Last month I saw David Sedaris live. His delivery of personal stories is amazing. He makes you laugh, guffaw, gape and from the first sentence, I'm hooked. I aim to replicate this level of engagement in my writing.
Earlier this week I read my first piece by Augusten Burroughs. My writing buddy Temporary Digs really likes him and I've always been curious. The essay I read was about getting a second dog. Such a simple topic, could be very boring, and yet I found myself actually snorting and chortling while reading this excerpt. I was alone, sitting on my couch, reading; the only sound is me laughing. I'm going to have to read more of his work.
Also am now on a quest to write my own personal essay, complete with my own quirky but true life examples injected with some laugh out loud morsels. We'll see how it goes ... I will keep in mind that, with each workshopping of another's short story in the Daily Grind, I realize that those tidbits in our fiction writing that seem to detract from the plausibility of the tale are usually real life incidents, not imagined by the writer. From the neighbor with Tourette's Syndrome to Athena's last name, truth is stranger than fiction.
And thus I will attempt to embrace my inner freak and share it, in black and white, with others. A little scary, but hopefully entertaining - even if it may be mildly alarming.
Subscribe to:
Post Comments (Atom)
No comments:
Post a Comment