This month, we’re going to look at “Unchoreographed” by Anne Georg. There are several things that are working well in this story: a great opening line, the precision of language, and the inverted Rags-to-Riches trope.
Opening line
As we’ve seen before in the previous two stories:
…an opening line is really important. “Unchoreographed” opens with: “Ursula’s arrival sucked the air out of the locker-room.” This gives us:
- a character: Ursula;
- a place: the locker-room;
- a problem: with “sucked out the air”, we know Ursula is not welcome.
It’s important, if you can, to not only hook the reader with a beautiful sentence, but give the reader information from the start; ground them with a character or in time and place; preferably both.
Precision of language
This is the following paragraph (which is a single sentence):
Teenage girls, skinny, stretchy, sidling along benches, pulled on white tights and pink tutus, tightened ribbons on leather slippers, turned their bun heads to stare; long torsos frozen mid-bend over sinewy legs, gossips hushed mid-sentence.
There is so much to unpack in this paragraph alone. Specificity is something that really shines through in a story. Imagine if instead of this paragraph packed with detail, Georg had written: “Several girls were getting ready for a dance class. They stopped talking when Ursula walked in.” Not only would it be shorter, but far less interesting. Most importantly, it would be much harder to picture the scene. The details Georg draws our attention to are: “white tights”, “pink tutus”, “tightened ribbons on leather slippers”. It’s a fine balance, of course—too much detail and a story can be weighed down—but what Georg has done here, and rightly so, is give small details of things readers are probably already aware of—tights and tutus and slippers—and has saved the intricate detail for the girls.
Look at how they are described: “Teenage girls, skinny, stretchy, sidling along benches”, “their bun heads”, “long torsos frozen mid-bend over sinewy legs”. We can really picture these girls.
If we unpack this further on a word-by-word level, note all the “s” sounds in the first half of the sentence: “Teenage girls, skinny, stretchy, sidling along benches, pulled on white tights and pink tutus, tightened ribbons on leather slippers, turned their bun heads to stare”. A pair or string of words that start with the same letter—skinny, stretchy, sidling—is called alliteration and can be very pleasing to read. Equally, Georg makes use of assonance too, which is when the middle sound of words is the same, i.e., “stretchy, sidling along benches”. These don’t necessarily have to be directly next to each other to have an enjoyable effect.
The final comment about this paragraph is the use of “turned their bun heads” which is original and striking.
Throughout the story, there are many more examples of alliteration and assonance. Take out a highlighter and see if you can find them.
Inversion of Rags-to-Riches Trope
There are infinite stories, but many people have suggested there are only several story types, such as “The Quest” or “Overcoming the Monster”. “Rags-to-Riches” is another common story type. Possibly the most famous one is Charles Dickens’ Great Expectations.
So, for Rags-to-Riches to work, there needs to be a starting point of “rags”. In “Unchoreographed”, we can see this here: “She’d paid dearly from her skimpy budget for this. And hadn’t she come to Europe for experiences?” And on an emotional level, we can see it here: “She examined herself in the mirror. Wrong outfit. She cringed. Her reflection glared back. Intimidated by teenagers? She hadn’t been the worst student in her dance class. Was she not intelligent, adventurous, and beautiful? People had told her that.”
What we’re expecting, despite appearances—financially, physically, and emotionally—is that Ursula will shine in the ballet class; that although a little out of practice, she’ll be the best dancer the instructor has ever seen; that the tittering girls will be wowed. Then the Rags-to-Riches story type would be complete.
However, this isn’t what happens. Ursula is unable to do the exercises, is clumsy, and is thrown out of the class. And although a little stung—”Snickers stung like slaps of judgment”—she eventually emerges triumphant: “Outside, she merged with an uncurated throng ambling, surging, zigzagging through unchoreographed lives, thrusting her forward with them.”
And, finally, note the use of “unchoreographed,” which loops back to the title.
Summary
As you can hopefully see, “Unchoreographed” by Anne Georg is working well on so many levels: the opening sentence, the precision of language and the reversal of type. And, not to be missed: the looping back to the title at the very end which gives a great sense of closure and satisfaction. This story is a great read!
Thanku. Love the clarity and simplicity of this piece. Very helpful to me