How Presentation Can Add Emotion - Lessons Learned From Spoken Word Poetry

As a prose writer, I've always enjoyed poetry from a distance. If someone makes me read one, I'll read it and take it in stride, but as soon as they're gone, I'll put it away. I often just find that prose speaks so much more to me than poetry and so, stay away from poetry as often as I can. However, this weekend I went to a Poetry Slam which has started to change my tune.

How Presentation Can Add Emotion - Lessons Learned From Spoken Word Poetry

A Prayer For Owen Meany

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A Prayer For Owen Meany

A book in less than 5 min :D:D

A Prayer For Owen Meany

A Prayer For Owen Meany

A Prayer For Owen Meany

A Prayer For Owen Meany

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Literary Talent - John Irving - Author Biographies

It has been said that John Irving often uses the literary technique of a story within a story and he uses it masterfully. A few his novels have a character who is a writer. John Irving is considered one of the best novelists in modern literature. He is a master storyteller and comic genius of our age.

Literary Talent - John Irving - Author Biographies

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English Final Crow

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John Irving was born John Wallace Blunt, Jr., on March 2, 1942, in Exeter, New Hampshire. His father was serving as an airman stationed in the Pacific. John never did meet his father.

Owen Meany

Literary Talent - John Irving - Author Biographies

John's parents were divorced when he was only two years old. When his mother married Colin Irving in 1948, Colin adopted John. His mother changed his name to John Winslow Irving. Winslow was her maiden name.

Literary Talent - John Irving - Author Biographies

John lived with his grandmother, in a large old house, until he was six years old when his mother remarried. When he was growing up, he was a moody and aloof child and that house provided many places where he could get off by himself. He said that no adult would talk to him about his father. So, in his mind, he demonized his father.

John says that it was when he was almost 40 years old and in the process of a divorce from his first wife, that his mother gave him a packet of letters that his father had written in 1943. This is when he found out that his dad had wanted contact with him. By this time his father had already died.

John had his first novel, 'Setting Free the Bees,' published when he was only 26 years old. In 1972, after his second novel was published, he was appointed Writer-in-Residence at the University of Iowa. While there John received a fellowship from the National Endowment for the Arts.

It was in 1976 that John moved to Massachusetts to become Assistant Professor of English at Mount Holyoke College. He served as Writer-in-Residence at the Bread Loaf Writers Conference.

It wasn't until 1978, when 'The World According to Garp,' was published, that John Irving was catapulted onto the 'Best Seller' realm. All his books since then have been best sellers. His later works have been compared to the work of Charles Dickens.

John had been active in wrestling while he was growing up and in college. In the 1980s, he coached wresting at prep schools all while he continued his writing.

In 1999, John wrote the screenplay for his novel, 'Cider House Rules,' and ultimately won an Academy Award for Best Adapted Screenplay. Since then he has continued to adapt his works into motion pictures.

John is known for is strong opinions and is anti censorship. John says, "If you feel so strongly about what's on television, don't have one. If you feel so strongly about people having abortions, don't have one. But, we are a country that likes to be punitive. We want to restrict. It is a kind of religious fervor run amok."

In 1987, John Irving John married his literary agent, Janet Turnbull. They live in Toronto and Southern Vermont. John has two sons.

Books by John Irving:

Novels:
Setting Free the Bees (1968)
The Water-Method Man (1972)
The 154-Pound Marriage (1974)
The World According to Garp (1974)
The Hotel New Hampshire (1981)
The Cider House Rules (1985)
A Prayer for Owen Meany (1988)
A Son of the Circus (1994)
A Widow for One Year (1998)
The Fourth Hand (2001)
Until I Find You (2005)
Last Night in Twisted River (2009)

Omnibus:
3 by Irving (1980)
Three Complete Novels (1995)

Collections:
Trying to Save Piggy Sneed (1993)

Picture Books:
A Sound Like Someone Trying Not to Make a Sound (2004)

Non Fiction:
The Imaginary Girlfriend: A Memoir (1996)
My Movie Business: A Memoir (1999)

Literary Talent - John Irving - Author Biographies

A book in less than 5 min :D:D

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For the uninitiated, a Poetry Slam is a competition of spoken word poetry. Google Def Jam Poetry and you'll get an opportunity to see some of the best in the business at work. While I didn't see anyone quite to that caliber, many of the competing poets were highly talented and opened my eyes to how I could bring poetic techniques into my own writing.

Owen Meany

How Presentation Can Add Emotion - Lessons Learned From Spoken Word Poetry

The winner of the Slam struck a chord with me as I really enjoyed the way he used the flow of his work to highlight his emotion. I asked myself, how could we extend this to prose writing? A lot of his emotion is derived from his delivery. How do you convey a raised voice, an intense thought, faster pace, when you aren't in control, when someone is reading your words on paper?

How Presentation Can Add Emotion - Lessons Learned From Spoken Word Poetry

First, be willing to play with font. Italics can be used for more than just book titles, and caps lock, while annoying on forums, can be effective when rationed. For instance, in a recent piece I've written, I attempt to highlight my intense thoughts by utilizing italics. "I could just kiss you, I thought". In a similar sense, caps lock can be used to highlight a louder delivery, seen when I write "Attempting to win her attention, I said 'Dan Brown's a great author.' Failing to get her attention, I try again. 'DAN BROWN'S A GREAT AUTHOR.' I shouted, perhaps a little louder than I'd intended."

Suddenly, the presentation of your writing is doing a little more than simply conveying the words to your reader, but also giving a feeling for what's being described. A great example of this is in John Irving's A Prayer For Owen Meany, in which everything said by Owen Meany is in full caps.

Going beyond simple font tricks, sentence structure can do wonders to convey the feeling of the piece and help replicate a lot of the emotion seen in spoken word poems. Shorter sentences slow the writing, making it choppier but placing a greater focus on the individual words. Longer sentences can speed things up as you find no hurdles in your reading, and placing a greater focus on the bigger picture.

Taking it even further, paragraph structure can do the same thing as sentence structure, only on a larger scale. More regular paragraph breaks can cause the writing to appear more staggered and slow the reader's intake of everything you've said. Longer paragraphs have the reverse effect, burying the reader in an uninterrupted wave of text which they can digest quickly.

Unfortunately, we don't always have the opportunity to read our pieces aloud to others. However, by utilizing these techniques, I believe you can capture some of the magic and emotion of spoken word by presenting your writing in a unique manner.

How Presentation Can Add Emotion - Lessons Learned From Spoken Word Poetry