Writing Exercises

Reveal character—or relationship—through a handful of objects you notice on the shelf of someone you know well.

As archaeologist, or detective, observe a couple of revelatory objects on the shelf of someone you can know nothing about, and write a paragraph or two about what they seem to disclose to you about that person's life.

Collections of objects such as this, one of Joseph Cornell's wonderful boxes, might be said to be cheating, not representative of their owner but merely assembled for artistic effect, but I'd suggest that what is deliberately chosen can be equally telling...


image:  Joseph Cornell, Untitled (Cockatoo and Corks),  WebMuseum, Paris