Tag: Let’s KIDD Around: KIDD Creative Writing Program

How the second person perspective utilizes distance as a way to tell traumatic stories, specifically from marginalized perspectives

Presenter(s): Hayley Schlueter—English

Faculty Mentor(s): Will Alden

Session 4: Let’s KIDD Around: KIDD Creative Writing Program

This project aims to understand the unique ways in which the second person perspective can be utilized for stories about trauma, and therefore, stories about marginalized identities and experiences—meaning people who experience some form of systemic oppression, such as women, people of color, and LGBTQ+ people . The second person often creates a sense of discomfort in the reader by calling direct attention to the reader, essentially forcing them to become a part of the story by inhabiting the “you” and the life of the story’s character . At the same time that the “you” creates this often uncomfortable intimacy, it also creates a sense of distance . My research explores the ways in which the second person perspective utilizes these seeming contradictions between intimacy and alienation, discomfort and distance, as a method for telling stories about trauma and identity through the examination of short stories such as Michael Cunningham’s “Mister Brother” and Kiese Laymon’s “You are the Second Person .” I am interested in the ways in which marginalized authors and characters, who already experience the world as deeply alienating, are able to use the second person as a way to emphasize and control that alienation .

What I Wanted to Say, But Couldn’t: Epistolary Poetry’s Effects on Access and Intimacy for Asian-American Diasporic Poets

Presenter(s): Katie Quines—Spatial Data Science, Geography

Faculty Mentor(s): Ariel Machell

Session 4: Let’s KIDD Around: KIDD Creative Writing Program

While much attention has been paid to the thematic similarities between poetic works produced by Asian-American writers, little commentary exists on why several Asian-American poets are partial to a particular poetic form: the epistolary poem, or a poem stylized as a letter . Contemporary poets ranging from Franny Choi to Ocean Vuong have produced several epistolary poems that discuss their perspectives on the experience of being part of the Asian diaspora . However, the epistolary form creates varied and distinct effects on themes common to diasporic writing, with some letter-poems giving authors access to voice and emotions that critique external, social structures, while some choose to address issues that exist internal to the Asian-American community . This project explores different benefits that the epistolary format confers upon poems written to address the experience of diaspora . By analyzing letter-poems from four Asian-American poets in relation to Marie Myuk-Ok’s theory that the epistolary poem functions as a means of giving minorities access to social critique, I argue that the letter-poems give access to more than pure critique . Rather, the epistolary format functions as a liminal space, which allows diasporic writers to both confront and come to terms with various forms of absence (racial equality and power, of knowledge of our own communities or histories, of physical separation from loved ones, etc .) . This project aims to help poets like myself, who write under the shadow of diaspora, understand the epistolary poem as a form that is ripe with potential for creating new understandings of identity .

Emery Owens Abstract

Presenter(s): Chelsea Pitarresi—Journalism, Cinema Studies

Faculty Mentor(s): Dan Cheung

Session 4: Let’s KIDD Around: KIDD Creative Writing Program

“Emery Owens” is a story of the liminal spaces of life; the peculiarity of the early stages of adulthood and adult relationships, when you have been given both the freedom and restrictions of an established adult, but have no idea how to take advantage of them . Max finds comfort in these in-betweens, and has difficulties moving to the next “big thing” his life has to offer . While adjusting to surprising annoyances in his new job at the bowling alley, Max leans on his brand-new relationship with Delilah for comfort . As the relationship progresses though, he finds himself not wanting to break the illusions of perfection that newness can offer relationships, and directs his anxieties towards Delilah’s unusual pet, Emery Owens . When I first started writing the story, I was focused purely on the strange dynamic between Max and Emery Owens and was writing with a very specific and dramatic ending in mind . However, as my writing came into shape, I found the real value of Max’s story in the smaller moments .

Suspending Disbelief in the Unreal: The Craft of Magical Realism

Presenter(s): Sophia Mick—Humanities

Faculty Mentor(s): Will Alden

Session 4: Let’s KIDD Around: KIDD Creative Writing Program

How do you get a reader to happily believe that your character’s husband has turned into an ape? Or that your narrator has developed a concerning but largely unimportant ability to fly? Why? Magical realism is often distinguished from other literary genres with a definition, however malleable, along these lines: a realistic narrative with surreal elements . These surreal elements are what fascinate me . This essay explores, on the micro scale, how understatement and detail help craft the suspension of disbelief necessary in the creation of magical realism, and on a macro scale, what magical realism means, both the term itself and the implications it has for author and reader . My research is composed of a close analysis of the micro techniques in works by authors Aimee Bender, Joseph O’Neill and Karen Russell, analysis of craft essays by Russell and Alice Munro, and a brief look at some of my own writing through the lens of Bret Anthony Johnston’s “Don’t Write What You Know .” As a lover of the magically real, I intend to examine and explain the literary craft of convincing magical realism and hopefully, to grasp at some understanding of why anyone would, or should, write it at all .