Artist B. A. Van Sise’s photo series Children of Grass—featured in “The Written Image” in the March/April 2017 issue of Poets & Writers Magazine—consists of portraits of American poets who have been influenced by Walt Whitman, with each photograph based on a poem. Browse through some of Van Sise’s portraits or select any other poet portrait of your choice, and taking a reverse approach to Van Sise’s project, write a poem based on the image. How does the language, tone, and rhythm in your poem relate to the composition, props, and background of the portrait?
Writing Prompts & Exercises
The Time Is Now
The Time Is Now offers three new and original writing prompts each week to help you stay committed to your writing practice throughout the year. We also curate a list of essential books on writing—both the newly published and the classics—that we recommend for guidance and inspiration. Whether you’re struggling with writer’s block, looking for a fresh topic, or just starting to write, our archive of writing prompts has what you need. Need a starter pack? Check out our Writing Prompts for Beginners.
Tuesdays: Poetry prompts
Wednesdays: Fiction prompts
Thursdays: Creative nonfiction prompts
Get immediate access to more than 2,000 writing prompts with the tool below:
Have you ever taken a job you didn’t want in order to support yourself? In “The Meaning of Work,” an episode of NPR’s TED Radio Hour, psychologist Barry Schwartz asks, “Why is it that, for the overwhelming majority of people on the planet, the work they do has none of the characteristics that gets us up and out of bed and off toward the office every morning?” Write an essay in which you explore Schwartz’s question by recounting your own work experiences. Has anything surprised you? Consider what your dislike or delight with certain jobs reveals about your own ideas regarding the purpose of work.
Social justice movements require strong leadership, organization, and resources, often starting with a demonstration leading to more action. Write a short story in which the protagonist wants to organize a demonstration for a cause. What events lead her to this point? Who does she turn to for help? Use the backdrop of this activity to reflect on the growth and development of your character as a leader.
Writing an unsentimental love poem can be one of the more difficult endeavors a poet can take on, whether the subject of that poem is a lover, a family member, or friend. Taking inspiration from the popular film 10 Things I Hate About You, a modern retelling of Shakespeare’s The Taming of the Shrew, write an ode to the aspects of a loved one that downright irk you. How might you use a form of repetition in your poem—like an anaphora or refrain—to build tension and showcase either the unlikable or admirable aspects of this person?
Poet, jazz musician, woodcarver, multimedia artist, painter. A variety of hidden talents may in fact lie behind the familiar faces of an apartment building porter, doorman, handyman, or other neighborhood figure. Write an essay about a time when you learned about someone’s secret skill or hidden talent. What are the assumptions that accumulate when you only encounter someone in a professional or public capacity? What might be inspiring or exciting about the idea that anyone—perhaps even everyone—may have a hidden talent?
Researchers recently discovered a new addition to the genus of lizard species that can shed their skin and scales when grabbed by a predator, in order to slip away and escape. The Geckolepis megalepis has the largest known gecko scales, and is able to shed them with particular ease, looking like a “raw chicken tender” before its scales are regenerated over the course of a few weeks. Write a short story in which your main character is able to escape from danger by altering her physical appearance in a drastic way. Why is it imperative that she escape? How does her transformation both save her and make her vulnerable? What is her “regeneration” process?
“The Love Song for Shu-Sin”—written around 2000 BCE in ancient Mesopotamia—is considered the oldest love poem that exists in text form, but also functioned as a song performed during a sacred marriage ceremony for Shu-Sin, a ruler in the city of Ur. Read through Sumerologist Samuel Noah Kramer’s translation and think about the elements of the writing that tie it to its specific time and context. What feels ancient about the poem? Can you extrapolate or interpret its meanings in a way that reflect your own experiences of contemporary love? Write a love poem that meditates on love as it might have been expressed four thousand years ago versus how you see it today.
Cabbages, pumpkins, eggs, sugar, honey, fleas, gazelles, doves—all are terms of endearment lovingly used in different cultures and languages. Think of a pet name you have used for a loved one, or one that has been used for you, and write an essay exploring your memories of the word or phrase’s usage. Is the term connected to a specific story or event? Is it used during particular moods? Does it soothe or ruffle feathers? Consider how these terms reflect a certain aspect of your relationships.
Last month, hundreds of thousands of red Skittles were found on a highway road in Wisconsin, having spilled from a truck transporting the candy for integration into cattle feed. Write a short story that starts with a similarly striking image of something highly unusual found on a road. As the story progresses, continue escalating the mystery and oddity of the situation. Does the story end with a satisfactory resolution, or does it leave the reader with lingering questions?
The Bop is a form of poetic argument consisting of three stanzas, each followed by a repeated line or refrain. The first stanza is six lines and presents a problem; the second stanza is eight lines and further expands upon the problem; and the third stanza is six lines and either resolves or documents the failure of resolving the problem. Read a Bop poem by Afaa Michael Weaver, who created the form during a Cave Canem writing retreat, and then try writing your own.
A travel website recently compiled a world map showcasing the slogans of different countries, most of which were created by tourism boards to promote tourism. Take a look at the wide variety of national slogans, or find the slogan or motto of a U.S. city or state you’re familiar with, and write an essay inspired by the phrase. Explore the ways in which the slogan touches upon the projected image or desired impression of your locale, and how it might resonate or conflict with your own memories.
Craft a piece of flash fiction based on the art of the rant: What exercises you? That is, what gets you in high dudgeon? Who pisses you off? Be specific: not just “I hate that guy,” but a riff on the last three times he cut you off in mid-sentence, the poisonous glow of his smile, and the unfortunate fact that he’s your brother-in-law. Now invert the previous exercise: How would he rant against you? Provide plenty of ripe details along with an incident or two.
This week’s fiction prompt comes from David Galef, author of Brevity: A Flash Fiction Handbook (Columbia University Press, 2016).
Many of the food-related traditions associated with the Chinese New Year—including eating fish, sweet rice dumplings, and certain vegetables—have their origins in Mandarin-language homophonic puns. Jot down a list of food-related homonyms, such as homophonic pairings like “lettuce” and “let us” or “beets” and “beats,” or homographic words with multiple meanings like “cake” or “milk.” Create a festive poem using some of the words or phrases you come up with that celebrate the start of a new year.
Last month, “bundespraesidentenstichwahlwiederholungsverschiebung” was voted Austria’s word of the year, which roughly translated means “postponement of the repeat runoff of the presidential election.” Likewise, words tied to politics such as “xenophobia,” Dictionary.com’s word of the year; Oxford Dictionaries’ term for 2016, “post-truth;” and Merriam-Webster’s plea for users to stop looking up the word “fascism” to prevent it from becoming its word of the year (“surreal” was the eventual winner) reflected what was on everyone’s minds last year. What was your word of the year for 2016? Write a short essay where you explore your interactions with that word and its meaning. Look up the word’s etymology for a deeper exploration.
A recent article in the Wall Street Journal explores bibliotherapy, “detox” book recommendations to help treat issues like stress, procrastination, and bereavement. The founder of the Book Pharmacy in Berlin suggests that “there are ‘detox classics,’ including epics like The Odyssey, and ‘detox-by-distraction’ bundles of crime, romance, or fantasy.” Write a short story in which a character visits a “book doctor.” What might prompt this sort of treatment? Which books are prescribed, and do they work as a cure? Are there any side effects?
Starting a new year often means an attempt at challenging resolutions or constraints, but in poetry, constraint can seem natural and even fun. For example, in Oulipo, formulas and frameworks (some more complicated than others) are applied to the lines and words of a poem. Try this exercise in constraint: Write a poem in which all of the words contain a vowel of your choice. For inspiration, read “Ballad in A” by Cathy Park Hong.
One of the possible origins of the phrase “the elephant in the room,” which generally refers to a problem that is glaringly obvious but willfully ignored, is thought to be Russian writer Ivan Andreevich Krylov’s page-long 1814 fable, “The Inquisitive Man.” In the story, a man visits a museum and recalls seeing a multitude of tiny animals, but not the elephant. Write an essay about a time when you failed to see the idiomatic “elephant in the room”—was it difficult or easy to ignore the issue? Did the people around you help or hinder the situation? What were the consequences of your actions, and what did it reveal about your tendencies in social interactions?
Within some cultures in Africa, Australia, and India, there exist strict rules which regulate the type of language permissible to use with one’s in-laws—for example, married women in Ethiopia who speak the Kambaata language and follow the ballishsha rule are forbidden to use any word that starts with the same syllables as the names of their parents-in-law. Often the solution is to use synonyms, euphemisms, or more generic terms. Write a scene in which two characters must have a conversation while abiding by a law that restricts particular words. Why is this law in place, and how do your characters deal with it? What power dynamics are involved? Are there hidden messages within the dialogue that cause a misunderstanding?
“I began writing poetry as an act of survival,” writes Safiya Sinclair in “Shadows of Words: Our Twelfth Annual Look at Debut Poets” in the January/February 2017 issue of Poets & Writers Magazine. Think about how you might look at your own writing as an act of survival: What are the most troublesome issues and sources of conflict in your everyday life, whether small and tangible or large and amorphous? How might the practice of putting pen to paper and giving words to emotions be integral to your encounter with these obstacles? Write a poem that helps you think through and voice your troubles.
“Surely nothing as simple as a notebook and a pencil could have saved my grandma, just as when things turned darkest for me, my wife had to intervene. Yet I still feel lucky that I became a writer when I did. Because for years those journal pages helped me hold myself together when the world pulled me apart.” In “Writing the Self: Some Thoughts on Words and Woe” in the January/February 2017 issue of Poets & Writers Magazine, Frank Bures discusses the benefits of expressive writing and the power the practice has to expand one’s sense of self. Over the course of several days, jot down notes exploring your current emotional state. Perhaps these notes will be the start of an essay or an exploration that continues.
Wraps, bubble tea, pork belly, kale, elaborate hamburgers, macarons. Different years are prone to different food trends, with the popular items appearing everywhere from fine-dining establishments, to fast food joints and snack trucks, to packaged goods and home cooking. Incorporate a trending food item from a certain time period into a short story. How does the insertion contribute a specific sense of time and place into your piece? What does it tell the reader about your characters’ lifestyles?
The cento, whose name is derived from a Latin term meaning “patchwork,” is a form of fragmented poetry originating in the third century consisting of lines taken from poems written by other poets. Contemporary centos often offer a humorous juxtaposition of contrasting images, ideas, and tones. Read centos written by John Ashbery and Simone Muench, and then try writing your own, sampling verses from diverse time periods, styles, and subject matter, and citing your sources at the end.
“Truth is a matter of the imagination,” wrote Ursula K. Le Guin in her 1969 novel, The Left Hand of Darkness. For many writers, artists, and filmmakers in the latter half of the twentieth century, envisioning the truth of the twenty-first century and beyond meant creating dystopian worlds, universes in which human society has adapted its systems to accommodate technological transformations, global climate change, postapocalyptic geographies, and consumerist greed. Consider the 1971 episode of Name of the Game titled “L.A. 2017,” directed by Steven Spielberg; the 1982 film Blade Runner, set in 2019; Stephen King’s 1982 novel, The Running Man, set in 2025; the 1993 film Demolition Man, set in 2032; and William F. Nolan and George Clayton Johnson’s 1967 novel, Logan’s Run, set in 2116. Do you remember your childhood fears and visions of what the future would hold? What dramatic changes in society have you witnessed? Write an essay about the hopes, worries, and predictions for the future that are most pressing for you know. Do you have any dystopian predictions for the future? How are your worries a reflection of both your individuality and the larger world?
Last year the Atlantic reported that researchers using computer systems to analyze the emotional trajectories of protagonists in nearly two thousand works of English-language fiction found that there are just six basic storytelling arcs: “1. Rags to Riches (rise), 2. Riches to Rags (fall), 3. Man in a Hole (fall then rise), 4. Icarus (rise then fall), 5. Cinderella (rise then fall then rise), 6. Oedipus (fall then rise then fall).” Think of a story that you often tell in your own life, perhaps a childhood memory that involves schools friends or a family occasion, or an adventurous incident that happened on a trip or vacation. Does it seem to align with one of these basic plotlines? Write a short fiction piece that maps the major elements of your story onto a different, unexpected arc.
“I’m Nobody! Who are you? / Are you – Nobody – too?” wrote Emily Dickinson in one of her most popular poems, published in 1891. Have you ever jotted down a memo to nobody in particular? Ever sent out to sea a message in a bottle? Left a note on a wall or a park bench to someone, anyone, who might happen upon it? All these types of missives have in common a sense of mystery surrounding the identity of the recipient, and an uncertainty about the intended recipient ever receiving the communication. Write a series of short poems addressed to an unknown person. How does removing the certainty of an addressee place more emphasis on other external factors, like geography and physical distance, and your own current preoccupations and state of mind? As you engage in a conversation with Nobody, what insights are revealed?
Ten years ago, James Brown, the “Godfather of Soul,” passed away on Christmas Day. In a Rolling Stone article from 2007, Gerri Hirshey writes that Brown’s “musical calls to social justice were not as eloquent as Martin Luther King Jr.'s speeches. But they were equally heartfelt.” In fact, after Dr. King’s assassination, Brown televised his concert in Boston and urged fans not to “react in a way that’s going to destroy your community.” Write a personal essay that explores a time you experienced music or a musician bringing a community together during difficult times. Did you feel more hopeful?
The holidays are a time full of festive cuisine with strange or unknown origins. The New York Times suggested in an 1890 article that the name “eggnog” may have originated with the way the drink is made, in that it is “necessary to ’knock’ the eggs with a spoon in beating up, and that on the thoroughness of this depends the quality of the ‘good cheer.’” Write a short story that includes a scene where the improper preparation of a holiday drink or dish escalates a conflict. How does this action become the catalyst for a confrontation?
“In the red room there is a sky which is painted over in red / but is not red and was, once, the sky. / This is how I live. / A red table in a red room filled with air.” Using these lines from Rachel Zucker’s “Letter [Persephone to Demeter]” as inspiration, write a poem where everything in the environment is red, as though the speaker is looking through red glass. How might color affect the way the speaker feels about an object, animal, or person? How might it affect tone?
The winter holiday office party is a tradition celebrated in workplaces of all kinds, and even chronicled in films. Write a personal essay about any sort of festive activity or event that you have attended with your coworkers. Do you consider your coworkers akin to close friends or family, or is your relationship more of a casual acquaintanceship? Has this changed over the years due to an experience or circumstance? Does a holiday office party serve as a setting in which you and your colleagues became closer or distanced?
“Creative people are drawn to each other, as notorious for falling in love as they are for driving each other insane,” writes Catherine Lacey in her new book, The Art of the Affair: An Illustrated History of Love, Sex, and Artistic Influence (Bloomsbury USA, 2017). The book, which is featured in “The Written Image” in the January/February 2017 issue of Poets & Writers Magazine, presents creative, romantic, and platonic connections between writers and artists such as Robert Lowell and Elizabeth Hardwick, and Billie Holiday and Orson Welles. Write a short story inspired by the sort of romantic entanglements and creative collaborations that Lacey presents in the book. How does involvement with the arts influence the scope and trajectory of the relationship between your characters?
The Hong Kong film 2046, written and directed by Wong Kar-wai, predominantly follows the main character Chow, a writer, over the course of several years, escapades, and love affairs, often dipping into scenes of him dining out on Christmas Eve each year. Jot down specific moments or memories from the same holiday over the years that you hold especially resonant and seem to connect a narrative. Then, write a series of poems capturing these events and experiences. How does the holiday itself lend a certain expected or consistent atmosphere even if the events that occurred or people present were completely different?
The holiday shopping craze over Hatchimals may seem unprecedented, but there have been many comparably popular gift toys over the years—including Tickle Me Elmo, Transformers toys, Cabbage Patch Kids, and the Atari game system—with some parents even admitting the possibility that their excitement over procuring the gift might in fact be greater than the child’s excitement to receive it. Write a personal essay about a toy you were given as a gift when you were a child. Why was it important to you? Was your attachment to the toy connected to memories of the gift giver, a festive event, playing with friends, or something else entirely?
Write a short story that takes place inside a bookstore, or incorporate a bookstore scene into a story already in progress. What kind of encounter between characters seems most tonally or atmospherically natural for a bookstore? Or conversely, what type of interaction seems deliciously inappropriate or unexpected? Does the search for a particular title play an integral part in the story? Consider whether the bookstore is modern and expansive or small and cozy, and how that might affect the scene. Browse through these videos and photos of a selection of impressive bookstores around the world for inspiration.
In Iceland, to write poetry is considered “part of being an Icelander,” according to Icelandic literature professor Sveinn Yngvi Egilsson, and not a “specialist activity” but one that includes a variety of practitioners such as horse breeders, scientists, and politicians. Write a few ferskeytt poems, a popular Icelandic four-line verse form with alternating rhyme. Spend just ten minutes or so on each one, implementing the poem as a casual and functional way to inject some humor or wit into dealing with everyday duties, workday blues, or the oncoming winter.
In a letter to the Swedish Academy, Bob Dylan explained that he would not be attending this weekend’s Nobel ceremony and banquet to accept the Nobel Prize in Literature because of “pre-existing commitments.” Think of a time you have been unable—or unwilling—to appear at an important event. Was the decision-making process a foregone conclusion, or did you waver? Do you generally take on many commitments or few? Once made, do you stick to them? Use this essay as an opportunity to explore your social priorities, and memories of other times in your life when you’ve been needed in two places at once.
Browse through the winning photographs of this year’s National Geographic Travel Photographer of the Year Contest, and select the one that most readily captures your imagination. Write a one-thousand-word piece of flash fiction inspired by this photo, and by the ways in which it both presents the natural world and offers insight, comparison, and reflection of humanity’s place within it. To go a step further, try writing more than one flash fiction story focused on a different perspective of the same photo.
The landay is a form of folk poetry from Afghanistan consisting of a single couplet—nine syllables in the first line, and thirteen in the second line—that is generally written anonymously and often recited or sung by women. As poet and journalist Eliza Griswold writes, “It must take on one of five subjects: meena, love; jang, war; watan, homeland; biltoon, separation; and, finally, gham, which means despair or grief.” Read more about the form and its historical and contemporary practices in Griswold’s piece in Poetry magazine. Then, write several landays of your own—biting, bawdy, or lamenting.
Zadie Smith, author of the new novel, Swing Time (Penguin Press, 2016), considers dancers who have influenced her writing in a recent essay for the Guardian. About Mikhail Baryshnikov, she says: “He has high and low modes, tough and soft poses, but he’s always facing outwards, to us, his audience.” Write an essay that begins with one of your memories of watching a dancer. How does the dancer’s body move through space? Did you feel a connection with the performance and the artist? Were you moved emotionally?
Earlier this month, actress Emma Watson hid books with handwritten messages in the London Underground and New York City subway stations as part of the community project Books on the Underground. Write a short story that begins with a character hiding a book in an unlikely place, like a bus stop or a graveyard or the hollow of a tree. What book would be hidden and why? Is anyone supposed to find it, and if so, what happens after? Is the discovery the beginning of a mystery?
In an essay for the Ploughshares blog, Emily Smith discusses representations of witches in literature and how they are usually associated with fear and terror. In her exploration of Macbeth, Smith notices that, “Shakespeare’s witches are…followed by dark clouds of rain.” Write a poem using dark or gothic imagery, such as a woman being followed by dark clouds of rain. What emotions are elicited from your depiction? Is she focused on the storm clouds or does she notice them only peripherally? How might you alter your rhythm and sounds to mimic those of a thunderstorm?
The 1987 John Hughes film Planes, Trains and Automobiles stars Steve Martin and John Candy as a mismatched pair both trying to travel from New York City to Chicago in time for the Thanksgiving holiday in what proves to be a comedic journey filled with bad luck, misunderstandings, and ill-timed coincidences. At its core are two central characters who seem to have philosophical outlooks, priorities, and skills that clash, and whose differentiation occupies much of the screen time and seemingly much of their respective psyches. Write an essay about a time when you were in a difficult situation and at complete odds with another person involved. Did you find yourself dwelling on your differences, and if so, how did that affect the trajectory of the outcome of events? In what ways might your differences have been emphasized by the attraction to larger-than-life oppositions?
“During the day, as I worked, I clarified daydreams, rehearsed thoughts. Phrases rose up, and as I shoveled compost, mulched garlic, or turned over the soil, the phrases turned too…. The world’s margins shrank but also grew luminous. After working outside in my body all day long, my mind felt brightly lit.” In “Turning the Soil” in the November/December issue of Poets & Writers Magazine, Tess Taylor writes about her revelatory experience volunteering at a farm while at a writing residency in southwestern Massachusetts. Try to carve out a few hours this week to spend engaged in an activity that is very different from—and outside of—your usual working environment. Get your hands dirty in a garden or park, sit quietly in a library, or people-watch at an airport or train station. Allow your mind to roam over unexpectedly fresh images and phrases that surface, and then write a series of flash fiction pieces inspired by your time spent “outside.”
In the early twentieth century, anthropologist Franz Boas published claims that the Eskimo languages had dozens or more words for snow—claims that have been pored over and analyzed, debunked and reaffirmed, and criticized and clarified in countless investigations since. Think of a natural or cultural phenomenon, such as a certain type of food, or an emotion, that you believe deserves or warrants a larger vocabulary. Write a poem that presents these new words—perhaps compound words of your own invention—along with their definitions and an exploration of why these articulations are significant to you.
“Theologians talk about a prevenient grace that precedes grace itself and allows us to accept it,” writes Marilynne Robinson in her 2004 novel, Gilead. “I think there must also be a prevenient courage that allows us to be brave…to make ourselves useful. It allows us to be generous, which is another way of saying exactly the same thing.” The winter holiday season is often associated with generosity and giving—being generous with one’s home and spirit, and the giving of thanks and gifts. Write a personal essay about a time when you have been the giver or receiver of a great act of generosity. Explore the connection between courage and generosity, reflecting on the exemplary people or events you encountered. What do you find are the greatest emotional challenges to doing something so bravely useful?
What do we mean when we call a story Dickensian? Often it is a lengthy work incorporating one or more of these elements: a dramatic and convenient twist of events, social-justice themes, a sentimental tone, a bustling city setting, a large cast of characters with vivid personality traits. Choose a memorable character from a Dickens story, such as Tiny Tim, Ebenezer Scrooge, Oliver Twist, the Artful Dodger, Miss Havisham, or Abel Magwitch. Write a short story in which this character has been inserted into un-Dickensian circumstances—perhaps a solitary exploration of the wilderness, a contemporary technology-filled existence, or a supernatural landscape. How do you maintain a Dickensian feel while ensuring that this piece reflects your unique creative voice?
In his 1821 essay “A Defence of Poetry,” Percy Bysshe Shelley writes, “Poetry is…the perfect and consummate surface and bloom of all things; it is as the odor and the color of the rose to the texture of the elements which compose it….” Make a list of words and phrases that describe the surface textures, odors, and colors that surround you as this year draws to an end, choosing the details that are most evocative of the season. You may find yourself drawing inspiration from the contrasting primary colors of holiday cheer, bright puffy parkas or dark wool coats, the shiny prints and textures of patterned gift wrap, the stark tones of snow, or the scents of fragrant conifers and baked desserts. Write a trio of poems, each focusing on one type of sensory input. Select an element—setting, narrator’s voice, repeated words, or a specific object—that stays constant through all three, tying them together.
As the dust settles from this year’s U.S. presidential election, think of a time in your youth when you participated in a school election or were involved with the student council. Were you optimistic of the changes that could be made? Did you vote with enthusiasm or take part in any protests? Write an essay reflecting on your experiences and what was important to you then, and how this might say something about who you are today.
The Saharan silver ant is able to survive in the extreme temperatures of the Sahara Desert, which often reaches almost 120 degrees Fahrenheit, with the help of physiological adaptations including highly reflective hairs that deflect the sun’s rays and longer legs, keeping them further above the hot sand. Write a short story that explores how a human character adapts when placed in a geographical location with extreme atmospheric conditions. Is your character alone or part of a pack? You may choose to write a story based in reality, or one that incorporates elements of the fantastic.
“By existing in a cinematic space, Shakespeare can feel alive and present,” says Ross Williams, founder of the nonprofit New York Shakespeare Exchange, whose film project Maya C. Popa writes about in “The Shakespeare Sonnet Project” in the November/December issue of Poets & Writers Magazine. The project aims to collect videos of each of Shakespeare’s 154 sonnets performed by actors in different locations in New York City, with a future series to be filmed in locations in the rest of the country and abroad. Browse through some of Shakespeare’s sonnets, and choose one that reminds you of a place you know, or which evokes a site-specific memory. Write your own sonnet in response, bringing phrases and ideas used almost half a millennium ago into the present by incorporating cinematic imagery of a contemporary locale.
“Sometimes the humor is a way to mask all that, so the reader won’t know that what I’m writing about is me, or figure out what side of the argument I stand on. Then there’s a risk in just trying to say what you mean to say…. Writing is a risk no matter what.” In a 2015 interview with Chris Jackson for the Paris Review, Paul Beatty, who was awarded the 2016 Man Booker Prize for his novel The Sellout last week, speaks about the risks of criticizing and including heated topics in his writing. Think of a topic or stance you are personally drawn to—but also afraid of—writing about. Write a personal essay in which you gradually expose this risky issue or opinion in a humorous way. How can offbeat humor, satire, or a generally funny approach allow you to tackle difficult subjects in a more oblique way?