Workshop Schedule & Sign-Up

Sign up for a slot you’d like to take and plan to submit work at least one week in advance of that date, if not two weeks in advance. You may exchange slots, if you change your mind or something comes up, but this must happen at about three weeks before the workshop date—otherwise, it may go to waste. If you miss your own workshop date without prior arrangements, you will lose your right to workshop in the future. Forever! Or at least until we forgive you. Choose wisely. This list will also be distributed on the yahoo group, where you can always find it by searching through the archives.

Jan 4 - Sujata

Jan 18 - Tom

Feb 1 - Jason

Feb 15 - Pierre

March 1 - Tom

March 15 - Elisa

March 29 - Kalman

April 12 - Sujata

April 26 - Lynda

May 24 - Marie

June 7 - Kalman

June 21 - Roger

July 5 - Sujata

July 19 - Alan

August 1 - Howard

Seeing and Believing and Acting

Exercise Your InkTank

Last night's craftshop exercise was one of those had-to-be-there things. (There was some acting involved, a foam bear claw, a dead plant, and a box of kleenex.) But for those of you (and you know who you are) who might be curious about what you missed, you'll find the gist of it below.


Because our talk about formatting and submitting manuscripts is (let’s face it) never very exciting, I thought we’d do something with a little zip in it tonight. Experiments in perspective—and by that I mean the writer’s way of seeing, not the character’s or speaker's—are always interesting because they remind us of ourselves as unique seers. As artists we have a responsibility to see—and record—the news of the world. Sometimes we forget this because we’re worried about POV shifts and space breaks and all of those criminally irritating mechanical concerns. It’s time to be reminded.

I’ll need a few randy volunteers for this experiment—let’s say three—who are willing to sacrifice a little on-the-spot writing time. We’ll concoct a moment, which we’ll then present to the group. The group’s task will be to record the scene as though witnessing it in the “real” world and to imagine the world around the scene. Write a poem, a story, follow the event where you like. We’ll share our work and see a little more clearly (perhaps) how we see. Use the space below to record as many details as you can as the action is taking place or directly thereafter. We’ll share these notes too.

InkTank Writers’ Salon Guidelines

Workshop Guidelines
Manuscripts must be submitted at least one week in advance of the assigned workshop slot. Otherwise, we’re all in trouble. Use our yahoo group and/or distribute copies by hand. Submit work that has been edited to the best of your abilities. Unedited work embarrasses everybody. We’re adopting (almost) professional formatting standards because it makes sense to learn them and work with them. We understand that e-mailing your work may disrupt your formatting—do the best that you can.

Titles: Pick one. Don’t italicize it, underline it, enlarge it, or type it in a wacky font. (It’s tempting, we know, but resist.)

For Prose: Submit no more than 25 double-spaced pages. Use 1-inch-or-so margins and a 12pt-or-so inoffensive font. (Most folks agree that Times and Courier are the standard.) Include your name and the date in a header and page numbers in the upper right corner. Your unadorned title should be centered above your first paragraph of text.

For Poetry: Submit no more than 10 pages. If the size or look of the font are somehow involved in your meaning making, they may vary to your little heart’s desire. Otherwise, keep it simple. Include your name and the date in a header and page numbers in the upper right corner. Your unadorned title should appear directly above your first lines of text.

For Everything Else: Use common sense.

Response Guidelines
Comment directly on the manuscripts up for workshop. Be nice, but don’t be so nice as to render your comments useless. Don’t ever be mean. Be critical, yet sensitive to the writer. If talking isn’t your style, make sure you offer more written commentary. If writing on the manuscript isn’t your style, make sure you give good verbal commentary. We’ll roll around the room and give everyone a chance to talk. Don’t use this as an opportunity to soapbox—keep it brief. It isn’t a bad idea to start with a positive. If you haven’t read the work, don’t comment—we won’t be offended if you leave at the break, but we will be offended if you huff off mid-workshop, or snooze.

Craftshop Guidelines
Craftshop topics are generated by group members. Speak up if you have an idea. The exercises give us a basis for a little technical or philosophical discussion and a chance to do some writing on the spot. If you’d like to share your craftshop results during the Salon, speak up. A little conversation about your work may transpire—nothing too serious. If you’d like to share your craftshop results later, send them to the yahoo group and they’ll be published on the blog. Anyone (even those who miss the meetings) is welcome to submit craftshop exercises for publication. Exercise sheets will appear on the blog after the Salon meets.

Salon Ethics
It’s simple: You’ve got to give at least as much as you receive. If everyone abides by this simple notion, the life of the Salon will be a dream. But if you don’t offer good commentary, don’t expect it in return. If you can’t abide by our guidelines, don’t expect us to be happy about it. Expect us to be sad. Expect us to think things about you. Remember that the Salon is free—it costs you nothing to be a member—but that does not mean it’s yours for the taking. It belongs to all of us and none of us; it is what it is. Please don’t try to make it something else and please don’t abuse it.

Salon Writers Write "Bad"

Untitled by Jason Gallagher

George. His name was George. With a name like George how could he have such a throbbing piece of man meat? It was juicy, huge in its girth but with the right amount of length. Not too much, just enough. It would fit comfortably inside my tight box. Try not to think about your own pussy while it is taking in that glorious member. I remember the pinch as it entered but I didn’t turn my head, I didn’t grimace. It was differently not something to cry over. I knew it would be over soon. There was no reason to not let him go through the motions. The thrusting would be deep; there was no better word for it then penetration. Teeth grinding with the intensity of each pound. Yet gentle. Each movement was forceful and gentle. That is how the whole thing can be deceiving. You think that it will be more then it is.


MOANS IN THE NEIGHBORS' SHED by Kalman Kivkovich

I hear the groans coming from the neighbors' shed.
The heavy breathing sounds like something out of my dreams.
I'm fifteen and dreams I have---flood of wet dreams . . .
I glue my eye to a crack in the wooden wall.
My gaze pierces the soft skin that blocks my view.
The moans fill the enclosed space beyond.
What the hell is it? My mind gears in full speed.
I close my eyes.
Something is bulging inside my trousers,
Thrusting against the already dilapidated partition.


WET DREAM by Kalman Kivkovich

I submit to a deep sleep,
Or do I?
Millions of thoughts, fragments of unidentified reflections,
Rushing through my resting head,
Thumping inside my skull,
Like giant waves on shore, beating against the boulders.
My mind struggles to focus into the hazy twister,
To grasp the indistinguishable.
And there she is,
Slowly advancing, floating toward me,
Like a mirror image out of the Greek mythology.
A spark in my brain turns my body over---once, twice.
I feel warm throughout,
My tongue searches for moisture off my lips,
I utter from within.
The lids of my closed-eyes tighten evermore.
My breath turns heavy,
My blood pulsates in an unrestrained rhythm.
My body stretches and again turns over.
I am being transferred away.
Where am I?
Now I feel my bare feet, resting on smooth pebbles,
I am standing on a still, dry riverbed.
I hear something,
A faint but rising sound.
It's coming closer,
Now it is roaring,
Oh God . . . the water!
I am going to drown,
I am on top---I am under.
I am wet,
My eyes open.



SEX WRITING WORKSHOP by Marie O'nan

We always had to kick the dog out of our bedroom before being intimate.
We always had to call it being intimate because Sylvia didn't want to say
fuck and she didn't want to sound like an easy listening song. All she
could say was weiner. "Oh Richard," she'd say, "I love your weiner." Or,
"Oh, your beautiful weiner."
"Sylvia," I'd say, "It's your weiner too. We share it like how siamese
twins share whatever it is that connects them."
Last night, we started to get intimate. The windows were open a little
because it was warm outside. You could smell the rain. Virgil howled
outside our door. He must've heard thunder. "Richard," she said, "Give me
your weiner."
"Sylvia," I said, "Fuck me hard." I don't know why I said it. I was
scared she would slap me, but she didn't. She just kept going the same as
before. I heard the rain and the dog crying and Sylvia's breathing and I
felt lucky.

Dirty Bird

Exercise Your Inktank
Bad Sex

I will confess I was dreading the prospect of writing bad literary sex scenes as examples for discussion. Thankfully, the Literary Review’s 2006 Bad Sex Award winner was announced yesterday. The judges say the award’s mandate is “to draw attention to the crude, tasteless, often perfunctory use of redundant passages of sexual description in the modern novel, and to discourage it.” Here are their criteria for bad sexiness: “unconvincing, perfunctory, embarrassing or redundant sex scene in an otherwise sound literary novel.” Pretty vague, if you ask me, but otherwise maybe fairly sound. If you already know the winner, hold your tongue. Otherwise, read through these selections and see if you can pick it. A disclaimer: the following excerpts contain seriously graphic sexual content that may not be appropriate for some readers and may completely ruin our chances of ever having a grown-up conversation about the topic.

David Mitchell from Black Swan Green
“Now she made a noise like a tortured Moomintroll.”
Irvine Walsh from Bedroom Secrets of the Master Chefs:
“Skinner took his thick green slime and spread it like a chef might glaze some pastry…A ludicrously distended clitoris popped out from nowhere like a jack-in-the-box.”

Thomas Pynchon from Against the Day
“Ruperta had trained her toy spaniel to provide intimate ‘French’ caresses of the tongue for the pleasure of its mistress. …Reef followed, taking out his penis, breathing heavily through his mouth. 'Here Mouffie, nice big dog bone for you right here.’”

Julia Glass from The Whole World Over:
“And then before her inner eye, a tide of words leaped high and free, a chaotic joy like frothing rapids: truncate, adjudicate, fornicate, frivolous, rivulet, violet, oriole, orifice, conifer, aquifer, allegiance, alacrity…all the words this time not a crowding but a heavenly chain, an ostrich fan, a vision as much as an orgasm, a release of something deep in the core of her altered brain, words she thought she'd lost for good.”

Mark Haddon from A Spot of Bother:
“And it swept over her like surf sweeping over sand then falling back and sweeping up over the sand again and falling back. Images went off in her head like little fireworks. The smell of coconut. Brass firedogs.”

Will Self from The Book of Dave
“The confusion of their bodies—his hairy shanks, her sweaty thighs, his bow-taut cock, her engorged basketry of cowl and lip.”

Tim Willocks from The Religion
“He bent her across the cold steel face of the anvil...she called out to God and convulsed with each slow stroke, her head thrown back and her eyelids aflutter, and her cries filled the forge…until she squeezed him from inside and he exploded to a prayer of his own within her body.”

Iain Hollingshead from Twentysomething
“And then I’m inside her, and everything is pure white as we're lost in a commotion of grunts and squeaks, flashing unconnected images and explosions of a million little particles…I can feel her breasts against her chest. I cup my hands round her face and start to kiss her properly. She slides one of her slender legs in between mine. ‘Oh Jack,’ she was moaning now, her curves pushed up against me, her crotch taut against my bulging trousers, her hands gripping fistfuls of my hair. She reaches for my belt. I groan too, in expectation. And then I'm inside her, and everything is pure white as we’re lost in a commotion of grunts and squeaks, flashing unconnected images and explosions of a million little particles.”

The Challenge:
Write some bad literary sex. Attempting the worst can be as instructive as attempting the best. Use any of the above passages as a model, or create your own scenario.