  Drama
This week: Edited by: StephBee - House Targaryen  
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DRAMA IS:
#1 - The Greek word for "action."
#2 - A real situation or succession of events having the dramatic progression or emotional content of a play.
Every year I enter the Writer's Digest Annual Writing Contest. For me, it's a great tool to develop my skills as a writer, but every year I struggle to define the "mainstream/literary" category. Then, last year, my story, "Spontaneous Decision" won 8th place in that category. A "mainstream/literary" story involves emotions, characters, choices - it's the embodiment of drama.
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What is "mainstream/literary" writing? How does it differ from genre writing?
Genre writing is easy to define. Usually plot driven, genre writing focuses on a genre - romance, suspense/thriller, or fantasy for example. Genre stories conform to the rules of the genre. For example in the romance genre, boy meets girl, boy falls in love, boy loses girl, boy gets girl back.
Mainstream/literary writing is everything genre writing isn't.
Generally, mainstream/literary is thought of to be a higher caliber of writing. Its character driven, as opposed to being plot driven. Using films as an example, any James Bond film would be a genre film. (Thriller/Suspense, Action/Adventure) "Sideways," a film about two guys who go out for a week of fun in the Santa Barbara wine region of California, is a character driven film.
Literary writing is creative, yet carefully structured. Writers blend tone, rhyme, irony, and dialogue (that higher caliber of writing) to construct a particuliar prose for their story, prose, or play.
The goal of literary writing is to help us, readers and writers, to understand life - and sometimes life doesn't go the way we want it. As a writer, by taping into your real life experiences and bringing them out in a story, you explore mainstream/literary writing.
As you construct your mainstream/literary story, the biggest focus should be giving your main character a choice. The choice can be neat and tidy, or sticky and complicated. The choice and the consquence of that choice is the crux of a character driven story and mainstream/literary writing. Think of the classics, Shakespeare, for example. His characters made a choice and then had to answer for the consquences. MacBeth comes to mind. Ah, that's drama!
Once you decide on a character driven story, you can employ several literary techniques to tell it. Techniques include metaphors, allegory, conflict, creative license, dialogue, foreshadowing, imagery, motif, setting, point-of-view, symbolism, and theme. I've only touched on a few of the more common techniques, but there are many others. When employed effectively, these techniques augment the story you're crafting.
Remember to keep this mind about mainstream/literary stories:
 Character driven
 Involves a choice
Explores the consquences of that choice.
A higher caliber of writing, employing various literary techniques.
NEXT: I'll discuss specific literary techniques you can use to craft your story.
RESULTS OF THE HOT DRAMA POLL
Question: Which film festival do you follow?
Answer: #1 - Sundance
Check out the Hot Drama Poll a little further on in the newsletter for May's question.
FEATURED PRODUCT REVIEW
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a place for my drama or non-comedy and non-fantasy/science fiction stories
#1547349 by ElaineElaine  |
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HOT NEW DRAMA CAMPFIRE:
SOME DRAMA ACTIVITIES:
|  | Drama Forum (13+)
For those of us drama queens and kings, a forum to swap writing ideas and post questions
#1394242 by Joy  |
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Have an opinion on what you've read here today? Then send the Editor feedback! Find an item that you think would be perfect for showcasing here? Submit it for consideration in the newsletter!
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Elisa the Bunny Stik 
I actually attended the Miami Film Festival 2007 for my World Cinema class. In addition to the films themselves (which were shown at about 7-8 theatres throughout Miami-Dade County), there were seminars on various aspects of filmmaking. I did attend a screenwriting seminar, which provided some insight into how scripts are read by a studio and how often the filmmaker's vision of a movie clashes with what the studio wants to release. For the 5 films I saw, I attended 4 different theaters (1 in North Miami Beach, 2 in the South Beach area and 1 at the University of Miami). It was a very exhausting yet intriguing experience. Though the Miami Film Festival is becoming known as the Sundance for Latin American films, you'll see films from all over. I saw films from India (Marathi subtitled in English; no Bollywood here), Israel, Japan & Denmark. A lot of the film techniques surprised me, and all the details won't fit in this space. So, have a link!
http://miamifilmfestival.com
Wow! How incredible. Thanks for sharing this experience. I'd love the opportunity to go to a film festivals. Learning about the different of aspects of film making intrigues me.
raynstorm
Great newsletter detailing the film festivals. There's a lot of information here I didn't know!
I learned a lot myself. It was a fun newsletter to compose. I couldn't cover all the film festivals I wanted to! I just might have to do a second film festival newsletter a little later on in the summer time.
Adriana Noir 
Great newsletter as usual, Steph! I was surprised when I found out Cleveland was having a film festival this year. A blip in the grand sheme of things, but just the same. Thanks for all the awesome ports and activities to visit.
If you check out the Cleveland film festival, let us know. We'd love to hear about your experiences!
StephBee - House Targaryen is a 911 Dispatcher for LAPD. Her book, "Destination:Berlin" is available at Amazon.com and IUniverse.com. "Destination:Berlin" is a tautly written saga of mistrust, determination, and survival." - Midwest Book Review.
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Drama: April 29, 2009 Issue [#3015]
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