# Writing Prompts for Pride A collection of writing prompts for Pride to help you deepen your queer stories and characters, explore new themes and possibilities, and reflect on what it means to be queer... in all our messy, magnificent multiplicities! Written by - Jamie Lawrence - Rex Mizrach Publish date 24/06/2026 June. Is there a sweeter (_and hotter_ 🔥) month? The parties, the long days… it’s all just so… _gay!_ This June has certainly been a busy one here at Ellipsus. In addition to the launch of Plus, we’ve been hard at work on making improvements to the tool, some of which will be rolling out very soon. But we want to pause (as we do every year!) to remember who we are, and why we’re here; to honor the communities that we belong to and love. Celebrating queerness; honoring each other; loving our differences with compassion, honor, and joy— _this_ is what Pride is all about. And we don’t have to tell you that right now—when so much of the world is trying to silence queer voices, explicitly erase queer experience, and shut queer stories and histories out of public life—telling and uplifting our stories is an act of resistance. So here’s a collection of writing prompts for Pride that we hope help you deepen your queer stories and characters. Go explore some queer themes and possibilities, and reflect on what it means to be queer… in all our messy and magnificent multiplicities! ## Becoming _Write about a character becoming more fully themself. What part of them has been waiting to emerge? Is it a sudden revelation or gradual; or a choice they must make again and again?_ _Artist: David Tovar_ _Revisit a scene where your character makes an important choice. Can you build up the stakes of this decision? What’s the cost of making the wrong decision?_ _Flesh out what it means for your character to live authentically. What does it share with, and differ from, from the other lives around them?_ ## Shelter _Artist: Rachel Droter_ _What (or who) does safety, refuge, or comfort look like to your character(s)?_ _Artist: Sir Lawrence Alma-Tadema_ _Picture your character in a space of safety. What do they learn about themselves, the world, or other people?_ ## Recognition _Artist: Jen Mazza_ _Your character encounters something that makes them recognize themselves—a story, an image, a conversation, a person, etc.—giving shape to something they couldn’t name. How does it change them?_ _Artist: Anna Sun_ _Write a scene where your character receives recognition from someone important to them._ ## Intimacy _Artist: Camille Deschiens_ _One character finally allows another to care for them. Why is accepting care difficult? What finally breaks through their defenses?_ _Artist: Holly Stapleton_ _Write the conversation that happens after the dramatic scene is over. After the kiss, the argument, the coming-out, or the reunion… what do the characters say or do after?_ _Artist: Anthony Cudahy_ _Write an intimate scene experimenting with new images or novel language._ ## First times _Artist: Dagou_ _Write a scene of your character waking up after their first queer experience. It’s the morning after—who are they with, and what happened last night? How do they feel?_ _Artist: Jeanne Mammen_ _Your character enters a queer space for the first time. What did they expect? What surprises them? What (or who) makes them decide to stay?_ _Artist: W. Dechant_ _First times are exciting, scary, and often messy. Write or revisit a first experience bringing these various dimensions into play._ ## Futures _Artist: Michelle Nguyen_ _Write the first moment your character imagines a future for themselves. Did that future come true?_ _Artist: Chema Mendez_ _Imagine your character in the future. What’s different about them? What’s the same? What have they learned by living a queer life?_ _Artist: Ivan Alifan_ _Reflect on what queer utopia(s) look(s) like to you._ _Artist: Pater Sato_ _What does your character want to change about themselves or their social environment? Write a scene where these desires shift, intensify, or transform._ ## Queer histories _Artist: Jeanne Mammen_ _Re-imagine your story or characters through another era. How do the period’s risks, politics, communities, and possibilities reshape them? Who do they interact with?_ _Artist: Arthur Ferrier_ _Your character becomes acquainted with a significant queer personality (through their work, in the flesh, etc). Write a scene exploring this encounter._ ## Found family _Artist: Paul Ferney_ _Write the moment a group of people becomes a family. What keeps them together?_ _Artist: Gerard van Horthorst_ _Write about a rift or drama that threatens the group’s dynamics. What wounds and loyalties exist within the group? How does it resolve?_ _Artist: David Tovar_ _Your character experiences a moment of true belonging. What does it feel like?_ ## Character exploration _Artist: Georges Rochegrosse_ _Take one of your underdeveloped characters and fill in their past. What does queerness mean to them? Who first offered them recognition, possibility, etc.? And what did they inherit from that history?_ _How do two (or more) of your characters relate to queerness? Write a scene exploring the differences between identities._