Quote (Application form)
APPLICATION REQUIREMENTS
1.) Written response: You are sitting in a coffee shop when one of your favorite authors walks through the door. You approach him/her and strike up a conversation. What do you say? What questions do you ask? How does he/she respond?
Based on what you know about the author's background/writing style, creat a 1-2 page typed dialogue that occurs between you and our favorite author. While this dialogue should reveal specifics about the author concerning his/her works and writing style, you may also touch upon other areas of focus outside the author's life as a writer. Keep in mind that you are being selected for EHS based on your writing ability and the creativity reflected in your response to the prompt. Please make sure your work is final draft quality. A committee of TRHS faculty/staff will read and evaluate your writing.
English Honor Society Application
Walking along the street I noticed quite the commotion coming from a nearby shop. Naturally curious, I decided it would be worth my while to check it out. Upon my approach I found further closing in impeded by the crowd of people gathered around the shop, which I could now identify as a Coffee Shop from the suspended sign out front. Still vaguely curious, I looked around, searching for some clue as to what was happening to cause such a commotion.
Before long I found it. The bright red lettering wasn't hard to spot, once I was looking, despite the crowd. "SPECIAL GUEST SPEAKER" it said, mentioning the date of that very day shortly below it, "F. SCOTT FITZGERALD DISCUSSES HIS BOOKS." By this point I had become somewhat worried. The final word on the poster was the kicker; "Live."
Alone this simple four letter word isn't much to think on, but when it's used to refer to a Jazz age author who's been dead for decades, it requires a bit more pondering. Not for me, though. I quickly realized what was happening. Though these people were gathering for a chance to discuss the works of the great author, they were misled.
I'd seen it on the news recently: the tales of long dead authors coming back to life at coffee shops in front of fans. It was an incredibly disturbing concept. I'd dismissed it as some sort of media prank, but clearly this was either a very well planned back up for a prank, or the "lies" were nothing more than disturbing truths.
The people there could have been there for a love of The Great Gatsby, or perhaps they gathered with the crowd. They could even have made the same realizations as I had and had stayed out of pure morbid curiosity. I, however, didn't plan to be present when the zombified author broke free from his eternal slumber. I looked around and became startled to find myself now enclosed in the mob; more people had come up behind me as I was lost in thought. I tried backing up, but the crowd delayed my process. I still had at least a row of bodies behind me when I heard the announcer's strange and mumbling voice. Then a loud noise arose from within the shop, followed by the screams of various shocked mob members.
I turned and began to run. The sky turned dark and stormy, matching the frantic air. The mob stampeded away from the horrid sight, trampling all those who got in their way. Sadly, as I soon found out, I wasn't nearly aggressive enough. Despite beginning at the back of the group, furthest from the store front, I ended up being shoved to the ground, losing my lead. A more powerful, and likely frightened man was the culprit, and I watched as he shrunk into the distance.
I stood up, carefully, and surprisingly found myself unmolested by the crowd. In fact, the world had become startlingly quiet. It struck me then: The crowd was gone, and I was alone. A shuffled step behind me caused me to whip my body around on my heels.
Now facing back, my eyes made contact with what could only have been spawned from my worse nightmares, or about six decades of decomposing. The figure in front of me was rotten and decrepit, and reeked of death. It closed the space between itself and myself as I stood dumbfounded. After a few horrifying second of shock, I took a few slow steps backwards.
"Why me?" I asked aloud. I hadn't anticipated my meeting with a favorite author to be so traumatic. The creature that had once been Fitzgerald responded with a groan as he quickened his approach towards me.
By now it was raining. It had begun slowly and had now picked up to a rather serious downpour. I was grateful for my new hat as I looked down, turned once more, and began running at full clip. With the brim saving my eyes from serious water damage, I glanced around for somewhere to go.
The heavy downpour made it hard to see, regardless of how clear the three inches before my eyes were. It also made it hard to hear, which was worrisome. At a street corner, I stopped quick, nearly sliding off my feet and onto the cold pavement. Making a check over my left shoulder I saw the ghastly author approaching me, no longer shuffling. Somehow he had become even more competent as I tried to escape him, and he too was now running. I began running once more, but realized all he same that I couldn't keep this up and would need to use my head if I wanted to survive.
I realized with a start that my limited knowledge may not do me much good, but I tried to think of relevant information, anyway. "Well, he lived during the 20s, so he may like Jazz music." I began, slowly and ineffectively. I made my way to the bottom of a hill, and started up it, with the frightening literary giant gaining slightly by the second.
"The Great Gatsby was a commentary on the lifestyles of the rich and the issues they caused." I continued. "He was most successful with that one work, and sank into depression and alcoholism later in life." That one I figured I could use.
Scanning the surroundings once more, I looked for the largest house I could find, hoping almost satirically that being in the presence of such extravagance may slow him up some. I set off in the direction of a white edifice near the top of the hill, determined to confront him once I got there.
As the foul beast closed in on me, I dove through the front window, left open despite the rain, much to my convenience. Less nimble in his death, Fitzgerald made his way to the door and began pounding it down as I wandered through the house.
Dripping all over the nice carpeting, I made my way to the kitchen. Not long after my entry, I heard the front door splinter, and my heart began to pound. I spotted a wine cabinet and quickly pulled out a bottle, readying it in throwing position over my shoulder.
Warily, I waited. Once the author, extolled as a symbol of his "lost generation", entered the kitchen, I did my best to lose him once more. I threw a bottle at him, aiming for his liver, figuring that his alcoholism would have made that a weak point on him. A few moments later, I'd realize I had been horribly mistaken.
In my panicked state, I hadn't been thinking logically. The bottles did me no good in the face of the approaching writer-turned-zombie. "I should have thought about the zombie defeating information I've gleamed from video games, not the F.Scott Fitzgerald information I've gained through The Great Gatsby and Garraty." I thought, a realization coming all to late as the wretch came upon me.
I fell to the ground and opened my eyes to darkness. I felt a heavy covering, but it wasn't the same. I found myself covered in a cold sweat, with the green glow of my alarm clock barely illuminating a corner of my own bedroom. It had all been a horrible bad dream, which I had awoken from in time to save my fragile dream-based.
In the darkness of the miserably early morning, I promised myself to never meet a favorite author in a coffee shop ever again, and tried to get back to sleep.
Personally, I think it hits all the requirements. I just leaned a bit towards the "other details may be touched upon" and "judged on creativity".