The character I'm writing about here is Rachel. She is Annie's ancestor and is burnt as a witch in the Prologue. I wrote things down as I thought of them.
Illustrate which details you would use to give the reader strong visuals of your character.
* torn, muddy, bloodstained nightdress
* long dark plait with pondweed tangled in it
* face bruised, dirty with mud, smoke and dried blood
* eyes tired from lack of sleep and watering from smoke, but very angry
* bare, dirty feet cut by stones, wrists rubbed raw from coarse rope
Illustrate details that you feel would give an accurate and coherent impression of your character.
* anger at Cramer
* love for her daughter (Rosie) and fears for her safety as she secretly leaves the village
* pity and understanding for the other villagers who betrayed her to Cramer
* sorrow that other innocent woman in the village have also been burnt
* despair of betraying her beliefs
* fear her goddess won't honour the curse as it goes against her beliefs
This is the final lesson in my first course. The next one I'm starting is a six week course called Horror Writing. I'm really enjoying them, and I'm finding them a good inspiration for plot points :-)
6 comments:
Thanks for sharing the lessons and specifics for how they apply to your book. Excellent reading and very informative.
The challenge seems to be (a)which aspects to highlight and (c) how to describe those aspects in a unique and interesting way.
I find it far to easy to fall into common cliche, tired overused descriptives that you'll find ad naseum in popular writing.
I know it takes work to assimilate the lessons from you classes and then share them with the world, but I do hope you can continue.
Best,
Rand
i don`t get the impression that the woman you are describing has been burnt as a witch. she has been bound, bruised and immersed in a pond and has smoke in her eyes.........but where`s the flesh searing agony, the sound of screams in her ears, not realising they are her own or the blind panic and psychosis knowing the fate that is befalling her as she sees the others die around her?
as an nlp practitionr i use the internal states of sight, sound, touch, taste and smell as theraputic tools. as mechanisms for narrative description they are equally as powerful.
what does it sound like when you are begining to burn to death? the smell? what do you see? these things can be described.
Thank you both for the comments :-)
I really want to try for the unique angle, I don't want this to turn out to be another standard ghost story. I try and think of cliches then write something completely different!
I've not reached the burning yet. This was sort of a moment in time in Rachel's life. She hasn't cursed Cramer yet, after that he will order the fire to be lit. Thank you for your questions, though, dr.alistair - lots of food for thought!!! :-D
My first two weeks on my Horror Writing course has asked for similar kinds of details as this first one. Just an introduction and description of what I'm writing, and a character study.
This week will be a proper piece of writing. It's unfortunate but I'm the only one doing the course - not getting much feedback on what I'm posting there!!! *lol*
Feena
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Good writing, top tips for character and dialogue. But if the village is in Essex the women would be hanged, not burnt. Please get the history right, it's important. If you want to have burnings, set the village in Scotland.
Under English law, witchcraft was a criminal offence, not a heresy, and was dealt with by the state, not the church.
Under Scots law, witchcraft was a heresy, and was therefore punished by burning (same as in Europe).
Read the history books if you don't believe me.
Execution of witches in England was by hanging (though women convicted of treason were burnt). See Execution by burning article on Wikipedia.
Hi Yvonne
Thanks for the comments and the link. I do believe you, and I know the 'witches' should have been hanged. But Cramer is Scottish and was determined to punish them in the way he felt was correct, by destroying them completely.
The villagers argue with him that what he's doing is wrong, but he ignores them.
:-)
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