The Big Fish Assignment

I doubt that I will blog very often on assignments given in class; however, I felt that this one could be beneficial to The Guild. In my Advanced Composition class, our first workshop assignment is based on Big Fish, the famed novel and Tim Burton movie. In the book/movie, an old man tells his son stories from his past, all of them outlandish and over the top but based in truth. The son doesn't appreciate his stories because he wants the facts about his father's life, partly because of his nature as a newspaper journalist. Our assignment is to find a newspaper article and use the facts of that article to create a very outlandish short story with strong narrative, elaborate description, and, of course, the human element (in Big Fish, it was a love story and a father/son story).

I've read other writing aids which mention drawing inspiration from the bare facts of newspaper articles, and I look forward to this assignment. My own story will involve a monkey interrupting commuters in Tokyo (that's the article's contribution). Other Guild members might be interesting in attempting this assignment on their own time. I think this experiement with fact and fantasy could be used in novels (obviously), short stories, and even poetry--for poetry, though, you would most likely be diving into the human emotions related to the facts of the stories.

As writers, we all draw material from real life, often our own life. But, if you're in a rut, this assignment could help you dig your way back to the surface.