Room 101: The First Writing Workshop

In addition to the writing that I do for the tabletop games industry, I've begun a Creative Writing PhD here in Glasgow. These are just the early days of four years leading to publishing a novel, but I've been very interested in what I've seen so far. For those who might be interested (navigate away now, if you are not), I thought I would share a little of my experience in our first writing workshop.

The workshop held last week was my first in a good long time--in fact, a very long time. Our first task was to consider setting. Essentially we were asked to quickly write a scene involving or describing to some extent the setting we were in, namely a meeting room in a university building.  Here's what I wrote:

"Jamie slipped into the room unnoticed. He hand slid along the inside wall searching for the light switch. He found it and flipped the hard, plastic switch upward. Above him, the fluorescent bulbs snapped to life with a quiet ping. Their cold light reflected off the white table in the centre of the room.

He let his rain-soaked bag slip to the floor and reached for the chair nearest him. He sat. As he grew accustomed to the light, his eyes darted to the blank screen on the far wall, the snagged threats in the deep, piled carpet, and finally to the scratches in the tabletop. His fingertips found their way into those scratched grooves, tracing them mindlessly.

His hand was shaking. He stiffened against the hard back of the metal chair. Relax, he told himself, relax. It will all be over soon. He glanced down to his bag on the floor. It lay there incongruous--a mottled, worn leather bag in a room full of sharp angles and stark monochrome.The gentle whispers of the air conditioning provided no comfort from the deep thrumming in his head. He looked up from the leather bag to the frosted glass door.

It would all be over soon."

One thing that really impressed me about the exercise was the quality of the writing from my colleagues. It was top-notch: engaging, literate, and often quite emotive. Each of us had a very different voice to be sure, but that, for me, is part of the appeal. The chance to see different approaches is invaluable.

One of the key points that I took to heart from the session was made by my PhD supervisor who stressed that setting, and even small descriptive passages, should have a kind of movement. It should have its own motion. I quite like this as I can see how movement can give something which might function more passively, like setting for example, an action of its own.

It reminded me of a Film Studies class (which I took during my undergrad in Edmonton a lifetime ago) wherein the lecturer focused on the role of camera movement in establishing the mise-en-scene. That motion tells a story in itself. I hadn't really considered how movement within a descriptive paragraph could function in the same way. Brilliant point and something I mean to try out more.