Outdoor Writing in the Style of Faulkner

Outdoor Writing in the Style of Faulkner Today, we will set out on a hike as a class. Our goal is to write a descriptive passage about the outdoors, with an emphasis on modeling our style after Faulkner’s. I encourage you to take photos and draw illustrations as well – just try to consider how Faulkner might approach such a task. We will stop at three points on our hike to read, talk, and reflect. At the end of the period, we’ll have a short piece of writing (in the style of Faulkner) to share.

AS WE SET OUT ON THE TRAIL

The path runs straight as a plumb-line, worn smooth by feet and baked brick-hard by July, between the green rows of laidby cotton, to the cottonhouse in the center of the field, where it turns and circles the cottonhouse at four soft right angles and goes on across the field again, worn so by feet in fading precision. (Darl, Chapter 1, Page 3) – note how Faulkner describes THE PATH vividly

The log appears suddenly between two hills, as if it had rocketed suddenly from the bottom of the river. Upon the end of it a long gout of foam hangs like the beard of an old man or a goat. (Darl, Chapter 34, Page 148) – note the PERSONIFICATION and SIMILE

Rhiannon will read an excerpt from her writing as a model for students. This will give you a guide for expectations.

THE VERNAL POOL

We submerge in turn, holding to the rope, being clutched by one another while the cold wall of the water sucks the slanting mud backward and upstream from beneath our feet and we are suspended so, groping along the cold bottom. Even the mud there is not still. (Darl, Chapter 37, Page 159) – note “Even the mud there is not still.”

Jewel and Vernon are in the river again. From here they do not appear to violate the surface at all; it is as though it had severed them both at a single blow, the two torsos moving with infinitesimal and ludicrous care upon the surface. It looks peaceful, like machinery does after you have watched it and listened to it for a long time. (Darl, Chapter 37, Pages 163-164) – note “It looks peaceful, like machinery does after you have watched it and listened to it for a long time.”

William Faulkner was an outdoorsman, so Tommy will talk about how hunters are attentive to their surroundings (get low; keep your head on a swivel). This will help us to be descriptive in our writing.

AT THE TRAIL CROSSROADS

It turns off at right angles, the wheel-marks of last Sunday healed away now: a smooth, red scoriation curving away into the pines; a white signboard with faded lettering: New Hope Church, 3 mi. It wheels up like a motionless hand lifted above the profound desolation of the ocean; beyond it the red road lies like a spoke of which Addie Bundren is the rim. It wheels past, empty, unscarred, the white signboard turns away its fading and tranquil assertion. (Darl, Chapter 27, Page 108)

When I reach the spring and get down and hitch the team, the sun has gone down behind a bank of black clouds like a topheavy mountain range, like a load of cinders dumped over there, and there is no wind. (Peabody, Chapter 11, Page 42)

Carly will talk about photography tips, and how composing a good photo is similar to composing a good piece of writing.

Mr. Ambrose, May 17, 2016