FILL: How do you start?
Aug. 26th, 2010 02:22 pm![[identity profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/openid.png){kind=small}
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writercisesOriginal posting 18 July 2010
Odd...
Over here
http://www.writingexcuses.com/2010/07/11/writing-excuses-4-27-major-overhauls-to-broken-stories/
at Writing Excuses, among other things, there was a short discussion of the need for new writers to just WRITE. Write lots, and don't try to fix it up, just keep going. You need the practice.
Somewhere on
http://madgeniusclub.blogspot.com/
the Mad Genius Club, there was some discussion of fan fiction, that this was a great way for new writers to do some early work.
And I've had the occasional thought that writers, like artists, really need to start out with simple imitation. In Zen in The Art of Writing, Ray Bradbury, who is often considered quite a creative guy with a good handle on language, mentions somewhat off-handedly that he spent considerable time copying other writers.
And then Mike Kabongo over here
http://madgeniusclub.blogspot.com/2010/07/historic-fixation-and-stagnation.html
talks about the peculiar split personality that SF & F in particular have towards the question of originality. Merely a hint that something might be similar to another work often results in knee-jerk rejection. But, on the other hand, daring to actually write something original also gets rejected. We want the same, but different! Although if it is too obviously the same, well, that's no good.
It kind of seems as if we need to recognize the "training ground" use of copying, emulation, and fan fiction -- doing variations and knock-offs -- as a way to get the basics really deeply imbedded, while still recognizing the need to mix, match, and stretch the boundaries.
How should new writers learn their craft? Is writing something like the writers they read really so bad?
Odd...
Over here
http://www.writingexcuses.com/2010/07/11/writing-excuses-4-27-major-overhauls-to-broken-stories/
at Writing Excuses, among other things, there was a short discussion of the need for new writers to just WRITE. Write lots, and don't try to fix it up, just keep going. You need the practice.
Somewhere on
http://madgeniusclub.blogspot.com/
the Mad Genius Club, there was some discussion of fan fiction, that this was a great way for new writers to do some early work.
And I've had the occasional thought that writers, like artists, really need to start out with simple imitation. In Zen in The Art of Writing, Ray Bradbury, who is often considered quite a creative guy with a good handle on language, mentions somewhat off-handedly that he spent considerable time copying other writers.
And then Mike Kabongo over here
http://madgeniusclub.blogspot.com/2010/07/historic-fixation-and-stagnation.html
talks about the peculiar split personality that SF & F in particular have towards the question of originality. Merely a hint that something might be similar to another work often results in knee-jerk rejection. But, on the other hand, daring to actually write something original also gets rejected. We want the same, but different! Although if it is too obviously the same, well, that's no good.
It kind of seems as if we need to recognize the "training ground" use of copying, emulation, and fan fiction -- doing variations and knock-offs -- as a way to get the basics really deeply imbedded, while still recognizing the need to mix, match, and stretch the boundaries.
How should new writers learn their craft? Is writing something like the writers they read really so bad?
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