The Sausage
A Writing Exercise
Howdy! Looking through my files, I stumbled upon this writing exercise I did back in November 2020, while I was following Ursula K. Le Guin’s fantastic writing guide Steering The Craft.
The exercise is called ‘Am I Saramago?’, and what you need to do is write a paragraph to a page (150–350 words) of narrative with no punctuation (and no paragraphs or other breaking devices), in the vein of Nobel Prize winner José Saramago.
I love how posts his writing exercises on his newsletter Gibberish, so I thought it would be fun to post my take on this one. Also, I was really shocked at how differently I wrote back in 2020. Why was I so angry?
Anyway, I hope you enjoy. And I look forward to seeing what the writers among you do with the exercise.
The smell assaults my nose making me gag and almost choke on my mint leaves but I don’t stop I continue on past the metallic stall where a fat mustached man is waving furiously no doubt trying to entice me to taste his filthy sausages and as I close in on him he’ll make a dumb sexist joke like you’re a woman aintcha bet you can’t say no to a nice fat sausage and when I see his leering face I think how about I kick your ass so hard you’ll be begging me to spare your colon you fat old sleazy fuck but I say nothing out loud because today’s my free day and I won’t spend it squashing bugs and oh there’s the joke and it’s exactly what I predicted God give me strength I turn right paying no mind to the other stalls toward the public baths for a nice hot soak to soothe my tired battered frame and when I reach downstairs whom do I see but my sister of course the brat had to be here already her back is turned and she’s curling her fingers to the men inside the water no doubt in search of a partner for the night and after all who’ll turn her down I wish it were that easy for me no actually I don’t give a fuck I could just beat the shit out of them and enjoy myself that way and I bet they’d enjoy it too finally my sister turns and sees me oh Leena I almost didn’t see you there just kidding you’re fat enough to block out the sun won’t you move a little to the side me and little John here are heading upstairs for a little private time and at that John lifts his hand and says howdy blacksmith but I ignore him training my eyes on the smug little bitch that is my sister and squinting and squaring my shoulders and she takes a step back saying sorry patting my shoulder and squeezing past me to the stairway knowing she made one big mistake and was about to get some private time with my knuckles.
Ohhh, now this is a story in the making, isn't it? I loved what you did with that. An incidental sausage and a wow of a look at a life...
well i find your posts and notes so often inspirational and deserving of some acknowledgement Andrei