  Short Stories
This week: My Five Sense Worth Edited by: Shannon  
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Nothing is more memorable than a smell. One scent can be unexpected, momentary and fleeting, yet conjure up a childhood summer beside a lake in the mountains; another, a moonlit beach; a third, a family dinner of pot roast and sweet potatoes during a myrtle-mad August in a Midwestern town. Smells detonate softly in our memory like poignant land mines hidden under the weedy mass of years. Hit a tripwire of smell and memories explode all at once. A complex vision leaps out of the undergrowth. ~ Diane Ackerman, A Natural History of the Senses
Welcome to the Short Stories Newsletter. I am Shannon and I'm your editor this week. |
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My Five Sense Worth:
How Sight, Smell, Hearing, Taste, and Touch Form Our Memories and Shape Our Lives
I was sitting in a coffee shop the other day sipping my Venti Extra Hot Chai Tea Latté and reading Committed by Elizabeth Gilbert when a familiar scent wafted my way.
Oh my God, is that Emeraude? I haven't smelled that in years! I thought, raising my head in an attempt to locate the source. Instead, I was immediately transported back to 1975 and my grandmother's red-carpeted living room.
"Oh, no. Skedaddle, children!. You know you're not supposed to be in here!" Grandma said, shooing my three brothers and I out of her living room. She reached behind the French doors for the rake she kept hidden there, and we watched, embarrassed and hurt, as she raked our footprints out of the pristine red carpet. "Look at what you've done. Where's your mother?"
The memory brought back all the shame I felt that day, all the guilt, all the longing for a loving grandmother who bakes cookies and hugs you till you can't breathe.
I felt seven years old again.
A smell can bring on a flood of memories, influence people's moods and even affect their work performance. Because the olfactory bulb is part of the brain's limbic system, an area so closely associated with memory and feeling it's sometimes called the "emotional brain," smell can call up memories and powerful responses almost instantaneously.
The olfactory bulb has intimate access to the amygdala, which processes emotion, and the hippocampus, which is responsible for associative learning. Despite the tight wiring, however, smells would not trigger memories if it weren't for conditioned responses. When you first smell a new scent, you link it to an event, a person, a thing or even a moment. Your brain forges a link between the smell and a memory -- associating the smell of chlorine with summers at the pool or lilies with a funeral. When you encounter the smell again, the link is already there, ready to elicit a memory or a mood. 1
"This kind of memory, where an unexpected re-encounter with a scent from the distant past brings back a rush of memories, is called a 'Proustian Memory'. It's named after Marcel Proust, one of the greatest novelists of the 20th century. He describes this phenomenon in the opening chapter of his novel Swan's Way, the first novel in his mammoth seven-part work, Remembrance Of Things Past." 2
I was a bit surprised by the intensity of the emotion I felt, and it made me wonder about my characters and their pasts, their experiences. What sights, sounds, smells, tastes, textures would trigger memories of pleasure or pain? Maybe Bluer Than Blue was playing when our protagonist's girlfriend dumped him. Now every time he hears that song he thinks of her. Perhaps the smell of rain reminds our main character of that day in second grade when she waited for the schoolbus in a downpour and saw her puppy get hit by a car. Could it be that your antagonist hates brunettes with straight hair parted down the middle because his domineering, physically abusive mother wore her hair that way? What about the character who can't eat chocolate chip mint ice cream because her uncle used to buy her a cone before he'd molest her?
You can thank your senses for every memory you've got, and so can your characters. Use them! Dig up something from your character's past that stops him in his tracks. Have someone wear that cologne, order that food, play that song.
Let's stir things up a bit and see what happens.
1. Dowdey, Sarah. "How Smell Works" 29 October 2007. HowStuffWorks.com. <http://health.howstuffworks.com/human-body/systems/nose-throat/smell.htm> 26 March 2011.
2. Kruszelnicki, Karl S. "Smell and Memory 1" 28 June 2001. ABC.net. <http://www.abc.net.au/science/articles/2001/06/28/313347.htm> 28 March 2001.
Peace and blessings.
Please check out "Newsletter Archives" [E] for all my editorials. |
I hope you enjoy this week's featured selections. Remember to do the authors the courtesy of reviewing the ones you read. Thank you, and have a great week!
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Alexander had hated tea. Funny how that memory suddenly came back to her.
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Feedback
The following is in response to "Short Stories Newsletter (March 2, 2011)" :
Rixfarmgirl  says, "You do a great job! Keep it up. Thanks for highlighting my Polly's Secret. They also just picked up my non-fiction Peanut Butter and Jelly story for their March issue." Whoo-hoo! I'll post it below with the rest of the submitted items. Congratulations!
BIG BAD WOLF is Howling  says, "Sometimes the scariest thing is women.  " I'm not touching that with a ten-foot pole, but I DID include your submitted story below. 
billwilcox says, "A very classy newsletter, Shannon. One of those that makes you think. I like that." Aw, thank you, Bill! I'm glad you liked it. (((hugs)))
atwhatcost says, ""I don't know about you, but if I don't like a story's main character, I won't continue to read.' Ah, but there are stories I've read, despite not liking the main character. One Flew Over the Cuckoo's Nest and The Godfather come to mind. I don't think it can be done easily in a short story, but nasty protagonist can still make for good stories." I think both of those characters are likeable (and charming) in their own way. As I read your feedback, Tony Soprano instantly came to mind. I'd love him one minute and hate him the next, but he, R.P. McMurphy, and Don Vito Corleone have one thing in common: you can't help but watch to see what they do next because whether it's good or bad, it's always interesting. Thank you for the R&R, Lynn! 
Dante  says, "Check out The Sad-Eyed Poet by Michael S. Campbell." I will. I always like to read work recommended by other writers. Thank you!
LJPC - the tortoise says, "Hi Shannon! I enjoyed your newsletter. I agree with your comment about bailing on a book if you don't like the mc. That happens to me a lot. Sometimes, it's not that I don't like them, it's that I don't really care--they're boring. There's a super-bestselling horror author who continues to find success although his characters are 'flawed'. (In my opinion, they're utterly unlikeable.) Weird, huh?" I couldn't agree more. Just because someone's a criminal or a little crazy doesn't make them unlikeable. If what they do is charming or interesting, the readers will keep reading (or watching). Thanks, Laura!
In response to "Short Stories Newsletter (November 9, 2010)" Lothmorwel says, "Reading a real-world (i.e., someone you personally know) person's work is hard. I was asked to read a story a few years ago by a friend. I didn't make it past the first chapter or so because she kept changing from one person's viewpoint to the other and didn't make it clear who was speaking when. I was too 'polite' and too scared of offending her to tell her the truth, so I just kept on saying I hadn't gotten around to reading it. I feel awful about that now; she probably would really have appreciated the advice, and if she didn't and got offended, then she wouldn't have been open-minded and humble enough to learn how to be a better writer. I'll never know. Next time I'll tell the tactful truth." Excellent advice! We need to hear the "bad" along with the good. It's this "tactful truth" that enables us to hone our craft and perfect our writing. Thank you for sharing!
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Short Stories: March 30, 2011 Issue [#4307]
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