ok this is a bit weird but bare with me. It might work for you or not but I find it really helpful for some of the more emotive stuff.
Basically, I took GCSE drama and part of the course was on Stanislavski, particularly his ten commandment's and drawing on past experiences. You use it to make your performance more realistic etc and a few weeks later I ended up using it on a piece of writing and found it really helped.
The past experiences thing is where you close your eyes and remember an experience where you were feeling angry etc. You then focus on this until you can expand on this. its particularly good for somehting you've never experienced but want to write about. For example, I've never been sold into slavery but I do not what it feels like to be abandoned, betrayed so I can use this to portray what the character is feeling .
"Emotion memory
Stanislavski's 'system' focused on the development of artistic truth onstage by teaching actors to "experience the part" during performance. Stanislavski hoped that the 'system' could be applied to all forms of drama, including melodrama, vaudeville, and opera. He organised a series of theatre studios in which young actors were trained in his 'system.' At the First Studio, actors were instructed to use their own memories in order to express emotion.
Stanislavski soon observed that some of the actors using or abusing this technique were given to hysteria. He began to search for more reliable means to access emotion, eventually emphasizing the actor's use of imagination and belief in the given circumstances of the text rather than her/his private and often painful memories."
As for the ten commandments, it is asking question such as;
where have i (the character) just come from?
where am i going?
what is my motive?
What is my immediate goal/ dream?
What is my long term goal/ dream?
etc etc
So you may find this completely unhelpful or not. Either way, have a go, google it, research it.
But now i need to stop getting distracted by this site and crack on with the mountain of college work I have to get through before i can even consider writing!
Kelly
Basically, I took GCSE drama and part of the course was on Stanislavski, particularly his ten commandment's and drawing on past experiences. You use it to make your performance more realistic etc and a few weeks later I ended up using it on a piece of writing and found it really helped.
The past experiences thing is where you close your eyes and remember an experience where you were feeling angry etc. You then focus on this until you can expand on this. its particularly good for somehting you've never experienced but want to write about. For example, I've never been sold into slavery but I do not what it feels like to be abandoned, betrayed so I can use this to portray what the character is feeling .
"Emotion memory
Stanislavski's 'system' focused on the development of artistic truth onstage by teaching actors to "experience the part" during performance. Stanislavski hoped that the 'system' could be applied to all forms of drama, including melodrama, vaudeville, and opera. He organised a series of theatre studios in which young actors were trained in his 'system.' At the First Studio, actors were instructed to use their own memories in order to express emotion.
Stanislavski soon observed that some of the actors using or abusing this technique were given to hysteria. He began to search for more reliable means to access emotion, eventually emphasizing the actor's use of imagination and belief in the given circumstances of the text rather than her/his private and often painful memories."
As for the ten commandments, it is asking question such as;
where have i (the character) just come from?
where am i going?
what is my motive?
What is my immediate goal/ dream?
What is my long term goal/ dream?
etc etc
So you may find this completely unhelpful or not. Either way, have a go, google it, research it.
But now i need to stop getting distracted by this site and crack on with the mountain of college work I have to get through before i can even consider writing!
Kelly
