Typescript posts a new challenge each Wednesday to encourage creativity and inspire conversation. Feel free to talk about the challenge or share your writing results in the comments section below by leaving an excerpt and/or a link to your own site or blog.

The spark of inspiration can be found anywhere you choose to look. From a title of a song to a sketch found on a napkin, from an overheard conversation to a series of picture prints, these stories are waiting to be discovered and told.

One of the reasons why I love creative expression is that it’s incredibly individualistic. It evokes inspiration and an appreciation of beauty, it stirs emotions and sparks conversations; however, each song, piece of writing, or work of art affects people in significantly different ways.

I love these challenges because I’m fascinated by what interpretations writers — word-artists — can come up with. What you bring with you when considering a challenge is just as important as the inspiration that it serves, for the moment’s emotions, thoughts, feelings, and your experiences may play a part in that interpretation. A painting may spark an original idea for one person, while another individual will look at the same painting and go in an entirely different direction, making the possibilities seem endless. One single idea branches off into original stories full of characters, plot, and your own original voice.

Visual art has always sparked the imagination in a way that few other mediums can. Every painting, photograph, sculpture is open to interpretation and tells a story of either the artist, the subject, or the viewer.

What story will you find?

Roy Lichtenstein
Roy Lichtenstein (1923-1997) was known as a 20th century American pop artist whose paintings are reminiscent of comic book panels. Full of color and dialogue bubbles that call to the comic book culture, this series of paintings depict a story in and of themselves, asking questions that spark the imagination. Who is Vicki and how does she know the man asking for her? Whose photo is that in the frame to which she says “good morning?” These paintings lay the foundation of the story, a moment frozen in a time. What story will you surround it with?

The saying goes that a picture is worth a thousand words. What words and stories do these illustrations spark for you?

Challenge: Use one or more of the Roy Lichtenstein paintings, depicted in the images below, to create a new short story or poem:

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In place of this week’s Wednesday Writing Challenge, Typescript is now offering Writing Challenge Roundups, a compilation posted the last week of each month. Check out the challenges that were offered during the month of September and feel free to share your work or talk about the challenges in the comments section below.

September Roundup
Word Play IV
What stories or poetry does this blend of words inspire in you?

Word Play 2.0
Check out this guest post by Nean Burkholder for a different spin on the Word Play Challenge.

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Typescript posts a new challenge each Wednesday to encourage creativity and inspire conversation. Feel free to talk about the challenge or share your writing results in the comments section below by leaving an excerpt and/or a link to your own site or blog.

The spark of inspiration can be found anywhere you choose to look. From a title of a song to a sketch found on a napkin, from an overheard conversation to a jumble of words, these stories are waiting to be discovered and told.

Note: This week’s post comes from friend, fellow writer, and writing challenge-enthusiast Nean Burkholder. Many thanks to Nean for helping out with this week’s challenge! Check out her poetry on her blog and follow her on Twitter.

One of my favorite writing prompts is the “Word Play,” based on random phrases found in places like spam mail, recycled into poetry and prose. What happens when random words, seemingly unrelated are thrown together into the same piece of writing? That’s for you the writer to decide.

Words come alive and certain words have their own personalities. We all have words that are favorites, words that roll on our tongues, are just fun to say, or that evoke particular images for us. Today, we revisit Word Play with version 2.0, where we take some of those words and invite them to party together. What will happen when these seemingly unrelated words with little to nothing in common are forced to interact? Will they spend their time in nothing more than small talk? Or will they delve into deeper conversation and reveal mysteries that will astound the world? It’s your turn to decide!

Word Play Version 2.0

One of the most fascinating aspects of writing is the ability to manipulate words and language to convey your intended meaning. Words have so many meanings within their own definitions, and coupling them with others can produce something not entirely expected but altogether magical. There are a thousand ways to describe an object, person, or place, and so, too, are there thousands of stories just waiting to be plucked out of the imagination and put to paper. Sometimes all we need to create that initial spark of inspiration is a word (or three, or four, or five…).

Challenge: Choose five or more of the words below with their “strong personalities,” and throw them together into a “party” in your poetry or story. Use each of the words you choose at least once and experiment with having them interact with one another in unexpected ways:

nostalgia, burning, reticent, nonchalance, blue, serenity, quite, wrung, felicity, caramel, tempestuous, linoleum, pancake, kumquat, Ragnarok, bamboozled, bequeathed, nifty, disquiet, barnacle, Mesopotamia, irregularity, labyrinthian, slipstream, verisimilitude, zodiac, bow, carnage, wren, bamboo, unique, shadow, mirror, chaos, frequent, resuscitate, laughter, scattered, bubble, susurration, squiggle, design, issues, certainty, momentous, whispers, slumber, assonance…




What are some of your favorite words, the ones that are beautiful, or sad, or mysterious, or… whatever? What interesting ideas can you come up with to make these words dance in ordinary settings?

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Typescript posts a new challenge each Wednesday to encourage creativity and inspire conversation. Feel free to talk about the challenge or share your writing results in the comments section below by leaving an excerpt and/or a link to your own site or blog.

The spark of inspiration can be found anywhere you choose to look. From a title of a song to a sketch found on a napkin, from an overheard conversation to a jumble of words, these stories are waiting to be discovered and told.

Who knew that a jumble of words could provide such inspiration? That such a combination could spark creativity, begin a story? A few months ago, I discovered well over 300 spam comments infiltrating my blog folder, containing strings of words that attempted to sell the latest dietary supplement with links to unknown sites. However, after skimming through these, I discovered that, upon a closer reading, there was really a sense of poetry in the combination of words, hidden inspiration in what seemed to be an incoherent passage.

What emerged was the Wednesday Writing Challenge: Word Play, where writers had a bit of fun and let their imaginations wander, sparking creativity, igniting something magical…

After a few rounds of this particular challenge, we’re back at it again. What inspiration will you find this time?

Word Play

One of the most fascinating aspects of writing is the ability to manipulate words and language to convey your intended meaning. Words have so many meanings within their own definitions, and coupling them with others can produce something not entirely expected but altogether magical. There are a thousand ways to describe an object, person, or place, and so, too, are there thousands of stories just waiting to be plucked out of the imagination and put to paper. Sometimes all we need to create that initial spark of inspiration is a word (or three)…

Challenge: Use one of the following couplings of words to create a new story or poem
(Note: many of these have had minor alterations to make a little bit more sense):

Everybody knew

The lost multiply

Marry one was wrong

Signs say she choose

Withdraw the touched

Music note the dilemma

I was mistaken

Have ordered the wise

The glass audience

Liberation sails

Dead star was evident

Open sky blinked

Children breathed sighs

Pointing to your dignity

Breathing statue born

Before yesterday

Only songbirds saw

Never his world

Given the flames

Flowers understood

Others started walking

What interesting combinations of words can you add to the fold?

3 comments

In place of this week’s Wednesday Writing Challenge, Typescript is now offering Writing Challenge Roundups, a compilation posted the last week of each month. Check out the challenges that were offered during the month of August and feel free to share your work or talk about the challenges in the comments section below.

August Roundup
Norman Rockwell
If a picture is worth a thousand words, what words will these illustrations spark in you?

Movie Quotes
Put your own spin on character and plot starting with your favorite quote.

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Typescript posts a new challenge each Wednesday to encourage creativity and inspire conversation. Feel free to talk about the challenge or share your writing results in the comments section below by leaving an excerpt and/or a link to your own site or blog.

The spark of inspiration can be found anywhere you choose to look. From a title of a song to a sketch found on a napkin to quotes of a movie, these stories are waiting to be discovered and told.

Some of the best movies are similar to a favorite book in that they’re the ones you consistently reach for on the shelf, the ones that stand out in your memory as something special. Maybe this was the first movie you ever saw in a theater. Maybe this movie was one you remember watching over and over as a kid until you could recite every piece of dialogue along with the actors (i.e. Annie, The Karate Kid — I and II). Maybe this movie was one that tugged on heartstrings or had you talking about it the entire ride home. However it became that movie for you, these are the characters you remember as friends, the scenes you recall in vivid detail, and the lines of dialogue that remain with you long after the credits roll.

Movie Quotes
Films have long been a favorite medium for the entertainment industry because they, like books, are a form of escapism that range in genres to suit a variety of tastes and preferences. From psychological thrillers to dramas, from romances to comedies, movies offer something for everyone. However, take away the special effects, the melodic score, and the visual artistry and you still have the essential components of storytelling: There are protagonists and antagonists, places wherein the action takes place, and themes of good vs. evil, life, death, family, and love. Characters, setting, plot.

Pieces of dialogue can not only tell you a bit about the plot of the movie, but also the characters themselves, and so I opened up this challenge to the Twitter community to ask about their favorite movie quotes. The responses were varied and pretty remarkable, and I want to thank everyone who participated.

Just like books — it’s all in the story.

Challenge: Begin with dialogue and see where it takes you. Already know the movie? Put your own spin on the plot with the quote as the starting point. Using one of the movie quotes offered below, create a new short story or poem.

“Get busy living, or get busy dying”
- The Shawshank Redemption (submitted by Sean)

Andrew Largeman: You’ll see one day when you move out it just sort of happens one day and it’s gone. You feel like you can never get it back. It’s like you feel homesick for a place that doesn’t even exist. Maybe it’s like this rite of passage, you know. You won’t ever have this feeling again until you create a new idea of home for yourself, you know, for your kids, for the family you start, it’s like a cycle or something. I don’t know, but I miss the idea of it, you know. Maybe that’s all family really is. A group of people that miss the same imaginary place.
– Garden State (submitted by Allison)

Sam: If you can’t laugh at yourself, life is going to seem a whole lot longer than you’d like.
– Garden State (submitted by Allison)

“Many of life’s failures are people who did not realize how close they were to success when they gave up.”
- One Week (submitted by Tom )

“They say stars are billions of tons of hot gas. But I think they’re just God’s salt. And He’s just waiting to eat us…”
– Can’t Hardly Wait (submitted by Akirah)

“You’re not going to lose me. You’ve given me a taste for life. I wanna be happy. Sleep in a bed, have roots.”
- Leon/The Professional (submitted by Mike )

Clementine: This is it, Joel. It’s going to be gone soon.
Joel: I know.
Clementine: What do we do?
Joel: Enjoy it.
- Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind (submitted by Carlos)

“Oh no, it wasn’t the airplanes. It was beauty killed the beast. ”
- King Kong, 1933 (submitted by Bryan)

“Yo, ya no soy yo. Por lo menos no soy el mismo yo interior.”
– Diarios de motocicleta (submitted by Ryan)
I am no longer me. At least I am not the same inside.
- The Motorcycle Diaries

Have a favorite movie quote you think will spark inspiration? Feel free to add it to the comments below!

2 comments

Typescript posts a new challenge each Wednesday to encourage creativity and inspire conversation. Feel free to talk about the challenge or share your writing results in the comments section below by leaving an excerpt and/or a link to your own site or blog.

The spark of inspiration can be found anywhere you choose to look. From a title of a song to a sketch found on a napkin, from an overheard conversation to a series of picture prints, these stories are waiting to be discovered and told.

One of the reasons why I love creative expression is that it’s incredibly individualistic. It evokes inspiration and an appreciation of beauty, it stirs emotions and sparks conversations; however, each song, piece of writing, or work of art affects people in significantly different ways.

I love these challenges because I’m fascinated by what interpretations writers — word-artists — can come up with. What you bring with you when considering a challenge is just as important as the inspiration that it serves, for the moment’s emotions, thoughts, feelings, and your experiences may play a part in that interpretation. A painting may spark an original idea for one person, while another individual will look at the same painting and go in an entirely different direction, making the possibilities seem endless. One single idea branches off into original stories full of characters, plot, and your own original voice.

Visual art has always sparked the imagination in a way that few other mediums can. Every painting, photograph, sculpture is open to interpretation and tells a story of either the artist, the subject, or the viewer.

What story will you find?

Norman Rockwell
Norman Rockwell (1894-1978) was a 20th-century painter whose illustrations graced the covers of The Saturday Evening Post for over forty years. These illustrations depicted the life of the modern American, often providing a glimpse into the average, everyday world of family, friends, and lovers and sparking a sense of both sentimentality and familiarity. However, there’s something deeper behind the scenes that Rockwell paints, a story full of depth marked by just one painted moment in time. Who is the girl sitting outside the Principal’s office and what kind of trouble did she get into? What does that little girl see when she looks in the mirror and why is she so eager to grow up? Who is that man standing up, surrounded by people, and what does he have to say?

The saying goes that a picture is worth a thousand words. What words and stories do these illustrations spark for you?

Challenge: Use one or more of the Norman Rockwell paintings, depicted in the images below, to create a new short story or poem:

3 comments

In place of this week’s Wednesday Writing Challenge, Typescript is now offering Writing Challenge Roundups, a compilation posted the last week of each month. Check out the challenges that were offered during the month of July and feel free to share your work or talk about the challenges in the comments section below.

July Roundup
Word Play III
Third time’s the charm! Have a little fun with words and see what new ideas you can discover.

Song Lyrics
What lyrics will help tell your next story?

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Typescript posts a new challenge each Wednesday to encourage creativity and inspire conversation. Feel free to talk about the challenge or share your writing results in the comments section below by leaving an excerpt and/or a link to your own site or blog.

The spark of inspiration can be found anywhere you choose to look. From a title of a song to a sketch found on a napkin to music lyrics, these stories are waiting to be discovered and told.

In a similar challenge based on song titles, we talked about how words and music can be a powerful form of creativity for their ability to evoke emotion and create experiences. Music speaks to the same part of our soul from which words stem, delving into a part of ourselves and calling forth sometimes stagnant emotion that can then be poured onto the page. The music you’re listening to can even shape the tone of your writing. A peppy pop ballad can make for an upbeat, feel-good story filled with humor and chaos. A slow ballad can cross boundaries and create melancholy and passion. However, it’s the lyrics that tell the story.

Song Lyrics
While the music itself can lend to inspiration, often the best lyrics are full of character, setting, and plot of their own, bringing to life a story. Very much like a poem, lyrics have power in their words, with imagery and rhythm guiding the tale. Pay attention when you listen to the radio or browse through the selections on iTunes. Your next story may be waiting in the music.

What song lyrics serve as your inspiration?

Challenge: Take a look at your own collection or use some suggestions below to create a new short story or poem:

I fell asleep on a late night train
I missed my stop and I went round again
Keane, “Try Again”

Before you hit the highway
You better stop for gas
There’s a 50 in the ashtray
In case you run short on cash
Carrie Underwood, “Don’t Forget To Remember Me”

Another glass of Whiskey but it still don’t kill the pain
So he stumbles to the sink and pours it down the drain
Carrie Underwood, “Wasted”

By the light of the moon
She rubs her eyes
Says it’s funny how the night
Can make you blind
Rob Thomas, “Her Diamonds”

Was a long and dark December
When the banks became cathedrals
And the fog
Became God
Coldplay, “Violet Hill”

Hitched a ride to the peaceful side of town
Then proceeded where thieves were no longer found
Collective Soul, “Precious Declaration”

I found God
On the corner of First and Amistad…
All alone
Smoking his last cigarette
The Fray, “You Found Me”

I woke up today in London
As the plane was touching down
And all I could think about was Monday
And maybe I’ll be back around
Three Doors Down, “Landing In London”

Friday night beneath the stars,
in a field behind your yard,
you and I are paintin’ pictures in the sky.
Taylor Swift, “I’m Only Me When I’m With You”

Thought I ran into you down on the street
Then it turned out to only be a dream
I made a point to burn all of the photographs
She went away and then I took a different path
I remember the face but I can’t recall the name
Green Day, “Whatsername”

I look out of my bedroom window pane
Every day, but the view just stays the same
Guster, “C’mon”

4 comments

Typescript posts a new challenge each Wednesday to encourage creativity and inspire conversation. Feel free to talk about the challenge or share your writing results in the comments section below by leaving an excerpt and/or a link to your own site or blog.

The spark of inspiration can be found anywhere you choose to look. From a title of a song to a sketch found on a napkin, from an overheard conversation to a jumble of words, these stories are waiting to be discovered and told.

Who knew that a jumble of words could provide such inspiration? That such a combination could spark creativity, begin a story? Two months ago, I discovered well over 300 spam comments infiltrating my blog folder, containing strings of words that attempted to sell the latest dietary supplement with links to unknown sites. However, after skimming through these, I discovered that, upon a closer reading, there was really a sense of poetry in the combination of words, hidden inspiration in what seemed to be an incoherent passage.

What emerged was the Wednesday Writing Challenge: Word Play, where writers had a bit of fun and let their imaginations wander, sparking creativity, igniting something magical…

After a second round of this particular challenge with Word Play II, we’re back for another try. What inspiration will you find this time?

Word Play

One of the most fascinating aspects of writing is the ability to manipulate words and language to convey your intended meaning. Words have so many meanings within their own definitions, and coupling them with others can produce something not entirely expected but altogether magical. There are a thousand ways to describe an object, person, or place, and so, too, are there thousands of stories just waiting to be plucked out of the imagination and put to paper. Sometimes all we need to create that initial spark of inspiration is a word (or three)…

Challenge: Use one of the following couplings of words to create a new story or poem
(Note: many of these have had minor alterations to make a little bit more sense):

That represents breath

Distance from errors

Named the sometimes hostile

Fetch some light streamed

Mind every watch

Swore the roses

Faded photograph had preserved

Courtly adieu slowed

She held ash

The misfortune stream

Cornered animal turn sympathetic

Better they are strangers

Bring the wind

Their two further doubts

The whole business was unlikely

After dinner dining

Mentioned seeing and crowds

Sometimes worked live musician

Charms promises for history

Recognize the recognized

She has his expression

What interesting combinations of words can you add to the fold?

6 comments