The Notebooking Daily 2020 Writing Series is a daily writing exercises for both prose writers and poets to keep your creative mind stretched and ready to go—fresh for your other writing endeavors. The writing prompts take the impetus—that initial crystal of creation—out of your hands (for the most part) and changes your writing creation into creative problem solving. Instead of being preoccupied with the question "What do I write" you are instead pondering "How do I make this work?" And in the process you are producing new writing.
These exercises are not meant to be a standard writing session. They are meant to be productive and to keep your brain thinking about using language to solve simple or complex problems. The worst thing you can do is sit there inactive. It's like taking a 5 minute breather in the middle of a spin class—the point is to push, to produce something, however imperfect. If you don't overthink them, you will be able to complete all of the exercises in under 30 minutes.
Erasing "Out of Season" 2
For poetry do an erasure or black-out poem from the following selection of Ernest Hemingway's 1923 short story "Out of Season". An Erasure/Blackout is really simple: you take the given text and remove many words to make it your own new piece. One way to go about the erasure that I like to do is to copy the text and paste it twice into your document before you start erasing or blacking out (in MS Word set the text background color to black), that way if you get further into the erasure and decide you want a somewhat different tone or direction, it's easy to go to the unaltered version and make the erasure/black-out piece smoother. Another tip is to look for recurring words, in this example marsala occurs many times and could be a good touchstone for your piece.
If you insist on fiction, write a piece with one of the three titles taken from this section:
- "Rusty Bobsleds"
- "Getting at the Same Thing From Different Angles"
- "With Much Winking"
Erasure Selection:
from "Out of Season"
OUT OF SEASON
It is closed until two, someone passing in the street said scornfully. Peduzzi came down the steps. He felt hurt. Never mind, he said, we can get it at the Concordia.
They walked down the road to the Concordia three abreast. On the porch of the Concordia, where the rusty bobsleds were stacked the young gentleman said, Was wollen Sie? Peduzzi handed him the ten lira note folded over and over. Nothing, he said, Anything. He was embarrassed. Marsala, maybe. I don't know. Marsala?
The door of the Concordia shut on the young gentleman and the wife. Three marsalas, said the y. g. to the girl behind the pastry counter. Two, you mean? she asked. No, he said, one for a vecchio. Oh, she said, a vecchio, and laughed, getting down the bottle. She poured out the three muddy looking drinks into three glasses. The wife was sitting at a table under the line of newspapers on sticks. The y. g. put one of the marsalas in front of her. You might as well drink it, he said, maybe it'll make you feel better. She sat and looked at the glass. The y. g. went outside the door with a glass for Peduzzi but could not see him.
I don't know where he is, he said, coming back into the pastry room carrying the glass.
He wanted a quart of it, said the wife.
How much is a quarter litre? the y. g. asked the girl.
Of the bianco? One lira.
No, of the marsala. Put these two in, too, he said, giving her his own glass and the one poured for Peduzzi. She filled the quarter litre wine measure with a funnel. A bottle to carry it, said the y. g.
She went to hunt for a bottle. It all amused her.
I'm sorry you feel so rotten, Tiny, he said. I'm sorry I talked the way I did at lunch. We were both getting at the same thing from different angles.
It doesn't make any difference, she said. None of it makes any difference.
Are you too cold? he asked. I wish you'd worn another sweater.
I've got on three sweaters.
The girl came in with a very slim brown bottle and poured the marsala into it. The y. g. paid five lire more. They went out the door. The girl was amused. Peduzzi was walking up and down at the other end out of the wind and holding the rods.
Come on he said, I will carry the rods. What difference does it make if anybody sees them? No one will trouble us. No one will make any trouble for me in Cortina. I know them at the municipio. I have been a soldier. Everybody in this town likes me. I sell frogs. What if it is forbidden to fish? Not a thing. Nothing. No trouble. Big trout, I tell you. Lots of them.
They were walking down the hill toward the river. The town was in back of them. The sun had gone under and it was sprinkling rain. There, said Peduzzi, pointing to a girl in the doorway of a house they passed. My daughter.
His doctor, the wife said, has he got to show us his doctor?
He said his daughter, said the y. g.
The girl went into the house as Peduzzi pointed.
They walked down the hill across the fields and then turned to follow the river bank. Peduzzi talked rapidly with much winking and knowingness. As they walked three abreast the wife caught his breath across the wind. Once he nudged her in the ribs. Part of the time he talked in D'Ampezzo dialect and and sometimes in Tyroler German dialect. He could not make out which the young gentleman and his wife understood the best so he was being bilingual. But as the young gentleman said Ja Ja Peduzzi decided to talk altogether in Tyroler. The young gentleman and the wife understood nothing.
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If you'd like some background music to write to, try producer ford.'s album "(The) Evening.
