Writing Creatively: A Guided Journal to Using Literary Devices

Holding thought loops, metaphoric maneuvers, startling juxtaposition, and clever catachresis, a guided journal allows students of the art of discourse a place to test the waters before leaving safe harbor.

Nancy Dafoe’s guided journal is designed to complement her book Breaking Open the Box: A Guide for Creative Techniques to Improve Academic Writing and Generate Critical Thinking, but it may be used independently from that text by composition instructors and writing teachers interested in helping their students develop, practice, and master creative techniques and skills in order to advance and enliven writing.

The design of Dafoe’s guided journal-featuring teacher and student sides-is intended to make it easy for writing instructors to work with their students on individual concepts. This guided journal contains models and exemplars, as well as encourages explorations in language.

Skilled academic writers, essayists, and novelists have long known that savvy application of poetic techniques and practice in language play makes for better writing in every genre and for more powerful rhetoric.