How about this for a tricky bit of writing homework:
Rewrite the Hemingway story Hills Like White Elephants in the style of Gabriel García Márquez’s The Handsomest Drowned Man in the World.
Hemingway’s prose is sparse and factual. For the most part, his story consists of dialogue between two people while waiting for a train. Márquez’s narrative is dense and mainly descriptive, told in the style of a fable or legend.
My task, therefore, was a difficult one. However, having spent most of a sunny Saturday afternoon struggling with it, I was quite pleased with the outcome. But my story seemed unfinished. I went back on Sunday and added an extra scene. This gave the story a better ending, but changed the theme into something a little different from the original Hemingway one.
Now, my next piece of homework: to rewrite the Márquez story in the style of AL Kennedy’s story, A Bad Son …..
Ruth Livingstone 