NARRATIVE CREATIVE EXERCISE – Oliver Twist

 

In the lecture in Week 11, we will explore the way Dickens changes his narratorial
voice in order to better represent nineteenth-century London life.
In this exercise:
• Choose a location in your life which is familiar to you: it can be a private space
(your room, your house, etc.), or somewhere public (lecture hall, shopping centre,
highway, etc.)
• Write a brief narrative piece (100-200 words), relating a scene that takes place in
the location, using a first-person narrator. Then, write another narrative piece
(100- 200 words), relating the same scene, using a third-person narrator.
• Consider the different kinds of information each voice allows: what’s similar/
different? what details can/cannot be included? which voice is the more ‘truthful?’
Consider, too, which is the best voice to use to tell this particular story—and why
that might be.
• Write a reflective commentary on your pieces. Discuss the relationship between
the content and the writing strategies you’ve chosen. For example, if you believe
first- person narration is more successful, how does this more accurately depict
the experience of the room? If you believe third-person is more successful, what
might this say about your current episteme? Explain how your approach is similar/
different to Dickens in Oliver Twist – and why.
• Don’t forget to state similarities between your work and Oliver twist – Dickens work
and also differences. INCLUDE DIRECT TEXT for evidence. Interrogate further
what other ways you could write? why did you choose these

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