The Writhing Society: A Salon for Constrained Writing Techniques
The Writhing Society meets to practice and discuss the techniques of constrained writing. We practice the methods invented by ourselves and by other writers, artists, musicians, and mathematicians.
Today, we'll do two different constraints inspired by our current situation:
1) Prisoner's restriction is a procedure that imagines the writer is a prisoner whose supply of paper is restricted: To put it to the fullest use, the writer avoids letters extending above or below the line, creating a lipogram in b, d, f, g, h, j, k, l, p, q, t, and y. "Coronavirus" conforms to this constraint.
2) Beautiful outlaw/belle absente: The outlaw in question is the name of the person (or other subject) to whom the poem (or other form) is addressed. Each line is a lipogram in each of the letters of the person's name. So if you were writing a beautiful outlaw to Brooklyn, the first line would be a lipogram in B, the second line would be a lipogram in R, the third line would be a lipogram in O, and so on. To make a true beautiful outlaw, each line would actually be a pangrammatic lipogram, meaning each line would contain ALL letters except for the omitted letter. Harry Mathews, in the Oulipo Compendium, has give us permission to omit irksome letters like j, k, x, or z.
This workshop will take place online via Zoom. Please RSVP to receive the Zoom link prior to the event.
The Writhing Society combines a class with a salon. In a two-hour session, you can expect a few minutes of introductions and explanations, an hour plus of silent writing, and a half-hour or so in which we will read our work aloud. Then, if there's a little time left for questions and discussion, we'll do that. If you know nothing about writing with constraints, if you do not think of yourself as knowing much about writing, come anyway. No prior knowledge required. This is nothing like your ordinary writing workshop. We work in a relaxed, supportive, playful atmosphere, and we welcome new members.
What are constraints? Constraints are rules, specific and arbitrary, that drive you to say what you hadn’t expected to say in ways you never would have chosen to say it. Constrained writing always involves a collaboration of languages: yours and someone else’s. It allows you to take directions from something outside yourself. In a world where forms of expression thought to be “free” in fact come ready-made from the discourses of powerful groups, composing with constraints becomes a disciplined practice for escape, from these or from oneself, and a source of fresh ideas.
