On writing...
Jan. 11th, 2013 07:50 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
shadowkatEnd of the week...and there are bits and pieces of it that seem wedged inside my brain, sort of similar to a slice of apple caught between your teeth. (Don't you hate it when that happens? That and contact lenses getting lost in your eye. Spent twenty minutes at work today hunting the contact that was lost in my eye - highly annoying.)
These bits and pieces are things I desperately wanted to say - but alas could not, and then the moment passed. So here they are...non-sequiture for your amusement or bewilderment and my mental relief. Writing is often a way of expunging the stray thoughts from ones brain. And I just thought better of it. Delete! Delete! Problem with the information age is too often we write what we think, even when we really shouldn't. Our brains do come with an edit button, after all. I just often forget to use mine, to my own considerable chagrin.
Been reading Margaret Atwood and well, work, so vocabulary has gotten a bit more advanced. I tend to mimic whatever I'm reading. Sad, but true.
Difference between writing a story in one's head and on paper...is the story in my head is more disjointed, it goes off on tangents, and is often told out of order. It's like watching segments from a movie but not necessarily in order. Also I paraphrase and skip scenes. Jump over bits. And then back-track. Leaving out long sections of explanation. On paper, you can't do that, well you can, but not if you want the reader to figure out what you are saying. The other difference - is often words and phrases sound better and play out better in my head than on paper. Or for some absurd reason - I'll come up with something amazing in my head but cannot duplicate it on paper.
Grating that.
Currently reading "Blind Assassin" by Margaret Atwood. Enjoying it. Even if I'm not exactly plowing through it. One does not plow through a Margaret Atwood novel, one savors it...like a fine wine. It takes time to digest properly. A skim-able page-turner this is not.
Atwood is a descriptive writer...and poetic. Reading Atwood at times feels like reading prose poetry, there's a rhythm and flow to the words. Most best-selling writers do not write like that. Literary writers do. Best-selling pulp novelists do not. Their books are leaner or more focused on action. Dialogue heavy. With little description or the description feels perfunctory and if lengthy unnecessary - like "we had baked bread, eggs, and bacon for breakfast. I work a pencil skirt and shirt. He wore a tie and pin striped suit." A good writer can make the description feel like watching a movie...you barely notice it. A lackluster writer...makes you want to skim and you wonder why they won't just get on with it.
EL James and Stephanie Meyer are crappy writers. You get bored reading their description, want to skim, and feel it is repetitive. James has witty dialogue and some witty ideas. But her description is repetitive as are her characters internal thoughts and monologues. Too much pop slang, and it is repetitive pop slang - to the point of grating. (I still like the whole contract bit - that was innovative and hilarious, but I'm also a Contracts lawyer, so this makes sense.) Atwood in stark contrast is a master - her description flows and you find yourself re-reading it. She has little dialogue. And the story unfolds like a splendid film in your head, detailed. The words sing.
To understand the art of writing - you need to read crappy and masterful writers I think - just to see the difference. I tend to forget crappy writers. Over time their stories fade and blur. While better writers stories take root in my head. I remember attempting to read Diana Galadhan(sp?) book Outlander - it was rec'd by a friend who hated romance novels but loved this one. I couldn't make it through it. Too flowery and whiny. The heroine grated on my nerves and I did not like the hero. Actually I liked the modern day husband - which went against the grain of the story. So I gave up. DG tries hard, but she's no Atwood, closer to EL James and Anne Rice, actually, both of which I've read and enjoyed but admit are trashy pop writers. Can't remember 90% of it. While Dorothy Dunnett's Chronicles of Lymond are memorized. Yes, Dunnett comes across as bit egotistical and pretentious in her word choice and use of language, but I adored the story she wrote, the characters she created. Her description is a tad on the flowery side - too many words and often in a passive or distancing voice - making her story inaccessible to a lot of readers. OTOH, working to get at it...can be engrossing. Austen had similar issues. I love Austen, but she's not easy to read. Writes in the passive voice. Often the story is told indirectly or as if it happened to a distant relation. And there's a stiffness to the language and dialect. On the other hand, this was the writing style of the time. Most people wrote in this manner. It was the style of letters - a formal writing style - in which you indirectly spoke of things. It was considered "rude" to speak directly of it. Austen made fun of this indirectness in her writing. And her works are in a way satirical. Jim Butcher and Kim Harrison and Janet Evanovich have more direct styles of writing. If in the first person - they also tend to be more minimalist in description. Conan Doyle and Dorothy Sayers were similar. As was Ernest Hemingway who strongly believed in less was more - having come at writing through journalism. James Joyce and William Faulkner in stark contrast are more wordy...descriptive, less dialogue and feel the need to make you chew, taste, and smell each syllable. They also wanted you to fall inside the mind and actually think like their characters - to capture how one thinks.
So much about writing is about what you intend to communicate to the reader. How you write a story, the specific style or words you use - often convey what your intent is. Not always but often. Some writers can only write in one style, others in many. Writing is an art-form, good writing, I often think is in the eye-of-the-beholder, although the basic tenants of technique are another thing entirely and open to objective critique. Amateur writers will often stumble over these rules or tenants. As a result, their stories are either unmemorable or poorly conveyed and confusing. The most important thing to remember in regards to writing is the main purpose is to communicate what is inside the writer's head to another outside party. If something fails in the translation...then as tempting as it may be to blame the reader, the fault ultimately lies with the writer - it is the writer's responsibility to convey what they are thinking. To obtain the reader's attention, short though it may be, to get them interested, and to convey the thought.
It's hard work - reader's are fickle creatures, with the attention span of gnats, and it is not helped by the fact that today they have a million other things to attract their attention. You have to work hard to get a reader interested. There are tactics, gimmicks, and tricks...but really it just takes a bit of luck, a touch of patience, and lots of work. And once you get their attention, your job is still not done. No, the hard work begins...you not only have to keep their attention, you have to find a way to convey your message to your reader through flimsy words and sentences without it somehow getting garbled in transit.
These bits and pieces are things I desperately wanted to say - but alas could not, and then the moment passed. So here they are...non-sequiture for your amusement or bewilderment and my mental relief. Writing is often a way of expunging the stray thoughts from ones brain. And I just thought better of it. Delete! Delete! Problem with the information age is too often we write what we think, even when we really shouldn't. Our brains do come with an edit button, after all. I just often forget to use mine, to my own considerable chagrin.
Been reading Margaret Atwood and well, work, so vocabulary has gotten a bit more advanced. I tend to mimic whatever I'm reading. Sad, but true.
Difference between writing a story in one's head and on paper...is the story in my head is more disjointed, it goes off on tangents, and is often told out of order. It's like watching segments from a movie but not necessarily in order. Also I paraphrase and skip scenes. Jump over bits. And then back-track. Leaving out long sections of explanation. On paper, you can't do that, well you can, but not if you want the reader to figure out what you are saying. The other difference - is often words and phrases sound better and play out better in my head than on paper. Or for some absurd reason - I'll come up with something amazing in my head but cannot duplicate it on paper.
Grating that.
Currently reading "Blind Assassin" by Margaret Atwood. Enjoying it. Even if I'm not exactly plowing through it. One does not plow through a Margaret Atwood novel, one savors it...like a fine wine. It takes time to digest properly. A skim-able page-turner this is not.
Atwood is a descriptive writer...and poetic. Reading Atwood at times feels like reading prose poetry, there's a rhythm and flow to the words. Most best-selling writers do not write like that. Literary writers do. Best-selling pulp novelists do not. Their books are leaner or more focused on action. Dialogue heavy. With little description or the description feels perfunctory and if lengthy unnecessary - like "we had baked bread, eggs, and bacon for breakfast. I work a pencil skirt and shirt. He wore a tie and pin striped suit." A good writer can make the description feel like watching a movie...you barely notice it. A lackluster writer...makes you want to skim and you wonder why they won't just get on with it.
EL James and Stephanie Meyer are crappy writers. You get bored reading their description, want to skim, and feel it is repetitive. James has witty dialogue and some witty ideas. But her description is repetitive as are her characters internal thoughts and monologues. Too much pop slang, and it is repetitive pop slang - to the point of grating. (I still like the whole contract bit - that was innovative and hilarious, but I'm also a Contracts lawyer, so this makes sense.) Atwood in stark contrast is a master - her description flows and you find yourself re-reading it. She has little dialogue. And the story unfolds like a splendid film in your head, detailed. The words sing.
To understand the art of writing - you need to read crappy and masterful writers I think - just to see the difference. I tend to forget crappy writers. Over time their stories fade and blur. While better writers stories take root in my head. I remember attempting to read Diana Galadhan(sp?) book Outlander - it was rec'd by a friend who hated romance novels but loved this one. I couldn't make it through it. Too flowery and whiny. The heroine grated on my nerves and I did not like the hero. Actually I liked the modern day husband - which went against the grain of the story. So I gave up. DG tries hard, but she's no Atwood, closer to EL James and Anne Rice, actually, both of which I've read and enjoyed but admit are trashy pop writers. Can't remember 90% of it. While Dorothy Dunnett's Chronicles of Lymond are memorized. Yes, Dunnett comes across as bit egotistical and pretentious in her word choice and use of language, but I adored the story she wrote, the characters she created. Her description is a tad on the flowery side - too many words and often in a passive or distancing voice - making her story inaccessible to a lot of readers. OTOH, working to get at it...can be engrossing. Austen had similar issues. I love Austen, but she's not easy to read. Writes in the passive voice. Often the story is told indirectly or as if it happened to a distant relation. And there's a stiffness to the language and dialect. On the other hand, this was the writing style of the time. Most people wrote in this manner. It was the style of letters - a formal writing style - in which you indirectly spoke of things. It was considered "rude" to speak directly of it. Austen made fun of this indirectness in her writing. And her works are in a way satirical. Jim Butcher and Kim Harrison and Janet Evanovich have more direct styles of writing. If in the first person - they also tend to be more minimalist in description. Conan Doyle and Dorothy Sayers were similar. As was Ernest Hemingway who strongly believed in less was more - having come at writing through journalism. James Joyce and William Faulkner in stark contrast are more wordy...descriptive, less dialogue and feel the need to make you chew, taste, and smell each syllable. They also wanted you to fall inside the mind and actually think like their characters - to capture how one thinks.
So much about writing is about what you intend to communicate to the reader. How you write a story, the specific style or words you use - often convey what your intent is. Not always but often. Some writers can only write in one style, others in many. Writing is an art-form, good writing, I often think is in the eye-of-the-beholder, although the basic tenants of technique are another thing entirely and open to objective critique. Amateur writers will often stumble over these rules or tenants. As a result, their stories are either unmemorable or poorly conveyed and confusing. The most important thing to remember in regards to writing is the main purpose is to communicate what is inside the writer's head to another outside party. If something fails in the translation...then as tempting as it may be to blame the reader, the fault ultimately lies with the writer - it is the writer's responsibility to convey what they are thinking. To obtain the reader's attention, short though it may be, to get them interested, and to convey the thought.
It's hard work - reader's are fickle creatures, with the attention span of gnats, and it is not helped by the fact that today they have a million other things to attract their attention. You have to work hard to get a reader interested. There are tactics, gimmicks, and tricks...but really it just takes a bit of luck, a touch of patience, and lots of work. And once you get their attention, your job is still not done. No, the hard work begins...you not only have to keep their attention, you have to find a way to convey your message to your reader through flimsy words and sentences without it somehow getting garbled in transit.