Monday, August 23, 2010

Ballad of a Thin Man: Chapter One, Chapter Two

I've had this really weird story idea/promt thing, where I would write a story about a song, each line a different chapter. Ballad of a Thin Man, Bob Dylan. This is gonna be hard. I'll try and write another one soon but I don't have any ideas where it could go from there. Look up the song and try and help me. (the first chapter is the title)

One. Ballad of a Thin Man.

His name was nothing. Jones, it was. Thomas Jones. Tom Jones. Nothing. His name was everything he was not- inconspicuous, unimportant. Normal. He was not normal.
Of course, like most "weird," or "abnormal" people, he had many normal aspects of his life. His parents, for instance. They were normal. God, they were normal. And his childhood. That was reasonably normal- as normal as any kid's childhood could be.
Mr. Jones was 23. Which was normal, that age. Another normal aspect to his life.
23.
Nothing special.
But then you see what he is, and you realize that he's special, no matter his childhood or his parents. They did nothing to keep this man normal. He was- for lack of a better word- stubbornly- abnormal.
And abnormal he remained.


Two. You Walk Into the Room With a Pencil in Your Hand.

"You!"
Jones looked up and gestured to himself, mouthing "Who, me?" to piss the person off.
"Yeah, you!" The person was, indeed pissed off. "Listen, man, you've gotta leave."
Jones began mouthing and gesturing to himself again and the pissed off man looked even more pissed off. "Yes, you!" he growled. "Get of my property!"
"Your property?" It was the first time Jones spoke, and the pissed off man wasn't expecting it. Jones's tone was surprised, and not mocking surprised, like "You own property?" but confused surprised, which made him continue. "Are you sure this is your property? Not someone... else's...?" His questino faded out at the end, as if he didn't really want to ask it for the fear the asking would bring more questions.
"Like who's?" Yes, more questions. "You aren't..? No..." His question faded off in the same way as Jones's, for the same reasons.
"No, I'm not."
"Um..." The pissed off man was now more confused than pissed off. "You aren't?"
"No, I am."
"But..."
"I'm sorry, I think I've confused you." Jones didn't look sorry at all, he looked pleased with himself that it had taken so little effort to confuse the confused man. "I lied: I am." This didn't reassure the man at all.
"You- y-you are?"
"I just said that, didn't I?"
"So you...?"
"Yes."
"Really?"
"No."
"What?"
"Kidding, again."
"Ah... so you are...?"
"Yes."
"Um..." The confusede man didn't know what to do. He definitely didn't want him there, but know that he was from the old owner, he didn't want to ask him to leave. There is no way to phrase that politely to one of these people.
"Um..." he repeaded.
"Should I leave?" Jones said.
"Um..."
"I'll leave."
The confused and pissed off man half-expected to hear an "I'll be back," but got only silence, which was welcomed back to the house with open arms.
Jones was jealous of the silence.


Three. You See Somebody Naked and You Say "Who Is That Man?"

So... what should happen? Do you like it? Well, more importantly, what should happen. I think the "Naked Man" will be somebody spilling their secrets.... but why does Jones visit the building in the first place? How did he know the owner? Why doesn't he live there anymore? Its so annoying to write a story when you have no idea where it's taking you.

2 comments:

  1. great idea! its interesting (or will be) to see how you string/pad simple verses into paragraphs, and make that a full story. just keep in mind that it still needs to be understandable. that being said, i think you should pick lyrics a little less.... cryptic... than Dylan.

    Good luck!

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  2. Thanks... but do you have any ideas? because I really don't know where he's going to and where he's coming from.

    ReplyDelete