This practice-based PhD comprises an original screenplay Loy, about the modernist poet and artist Mina Loy (1882-1966), and a thesis which reflects on the writing of the screenplay using The Writer's Journey by Christopher Vogler (2007) as a creative aid. Vogler presents a screenwriting paradigm called The Hero's Journey which is adapted from the mythological theories of Joseph Campbell (1949) and is influenced by Jungian psychology. The research question asks how the Hero's Journey is relevant to the development of Loy with two female protagonists and whether the paradigm is universal in terms of gender. A secondary aim considers the potential value offered by Jungian feminist paradigms of Murdock (1990), Shinoda Boden (2004) and Pinkola Estes (1992) to the writing of Loy. The thesis reflects on the creative process of using these paradigms, and evaluates their effectiveness for Loy which explores the themes of identity and intimate relationships from a feminist perspective. Chapter 1, 'The Transformational Journey', explores the usefulness of the stages of the Hero's Journey to the structure and character stories of Loy's protagonists. Chapter 2, 'The Heroine's Journey', questions to what extent Murdock's 'Heroine's Journey' offers alternative value for the development of narratives with female protagonists. Chapter 3, 'Archetypes and Character', explores the archetypes of both Vogler and Jungian feminism as creative systems for character development in Loy. Chapter 4, 'Beyond Heroes', describes how the application of Jungian concepts which are wider than those used by Vogler assists the exploration of intimate relationships in Loy. The Conclusion contends that while Vogler's paradigm has some value for the writing of Loy, it is limited for the exploration of relationships and there is a masculine bias to his principles. An emerging screenwriting framework for relationship-orientated narratives with protagonists of both sexes is then proposed which may be useful to screenwriters.

<p>This thesis is a book length collection of poetry. Divided into five sections, the book </p> <p>follows a fractured self as it relates to romantic partnership, friendship, sexual trauma, political </p> <p>identity, and other factors. The first section introduces the different paradigms the speaker spends </p> <p>the rest of the book trying to understand her role within, exploring themes such as the ecstasies </p> <p>and let-downs of friendship, sexuality arrested by trauma and body-image, and anxieties about </p> <p>climate disaster and economic collapse. The second section grounds the speaker’s experience of </p> <p>dissociation in her college years. The third section continues to develop themes from the first two </p> <p>sections with an emphasis on the speaker’s relationship to language and its limitations. The fourth </p> <p>section, the only standalone sequence of poems in the collection, recounts a set of circumstances </p> <p>in which the speaker must reconcile her different factions of self during a crisis. The fifth and final </p> <p>section presents a speaker on the doorstep of acceptance of self, attempting to find stasis.</p>

Karmic Buyback: A Pilot Program, a screenplay, is the story of Oliver Harker, a water resources engineer in his early thirties, adrift in a world of lost social connections. Aside from this work, which he describes as "just a lot of redundant paperwork," his only connection to the outside world is his exuberant younger brother Van. With no father to speak of, and harboring long term resentment against his mother who ran away to Africa the day after Van's high school graduation, Oliver's defining tragic moment came three years earlier. It was then he discovered Eva, the woman he planned to marry, cheating with an old flame. Isolating himself from his few remaining friends, Oliver has become a short-tempered, unbearable grump. Meanwhile Eva, unbeknownst to Oliver, has recently died. She wakes to find herself in a strange, antiseptic afterlife where she is given the opportunity to repair some of the bad karma she accumulated in her short life, specifically in regard to Oliver. As Van begins to help him reestablish social ties, an accident which lands Oliver in the hospital finally draws their mother back across the Atlantic. Oliver must decide between Eva, in her foolish attempts to win him back as a result of the ultimately misguided Karmic Buyback Pilot Program, and the real people who love him.

The following report documents the evolution of the script The Other Side of Shadow and the effects that extensive rewriting, character work, and story restructuring have had on the author. / text

This study took the widely-accepted, ‘industry standard’ Structural Paradigm of feature film plotting, and ‘road tested’ it, assessing its value as a tool in the process of actually writing a feature film script. The methodology employed was to write a feature film script (titled THE ARM THAT DOES THE HARM) and look to apply the Paradigm to the writing process. Journals recording the process were kept and peer assessment undertaken. The data from these sources was then analysed and conclusions drawn. The reason for and value of this study are that, while this Paradigm is widely espoused by screenwriting gurus, taught as part of film courses and applied as a tool of script assessment and review, there is very little documented evidence of its actual value to the practice of writing a script. My findings revealed that, though a useful reference point throughout, the Paradigm is most valuable during the early stages of story structuring and again, most particularly, when editing later drafts. An important outcome of this study was that it identified the Paradigm as a valuable tool, not a rule that must be adhered to, a series of points a narrative must be seen to ‘hit’ in order for it to be considered to have been told correctly. Further, this study demonstrated in practice how this tool can be applied. This study suggests that trying to force an evolving story into the confines of the Paradigm can inhibit the story from developing ‘organically’ from its characters. Rather, the Paradigm should be applied as a tool for helping shape stories that first and foremost should be character-driven.

<p>  </p> <p>This thesis is a book length collection of short stories. It features eight short stories, most of which generally fall into speculative and related genres, including quasi-historical fiction, ghost story, fiction of the weird, and others. The stories feature original characters as well as versions and send ups of figures from history, culture, and religion, such as Yiddish film actress Molly Picon, urban legend The Jersey Devil, the professional athletes of the National Hockey League, and religious characters Vashti and Esther from the Book of Esther. It deals with themes such as Judaism, diaspora, queerness, ecological and political collapse, isolation, coming of age, and the ability to understand oneself within the gaze of another.</p>

<p>A thesis involved with the coming of age of a young queer person.</p>

<p>A collection of short stories featuring surreal events and worlds showcasing interpersonal struggles in the backdrop of environmental issues.</p>

<p>This thesis consists of a chapbook length collection of poetry. </p>

<p>This was a creative endeavor undertaken to understand what it is to “create” literature. Stories vary in both theme and style. Each one attempts to engage the reader’s understanding of their own world.  </p>