A Writing Assignment
“That’s okay, just give us a quick think-piece for tomorrow,” Riker said. “Remember Mrs. Fisheye.”
…Qwilleran did his quick thinking. Both he and Riker remembered their high school English teacher who regularly assigned the class to write a thousand words on such subjects as the weather, or breakfast, or the color green. Fisheye was not her name, but it was her misfortune to have large, round, pale, watery eyes. As a student Qwilleran had done his share of groaning and protesting, but now he could write a thousand words on any subject at a moment’s notice.
Surveying the landscape…he decided on his topic: fences! Moose County was crisscrossed with picket fences, hand-split snake fences, barbed wire, four-bar corral, even root fences, each delivering its own message from Welcome to Keep Out….Qwilleran was prepared — if those observations added up to fewer than a thousand words — to quote Robert Frost, allude to Cole Porter, and trace “fence” to its Latin root. He might even dedicate the column to Mrs. Fisheye.”
–Lilian Jackson Braun, The Cat Who Talked To Ghosts
That story came out in 1990. In 1991, I was coincidentally given the same assignment by one of my own teachers: to pick a subject at random and write a thousand words about it. And if you couldn’t pick one, one would be picked for you. One of my classmates couldn’t figure out what to write about, so he was given desks as a subject. Why do student desks differ from teacher desks? Why are they only built for right-handed people? Why the bloody hell do they get smaller as we get bigger? What does a typical school desk arrangement say about how we teach our kids? What is the average number of underside gum deposits?
Perhaps not coincidentally, I chose fences. Why not? Thanks to Lilian, I’d already had a year to think about it.
Turns out, it’s really easy to write a thousand words about damn near anything. And the less interested you are in the subject, the better — because you end up making it interesting to yourself to write about, which means it’s more interesting for the audience to read.
HomeStation has one guiding principle for its writing: we don’t care about the subject being reviewed. We care about how that subject made the reviewer feel.
There must be, at any given time, thousands — probably tens of thousands — of people writing about the video game industry. Just as there are an equal number of people writing about cars, music, movies and so forth. So why is it that so many of them are forgettable? What separates a few, such as the late Roger Ebert, from the pack?
How to make car reviews interesting.
Simple: are you writing about the sticks and bricks, or are you writing about your reaction to it? If it’s the former, you’re boring. If it’s the latter, you might just have something worth listening to.
So this, then, is my challenge to all of you: pick something from Home which you have absolutely no interest in. And write a thousand words about it.
Doesn’t matter what it is. Bored to tears by dolphy racing? Make it interesting. Don’t give a shart about Pottermore? Dive into it. Ignore war games like No Man’s Land because it’s not your bag, baby? Time to go shootin’.
This all stems from a recent team discussion we had about where everyone’s strengths are as writers, artists, filmmakers, et cetera. Everyone has their comfort zone: Kassadee enjoys researching Home’s marketplace and ferreting out good deals. Bill is happiest when he’s creating esoteric art-house machinima involving mystical symbols and Zen chimes. Burbie’s always up for covering what’s hot and new in Home. I’m obsessed with behavioral economics and consumer trends. And Terra wants to kill everything with fire. The list goes on.
Thing is, you always have to stretch and grow. If we don’t grow, we die. This is why we’re constantly branching out and trying new things. Graphic novels? Why not? A Home cookbook? You bet! Machinima contests where we challenge people to film fake developer ads? All in day’s work.
Because it’s fun.
Cigars in space. Write 1,000 words.
See, here’s the big thing about HSM: we got into this to enjoy the act of creative expression, and build a brand that was synonymous with top-tier product quality. That’s it. That’s all we’re in it for. If opportunities arise because of the quality of the product, that’s great — but it’s important to surround yourself with people who are driven by the love of creating something, not a desire for internet fame or popularity kudos or any other such nonsense. No one has to say anything, but it makes a very perceptible difference with the type of personality such a project attracts, the level of product that ultimately is produced from it, and the kinds of opportunities that might just arise as a result of it.
So we don’t focus on what we can individually get out of it — we focus on what we can put into it. Because that keeps making us better at what we do, and that’s how we grow.
(Not everyone’s going to get this. It doesn’t make HSM the most popular kid in the neighborhood. But it does make us, in terms of readership and market penetration, one of the top Home media sites in the world.)
And now comes the latest challenge. A challenge we hope you’ll join us in.
The only way to grow in life is to step outside of your comfort zone. So just as we’ve challenged each writer, artist and filmmaker on the team to cover something that they’re not interested in, so we want to extend the same challenge to you. Go to a public space you’ve never been to before. Play a game you never thought you’d play. Chat with someone you’d normally avoid. And tell the world about it. Send your story into submissions@hsmagazine.net and let’s publish them for the community to see. Because I’ll bet some truly fascinating stories come from this, and if you’re the kind of person who loves to creatively express, then here’s your chance to be published.
Well, whaddaya know. Just broke a thousand words.
April 8th, 2013 by NorseGamer | 5 comments
NorseGamer is the product manager for LOOT Entertainment at Sony Pictures, as well as the founder and publisher of HomeStation Magazine. Born and raised in Silicon Valley, he holds a B.A. in English/Creative Writing from San Francisco State University and presently lives in Los Angeles. All opinions expressed in HSM are solely his and do not necessarily reflect the views of Sony DADC.
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I am going to give this a shot. The hardest part is trying to decide what to choose. I like the idea of stretching ones self, even this late in life I can always learn and grow.
I am sitting at SportsWalk giving this idea a go..it has been 45 mins and the page is still blank..but I am not giving up.
This is a great idea, as much of a fan as I am of Home, there are people and places I do avoid that I could probably take a 1000 word look at. I have always adhered to the logic of Steven Spielberg when he said of film making, that he makes the movies he wants to see, and I have always written what I wanted though I am no Spielberg by any stretch, but a walk in the ‘out of my comfort zone’ sounds like fun too. Again, great idea.
Outside my comfort zone lies my slightly-nervous zone.
Outside my slightly-nervous zone lies my don’t-want-to-be-here zone.
Outside my don’t-want-to-be-here zone lies my gibbering-terror zone.
Be careful what you ask for.
A lot of us find ourselves -- daily -- in situations where we don’t want to be. But we stick with it and do them anyways.
Why? Well, those reasons vary from individual to individual.
Do it enough times, and the fear lessens until eventually, it goes away altogether.