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- Reading responses must be AT LEAST 250 words.
- Include your full name at the end of your comments. Unnamed comments will be deleted.
- From the "Comment As" drop-down menu, choose Anonymous, then click "Publish."
- Reading responses are due by midnight on the night PRIOR to our discussion of the required reading.
In Chapter Five “ Why You Need to Show and Tell”, the chapter is very detailed and it has some of the best advice I read yet. I liked the examples they gave us about the difference in a paper with show and a paper will tell. The difference is pretty shocking to me. I think after reading this chapter showing is more effective than telling. The showing examples were so much better and sophisticated too. It was just so much better written. In the telling examples they didn’t sound wrong but it didn’t sound better than the showing examples. I think if you can balance both our writing can be so amazing. I loved this chapter.
ReplyDeleteIn “Brownies”
I was so intrigued by the beginning of the reading how Packer describes the white girls and the Disney character metaphors, I thought it was funny. It’s you typical group of girls that are at that age of rebellion. There's your groups that stick together because of their ethnicities. I enjoyed this reading it had humor and conflict, and you can most likely connect the story to something you have witnessed or been apart of. I feel like the author uses a lot of humor to cover up the real issue here (racism) because its a very sensitive topic. I liked Octavia’s character the most, and I enjoyed the details in this reading.
Lizette Garcia
The chapter starts of by telling us that there is a thing as telling the reader too much. This was something that I was not aware was an actual thing. I thought that the more you tell your readers the better however it is better to show your readers than to tell them. If the option is available. I really liked how it gave us example on different things that you have to tell and different things that you can show. For example, when in the book it says if it is information we wouldn’t necessarily pick up of ourselves if the event were being played out in a movie screen. This really helped me because due to this line I starting seeing my own characters in a cinema way. I have to stage direct then in way that flow but also allow the reader to picture the movements that they are doing as I as the writer picture them.
ReplyDeleteFrom the story Brownies I really liked the way in which the author showed us who the characters where through the dialect in which then spoke. Even though it is English I read it in the tone of voice that was not mine. One example would be, “Then we gone sneak into they cabin, then we gone put daddy longlegs in they sleeping bags. Then they’ll wake up. Then we gone beat ‘em up till they flat as frying pans!” I really like how though dialogue we can see exactly what is going on, how it is going to happen and it tells us about who the people are speaking are and where their dialect if from. Although it does not specifically say from we as readers we can conclude.
Evelyn Lopez
This was a chapter I was looking forward to reading and I learned a lot from it. This semester, in another English class, I had my professor revise my essay with the suggestion to work on “showing” the story more. I haven’t found my balance of showing and telling yet, frankly I quite forget about showing my story, my habits tend to just tell and explain what is going on. This chapter was helpful to me in explaining different ways in showing a story, and how it can highly enhance your story. It also gave me the assurance that sometimes telling a story isn’t bad, as long as you have a proper attitude with it. The sub-chapter I found most beneficial was “Traditional Uses of Narration” in suggesting whether some things should be shown or told. Traditionally, the important stuff is shown, and I can agree with that and will focus on it for my revision.
ReplyDeleteThe story was pretty interesting, I got the feeling as if it were two wolf packs fighting each other. Each group had its own leader, and a tightknit group full of different personalities. The dialogue was what really gave each of these girls a personality, and even little things like how they’d play around with the word Caucasian, showed and introduced me to the problem that was to come. The imagery was also great, the author consistently reminded us about the environment the girls were in by describing the leaves, fish, cabins, and the sort of stuff you’d see on a camping trip.
Jesus Pena
It’s nice when someone or something reaffirms your beliefs, isn’t it? It’s like winning the argument by default and I like that (haha). But seriously, this chapter was a bit of a, shall we say, nice confirmation that a healthy blend between showing and telling is needed for good storytelling. Anywhere you go the phrase “show, don’t tell” will be drilled into your head repeatedly, it almost becomes corny. Showing is very important, don’t get me wrong, but slapping someone on the hand like a penguin with a ruler just because there’s a little bit of exposition in the story is mind blowing. That being said, I like how LaPlante points out that just because we are allowed to tell – or have been told to show more – doesn’t mean it’s always good writing. She presents the idea that while we can tell, we must understand when and where to use it – that is to say, we must learn the merits of both.
ReplyDeleteI actually really enjoyed “Brownies”. First, I have to say I did enjoy Packer’s (as a Cowboys fan that leaves a bad taste in my mouth) writing style; her use of similes and metaphors was nice and she provided some nice detail in the beginning with the Disney backpacks and whatnot. I can see why LaPlante used this story to supplant the chapter, as there is a good amount of telling in it (at least from what I understand of it). It further proves her point that telling too much isn’t always indicative of bad writing and that good stories, such as this one, can be told (so to speak) even when telling.
Chano Martinez
Isaac J McCoy
ReplyDeleteResponse One
Growing up with a psychologist for a father, I have never really considered not constructing my stories with anything but a mix of showing and telling the happenings within my stories. I tell the actions, yes; but I tell them in such a way as to show the inner feelings and frustration of my characters. I create levels of narrations deeper than one would expect so that the deeper one digs, the fuller sense of the story is revealed. My stories are stories at the surface; but the depth of the character depends on the depth which the reader digs into the story. I do not see how this chapter changes or alters my writing process or opinion of exposition as it is, basically, what I have been doing since I started writing stories when I was twelve. My own life has been my teacher, showing me through real people how to narrate my fiction with the diction that is required to bring to a higher plane of understanding.
Response Two
I am confused as to the point of the story, it sounds as though it is showing racism and religious hypocrisy on all sides of humanity. Not directed at any particular race or religion, but at everyone from everyone. It seems as though ugliness is not derived from a single group of people, but rather all people are ugly. I like how the story shows us through telling and showing. It does not limit its representation of feelings and heart within its characters, but instead uses both avenues presented in the chapter to rightly present the inward and outward situation of the characters throughout the story.
Well this chapter, textbook overall, is an eye-opener sort of thing because it sort of goes against what I’ve been taught in previous creative writing classes. As the book mentions, it’s not necessarily wrong, for instance, in this chapter’s topic, showing and telling is discussed and, although, educators says that we ought to show, not tell, the reason behind this is because doing a good telling can be challenging. This makes sense. The examples Leplante used to differ showing and telling were also very good, especially with labeling each and adding various examples, although; it really helped to have the piece from Elliot which had various versions using more or less of showing and telling. I still wonder, if I ever become a creative writing educator, do I tell my students what Leplante says, to show AND to also tell? I feel like this is very useful information every student who wants to improve their writing should know. As per the story we read “Brownies” it took me by surprise with the other troop’s disabilities and what ZZ Packer did there. He changed everything around, it was a really good story. As I was reading along, after reading the chapter, I did pick up on showing and telling. I feel like this story is a combination of the two elements because there seems to be as much telling as there is showing. It takes turns, so I’d say it stands around the middle in Leplante’s chart at the end of the chapter.
ReplyDeleteLizbet Cantu
The concept of showing and telling has been an aspect that is always evident in my creative writing classes, whether it is for writing literature or even in poetry. The advice that I have always encountered in workshops or in courses is the usual of, “Put the audience in the shoes of the narrator, make them feel everything that is around them”. I favor the approach that the author takes with the two aspects since I feel that there has to be a balance between both of them, or in a sense, there is a time and place on when to use either. The reason being is in pieces of literature that I have encountered, there are scenes or events that I feel could be told without all the dramatization and would be fine with just the narration and told to the audience. What I am trying to say is, sometimes too much showing can be depicted as spreading unnecessary details. In addition, the section titled, “Good Intention, Bad Advice”, is an issue that is evident in creative writing courses since “good telling is difficult to do”. The instance is due to the fact that “telling” can be misconstrued as being too vague or not being specific enough, thus creative writers will feel obligated to want to elaborate more when they feel that it was not their original intention. On a final note, I felt the continuum with the mapped out stories was interesting in which it shows which are pure showing and which are pure telling.
ReplyDeleteIn regards to “Brownies” by ZZ Packer, I would say that she has a unique blend of showing and telling. In my opinion, she executes similes and figurative language to depict the concept of race color. For example, right from the introductory paragraph she references the complexions of the white girls as ice cream flavors. In addition, I found it interesting when she states that, “Whites were like those baby pigeons: real and existing, but rarely thought about.” Through my perspective this is a blend of both showing and telling since she is utilizing a simile to depict a visual portrayal for the audience, and then the author is telling us without the need to dramatize.
Patricio Hernandez (P.J.)
The show and tell article opened my eyes to the kind of writer I am. Straight up, I tell. I should feel ashamed for not wanting to be more artistic about my craft, but I just wanna tell stories. The story by ZZ Packer preached everything that the Show and Tell article was trying to layout. The main thing to get from writing, is to stretch out something that doesn’t matter. Laplante Condemns the act of summarizing. Well, sometimes the writer wants to get the dialogue and characters and not get hung up on a minor thing. There is this passage from Lomita, that, I’m not gonna lie, I dug the brief passage, but I got it already. Homeboy is in love with Lolita. I keep getting this idea that as writers we should see ourselves as story tellers and writers second. I want to tell a story not be Herman Mellive. I respect those who have their own voice, like Packer, who clearly has a voice, but cannot tell a decent story. The story was told from the perspective a kid, and this kid has a huge vocabulary. And the when it comes time to finally doing the deed, I was let down. I liked the words but not story. Don’t get me wrong Packer is a good writer but I didn’t see any story. Also, there is a lot of hate bashing on Hemingway. I feel like Laplane doesn’t understand Hemingway and should probably stay away from him.
ReplyDeleteMathew Betancourt
Reading this chapter, I couldn't help but realize who all of my past creative writing classes dealt with more showing than telling. I ended up liking this chapter because it gives a valid reason as to why a writer should show and tell. It reminds me of the libra zodiac, because both balance each other out. If the story is better told than shown, it's better to add the ideas of a character, description and interpretation. If the story is better shown, then dialogue and setting elevate the work. It's like a balancing act and takes a lot of thought to build up a story. I was somewhat confused as to what the difference was but reading Brownies helped clear the idea.
ReplyDeleteBrownies
the story Brownies by ZZ Packer was a perfect weave of show and tell. When there wasn't dialogue between the scouts, the narrator, snots, was describing how she saw the situation. The language was fresh and was a whole new way of interpreting "caucasians." The ending of the story also caught me by surprise as to how the narrator tied together the moment when the girl was cleaning the floor of the white girls' mess, and the religious folk that cleaned her front porch on their knees. It was a strong scene, and the way the author showed and told with dialogue and her two cents was executed well. Its also when the mom of scout 909 is saying they never said the 'bad' word, the narrator points out the voice in how they said it saying that it sounded like the girl had her tongue caught in her mouth.
Kassandra Salas
Unlike last chapter, this chapter is definitely much better and is particularly interesting. I remember in another creative writing class, my professor wanted showing, not telling. In my story from that class, my professor wanted more concrete details and such. However, with this chapter, it definitely helps. I love how LaPlante is not saying one is better than the other but instead says that both (showing and telling) are important and make up creative writing. It’s wonderful to know that one isn’t better than the other, but instead both are. At first, I was a bit confused with what was showing and what was telling, but with the examples LaPlante provides, I understood much better. Particularly the example of Lolita by Vladimir Nabokov. That example is showing where exactly to show and where to tell rather than the general telling that LaPlante gives in page 156. Also, I loved the map LaPlante laid out. At one end is “Pure Showing” and the other “Pure Telling” with the examples placed. It’s definitely helpful because it shows exactly what is “showing” and what is “telling”. Lastly, this chapter also provides an interesting perspective because LaPlante also makes interesting comments about workshops that I thought about my own workshop session especially because I remember in my workshop, people wanted to see more of certain things. In conclusion, I really enjoy this chapter and find it extremely useful.
ReplyDeleteThe short story “Brownies” is a great choice for this chapter. If I understood exactly what “showing” and “telling” is, I think this short story has both of them but more of telling mixed with figurative language and imagery. An example of ZZ Packer telling us is when the group sings The Brownie Song to cheer up Octavia’s mother. After the song is sung, the narrator tells us, “The Brownie Song was supposed to be sung as though we were elves in a workshop, singin as we merrily cobbled shoes, but everyone except me hated the song and sang it like a maudlin record, played at the most sluggish of rpms” (171). Obviously if ZZ Packer did not “tell” us this, the reader wouldn’t know that while the song is supposed to be happy, the troop don’t even like it! This is just one of many examples Packer tells. Also, this story is humorous but also has a much deeper meaning with racial issues and such which is why I really enjoy it. What I particularly love is how the young African American girls (although only Arnetta supposedly heard it) will not stand by other kids calling them racial slurs. I just think this story shows a lot about African American kids growing along these awful racist terms and how it affects them. The ending with Laurel’s father’s story and her realizing “there was something mean in the world that [she] could not stop” (178) hits hard. It’s truly an incredible story and I am glad to discover a female author I haven’t read before on International Women’s Day!
Emily D'Gyves
Very interesting chapter. For a long time now, I have been focused on showing way too much when in reality, I need to do a bit more of telling. My characters do things that are supposed to make my audience consider why exactly they are doing what they are doing but, I realize that sometimes telling why my characters do certain things is important. I suppose that a mixture of showing and telling could be beneficial and healthy for any story.
ReplyDeleteI feel like in "Brownies," by ZZ Packer, we receive a healthy amount of both showing and telling. ZZ never reveals too much through the dialogue but, it is just enough for a reader to insinuate certain things. My goal is a writer is to reveal a small amount of information so that my reader can understand what i am trying to convey. I want my work so be open for interpretation but, at the same time, I want my readers to understand that there are main themes in my writing. I feel like ZZ Packer did this extremely well.
Michael Perez
Chapter five was interesting to read. It is a really common thing for teachers to say "show and don't tell." I liked that the chapter clarified the differences between showing and telling, but it did not make one or the other more important. When I first start writing, I usually start by telling a story like I would in a conversation. Once I am through I start incorporating the "dramatizing" of the story. I agree with LaPlante's view of stories including both showing and telling in a balanced way. Overall the chapter was enjoyable and showed interesting examples for both types of writing a story. The practice exercises at the end of the chapter also seem really helpful. The first one seems to be what I already do when I write.
ReplyDeleteThe story was interesting. It included a nice variety of showing and telling. I thought it was just going to be about getting revenge, but the way the story is written shows more than that. I liked the Daphne's character and how the author connected the Mennonites painting their porch and not being thankful with the instance where Daphne was picking up the trash meticulously. I feel that if the story would have just been told and have no elements of showing, it would not be as strong as it came off.
Daniela Hernández
This was the hardest chapter for me to understand. Usually the examples LePlantes includes are super helpful but the ones in this chapter just made me more confused. I understood it was about the importance of when to show and when to tell in a story’s narrative. What I wasn’t too sure about was what is considered telling and what is showing. I had to read the chapter twice before I was able to differentiate between the two. My favorite part of this chapter was that it was explained that teachers tell us to show and not tell because not everyone is able to “tell” correctly. I thought this was interesting, and I liked the reasons why teachers and professors think that way. LePlante doesn’t discourage the reader from showing and not telling, but to experiment with both. She even gives us examples of stories that range from using mostly the telling method to the showing method, and everything in between. “Brownies” was an interesting story. Thanks to what I learned in the chapter previously I could tell that the author was telling than showing. I thought it was a cute story about the mentality of young children. My favorite part was the comedic break when Janice comes out of the bathroom stall when she was supposed to be fighting with the white girls. I didn’t like the conclusion of the short story as it left the reader with a lot of questions, but I guess that wasn’t the point of this story.
ReplyDeleteFlavio Hernandez
Although I have greatly enjoyed all chapters in LaPlante’s book and have found them all to contain helpful information, chapter five has been the most helpful thus far. I love telling stories. When I was a little girl I would walk around making up stories to people. When I write I often get caught up in the storytelling that I forget to show the reader what is going on. The different examples throughout the chapter between telling and showing really helped me find ways to improve my writing. A good story has a combination of telling and showing. I have trouble figuring out when to tell and when to show. LaPlante states that it is best to show the important stuff like behaviors, interactions and conversations. Dialogue is a major key in showing and so are character gestures. Brownies by ZZ Packer was a story that reflected on racism without actually telling the reader it was about racism. The detail used was my favorite part. How the two groups were distinguished and the metaphors about the white girls with the disney sleeping bags was genius. The dialect was also very strong throughout the story. I feel as if the dialogue used helped the reader connect with the characters personality.
ReplyDeleteMayela Montenegro