October 1 Newsletter

Spooky prompt - what else? Assonance and consonance. Market: Event Magazine. Can writers respond to workshop feedback?

Prompt

October—with Halloween and ancient Samhain—is a mysterious month, with shadows of early dusk and longer nights.

I’ve walked by this corner in the West End of Vancouver so many times. Usually I notice the ladder halfway up the wall—and wonder who might be tall enough to just grab and climb. And why. Or I wonder about the ugly bars in the windows. Ugh, I hate bars. Often I’ve looked at the tree itself. But this one night, suddenly, I saw the shadow. How it stretches over the sidewalk. How it climbs the building…

The one other time I posted a purely photographic prompt, the results were fun. Fiction, poetry, nonfiction, let’s see what you come up with. Engage with the photo. The subject matter does not have to relate exactly to the image—let the image speak to you, and discover within your mental/emotional/physical/spiritual response.

Share in the separate monthly thread.

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Assonance and Consonance

With the advent of our new poetry group in the Workshop Space, and questions around “what IS poetry?” it’s timely to post about assonance and consonance.

Most are familiar with the device of alliteration—words beginning with the same sound. Assonance and consonance are similar, but refer to repeating sounds within words that are in proximity; assonance refers to sounds that are vowels (and vowel sounds—see the example below of a Poe poem), and consonance is the sound of recurring consonants.

Really, this is useful in all forms of writing—even to create a tackle-and-take-to-the-ground title for a business piece.

Writers who create song lyrics often use these devices. Listen to a little rap music. Listen for full rhymes, and you’ll find not as many as you might think. Slant rhymes/ half rhymes are generally all about assonance and consonance, which create rhythm; rhythm can trick the ear to sound like rhyme. “Like rhyme” is assonance, come to think of it…

When you read titles or phrases or passages, pieces that strike you as “strong writing,” note this quality. It’s probably something you’ve made use of unconsciously already, if not consciously, choosing one phrase over another and unsure why, but recognizing that it “sounds better.”

Blue Moon / Life of Pi / Light My Fire

“Hear the mellow wedding bells” - “The Bells” by Edgar Allen Poe

A lot of country music lyrics also make solid use of this device.

Dolly Parton’s “Country is as Country Does” has the consonance of is/does, the alliteration in “Its the way I am and it’s the way I was”—those w-s! (Note how the short-i, long-i, short-i, long-i creates a weaving pattern, too.)

The Chicks, in the song “Long Time Gone” — I caught wind and hit the road runnin' —note the three short “i” sounds in wind/hit/runnin’ —they create a rhythm that captures the meaning of the line.

And—picturebook workshop group—you’ll find this in works for younger people, as it creates rhythm and musicality on the page. Check out Charlie Parker Played Be Bop by Chris Raschka, a PB of very few—very few!—words. With lines like: Never leave your cat alone… In the closing line of the book the assonance is emphasized thus: Never leave your cAt A-lone (with the hyphen). This double-beat at the end of the line—at the end of the book—creates a strong end. (Picture the drummer!) Or the line: Charlie Parker played alto saxophone… That “altO” emphasizes the “saxOphone,” in a way you might not usually hear.

Often picturebooks will have a refrain of some sort, and assonance/consonance/alliteration will be significant in that.

When you work with assonance, consider the effects of how each vowel sounds. The squeal of “ee,” the awe of “oh,” and more. How can you make use of these?

Consonants can have a hardness or a clip to them… or a softness. What is it that your story or poem is working to convey? So it’s not just your words working to create; but the subliminal in the sounds of them.

Edgar Allan Poe combined alliteration, assonance, and consonance when he worked. Consider this one line from “The Raven”:

“And the silken sad uncertain rustling of each purple curtain”

alliteration: “s” sounds at the beginning of silken/sad

assonance: “er/ur” sounds in uncertain/purple/curtain

consonance: “s” sounds in uncertain/rustling (which continues to build on the previous alliteration)

You can look for these elements in others’ works, and see/hear it in your own. (The read aloud piece I go on about…) With awareness, you can add or take away; you can make use of it to create rhythm or some punch or softening where needed.

Post a line with assonance and/or consonance in the “comments!” I’d love to see.

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Workshop update - the question of ‘Writer Response’

This is a significant question! (Thank you, Ed.) The short answer is “yes.”

The long answer is more. Often, in traditional workshop structure, the writer whose work is being discussed is expected to be silent, at the very least for the duration of the discussion time.

But while I do think this has some validity, I’m going to say that, for the purposes of what we’re doing here, it’s equally valid for the writer to respond.

In this on-line space, the person offering feedback is able to post their thoughts altogether, at once. This means that “discussion” is a bit tougher to re-create. It’s been good to see others weigh in on points brought up—this is the closest we can get to “discussion.”

Traditionally, workshops take place face-to-face, and I have sat through workshops in which the writer waves their hands around and starts to protest and explain… and it’s not pretty, and it’s certainly not useful. To anyone.

Also in face-to-face workshops where everyone—literally—has a seat at the table, there’s a human back-and-forth that evolves. It includes body language, and tone and nuance, laughter and pause. It includes reading each other far beyond anything that is words-on-page. I am very grateful, here, for the care that you (plural!) are taking with the process, as we try to allow for this piece.

The process of workshopping is challenging in many ways. We’re used to thinking of how hard it is for the writer, but it can also be a daunting process for the person offering feedback; there’s the Thing of honouring the writer, yes, but also of honouring what the story or poem is and what it might want to be, what it might become. It takes time and care to word thoughts about another’s work.

And so there are times when the writer whose work is being discussed can weigh in: points to clarify, for instance, if there’s a sense of going off-rails. Or questions, most certainly—please ask questions concerning feedback if you have them. Or post a note to enter the discussion. (Acknowledging those who have offered feedback, and say “thanks” is always good!)

Where to “draw a line” is if you find yourself explaining the work; ultimately, you want your work to speak for itself. How I’ve thought of this line is: do I feel like I’m standing in a bookstore, hanging over the shoulder of someone reading the back-cover blurb of my book, and I’m now telling them about the work… ? And no, I want to know how the reader and the story are interacting, and whatever gaps are there will inform me of where I need to take the work.

Thoughts on this writer-role in the workshop?

Archive piece

This is one of the earliest Unschool posts, on the equations of creating the picturebook. Note that I re-open these archive pieces as “free,” so all can read for the coming month.

1 + 1 = 3: The Equation of Picture Book Writing

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Off To Market

Event Magazine, a respected publication and credit, has its Creative Nonfiction Annual Contest with a deadline of October 15. The entry fee is a bit high—$34.95—but includes an annual subscription to the journal. Do know that even if you are not yet actively publishing, if you are writing with publishing as a goal, and can demonstrate that you are actively working towards that, then such things—subscriptions and entry fees—are in fact tax write-offs. Something to keep in mind, along with the fact that you are supporting the magazine. Maximum word count is 5000, and 1st prize in $1000.00.

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Re-cap of September posts

Always kicking off with the first-of-the-month post and prompt. The prompt was focused on working within the CHARACTER’S journal to discover their voice. No one has posted a piece yet, but it’s never too late to visit these monthly prompts, post and receive some feedback. (Check out the indexes to access—2021 and 2022.)

I created a few 3 Day Novel contest posts as well as a post or two about the new workshops. In addition to the currently-running picturebook group, I’ve added a poetry group, and another working with scenes, both fiction and nonfiction. (Do email me if you have any questions about joining in—note workshopping is for those who have joined as paid subscribers. You can click the “workshop space” under the “Unschool” title at top of page, and there you go… Can’t find the page? Simply click on the title of THIS post in your email, and there you go… )

I posted two pieces on the complex topic of “voice”: here’s the first, and the second (with a focus on the narrator’s voice, and the idea of “play”).

We did a “close read” of The Sweetness of Water, by Nathan Harris, looking at his use of anthropomorphism, and his sense of timing—when to deliver information within a story.

We finished the month with a “market” piece of writing contests—check them out if you missed.

There’s been a total of six pieces submitted to the various workshops—so good to see. Thank you to all who are participating in this work, both sharing, and offering feedback.

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Forthcoming

I’m working on a piece about speech tags, as requested by a paid subscriber. Are they always necessary? When can you get by without them? And more…

And the loop trail piece; it is coming!

Another subscriber question, from someone who has just self-published her first book, is about How to promote? A big question which does not only apply to those who are self-published. It’s become a big piece in even traditional publishing.

Do let me know your writing and publishing questions.

Email: alison@alisonacheson.com

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Response to the September Poll

First poll we’ve done! I was interested in what are your September plans, and discovered no one is taking a break. Instead, there were equal numbers launching in to completing an old project and “renewed writing” after summer lull.

I know my summer was busy with writing and hiking and trying to “keep up”—whatever that means. NOT a lot of relaxing. So I’m definitely in the “old project” camp, trying to get a children’s novel completed before my agent returns my latest to me for re-vision.

And half of the number of those who responded are into new projects. This would appear to be true, given the interest in the workshops :)

There’s the old saying, generally attributed to Sir Arthur Conan Doyle: “Change of work is as good as play.”

Let’s talk about this for November.

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Questions??

I do ask this with each newsletter. Let me know what’s on your mind!

alison@alisonacheson.com