From the article: Creative Writing Prompts
What creative writing prompts have worked for you? Please contribute ideas you've used in classes, found in books, or just dreamed up. Share Your Prompt
Poetry 101
- My favorite thing to write is poetry. My favorite poet is Emily Dickinson. My favorite writing prompt is to read an Emily Dickinson poem, then write an original poem of my own, using an element from the poem I have just read. It could be anything from a character, a topic, to a tone, or even a random word. I take that element and write about it on a tangent which has nothing to do with the original poem.
- —RoninWhiteheart
Pictures are worth a thousand words
- While taking a class in creative writing, our teacher decided to try something different. Everyone was handed a picture, and we spent 20 minutes creating a story for the picture. This can be a great warm-up, or even a writing tool for experts. (Ex.) The picture I was given portrayed an elderly couple, holding hands, looking off to the left of the camera lens. There was a large boat in the background. This prompted me to write about the couple as though they had just come from there home in Europe, to join there son in America. There is a feeling of fear and isolation in the photo, and this was the best way I could think to translate it into words.
- —Guest Adam C
People
- Observing people in different situations is what gets me thinking and then, of course, writing. I wrote a four page short story by observing a man in a diner one late night who looked so desperate that he might shoot up the place. In my story, the guy is the total opposite than the one in the story as far as looks (he looked like a trucker or something and my guy was a millionaire) and he was running from the police after repeatedly raping his daughter. In the end he is desperate enough that he takes his own life. All this from sitting across the room from a middle aged man who didn't smile! It helps to take a notepad with you although I had a napkin to improvise ;).
- —Guest T
oneword
- There is a wonderful site called oneword (oneword.com) where you are asked to write about a daily word (it's always a surprise). You have 60 seconds. At the end, you can finish your sentence, revise, whatever, then post it for others to see. Or you can take your writing elsewhere. But it is really great and really sharpens your writing skills if you do it daily. It only takes 5 minutes, maybe less! I recommend making these 60 words or less. Oh, it is free, and you don't need to sign up with them to do it. Anyone can! Absolutely no questions asked. I would recommend this site.
- —Guest Rebie
Starting with a phrase
- A pretty successful writing prompt I’ve come across is scanning through any large body of text (on any subject.) You do this to pick out a phrase that invokes some kind of scene. It does not matter how unrelated your mental image is to the original source material. For example, I recently wrote a scene where a nomadic tribe of “technologically behind” aliens witness the fall of an unmanned Earth space probe to their planet. They offer their new visitor gifts such as bowls of berries and wreaths of flowers. This whole 12 page story stemmed from the phrase “wreath of flowers” that I read in a home gardening book.
- —Guest I like pie
INKsters Daily Prompts
- I use the daily prompt list from the virtual world literary salon here: http://slinksters.blogspot.com/
- —Guest SweepAnd Mopp
Mind images
- I get a mental image that unfolds into a story idea.
- —Guest Schliessmann
My Grandmother's Kitchen
- This is an exercise I've used when teaching, from a book called The Practice of Poetry. I find that this exercise, which begins by asking them to draw a picture, helps my students be more specific and more visual in their writing. (With younger students, I bring in a box of crayons and pass it around first.) 1. Draw a picture of your grandmother's kitchen. 2. In the picture, you must portray something green and something dead. 3. Write a poem or story about the drawing. 4. Halfway through, a female relative must enter the poem/story.
- —Guest Rebeca
