Writing
Melodrama (Scary melodrama)
A melodrama is a type of romantic comedy set in an exotic location that uses two-dimensional characters. Melodramas feature an obvious villain, a squeaky-clean hero, and a maiden in distress. Melodramas are more concerned with creating strong emotional reactions for the audience rather than on creating a strong plot (story) for the audience. Always the hero wins the girl and the bad guy receives just punishment.
Conventions
Characters in Melodrama
- A Hero: handsome, strong, dependable, trustworthy, shiny
- The hero’s faithful servant, comic relief, discovers villain’s evil plot
- an obvious villain,
- a villain’s accomplice, comic relief, bumbling, foolish, likable not all evil
- a heroine in distress,
- a maid servant: opposite of heroine, goes with servant
Events in Melodrama
Use these twelve events. Put each into its own paragraph. Type the underlined words into your story.
- The villain (wrongly) feels cheated or slighted and seeks revenge: Label as Villain Feels Cheated
- The villain tricks the good but not very clever hero: Label as Fooled
- an important piece of paper falls into the wrong hands: Label as Evidence
- an unusual, exotic location for a story: Label as Location
- love and crime go hand-in-hand: Label as Love and Crime
- awkward social situations both funny and embarrassing: Label as Awkward
- Extreme contrast is present in melodrama: justice versus revenge, or honesty versus deceit, or diligent-industrious-working-effort versus laziness, or generosity versus greed, etc.: Label as Contrasts
- young lovers who do not know they are perfect for each other: Label as Young Love
- justice: Label as Justice
- the 'aside' (an 'aside' is a moment in a story where a character talks directly to the audience to reveal a secret or other information): Label as Aside
- improbable events come together: Label as As If
- a miraculous ending where all problems are neatly resolved: Label as Yeah! We're Saved
6 Traits of Writing--Middle School Level
Format
- When you save, your name must be part of the documents <saved name>
- Mr. DeGroot must be allowed to have editing privileges
- Double space your essay
- Print your essay
Heading
- The top of the essay must include your name, Tragic Hero Essay, title, and sub-title
- The title must be more than one word; the title of your essay is not “tragic hero essay” Tragic Hero Essay is the title of your assignment, not of your individual report.
- The sub title must be a complete sentence
Introduction
- Summarize each paragraph in under seven words; write the summary in the margin (this is already done)
- Use these summaries to create two things: (1) an introductory paragraph, (2) transitions (this is already done)
- Introductory paragraph: Combine the summaries into one new paragraph, add words to make it coherent, put this new paragraph at the beginning of the essay
- Transitions: Create a new sentence by combining the summary from paragraph one with the summary from paragraph two; put this new sentence at the end of the first paragraph. Do this same process for paragraphs two and three, paragraphs three and four, and so on for all paragraphs
Body
- All paragraphs must have a minimum of five sentences
- You must state that you were at fault--not that it was “technically” the cat’s fault nor or siblings fault nor bad timing nor coincidence nor anything else but your fault. (Oedipus did not blame the cat, so neither can you.)
- Divide your longest paragraph into two paragraphs
- Provide an answer / explanation to all “?s”
- Be more descriptive: each paragraph needs to have at least one reference to one of your five senses (sight, sound, taste, touch, smell); that is, each paragraph must have at least one word that conveys color, odor, noise, tactile sensation (touch), or taste. This essay is a narrative (writing that tells a story). You must underline the words / sentences where you do this.
- Some of your sentences are wordy--cut the clutter
- Some of your sentences are skimpy--fill in the details
Conclusion
What is the moral of your story? What is the lesson that we the reader are to get from your experience? Write a paragraph that explains your moral. This paragraph goes at the end of the story. Note: you need a transition sentence that will connect your previously last paragraph to this new last paragraph.
Check list worth 14 points. Each item is yes or no. If yes, then you get a point. If no, then you do not get a point.
- Essay has these four items: (1) your name, (2) "Tragic Hero Essay," (3) a title, and (4) a subtitle that is a complete sentence
- Essay has at least 500 words
- Essay has at least seven paragraphs
- The first paragraph is a preview of the entire essay
- Each paragraph has at least five sentences AND a transition sentence at the end
- Essay uses and puts in bold these words (or obvious synonyms of the words) in this order: hero, flaw, problem, choice, reversal of fortune, recognition--each of these terms is in its own paragraph.
- Each paragraph from number 6 (hero, flaw, problem, choice, fortune, recognition) includes some sensory detail, and those details are underlined
- No two sentences in any one paragraph start with the same word
- The word “you” is not used (except if it is used inside of a quotation)
- Contractions are not used
- No sentence begins with the words there, those, these, this, that, it
- All subordinate clauses include a comma--please <view> PDF below
- No sentences are run-ons or comma splices
- The essay has no spelling errors.
Tragic Hero Essay
A Tragic Hero is (1) a good person (2) is better than others (3) can solve most any problem. You must show, give examples of, how you are a tragic hero. Do not write, “I am a good person.” You must let the reader decide for herself that you are a good person. Describe things you did that show and prove that you are “a good person” and “better than others” and can “solve most any problem. Also, if you are good, these descriptions or stories will also come back into the story later on, near the end.
Tragic Flaw is your weakness. Describe it. Let the reader share in your emotions for it, both the good and the bad (ice cream: think of all the ways you could describe your love for ice cream, all the different flavors, toppings, types, colors, malts, Sundays, bars, twist cones, blizzards, etc. AND think of all the ways that some people—maybe not you, but some people—might feel bad about eating ice: guilt for eating all of it (think whole box), guilt for eating someone else’s, guilt for knowing you “pigged-out,” etc.
Problem/conflict—describe in detail. Describe how you did not create the problem. Describe how you were stuck with it. Describe how you tried to ignore it or avoid it or refuse it but it stayed around anyway and only seemed to get worse or more annoying.
Choice—describe the two choices you had. Describe what you thought would be the result of each choice. Describe how you knowingly went with the bad choice. Yes—you did not or may not have known the full range of negative consequences that your bad choice could lead to, but you did know that it was a “bad” choice.
Reversal of Fortune—Instantly, things began to go bad, but you didn’t know it. What little things started to go bad. This gave you a clue that maybe you might get caught. Describe those things.
Recognition—Ultimately you realized that your choice lead to catastrophe (bad things in your life, punishment, trouble, getting caught, facing your choice). Put in writing that you acknowledged (realized) that you, yourself, were the reason that the bad thing happened to you. In other words, at the end of your essay, you tell the reader, “I was to blame!” In doing this, you become a round character—one who changes, one who has grown up, one who is older, one who is wiser.
Each item above must be in (at minimum) its own paragraph. In other words, this essay must have a minimum of six paragraphs (one for "tragic hero," one for "tragic flaw," etc.) and probably should have more.
A paragraph must have five sentences: a short topic sentence, a longer version of the first sentence, an example of what you are talking about and/or elaboration on what you are talking about, a transition into the next topic / paragraph that you are going to talk about.
Tragic Hero Essay 4 (Instructions)
At this moment you have both an informal essay and a pattern-heavy essay (meaning your writing is tightly restricted to a predictable, repetitive, and slightly boring pattern). Sometimes that is good, but not for the type of writing (narrative) that we are doing now. Here is what you do:
Things that do NOT need an explanation:
- Stop using the same word to start every sentence, so (for each paragraph) change sentences that start with the same word / do not allow two sentences to begin with the same word. If you write “I blah blah blah” and “I’m blah blah blah,” then (yes) you ARE starting two sentences with the same word.
- Stop using the pronoun “you.” Change “you” to the antecedent that you [insert your name here] are referring to. Change “Have you ever thought that …” to “Has the reader ever thought that ….”
- Do not use contractions (can’t, don’t, I’m, he’d, wouldn’t, …)
- No sentence may begin with the following words: there, those, these, this, that, it
- “to get straight A’s” should be written “straight As”
Things that DO need an explanation:
- Correct run-on sentences and comma splices
- Correct subordinate clauses by adding a comma
Kaity Schuler- Klutzy
Carolyn Kleve- Creepy
Hunter Orthmann- Steve
Bambi--???
Uppity--???
CURTAIN UP: the bedroom of the three bears. SNOW WHITE, GOLDILOCKS and PRINCESS sleep in three small beds. DWARVES enter right.
GIDDY: (SEES THE GIRLS) Oh, boy! Oh, boy! Oh, boy! Looky, everyone!
NOSY: What is it?
ROWDY: ( RUNS TO ONE OF THE BEDS) It’s a girl! (RUNS TO ANOTHER BED) And another one! (RUNS TO ANOTHER BED) And another one! (RUNS BACK) That explains why the food was gone! These three must have eaten it.
Steve: I was hungry, I wanted that food
Creepy: No, Steve! It was Guilty!
Guilty: I-I-I did? Oh, I’m sorry. Wait what’d I do?
Klutzy: I thought I spilled all the food?
WHINEY: No! Really? Well this is just great!
HIPPIE: Don’t worry about it. Everything’s going to be one hundred percent copacetic. You’ll see.
GUILTY: I’m sorry, you guys. This is all my fault. I should have locked the door on my way out. (TO FLIGHTY) I was the last to leave, wasn’t I?
CREEPY- (walks to bed and Sniffs Snow White) Smells like apples (creepy giggle)
FLIGHTY: I’m sorry. What are we talking about?
GIDDY: The girls! We’re talking about the girls who’ve come to stay with us!
FLIGHTY: Oh. I knew a girl once. her name was… Hmmm… What were we talking about?
WHINEY: No, no, no. We can’t keep them.
ROWDY: Why not? We have room for more!
HIPPIE: He’s got a point. It’s been totally legit having the bears stay with us. It was cool that Guilty here thought of it.
GUILTY: Yeah, that was all me, too, Sorry.
GIDDY: Can’t they stay? Can they? Can they? Please, please, please?
FLIGHTY: What? Who’s staying with us?
Nosy: That’s a good question. Who are these girls? Where are they from?
MARGARET: It’s okay everyone, just calm down.
ROWDY: I’ll handle that (Runs to Princess’s bed and shakes her. She awakens, extremely confused and frightened.) Hi! I’m Rowdy.
PRINCESS: (Frantically tries to get away.) I’m sorry. I’m so sorry. I didn’t mean to invade your home uninvited. I’ll go.
HIPPIE: (Stops her.) No way! It’s cool. It’s cool.
GIDDY: We’re happy you're here!
HIPPY: Yeah, yeah. Totally cool with it.
WHINY: Speak for yourself.
HIPPIE: Oh, stop your whining. (To PRINCESS) Were totally cool with it. So just take it easy.
GUILTY: Yeah. We didn't mean to wake you so abruptly. I’ll take the blame for that one. I really should have prevented Rowdy from doing that.
ROWDY: I thoughts that was what you wanted me to do. (Indicates SNOW WHITE) Hey! Should i wake her? (Runs to SNOW WHITES BED.) Wake up, sleeping beauty! Wake up!
WHINY: NO! NO! NO! Stop that! We don't want another one freaking out on us.
PRINCESS: Im sorry
HIPPIE: NO its cool. Its perfectly natural to freak out. Its not everyday you sneak into someones house and wake up to a stranger standing over you.
FLIGHTY: I woke up one day and there was a dwarf standing over me. It was so weird.
ROWDY: That was me.
GUILTY: Are you sure it wasn't me?
CREEPY: Actually it was me
NOSIE: Yeah, Creepy does that all the time
FLIGHTY: What?
PRINCESS: So, you're the resident of the cottage?
HIPPIE: Thats us. Were the seven dwarves who work the diamond mines up the path. You've met Rowdy
ROWDY: Hey!
HIPPIE: Im Hippie, the cool one. This is Flighty. (FLIGHTY isn't paying attention.) Flighty!
FLIGHTY: What? (Relizes) Oh. Hi.
HIPPIE: And over here is Whiny
WHINY: Your not going to want to stay long, are you?
PRINCESS: Oh, no. I'm on a quest to find my house. I must be going soon. I didn't even mean to stay this long.
WHINY: Finally, some good news!
HIPPIE: Don't mind him. He just got up on the wrong side of the bed. This is Guilty.
GUILTY: So sorry i didn't introduce myself. I should have thought of that
GIDDY: Me! Me! Me!
HIPPIE: I'm getting to you. (To PRINCESS) This is Giddy.
Princess: Pleasure to make your acquaintance.
Giddy: (Excited.) Me, too! We’re going to be BFFs, I know!
Hippie: And, of course, Nosy.
Nosy: Hi. So who are you?
Princess: Oh. Well, that’s just it. I don’t know who I am. I’m lost in these woods, and I’m trying to find my way home, but I don’t know where that is.
Hippie: (Notices her shiny pendant necklace and points to it.) Wow! That’s heavy.
Rowdy: Whoa! Check out the rock!
Nosy: Where’d you get that bling?
Flighty: Did someone say “bling”?
Giddy: Shiny! Shiny! Shiny! Oooh!
Flighty: Shiny? Where? (Sees pendant.) Oooh! Shiny!
Guilty: Why didn’t I notice that?
Hippie: Yeah. The princess here’s carrying a huge hunk of ore.
Princess: (Notices her necklace.) Wow! I honestly hadn’t noticed it was there.
Rowdy: Yep. Must be made by dwarfs.
Princess: I don’t know, but its so light I didn’t even know it was there.
Rowdy: Yep. Must be made by dwarves.
Princess: (Looks at it closely) This is the emblem of the Outer Kingdoms.
Giddy: She’s a princess! She’s a princess!
Princess: Yes. I am. I’ve discovered that much, but I don’t really know much more than that. I’ll have to find my way home one way or another.
Hippie: If we can help in any way, just let us know.
Giddy: The seven dwarves are always ready to lend a hand!
Whiny: Speak for yourself! Six of the seven dwarves might lend you a hang, but count me out!
Guilty: Make that five. Sorry. I always cause trouble when offering help.
Princess: So there are only seven of you? There were ten place settings.
Giddy: These are for our guests! I just love having house guests! And now we have the three of you joining us, too!
Princess: So you know we were coming?
Whiny: No. those are for the bears
Guilty: My fault. I invited three bears to live with us. The extra settings are for them
Whiny: Its only temporary
Hippie: They’re subletting until they can find a pad that’s a bit more Zen. Their feng shui was totally out of whack, because they’ve been dealing with this little blonde girl who kept breaking into their house. It was totally unsatisfactory
Rowdy: This is her! This is her! It’s Goldilocks
Whiny: Oh no! Now she’s broken into our house
Guilty: It’s all my fault. I should have locked that door
Whiny: Now we’re really going to get it. The bears will not be happy.
Bear: Why won’t we be happy?
Whiny: Oh no! Oh Great! Oh no!
Big Bear: Why won’t we be happy?
Hippie: Yeah, but it’s cool. It’s cool. Just relax and--
Bear: Not this again
Big Bear: Yeah! We’re fed up with this nonsense! Right Tiny
Tiny Bear: (roars)
Princess: Oh my
Bear: Who’s this?
Giddy: She’s our guest
Rowdy: She broke in and helped herself to your food and your beds
Hippie: Cool it Rowdy! You’re not helping.
Big Bear: So we had to deal with two of you now, eh?
Rowdy: Three actually
Hippie: ROWDY!
Bear: We’ll have to teach you not to break into people’s homes now. Won’t we Tiny.
Tiny Bear: (Roar)
Goldilocks: Ah, They’ve come home!
Big Bear: You’re right we have
Bear: This time you’re not getting away Blondie!
Tiny Bear: (Roars)
Goldilocks: Hurry! Follow me!
Bear: Get them!
Hippie: Calm down, everyone!
Big Bear: Don’t let them get away!
Whiny: I knew this would happen!
Guilty: This all my fault! This is all my fault!
Rowdy: (Just enjoying running around.) Woohoo! (Having cornered PRINCESS, TINY BEAR swipes at her. PRINCESS dodges, screams and runs OFF RIGHT. BEARS roar in frustration.)
Giddy: (Waves, upbeat.) Good-bye! Safe travels! We’ll miss you!
Nosy: I wonder where she’ll end up.
Flighty: Who? (Looks around at the mess.) Did I miss something? (LIGHTS FADE to BLACK.)