Fear of Restriction

Welcome back for the sixteenth day of Writober. Today we’re exploring our third universal fear: loss of autonomy through fear of restriction.

Fear of restriction is a fear of being confined. This could be a fear of being bound, of small spaces, or even tight clothing.

Rhetorical Device: Litotes

Litotes is an ironic understatement in which an affirmative is expressed by the negative of its contrary. Example: “It’s not the worst movie I’ve seen” or “You won’t be sorry.”

Fighting Fear of the Blank Page: Last week was the beat poets’ week at ModPo. Another of the resources was Jack Kerouac’s “Belief & Technique for Modern Prose”:

Belief & Technique for Modern Prose

by Jack Kerouac

Scribbled secret notebooks, and wild typewritten pages, for yr own joy

Submissive to everything, open, listening

Try never get drunk outside yr own house

Be in love with yr life

Something that you feel will find its own form

Be crazy dumbsaint of the mind

Blow as deep as you want to blow

Write what you want bottomless from bottom of mind

The unspeakable visions of the individual

No time for poetry but exactly what is

Visionary tics shivering in the chest

In tranced fixation dreaming upon object before you

Remove literary, grammatical and syntactical inhibition

Like Proust be an old teahead of time

Telling the true story of the world in interior monolog

The jewel center of interest is the eye within the eye

Write in recollection and amazement for yourself

Work from pithy middle eye out, swimming in language sea

Accept loss forever

Believe in the holy contour of life

Struggle to sketch the flow that already exists intact in mind

Dont think of words when you stop but to see picture better

Keep track of every day the date emblazoned in yr morning

No fear or shame in the dignity of yr experience, language & knowledge

Write for the world to read and see yr exact pictures of it

Bookmovie is the movie in words, the visual American form

In Praise of Character in the Bleak inhuman Loneliness

Composing wild, undisciplined, pure, coming in from under, crazier the better

Youre a Genius all the time

Writer-Director of Earthly movies Sponsored & Angeled in Heaven

As ever, Jack [Kerouac]

Jack Kerouac, “Belief & Technique For Modern Prose: List of Essentials,” from a 1958 letter to Donald Allen, published in Heaven & Other Poems, Grey Fox Press, 1958, 1977, 1983. This was also published in the spring 1959 issue of Evergreen Review.

Choose from Kerouac’s list: What resonates with you? Try to write from one of these beliefs and or techniques.

*Quick Note about links in this post: I am an amazon associate, so most of the links in my post will take you to amazon products. If you buy from these links, I will make some pennies which will help me pay for this site and my creative endeavors.

OctPoWriMo

Poetry Toolbox

These are quick exercises that I hope you’ll do every day. We will build on these exercises throughout the month.

Word list: Write down the first ten words you think of when you think of fear. Any words at all. Anything that comes to mind. Then choose your three favorite and say them aloud a few times until you hear the accented and unaccented syllables (if more than one syllable) and notice the duration of each syllable. (Inspired by Frances Mayes’ list of a hundred favorite words in The Discovery of Poetry)

I created this Excel Spreadsheet for you to use to collect and explore your fear words.

OctPoWriMo wordlist Download

2. Sensory Imagery: In your journal or a word processing file, fill in these lines as quickly as you can. Notice they are slightly different from last week. You may want to revisit one or two in more detail if you’re inspired and have time.

I didn’t see

I didn’t hear

I can’t carry

I didn’t smell

I wouldn’t follow

The dead end road

The frustration of

I can’t taste

The burn of

I witness

I touch but don’t feel

(Inspired by a week one exercise in the poetry chapter of The Portable MFA in Creative Writing)

3. More Sensory Imagery: Ask yourself sensory questions about fear of restriction.

4. Choose one poem to study all week: Read your chosen poem again. Look at one stanza at a time. Any new ideas? Learn more about the poet. Read some other poems by the poet. Are any lines still giving you trouble? Write about it in your journal.

Poetry Building

Litotes uses understatement and negative language. How can litotes help to express a fear of restriction?

Example poem: Today we’re looking at Fear by Liv Mammone, copied here from poets.org for educational purposes.

Fear

Liv Mammone

If the pain doesn’t come back,
what will I write about? Will the poems
have tendon and teeth? I didn’t get
right the sonnet of all its colors.
I did not find the exact dagger of phrase
about the long loss of my life.

Hope is all I do and am.
I don’t think I’m poet enough
to make you taste this mango;
or see that sutured sunset unless
from a hospital bed.
I was good for carving.

There will be kisses, music, street names.
Loved ones will go where the gone do.
What if I don’t want to (write it: can’t)
write about these things.
What if I would rather feel
than create feeling?
What then? Go ahead.

How does this poem make you feel? How did Liv Mammone express the fear of restriction?

Today’s prompt: Write a poem exploring the fear of restriction using litotes.

Form: If you’re looking for more of a challenge, write your poem as a Kyrielle, using litotes in your repeating line.

Writober Flash Fiction

Write a story with a beginning, middle, and end with conflict that leads to change in less than a thousand words (no minimal word count) inspired by one of the images in the Loss of Autonomy folder of the Writober 2024 Pinterest board. How does fear of restriction affect your character?

NaNo Prep

Time to start thinking about some important scenes for the middle of our novel. By now we should have a pretty good idea of what genre we’ll be writing in, but if you’re not sure, head over to Story Grid and look at the articles on Genre.

Once you’ve figured out what genre you’ll be writing in, Story Grid has great cheatsheets for each genre that outline the conventions and obligatory scenes. I also recommend picking up the book The Story Grid by Shawn Coyne.

Halloween Photography Challenge

Take a photograph that depicts restriction or fear of restriction and link to your photo in the chat.

Get Moving

Now that you’ve read all the prompts and have all these ideas running around in your head, it’s time for motion. Some suggestions:

Play: Chase after and pop some evil spirits taking form as bubbles from this Halloween Bubble Machine.