Here are over 130 ten-minute writing exercises for you to dip into and enjoy. Approach these challenges with the minimal of mental preparation. Don't agonise over writing the "perfect" response; simply put pen to paper and start writing! Try carrying a notebook and paper with you, for the next time you find yourself with 10 minutes to fill waiting for the bus/train/doctor/etc.
Sunday, 30 June 2013
Saturday, 29 June 2013
Hymn to her
Using the words of William Blake's famous poem in the same order that they appear, write for 10 minutes on the theme of religion. For instance, you might write And only yesterday, someone mentioned religion. Did I really expect to escape a discussion on something so fundamental? Those zealots of yesterday certainly had something to answer for....etc etc. The poem goes thus - And did those feet in ancient time/Walk upon Englands mountains green/And was the holy Lamb of God/On Englands pleasant pastures seen!
Friday, 28 June 2013
The i's have it
Who needs i's anyway? Write for 10 minutes on the topic of romance without using the letter i.
Thursday, 27 June 2013
Follow the path
You're walking along a country lane and notice a small path leading off to the right. You've got 10 minutes to spare so you decide to follow it. Where does it take you?
Wednesday, 26 June 2013
Colour my word
Colours are emotive things. Purple has a very different vibe to yellow, say. What do colours mean to you? Choose a colour and write about it for 10 minutes.
Tuesday, 25 June 2013
Pick n Mix
Write down your choice of words for the following:
A day of the week
A time of day or night
A colour
A room in the house
A body part
A piece of clothing
A sound
An expletive.
Write a short story incorporating all the words you've chosen.
A day of the week
A time of day or night
A colour
A room in the house
A body part
A piece of clothing
A sound
An expletive.
Write a short story incorporating all the words you've chosen.
Monday, 24 June 2013
Prepositions are us
You can write wonderfully without knowing a great deal about grammar or, for instance, what a preposition is. Well, you can, but you'll be an even better writer if you know a few odds and sods to give your work colour, texture and verve. So. A preposition links nouns, pronouns and phrases and usually indicates the temporal, spatial or
logical relationship of its object to the rest of the sentence as in
the following examples:
- The book is on the table.
- The book is beneath the table.
- The book is leaning against the table.
- The book is beside the table.
- She held the book over the table.
- She read the book during class.
Sunday, 23 June 2013
A of the Dolphin
OK, you will not be compelled to write on dolphins, but the pun's too good to miss. Notice something interesting in the previous sentence? This one, too? Yep, no As. Now it's your turn. For 10 minutes. Beginning "I remember the first time I..."
Saturday, 22 June 2013
Alphabet writing
Write for 10 minutes, using each letter of the alphabet in sequence as the starting point for a new sentence. For instance: After the rain started, Florence worried more than usual. Baby Joey cried as the raindrops whipped against their roof. Couldn't he tell they'd want him home? Down at the bar, Mike drank long and hard. Even though he knew he should be getting back, he stayed. etc. etc.
Friday, 21 June 2013
Open the box...
You're walking at the beach just before dusk and you notice something
catching the sunlight near the rocks. It's a big, metal box. You stop
and dig it out from the sand. You try the lid. It opens to reveal....
Thursday, 20 June 2013
Wednesday, 19 June 2013
Sadness
The news has left me feeling sad the last few days, making we want to explore sadness in my writing. What makes you sad? How does sadness feel? Write on this topic for 10 minutes, going wherever the flow takes you. (I promise happier things tomorrow).
Tuesday, 18 June 2013
Food of life
Time for another musical challenge. Write for 10 minutes beginning with the words "Happiness is...." as you listen to this music: http://www.youtube.com/user/okanokumo?v=czZoOWa51n8
Monday, 17 June 2013
Dialogue I
Writing dialogue can be tricky, but the main thing is to write it how real people speak. For instance, very few of us go around saying "Thank you very much, goodbye". Rather, we say "Cheers, catch ya later" or "Thanks, see you soon". TASK Have a go at using dialogue to create a story, using as little non-dialogue writing as you can. Begin with the words "Janet and Frank were sitting on the sofa when the bomb hit." When you've finished, read back your story out loud and correct any dialogue that doesn't sound like a real person would say it.
Sunday, 16 June 2013
Metaphor, 1
Metaphors are words used to give the reader a greater sense of something. Unlike a simile, which is a word used to describe what something is like ("The dog is like a storm"), a metaphor is used to describe what something is, metaphorically ("The dog is a storm"). Note the different energy in these two statements. Spend a few minutes coming up with a range of metaphors for the following: LOVE, THE OCEAN, HATE, THE SKY, YOUR BED, THE SUN. Spend the rest of your 10 minutes using these metaphors in a piece of writing. If you like, begin with the words "The sun is....".
Saturday, 15 June 2013
Dusk words
This evening, head outside at dusk and experience the world as it loses light. Spend 10 minutes writing about the experience, beginning with the words "Goodbye to..."
Friday, 14 June 2013
Wake up to writing
Take a pen and paper to bed with you tonight. The moment you wake up, put pen to paper and write for the requisite 10 minutes. New brain energy makes for interesting words!
Thursday, 13 June 2013
Fantasy room
Take a moment to really look at this rather magical room, then write a scene set in it. If you need help to get started, consider these questions: Who lives here? Clearly there's a meal about to take place, but what's the occasion? Is someone coming for a visit? And what are the stories behind some of those interesting bits and pieces?
Wednesday, 12 June 2013
Description
Find an object in nature. A rock, a branch, a shell on the beach. Use all your senses to explore it. How does it smell? feel? look? sound? Write for 10 minutes without naming your object, describing it in detail to someone who has never seen one. (Perhaps they're from another planet?) If a narrative theme introduces itself, go with it.
Tuesday, 11 June 2013
Self love (or not)
Write two poems, one to your favourite body part, another to your least favourite body part. They do not have to rhyme.
Monday, 10 June 2013
Sensory exercise
Close your eyes. Run your fingers over your face and neck, focusing on receiving touch. Write for five minutes. Carry out the same process, but this time focus on how your fingers feel giving touch. Write for five minutes. The trick is to try and isolate the "receiving" to your skin from the "sending" of your fingers. Tricky, but fun. Fear not if you go off on a tangent – that's the fun of writing.
Sunday, 9 June 2013
Verb Ate Him
Consider the lyrics below. It's a song I wrote during a writing exercise where verbs were forbidden, about the day I visited the Sydney Museum of Contemporary Art and watched a video of David Beckham sleeping. It's not the world's greatest song, but hopefully it will give you a sense of what can be achieved (mostly) without verbs.
Write for 10 minutes without a verb, beginning with "Rain on my face...". Don't get too hung up if the odd verb pops out – "is" and "are" are particularly difficult to avoid :)
David Asleep
Buskers down on Circular Quay
Coffee in the air, sunlight on the Manly ferry
A cafe, soup thick with roasted chestnuts
Two courses for just thirty nine bucks.
Far above this literal world
On the fourth floor of the museum
Impossibly fair, those lips, that hair
Just he and I
David asleep.
Fashionably unshaven
I would that mouth a kiss
Lick of lip and turn of head
Grow in me this silent need
So unfair, such lush perfection
Orb of eye safe beneath that shining skin
A perfect nose, this silent child
Mangoes ripening on the wind
Golden chain upon his skin
I am (damn! a verb!) hunger
I am every woman
If those eyes be open, death for me
Too much, that look
David asleep.
Copyright Jane Cornes May 2006
Write for 10 minutes without a verb, beginning with "Rain on my face...". Don't get too hung up if the odd verb pops out – "is" and "are" are particularly difficult to avoid :)
David Asleep
Buskers down on Circular Quay
Coffee in the air, sunlight on the Manly ferry
A cafe, soup thick with roasted chestnuts
Two courses for just thirty nine bucks.
Far above this literal world
On the fourth floor of the museum
Impossibly fair, those lips, that hair
Just he and I
David asleep.
Fashionably unshaven
I would that mouth a kiss
Lick of lip and turn of head
Grow in me this silent need
So unfair, such lush perfection
Orb of eye safe beneath that shining skin
A perfect nose, this silent child
Mangoes ripening on the wind
Golden chain upon his skin
I am (damn! a verb!) hunger
I am every woman
If those eyes be open, death for me
Too much, that look
David asleep.
Copyright Jane Cornes May 2006
Saturday, 8 June 2013
Adjectives are us
Many of us use way too many adjectives in our writing. Without getting too tied up with grammar, adjectives are used to describe nouns, as in "the red dress" or "the grumpy man". I love this quote from the grammar.ccc website, "Let your broad-shouldered verbs and nouns do the hard work of description". Take the following sentence as an example: "Her red dress rose in the cold wind, sending pinprick shivers up her slim, brown body." Without adjectives it reads thus: "Her dress rose in the wind, sending shivers across her body". If you're interested in seeing how a published author does it, check out the work of Raymond Carver, whose short stories are renowned for their lack of adjectival flounce. Such writing allows the reader to "see" the action more clearly - it's almost like reading a screenplay with directions to the actors. Have a go at writing for 10 minutes without any adjectives, beginning with the words "There were pigeons on the window sill".
A useful overview of adjectives is to be found here: http://grammar.ccc.commnet.edu/grammar/adjectives.htm
Friday, 7 June 2013
Free writing
Use the free writing technique. Beginning with the words "In the beginning...", write down your stream of consciousness without stopping to think about it. When your left-brain editor kicks in and tells you to stop and re-read before your 10 minutes are up, ignore her. Remember, you're not writing a ready-to-publish Pullitzer Prize winner, just some interesting thoughts no-one else need ever read. You may be surprised where this challenge takes you.
Thursday, 6 June 2013
Exploring visceral
Even if you think you know what it means, look up the various definitions of "visceral". Take 10 minutes to write three short scenes titled "Visceral, I", "Visceral, II" and "Visceral, III". They can relate to each other but don't have to.
Wednesday, 5 June 2013
Eating chocolate
With your eyes closed, eat a piece or two... or three... of chocolate, focusing intently on the party going on in your mouth. Notice how the chocolate clings to your tongue; how the sweetness lingers; how firm yet increasingly soft it becomes against the roof of your mouth... Write for 10 minutes on what you're experiencing, letting the words take you where they will - beginning, if you like, with "Oh, how we danced..."
Tuesday, 4 June 2013
Random page exercise
Open any novel at a random page and choose from it a sentence of around 15 words, give or take. Using each of the words in the sentence in turn, create new sentences. As an example, if your sentence was "My cat has fleas", you might write a piece that read "My, how the time flies when nothing but the moon measures each moment. Cat or dog, there is something outside making a disgruntled yelp that turns my blood cool as midnight. Has anyone told you how amazing you look in this yellow glow? Fleas may be small, but the pinpricks of moonlight in your eyes are smaller." Keep going until you've used up all the words or run out of time. Don't get too caught up on trying to create a narrative flow with your sentences. The idea is simply to create a series of sentences that may, or may not, relate to each other - often, inexplicably, flow happens. If not, it will still be delicious.
Monday, 3 June 2013
Writing without "A"
"So silently the night creeps over me..."
TASK Continue writing for 10 minutes without using the letter A.
TASK Continue writing for 10 minutes without using the letter A.
Sunday, 2 June 2013
Writing to music
Copy and paste the link at the end of this post into your browser. It will take you to one of Mozart's most famous violin concertos (No.5 in A, second movement). Just listen for the first minute (or so), then start writing, beginning with the words "This morning, I..." and continue until a minute (or so) after the music ends.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=caVr-VdeDvw&list=RD023kvWClaJKd8
Saturday, 1 June 2013
Using a photograph as the starting point
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