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In this short story I'm trying to describe an unexceptional scene in an exciting and compelling way. I want to make a common ritual seem strange and a bit surreal. Does this paragraph accomplish these goals? What could be done to improve it?
The Great Books Program
The desert sun lay shattered and
abstract on a shimmering pond and the
dry morning air spoke of an
oppressively hot day to come. Slippery
and speckled fish darted to the sounds
of Beethoven’s Fifth symphony which
played at high volume directly into
Buck's two ears. All around him, tens
of college students diffused casually
through the golden cobblestone
courtyard between the tall dormitory
building and the forty-eight stairs
which led up to Patton Hall. Some
students walked alone absorbed by
thoughts or squinting at the bright
rock or rubbing sleep from tired eyes,
others skipped in pairs and talked
loudly about the day's news, parties,
school work and other diversions. Each
had a copy of Homer, Joyce and the
Bible cradled with affection or tucked
studiously under each arm. Buck shut
his eyes behind his dark sunglasses to
exorcise the pain from his pulsating
forehead. When he opened them, a fish
had paused for a moment as though to
look up at Buck through a critical
eye. Buck's left hand pressed a
smoking cigarette to his lips and Buck
inhaled deeply. Moments before the
cold ichthyic stare would have
shattered the sense of serene
isolation that the morning brings, the
fish slipped away into a blur of
colorful pulsating streaks as if
disappointed in what it saw. Buck took
a sip of the bitter coffee which he
held in his right hand, stomped out
what remained of his cigarette, picked
up his books which lay at his feet and
walked off slowly toward the fiery sun
with the supernatural ecstasy of
Beethoven's strings and horns playing
loudly in both ears.
Thanks a lot!
(My blog where I originally posted it)
(4)More posts by @BetL639
4 Comments
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First, I would break it up into more paragraphs. That enhances readability.
Second, using the adverb abstract is strange, but you do not gain surrealism doing so. You kicked me out of the story before I reached the first full stop (period, if you are an American).
Talking about the story: There is none! justkt pointed that out already.
Overusing adjectives/adverbs will bring you nowhere. If you want it to be surreal, describe the scene from an LSD viewpoint (yeah, the drug).
Assuming the protagonist has a terrible headache and needs to go to the bathroom fetching some aspirin, you could write: "He was walking through honey and it sounded pink." Well, I wouldn't use pink, but you get the idea.
Where's the conflict in this piece? I see it as a piece of descriptive writing, perhaps a study in describing a scene, but I don't get a sense of movement and plot. Even flash fiction should have some sort of movement.
To give a sense of the surreal cut out most of your adjectives and adverbs. Use them judiciously in an unexpected way so that a word like "shattered" really shatters the reader's sense of what should be and makes him or her sit up and take note. The words you've freed up can be used to provide movement towards a conclusion. Flash fiction is often best at providing an unexpected conclusion, so you may want to go for something that provides an O. Henry-like twist without being over-the-top.
First impression: too many adverbs and descriptions, and too much detail. As Stephen King notes, "The road to hell is paved with adverbs."
A few lines in, and I wanted to skip ahead. What's important to the story? The music he's listening to? Forty-eight steps? The people walking around? The pond? The fish? The coffee? The cigarette?
Everything is "shattered", "shiny", "dry", "loudly", "darted", "slippery", and so on. There is too much going on here, and everything becomes a bit "noisy". In fact, what you've written can almost be described as "purple prose". It's also largely meaningless: lots going on, but the majority tells me nothing of the character or the story.
You don't have to describe absolutely everything. Focus on what's important.
College student (is Buck a student?) smoking a cigarette in public unpunished and enjoying Beethoven's music sounds quite strange and surreal to me. Since the paragraph doesn't explain why students were carrying those books I am not able to decide wheter it was for their interest of classic literature or for those books were just from a required reading list.
It is good but what unexceptional can I see?
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