Journal Entries

The Stretcher - Going Out

I knew I had messed up the 'sin' challenge soon after I had posted my piece about Osama bin Laden. It was simply too short. B'Elana called it 'succinct' but sketchy might have been more accurate. In the end, I took it off, with the view of rewriting it.

I was expecting to be evicted and, sure enough I was. It has been a great competition. Before the Stretcher started, I wondered if it might prove divisive but I was wrong. Instead, all the competitors have been really friendly, going round giving advice and constructive criticism. Thanks, folks.

There has been some superb writing, too, and who ever wins it will have deserved the accolade of a 'star writer'. I have learnt quite a lot, particularly about writing for the Edited Guide, which is something I hadn't done before. I even know what a 'curly apostrophe' is now!

It has been time consuming, though, and I shall be glad to get back to my usual habit of writing poems and bits of fiction. I might write pieces for the Edited Guide too, but I will be able to choose my subject.

Good luck to all the remaining Stretcherinos with the rest of the competition!

Discuss this Journal entry [18]

Latest reply: May 14, 2009

The Stretcher -Deadly sins

I'm beginning to get worried about these judges. Last time, they wanted us to defend the indefensible; this time they want us to unravel the seven deadly sins. I wonder where they're getting their inspiration from?

They are not asking for a straightforward article on one of the sins either. They've assigned us all a sin (I've got avarice) and asked us to 'write an EG-style Entry about someone who enacted the OPPOSITE trait to your sin and yet caused something bad to happen as a result.'
How convoluted is that?

So I started thinking about avarice and its opposites. Obvious opposites are generosity, open-handedness, carelessness with money. I could think of a few celebrities who are careless with money but most of them are as busy making it as spending.

On the other hand, there have been people who live austere and simple lives, giving up personal wealth, but tried to impose their standards on others. It was while thinking along these lines that I came up with the idea of writing about Osama bin Laden. Such an article should, at least, be interesting! So I started doing my research, on the BBC and Guardian websites, amongst others.

It then occurred to me that I knew of ordinary people whose generosity could cause them trouble. I have met parents who have tried to help their adult children pay their debts and got into financial problems themselves. I wondered if an article on these people would meet the bill better. I did some research, found an article on the Guardian's website and some debt advice on the website of the Citizens Advice Bureau.

So, I ended up with parts of two articles. The article on 'The Bank of Mum and Dad' was worthy but boring. The article on Osama bin Laden was a short biography, topped and tailed by pieces about sin. In the end, the latter won.

Discuss this Journal entry [8]

Latest reply: Apr 21, 2009

The Stretcher - defend the indefensible

I didn't do very well with my piece about the execution of Charles I. Skankyrich said it was 'competent' but 'a little flat'. Pinn pointed out that I had got the year wrong; the right year was 1649. Oh, dear.

The new challenge was to 'write an Entry that defends the indefensible.' This sent me into a flat spin. Were we expected to defend the Nazi concentration camps, or the slave trade? I might be just a scribbler but I have some integrity. So I set about thinking about something I could defend. I thought I might be able to write about Josef Fritzl - not defending him but trying to understand what made him tick.

Now I am a worrier and one of the worries that haunts me is that the human race may be rushing to its own destruction. Normally, I keep this worry locked up somewhere in the back of my mind and get on with my life. But on this occasion, it came hurtling out of its cage and demanded to be noticed. Could I write an article arguing that the human race is doomed?

I wasn't sure that this would meet the requirements of the competiton. If the Stretcher wanted us to defend the indefensible, didn't it mean some awful behaviour? What I was defending was an unthinkable idea. However, once I had thought of this subject, it would not go away, so I set about writing my article.

It was largely based on articles I had read in the New Scientist and The Guardian, with some up-to-date news from the Antarctic. By the time I had finished it, I was thoroughly depressed. How are we supposed to live if I am right? All I can say is that human life has always been insecure and the things we value are always transient.



Discuss this Journal entry [1]

Latest reply: Apr 7, 2009

The Stretcher -Be a Camera

I'm surprised to be still in this competition; I thought I would be going out after the double-letter word challenge. Instead, I moved up a place or two. Now I don't think that the judges were that impressed with my prune piece, so what must have happened is that members of the public voted for 'For My Son'. Thank you for your endorsement, whoever you are.

Now the next challenge was 'write like a photojournalist. No time must pass in your piece. It must describe a famous event, in either EG or AWW style, in a single scene, viewed in an instant.'

The more I thought about this challenge, the trickier it seemed. I could think of a number of famous events for which there is an iconic photograph: the destruction of the World Trade Centre, the assassination of President Kennedy, the arrival of a man on the moon.
But it seemed to me that the judges would not be impressed by the straightforward description of a photograph.

On the other hand, there are plenty of famous events for which it is difficult to think of one moment that encapsulates them. I thought of the eruption of Vesuvius, the Battle of Britain, the Iraq War.

What I needed was an event where I could identify a moment, however short, where there is almost stillness. In other words, a tableau, but one without a famous photograph to depict it.

I was drawn to the execution of Charles I and I found a reproduction of a contemporaneous print. It had what I wanted - an interesting scene, with the crowd in the foreground, the Banqueting House at the back and the scaffold in the centre. The print depicts the moment after the axe has fallen but I chose the moment before.

Having read a bit about Charles and his execution, and looked carefully at the picture, I wrote my piece. It seemed pretty short but I defy anyone to write a long piece which describes an event but in which no time passes.

Discuss this Journal entry [1]

Latest reply: Mar 21, 2009

The Stretcher - double letters

As I feared, the judges were sniffy about my entry to the Valentine competition. They said it wasn't to do with 'better' and gave me a poor set of marks. This leaves me dangerously close to the relegation zone. Aaargh!

The next challenge asked for a piece for either the AWW or PR, on any subject. It had to be prose and it carried the peculiar requirement: 'The last word of every sentence must contain a double letter.'

I suppose I should have spent a while thinking and planning something that would impress the judges. Instead I thought "I shouldn't take this competition so seriously. I'm not going to spend ages over it."

I wasn't sure how hard it would be to write sentences ending with double letter words anyway. So I dashed off a short piece: 'Brighton Impressions', about my favourite town. It didn't prove too hard, but I was sure that this piece wouldn't do for the competition. It wasn't particularly stylish or interesting. And there are lots of pieces about Brighton on hootoo, although none of them have made it to the Edited Guide. What I needed was something more original.

So I thought I'd write a short article about Agen Prunes. Yes, prunes!
I haven't really got a prune obsession, it's more that I like the part of France they come from. So I set about doing my research, using the 'Pruneaux d'Agen' website. There is an English version, but the French is fuller.

I ended up with what I hope is a reasonable short article. At least I could find no existing articles on prunes or even plums on hootoo. It's not particularly stylish, though I did manage to include one double letter French word.

Discuss this Journal entry [1]

Latest reply: Feb 22, 2009


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