quote:Create, in oral cooperation, two characters suitable for a ghost story -- first the victim (the person frightened or harmed), then the ghost. Work out for these characters the name, age, background, psychological makeup, physical description, family connections, circle of immediate friends, occupation, appropriate setting, and anything else that seems important. In doing this exercise, and all those that follow, do not be unduly clever -- for instance, choosing as the two characters here a dog and a lizard. Undue cleverness defeats the purpose of the exercise, raising complex problems before the simple ones have been solved.
Since we're not exactly "oral" here, whatever we "say" will stay (unless you decide to edit what you've said, or I or my assistants delete it because it goes against the registration agreement).
If you've ever been to one of OSC's "1000 Ideas in an Hour" presentations, you may know one way this can work.
Think of it as a brainstorming session -- no idea will be tossed out, but some ideas will inspire other ideas, and those are more likely to be the less obvious ones. Feel free to build on anyone else's ideas and let the ideas flow where they may.
(Strive to be less obvious without being "unduly clever.")
And anyone who reads this topic or participates in it can use any idea or any inspiration from any idea in any story any person cares to write. Ideas are not copyrightable and they are a dime a dozen (as we will see).
posted
Well, since one standard trope of the ghost story is the young girl as victim, old scary chain-rattling dude as ghost, I suggest the inverse.
Ghost = 10 year old girl. Died by some freak accident in the drafty third floor of a stone walk-up on a busy city street.
Victim = 45 year old female writer who is renting the apartment. Unmarried. No kids. No pets. Lives alone. Don't all haunting victims need to live alone? Shoot, then she probably needs some sidekicks.
Further inversion - all the hauntings happen during the day, JUST when the writer gets her flow going.
I kind of like those ideas, but since we're kind of brainstorming let me try to think of something else.
I don't think I've seen many writer ghosts. So how about nstead the ghost is a writer? A 35ish struggling writer who hanged himself in a lonely garret room papered with letters of rejection back in the 1920s.
The victim? An editor who has taken the beachhouse for the summer and brought a briefcase full of manuscripts.
Ok. Not too good. Too writer related and no one cares about writers except writers. Alternate idea.
The ghost. A geeky computer hacker who was accidentally exectricuted while over-clocking his computer. (Ok, unlikely but it COULD happen)
The victim. A female programmer whose computer he invades.
posted
How about a ghost-writer who is haunted by the spirit of a dead celebrity that he wrote a book for? Since the celebrity never actually wrote (or read) the book, the ghost-writer might have slipped something in that embarrassed the celeb, leading to their downward spiral and eventual suicide.
This might be an intersting exploration, since ghost-writers never really "exist" in the literary world, they are almost like ghosts themselves...
Then we could get all existential and Freudian, and try to determine whether the ghost-writer (who doesn't "really" exist outside of the books he writes for other people) or the ghost (the dead vain celeb who was out there in the spotlight, but had to have it all, including being perceived as an author) is the most "haunted" by the experience.
[This message has been edited by Igwiz (edited December 20, 2007).]
posted
The ghost...what looks to be a little girl asleep in her bunk at a summer camp. It's really a young a boy with blond hair, but the victim, a female staff member just out of highschool, can't tell the difference...
The overclocking one sounds like fun...I think it would be more interesting if the processor exploded and killed him rather than electrocution...
posted
Ghost: Audette, a slave girl who died in the 1860s. She served and serviced the master with the false hopes that he'd always take care of her. House slaves were always better treated than those in the fields. When the master turned her away--for another slave girl--she focused on the children. They both took sick and when Audette tried to remedy them, she overdosed them and killed them. This led to her hanging.
Victim: Nadia, an abusive au pair, who is only doing her job until she can connive some southern gent into making her a legal U.S. citizen. The family she lives with are restoring an old plantation.
[This message has been edited by InarticulateBabbler (edited December 20, 2007).]
posted
Man traveling at night in a deserted part of Scotland runs out of petrol (gas, if you are American!). He is very tired and he watches as the needle slowly goes down but he doesn't pass any stations. Just when he thinks it is too late he sees a small independent petrol station. He has a conversation with the attendant as he fills his tank. The attendant says he looks really tired and he is welcome to pull up his car and rest their for the night. He agrees. When he wakes in the morning, he gets out of his car to look around and sees the garage is just a burnt out ruin. It is obvious there was a fire there a while ago..
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psnede
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posted
Victim - 7 year old boy of prominent parents (father is a politician, mother has radio program). He is already in therapy for having an overactive imagination. He is scared of the dark and always needs a night light and doesn't eat anything green. He still thinks girls have cooties.
Ghost - 7 year old girl who died in the same house the family lives in (pretty cliche, but this is what happened nonetheless). she finally has someone her age to interact with, but the boy doesn't like girls. especially ghosts!
posted
How about: Guy obsessed with girl Girl not impressed Girl dies Girl's ghost becomes obsessed with guy (perhaps a connection to the living world) Guy is terrorized by what he always wanted... Posts: 121 | Registered: Sep 2002
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