International Embarrass Yourself as an Artist Day

[pegkerr]

Having been double-dog dared by matociquala, I have pulled out the earliest sample of writing that I can find. This is from 1978. I am not quite sure this fits her criteria, since it's a school assignment. Think of it as fanfiction. Ibsen fanfiction. The assignment was to write a fourth act to A Doll's House. When I wrote a thank you letter to all my high school English teachers when Emerald House Rising came out, sending them a copy of the book, my senior year English teacher faxed this to me in 1998. He had kept it for twenty years, handing it out as a sample to students as he continued to assign this exercise. Therefore, I present to you, the fourth act of A Doll's House:

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Comments

[cakmpls.livejournal.com]

Wow. Impressive work.

[sternel.livejournal.com]

Oh, I like that very much. Thank you for sharing.

[marikochan.livejournal.com]

(Note: I think you mean matociquala.)

[pegkerr.livejournal.com]

Yes, thanks! Have fixed.

[aome.livejournal.com]

As someone who has never read Ibsen, I can say you painted such a clear picture of the characters that I didn't need to have read A Doll's House to have a great sense of who they were and at least some of what had been in their past. You gave good stage directions, too, including the lighting. I'm very impressed - no way could I have written that well in high school.

[pegkerr.livejournal.com]

My English teacher tells me that he felt rather smug that he had picked my essay to serve as an example to others; when I was published, it justified what he had felt many years ago, that I did have talent.

*Sigh*

[aome.livejournal.com]

Well, I still believe in you - but I know well how fatigue, distractions of life, and darkness can get in the way of creativity. I'm doing an email RP with Ali (reprising our B/R roles, but post-HBP), just for fun, and it's taking me ages to come up with replies. My own creativity feels all shot to hell, and this is a little project.

[huladavid.livejournal.com]

There's something I love about the idea of Ibsen fanfic.

(Does that make "Godzilla vs. Jane Austen" fanvideo?)

What a great assignment!

[thorintatge.livejournal.com]

Now I'm trying to think of what direction I would have taken with that assignment. Your piece was certainly good, for high school. This reminds me of when I wrote an alternate ending to Lord of the Flies. Unlike just about everything else I wrote in high school, I can still read it with pride instead of cringing. Probably because I was using an established setting and tone, instead of creating my own weak ones.