Beat The Blank Page Writing Exercise  

April 2004 

"Depending on Your Point of View"

The blank page never ceases to intimidate - it seems presumptuous to intrude on its perfect whiteness. As our pens hover uncertainly, it asks us who do you think you are? Easier not to begin, to go and do something less risky instead (like the washing-up) - after all, if we don't write anything, then the possibility of creating something brilliant and beautiful remains; we haven't marred that hope with the messy, no-guarantees process of writing.

If this is how you feel too, then I hope this regular exercise page will help. What follows is meant as a starting point, a way of allowing you to make that initial mark on the page, and ease you into the creative flow. These are exercises which I've found useful myself and which I've tried with different classes of students. It may seem artificial to be given a starting point, rather than letting inspiration strike, but I've always found that inspiration needs encouragement and the right conditions in which to flourish. Exercises don't always result in a finished piece of work (although they can do) but at the very least, they get you going, and fire up the brain. If you come out with even one image or word you might use later on, then the process will have been worth it.

Instructions

Purpose

• The first person perspective is often the most instinctive point of view when writing a poem. Whilst this can have the benefits of immediacy and a sense of authority it can run the risk of obscurity; what seems obvious to the writer isn't necessarily so to the reader. I've often had students show me poems in which something dramatic is obviously happening which the writer wants to record, but exactly what remains difficult to interpret. In these cases, the poem might present an emotion but without the context which would allow the reader to engage in what is being expressed. This exercise can be helpful in restoring the balance between inner and outer realities, whilst also helping the writer rediscover those vivid external details which can anchor a poem in a reader's imagination.
  
• Writing about first person experience in the third person can also be strangely liberating. It can allow a writer to describe experiences or express thoughts and feelings that they might feel uncomfortable about doing in the first person. The disguise may be slight, but it can give the writer a sense of permission, particularly when tackling difficult subjects.
  
• A follow up exercise might be to look at earlier work, particularly poems which you feel don't quite succeed, and see if changing the perspective from a first person to a third, or indeed vice versa, opens the material up again.

Example Poem

Another one of mine I'm afraid - simply because it's impossible to presume that a third person poem by another writer is actually about their own subjective experience. This one from Beyond Calling Distance is based on memories of teenage nightclubs. I chose to write about myself in the third person as I wanted the poem to be highly visual reflecting its obsession with image and how you try to project yourself at that age. This technique helped me 'see' the scenario more clearly. Or maybe I'm just embarrassed about admitting to being sick on snakebite . . .

[top]