The Glendale Community College English Division & Alternative Field present
absurdities
An Anthology of Student Writing
We are living in a time in which we are told not to trust our intuition, our logic, our instincts. Instead, we should put our faith in people who know better than us. They tell us what not to read, what not to think, what not to do with our own bodies, who not to speak to or of. They tell us change is impossible, that we must live with threats of violence, and the violence, threats of extinctions, and the extinctions, that we must accept our powerlessness. Do not ask questions, do not do the calculations, do not look behind the curtain, do not reach out to your fellow human. We turn away from the casualties of war, from those who bleed and starve in the images on our screens. The world is coming at us fast but also, it seems, sideways, at a slant. So we type up careful stances from the safety of our chairs, wording and rewording sentences, thinking we are somehow changing the world. Maybe it’s time to meet absurdity with absurdity. Absurdity, I think, allows for humor—and anger—both of which can lead to action and therefore, hope. For in order to act, we must have hope.
You’re invited to respond to absurdities in any form or genre that makes sense to you. A personal essay, short story, or poem. Fragmented or hybrid work. All forms, genres, experiments are welcome!
The following prompts can help you engage with this theme in a constructive way, but feel free to use your own prompts around Absurdities.
1. The Current Event
What’s an issue or current event that gets your blood boiling, confuses you, defies common sense, upsets or overwhelms you? Write a fable or fairy tale addressing that issue. Use the conventions of fairy tale or fable. Don’t address your issue explicitly; rather think in metaphors, fantastical characters or events or magic that address the central issue or question.
2. The Extended Metaphor
Write a story with an extended metaphor that somehow addresses an issue important to you.
3. A List or An Instruction Manual
Write a flash fiction or nonfiction piece as a list or instruction manual for a topic that does not (on the surface) lend itself to instructions or lists. Or choose another form that seems "absurd" for your content.
4. The Absurd Angle
Come at a story that you’ve been wanting to tell, fiction or nonfiction, from an absurd angle. Take on an unexpected viewpoint (from a fly on the wall or a pet), create a strange timeline, change one thing about the setting. (Earth is a giant trampoline, the town’s inhabitants all have cheese heads,….)
5. Satire
Use satire in the form of exaggeration or humor to comment on a political, cultural or social phenomenon.
6. The Absurd Element
Write an otherwise realistic poem or story with one absurd or outlandish element: talking stars, cars who are treated as people, a flat earth.
2. The Multiverse B-Side
Design a fantastical land that defies all logic and reason.This could be a place you access through a daydream, a malfunctioning washing machine, or by swallowing a particularly strange piece of candy. The sky might be made of mashed potatoes, raining sentient buttons. Trees grow upside down, populated by philosophical squirrels who converse in limericks. Describe how you enter this land and what your senses experience. How do the nonsensical inhabitants live? What are their customs, challenges, politics, unpolitics, and philosophies? Have fun with the illogical!
2. The Great Debate
The upcoming national debate takes a bizarre turn when the two main candidates are replaced by:
A sentient, overly dramatic houseplant known for its fiery pronouncements on social media.
A tap-dancing robot programmed with the collected soundbites of every politician in history.
Write the transcript of this absurd debate. Include the houseplant's passionate pleas for universal composting and the robot's glitching attempts to appease all sides with contradictory statements. Create a media frenzy surrounding the debate, with news outlets dissecting the meaning of the houseplant's wilting and the robot's malfunctioning tap shoes. How does the public react to this unexpected turn of events?
Explore the satire behind this scenario. What aspects of the current political climate does it highlight?
Sample Readings
George Saunders, “I Can Speak”
Italo Calvino, The Baron in the Trees—read an excerpt (a young nobleman decides to move to the trees on his family’s property permanently and does)
Gabriel Garcia Marquez “The Handsomest Drowned Man in the World” (PDF)
Julio Cortazar, excerpt from Cronopios and Famas (.doc)
Alejandro Zambra, “Thank You”
Mariana Enriquez, “The Dirty Kid” (horror story)
Ursula LeGuinn “The Ones Who Walk Away From Omelas” (PDF)
Kafka “The Metamorphosis”
Samples of satire from McSweeney’s Internet Tendency: Class is Cancelled" and The 2044 Election is the Most Important of Our Lifetimes
Optimism One, “Dear Facebook Friends” at Brevity Magazine
Ben Lerner, “The Hoffman Wobble”
Submissions due by Thursday, 5/9 at 11:59 pm Pacific Time
Up to 3 pages, double-spaced for submissions in prose (fiction or creative nonfiction), poetry or drama
Open to all students at Glendale Community College
Please write your name (how you would like it to appear in the publication) and contact information at the top of your submission, and please include the city in which you live.
.doc or .docx files only please
Email submissions directly to Kate Martin Rowe at kmartinr@glendale.edu
& then, join us for the reading & book launch on
SUNDAY, JUNE 2nd AT 3PM PACIFIC TIME
IN PERSON @
AVENUE 50 STUDIO, 131 N. AVENUE 50, HIGHLAND PARK 90042
All work will be published by Alternative Field, as part of a zine project coordinated by Kate Martin Rowe of Glendale Community College. Alternative Field, and it’s imprint Alternative Field Notes, is committed to disengaging from writing that perpetuates violence in its many forms, and as a publisher, this means not accepting work or writers of work that support racist, xenophobic, classist, sexist, misogynistic, ageist, ableist, homophobic, and or or transphobic ideologies.
