no outside research
Following the rules laid out by Tim O’Brien in his masterpiece “How to Tell a True War Story,” you will tell a story of your own. Your story could be about a soccer game you played in, the loss of a beloved family pet, a particularly difficult English paper you wrote for Ms. Taylor in 10th grade. Choose some sort of challenge you have faced, and recount the event in a way that gets to the emotional truth of the experience.
You can and should be “adding and subtracting, making up a few things to get at the real truth.” This means that your story should not be an accurate retelling of events, but a way for you to convey what you were feeling in the moment. Emphasize the “story-truth” over the “happening-truth,” and have fun.
MLA Format