Power Struggle Story

Power Struggle Stories Name:_____________________
Narrative/Imaginative Writing
IHS Literature and the Arts

The Struggle

For your first major writing assignment for 10th grade you will write a 500-word story about a power struggle. This will be a short story (approximately 2 pages), and so it will require you to limit yourself in a few important ways. First, you may have only one or two characters. Second, you may write only one or two main scenes (ie, your main character will be in only one or two places). Third, please limit your plot elements. This is a story of a single power struggle, that reflects a single internal and a single external conflict. However, it must have both an internal and an external conflict, as follows:

Required Plot elements: The story must have both an external and an internal conflict. An external conflict means that things happen to your main character or main characters, and he or she has to respond to them. In this case, your narrator will be in a power struggle, and the external conflict will be the actions of the other person in the power struggle that trigger your main character’s responses. However, if your main character’s power struggle is with himself or herself, then the external conflict will be the outside forces that trigger this internal power struggle to surface. In Lord of the Flies, external conflicts include the lack of a protein source other than pigs on the island, the fact that the boys are crashed on the island, etc. For the character of Ralph particularly, external conflicts include the things other characters, especially Jack and Piggy, do and say. These things add stress to Ralph’s internal conflicts.

An internal conflict is a conflict within the main character. For example, in Lord of the Flies, Ralph is conflicted between his desire to have fun and his growing sense of responsibility. Also, Ralph is conflicted between acting in an intelligent way and acting in a way that gains the approval of others. One of the reasons that Ralph is the main character of Lord of the Flies is that he is the character whose internal conflict is the most pronounced. Piggy and Jack conflict most openly with each other, but they both are certain who they are. It is precisely Ralph’s lack of certainty, his indecision, that makes him the character to whom most audiences can relate. Your character’s inner conflict needs to grow as the external conflict increases stress on it. The resolution of your plot should rely on a shift in your main character’s internal conflict. Your story may be resolved when the main character recognizes that the conflict exists, and so understands himself or herself more clearly. It may happen when the inner conflict is only partly resolved, or it may happen when the inner conflict is entirely resolved. This shift in your character’s understanding of himself or herself should also be what brings about a shift in the external conflict.

Another way to understand internal and external conflict is to think about the situation vs. the story. Memoirist Vivian Gornick distinguishes between the situation a narrator is in and the inner shift that the narrator is working toward. A final way to understand internal and external conflict is to think about the classic hero’s journey. In the classic hero’s journey, the main character experiences a change in himself or herself after facing the abyss or losing hope, and it is this change that leads him or her to victory and allows him or her to return home.

The beginning: the story should start with a vivid scene that both introduces the characters and the conflict.

Building tension: As the tension in the story builds, the narrator’s internal conflict should become more and more pronounced. Often, it will become pronounced to the extent that the main character gives up hope.

The Climax: At the climax of your piece, your main character should shift in terms of his or her internal conflict, which should bring about a shift in the external conflict.

The ending: The ending should bring about resolution in which there is an outcome regarding the internal if not also the external conflict.

What this story is not: This story is not a travel narrative. DO NOT TURN IN ANY PART OF YOUR FRESHMAN YEAR TRAVEL NARRATIVE FOR THIS ASSIGNMENT.

Standards: This story will be graded and evaluated for your CIM narrative. Your scores will be based on:

1. Organization – a beginning, rising tension to a point of resolution, and an ending.
2. Vivid Imagery. Show, don’t tell. Write scenes so that your audience feels present in them.
3. Sentence Fluency- This particularly relates to verb tenses and character introductions – do I know what is happening, when? Can I follow the story, as a reader? This also relates to extra words. If you have extra words, sentences, and clauses in your work that only serve to confuse your point, cut them.
4. Word Choice: Chose words that mean precisely what you want them to mean. Do not just use a thesaurus to find synonyms. Look words up in the dictionary also, to find out their individual nuances, and gain control of the meaning of your words.
5. Syntax: this includes grammar, paragraphing, the order of words, etc. Do you have control over the meaning of punctuation? Do you use commas, semicolons, periods, sentences, dialogue, etc. to say what you mean them to say?
6. Length: Your story should end up 500 words. This is short. Make sure to cut words you do not need, and you write a story that is designed to be short.Power Struggle Stories Name:_____________________
Narrative/Imaginative Writing
IHS Literature and the Arts

The Struggle

For your first major writing assignment for 10th grade you will write a 500-word story about a power struggle. This will be a short story (approximately 2 pages), and so it will require you to limit yourself in a few important ways. First, you may have only one or two characters. Second, you may write only one or two main scenes (ie, your main character will be in only one or two places). Third, please limit your plot elements. This is a story of a single power struggle, that reflects a single internal and a single external conflict. However, it must have both an internal and an external conflict, as follows:

Required Plot elements: The story must have both an external and an internal conflict. An external conflict means that things happen to your main character or main characters, and he or she has to respond to them. In this case, your narrator will be in a power struggle, and the external conflict will be the actions of the other person in the power struggle that trigger your main character’s responses. However, if your main character’s power struggle is with himself or herself, then the external conflict will be the outside forces that trigger this internal power struggle to surface. In Lord of the Flies, external conflicts include the lack of a protein source other than pigs on the island, the fact that the boys are crashed on the island, etc. For the character of Ralph particularly, external conflicts include the things other characters, especially Jack and Piggy, do and say. These things add stress to Ralph’s internal conflicts.

An internal conflict is a conflict within the main character. For example, in Lord of the Flies, Ralph is conflicted between his desire to have fun and his growing sense of responsibility. Also, Ralph is conflicted between acting in an intelligent way and acting in a way that gains the approval of others. One of the reasons that Ralph is the main character of Lord of the Flies is that he is the character whose internal conflict is the most pronounced. Piggy and Jack conflict most openly with each other, but they both are certain who they are. It is precisely Ralph’s lack of certainty, his indecision, that makes him the character to whom most audiences can relate. Your character’s inner conflict needs to grow as the external conflict increases stress on it. The resolution of your plot should rely on a shift in your main character’s internal conflict. Your story may be resolved when the main character recognizes that the conflict exists, and so understands himself or herself more clearly. It may happen when the inner conflict is only partly resolved, or it may happen when the inner conflict is entirely resolved. This shift in your character’s understanding of himself or herself should also be what brings about a shift in the external conflict.

Another way to understand internal and external conflict is to think about the situation vs. the story. Memoirist Vivian Gornick distinguishes between the situation a narrator is in and the inner shift that the narrator is working toward. A final way to understand internal and external conflict is to think about the classic hero’s journey. In the classic hero’s journey, the main character experiences a change in himself or herself after facing the abyss or losing hope, and it is this change that leads him or her to victory and allows him or her to return home.

The beginning: the story should start with a vivid scene that both introduces the characters and the conflict.

Building tension: As the tension in the story builds, the narrator’s internal conflict should become more and more pronounced. Often, it will become pronounced to the extent that the main character gives up hope.

The Climax: At the climax of your piece, your main character should shift in terms of his or her internal conflict, which should bring about a shift in the external conflict.

The ending: The ending should bring about resolution in which there is an outcome regarding the internal if not also the external conflict.

What this story is not: This story is not a travel narrative. DO NOT TURN IN ANY PART OF YOUR FRESHMAN YEAR TRAVEL NARRATIVE FOR THIS ASSIGNMENT.

Standards: This story will be graded and evaluated for your CIM narrative. Your scores will be based on:

1. Organization – a beginning, rising tension to a point of resolution, and an ending.
2. Vivid Imagery. Show, don’t tell. Write scenes so that your audience feels present in them.
3. Sentence Fluency- This particularly relates to verb tenses and character introductions – do I know what is happening, when? Can I follow the story, as a reader? This also relates to extra words. If you have extra words, sentences, and clauses in your work that only serve to confuse your point, cut them.
4. Word Choice: Chose words that mean precisely what you want them to mean. Do not just use a thesaurus to find synonyms. Look words up in the dictionary also, to find out their individual nuances, and gain control of the meaning of your words.
5. Syntax: this includes grammar, paragraphing, the order of words, etc. Do you have control over the meaning of punctuation? Do you use commas, semicolons, periods, sentences, dialogue, etc. to say what you mean them to say?
6. Length: Your story should end up 500 words. This is short. Make sure to cut words you do not need, and you write a story that is designed to be short.



FIVE IDEAS AND THREE BEGINNINGS DUE: _____________

ROUGH DRAFT DUE:_____________

FINAL DRAFT DUE:_________________




FIVE IDEAS AND THREE BEGINNINGS DUE: _____________

ROUGH DRAFT DUE:_____________

FINAL DRAFT DUE:_________________