SAY IT WITHOUT SAYING IT
This exercise is a classic!
A woman just found out that her husband has been cheating. The husband comes home and they have a conversation. They don’t talk about the cheating. What could they be talking about?
SAVING A KITTEN
Two men hear the sound of a scared kitten coming from a pit.
BLAST FROM THE PAST & BACK TO THE FUTURE
Go back to when your character was much younger. Preferably when they were a child, a teenager or in their early twenties taking the first steps in life as an adult.
MOOD SWINGS
Your character is in a terrible mood. What could possibly cheer them up?
SHOPPING LIST
Write a shopping list for your character. What kind of things would they shop for on a weekly basis?
MADE IT TO THE FRONT PAGE!
Your character made it to the front page of the local newspaper!
THE PROUST QUESTIONNAIRE
The Proust Questionnaire has its origins in a parlour game popularized by Marcel Proust, the French essayist and novelist, who believed that, in answering these questions, an individual reveals his or her true nature.
FAIRYTALE PERSPECTIVE
Choose a famous fairytale or story. Choose one scene from this story and retell it in your own words. But this time you pick a different character to be the main character and you write the scene from their perspective.
EAVESDROP EXCURSION
We have been taught in school to write in proper grammatically correct sentences. When you start writing dialogue this is the first thing you must unlearn. If you listen carefully most people don’t speak in complete and perfect sentences.