Friday 17 January 2014

University

I'm so happy with my first two weeks back at university. My boyfriend and I have started a healthy eating plan so we're having lots of fruit and veg and no sneaky trips to McDonalds. I think it's a bit much to ask my body to run better by just changing my diet so I can't say I'm feeling a change but it's always good to be healthy. 

But the best bit about this week has been getting my results back. I wasn't that pleased with my first result as I didn't think the teacher really understood what I was doing and she said herself that she wouldn't choose to read the kind of stuff that I write. (My stories are a bit on the ethereal side, or rather my storytelling is ethereal, it's hard to explain really. If it was a song I guess you'd call it soulful). But I did get a 2.1 so I can't complain really. Then I got my results back for my Writing for Young People essay which was about escapism in children's literature. I got a first!! I couldn't believe it. I never seem to be able to get into the first category with essays, I always get 1 or 2% off but I finally did it. It was pretty good, if I may say so myself. 

Then for my next essay, which was for my Short Stories module, I got another 2.1. The essay was on omission, which is the writing practise of leaving out certain information and how by leaving out something you're actually adding a whole backstory to the piece. For example a simple awkward line between a divorced couple might hint at a whole other story, but it's all up to the reader's imagination, which adds depth to the story, a story beyond the story if you like. And next I got another first for my short story collection!! It included three short stories. One about a mad woman and the storyline is her murdering her son but you don't know if she actually did or it was all in her head (lots of omission going on there), one about a homeless boy walking through a desert, which is just really descriptive and one I wrote in hospital two years ago that I brushed up and that was about the first time I was in hospital and someone died in the ward. (They don't sound that good when you try and explain them but I promise you they're better than they sound!) I may be all happy and positive in real life but my writing is madly depressing I'm afraid. But anyway my tutor loved it and said I'm really good at creating a vivid setting and a strong sense of self (okay, so I have no idea what that last one means but it sounds good). And he said I was talented, so I feel really spurred on to do good in everything else now! I'd really love to publish a book of short stories so it's good to know I have three good ones to put into a short story book. I'm afraid I can't put any of my writing on here because it would make getting it published extremely hard. But you'll definitely be hearing about it if I do get something published! 

The best bit about everything is that I'm done with my short story module now so I get every Wednesday off and as long as my marks don't change when they're moderated I've bagged a first for that module as my 2.1 was high enough that I averaged out at a first. Woppeee! 

I'm feeling quite positive about getting a book published now. It is really difficult being a writer but I think I'm just about naive enough to think it's possible, just wise enough to know how to do it and just mad enough to keep working at it. I'm going to get a book published if it kills me! 

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