Imaginative Narrative

Imaginative Narrative  
Assignment: Imaginative Narrative (due at BEGINNING of class on due date—see syllabus)
In about 2 pages, tell a story about a time someone did or said something you didn’t like—it
could be something you disagreed with, or simply found annoying, or distasteful, or that you just
disliked for some other reason. It doesn’t have to be something they said or did directly to you,
but it should be something you experienced or witnessed in person. Also, it doesn’t need to be
highly dramatic, just personally unlikeable to you. Finally, here’s the big thing, tell this story
from the point of view of the person who did or said the thing you didn’t like. This is where the
act of imagining comes in.
➢ Don’t get me wrong, I’m not asking you to imagine something that would make you
condone or approve of the unlikeable behavior; I’m asking you to imagine some cause(s)
of that behavior, some scenario(s) or circumstance(s) or life detail(s), that might make it
possible for you to have sympathy for the person him/herself.
➢ (This kind of imaginative thinking is challenging, but it’s crucial to the rhetorical
effectiveness that this course is designed to hone—to the kind of communication that can
profoundly influence an audience who doesn’t see eye-to-eye with you. If you can try,
through imagination, to see the world the way someone else sees it, you will be much
better able to communicate with that person in a way that will compel them to truly
listen.)
Thinking in the narrative terms found in The Seagull Book of Stories, make the person who did
or said the thing you didn’t like into the “protagonist” of your story (probably also the “first
person narrator”). For definitions of these terms, see “Point of View” (SBOS xiii) and
“Character” (SBOS xvi)