The Scholar: Dannielle Lu

The Project: Elsewhere, Briefly

What was your project, and why did you pursue it? My project was a collection of short fiction called Elsewhere, Briefly. I wanted to explore relationships between people, but especially the really small moments that normally get overlooked. A lot of my inspiration comes from just watching people in coffee shops or walking around cities and imagining the lives behind these really ordinary interactions. I’ve always been interested in writing, so Scholars gave me a chance to actually dedicate so much time with what my own style looks like instead of just writing for an assignment or a diary entry.

Surprising discovery: I think I realized how much I like restraint in writing. I used to feel like I had to explain everything for something to be meaningful, but through my research and writing these stories, I realized that sometimes saying less actually makes something feel like more. I started focusing a lot more on atmosphere and even silence. I also didn’t intentionally plan for every story to connect, but looking back, they all somehow return to the same idea of how people are shaped by each other.

Biggest challenge: Probably figuring out how to take inspiration from so many different places and actually make it my own. I was looking at books, films, photography, personal memories and even just people I saw walking around. It was easy to say, “I like the way Ishiguro does this,” or “I like the atmosphere of this scene,” but it was harder to figure out why I liked it and how I could use that in my own writing without just trying to imitate it.

Tip for future scholars: I would say don’t go into it thinking you already need to know exactly what your final project is going to be. A lot of what mine became came from things I discovered while I was actually doing it. Just pick something you genuinely care about enough to keep thinking about for an entire trimester, and let it change as you go. I think the process of figuring out what your project actually is part of the project itself.