Little Traces
A Chapbook
"Girl": A Kincaid Model Exercise
Write a very brief story modeled after "Girl":
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You can choose to write your piece with the same theme (a parent admonishing an older child, who is becoming more adult) or you can create a different set-up between any two characters; follow Kincaid's lead and use the story to reveal the tension between them.
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Write detailed phrases that give instruction spoken from one character to another, using emphatic (do this, don't do that) phrases, with the "you" mostly implied (Reread "Girl" to see how often she says you.)
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25 to 45 "instructions" linked by semicolons.
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Two italicized lines placed apart from each other in the text (follow Kincaid's lead for where) that are from the character receiving instructions
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Make sure the characters' roles are only implied, not directly stated
If you want to create a different scenario:
Be sure to include the power difference between the characters, and have the instructions be about "surviving" in a particular culture and "living up to" the more powerful speaker's standards. Follow all the other bullet points above.
After Jamaica Kincaid's super-short story “Girl”...
As you can experience by reading "Girl,” by Jamaica Kincaid, the story creates characters and a fully fleshed-out story in just one paragraph crammed with phrases connected with semicolons (;). Here are some things to note:
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There are 43 different instructions (if I've counted correctly) from a character who is likely the mother of the "girl" character.
What makes these lines read like instructions? It is emphatic, implied "you" in each sentence. While a directly stated "you" is used only sparingly within some of the phrases, we all know from reading that "don't walk bareheaded in the hot sun" is spoken to someone; the implied "you" is the girl
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There are 2 lines spoken in defense from the girl, likely the daughter; these two lines are in italics, to distinguish them from the instructions.
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Most of the lines are specific instructions about how to survive in a particular culture (easily recognizable as different from most of our situations!) at a particular time.
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Another thread in the story, which is very important to the story and to create the tone, even though much fewer lines are dedicated to it, is the mother character's admonition to the daughter not to be "the slut you are bent on becoming."
As an aside, this whole very very short story is a great example of how to create a complex list using semicolons, as well as how to punctuate the phrases between the semi-colons (with commas and dashes), even though you would rarely do a complex list this long!