M 05-Oct Slaughterhouse Five (through Chp 5; Caroline & Erin)
W 07-Oct Slaughterhouse Five (Chp. 6-8; Laura Navia)
F 09-Oct Slaughterhouse Five (Chp. 9-10; Audrey)
F 09-Oct Due: Response 3 — Prompt
Extra Credit for Resp 3. (due 12-Oct)
extra credit — part of Resp. 3
200 words (separate entry/post); due M 12-Oct
- Read and respond to a classmate’s entry.
Describe the affect expressed (that you intuit from the fragments).
Evaluate the effect of (or the extent to which) the entry’s expressing experience through “unconventional discourse.”
From this, (important) discuss “lessons” to take from Vonnegut, for understanding experience and expression—particularly for expressing experience.
(note: feel free to email me with questions or for further instructions about this reading-reply)
Response 3: Creative Writing Assignment (Responding to Slaughterhouse Five)
500-600 words; 10 points
Due: Fri 09-Oct (11:59pm)
- Vonnegut provides the impetus for this imaginative assignment in several ways: the full title(s) of the novel; Billy Pilgrim’s profession (optometry); the Tralfamadorians’ perception (“four dimensional”); the formal (textual) breaks in the narrative, which compel us to “fill in the blanks.”
- Tip: Review notes on writing of the disaster and “concealed” or “hidden” (secret) truth of experience: Wed 07-Oct.
Option 1
Task: Express a particular affect {subjective dimension of “experience”: feeling, mood, disposition, attitude, stance} that Vonnegut conveys through Slaughterhouse Five. Use the aesthetic logic of expression, rather than explicitly stating or describing this affect (in “rational” discourse).
- So, first step: decide upon a specific affect that you have intuited from the novel. This can be about Dresden or Vietnam, but likely more general, involving a feeling/stance toward both — I have presented Dresden as Vonnegut’s vehicle for addressing Vietnam, after all.
Option 2
Similar task, but complementary perspective: use the novel’s elements—characters, settings, (respective) narratives, etc.—to express (an) experience of your choice/invention. This need not be inherently “related,” but probably “parallel” with Vonnegut’s topics. As we do not seek to “reveal” or “unveil” the “truth” of this experience (scientific / rational mode), your composition should not “tell the testimony” of the situation but present an expressive figure that conveys the affect of experience.
Composition Method
(parameters, expectations, suggestions)
1) Form/composition: Non-linear vignettes; fragments of narrative moments at respective times and places. (Suggested: 3-4 vignettes, minimum.) So, this can not be a linear narrative within one setting!
2) Using Vonnegut’s characters, compose brief scenes that occur “within the gaps” of the novel’s narratives. In other words, invent by imagining likely anecdotes or events, based upon the information and characterization that Vonnegut provides. These will be original scenes, within the parameters of both history and the novel. tip: “multiple worlds” (cf. Abbott Chp. 12)
3) Hybrid discourse: creative or inventive (e.g. science fiction) and historical (accounts/facts). Permissible but not required to include “metafictional elements” (e.g. the authorial voice of Vonnegut or Burroughs writing the novel).
4) Style: concrete and vivid imagery, using figures, (i.e. not abstract/general); descriptive language and dialogue (explicit, realistic, evocative, “expressive”). i.e. “write like Vonnegut” in terms of diction and tone, to express your implied affect (of experience). Use this formal approach to convey not “what it is like” but what it is to undergo this experience…
5) Use “minor characters” (particular individuals) from the novel.
- – rationale: to whom is Slaughterhouse Five dedicated, after all? (Consider effect)
– rationale: following Vonnegut, we are not writing in the “autobiographical” mode.
- Examples:
- Bernhard and Mary O’Hare
Valencia Merble
Lionel Merble
Barbara Pilgrim
Robert Pilgrim
Roland Weary
Edgar Derby
Werner Gluck
“The Blue Fairy Godmother”
Howard W. Campbell, Jr.
Bertram Rumfoord
Eliot Rosewater
Kilgore Trout
Montana Wildhack
Overall, feel free to use any/all of the unconventional techniques that Burroughs and Vonnegut employ, especially to present non-linear narratives. In any case, your composition should necessarily reflect an effort to try at least one experimental method of writing, as learned from reading Naked Lunch and Slaughterhouse Five.
- For example, consult and/or try the Cut-up machine or a similar writing prompt / exercise, in addition to the parameters above (note “proceed with caution”…? Remember, still a few parameters for this assignment, to experiment within.)
