In 50 words

ChangeThis released a new manifesto called Mini Sagas: Bite Sized Lessons For Life and Business by Rajesh Setty. The premise is interesting...

A mini saga is a story told in exactly 50 words—not 49 or 51 but in exactly 50 words.

Benefit #1: 
Writing a mini saga expands your creativity. Constraints typically expand creativity 
or induce flight. When you have to put everything in 50 words, you have to “leave behind” a lot.
That’s where the creative juices start flowing.

Benefit #2: 
Writing a mini saga stretches your thinking. What will you write about? You have to think 
about topics that will fit in 50 words or squeeze them to fit in 50 words. That puts thinking  
on overdrive mode.

Benefit #3: 
Writing a mini saga enhances your discipline. Deciding what to write about, deciding what 
to leave behind and putting it in 50 words requires discipline throughout.

Here is my effort:

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Finding Time

Each time I pass the picture I take a few seconds to straighten it. On its single nail, heavy tread makes it tilt. I always have the extra seconds to make it straight, but I never have the precious minute needed to get the second nail to straighten it permanently.

_________________________________________

Give it a try. It's kind of fun!

Comments

[Paul C.]

Interesting assignment. We had a writing contest with our board of education to write a story in 55 words. One of the winners was from my class who wrote a story with the title:

'The Fortune Teller.'

I walked into the fortune teller's tent. She had bangles and dangles and her hair was long and tangled. "Sit here young man; let us look into my crystal ball; the next woman you meet will be your wife."

"Ha! I'm already engaged." I said leaving the tent. Suddenly I bumped into Loveliness...my fiancee!?'

[Janice]

I checked out the entire manifesto, with its samples of 50 word stories but I liked yours the best!
Yours actually has a lesson embedded in it... that if you don't take the extra time to fix the problem, you are destined to repeat the same action again and again.
I'd really like to use something similar with my class.
I like the idea of limiting the number of words. I've been participating in a week in a sentence activity, where you sum up an entire week in one sentence, and that's a lot of fun, and provides some good reflection. I also heard someone talk about restricting powerpoint presentations to just six words per slide... the rest had to be able to be explained by the image or by the presenter, and that was a neat idea too. It really helped the students create better presentations.
If I end up doing anything neat with this 50 word mini saga idea, I'll let you know.
Thanks for sharing it Doug. You always seem to find great stuff! :-)

[Doug Johnson]

Hi Paul,

I like the detail your student managed to include in his little essay. It must have been the luxury of the extra 5 words!

All the best,

Doug

Hi Janice,

Thanks for the comment. I agree that some kind of structure or limit can give writers the incentive to really examine their writing. I often think of the power of sonnets and haikus - and their limits.

Please do share any of these you try!

Thanks,

Doug