up a tree…

Here are my in-line reactions: The Story of an Hour – JP comments. I enjoyed reading, and am excited to see where future drives will take her.