The Place For My Writers Notes

Original posting 20 Sept 2011

Ready? Got all those other steps all done?

Step One: A list of traits (with action tags!) that you like and dislike?

Step Two: Answer the questions! What kind of story, setting, time? What are the name, age, traits, problems or faults, and motivation for the main character, their opposition, and the major secondary characters? Where does your story begin and end? What research do you need to do? If it was onstage (or a movie or TV -- straight to DVD?) what would be the dramatic scenes? Who might publish this?

Step Three: Expand those main characters. What is their dominant trait (and tags)? What is their goal and motivation? When do they enter the story and leave it? What is their physical description and role in the story? Oh, and what is their self-concept?

Step Four: What is the story question and answer? What is the scene/sequel chain linking them? For each scene, what is the goal or scene question, problem, conflict, and disaster or scene answer? For each sequel, what are the emotions, thoughts and planning, and decision?

With all that background, it's about time to start putting words on paper -- what most people think of as writing! Sooner or later, you have to write a draft. And, now is the time.

Writer's Digest, May 1992, has the article by Jack Bickham about Step Five: The First Draft. And here's my summary of Jack's article.

Jack starts out with two pieces of advice -- first, waiting won't make you more confident. So start writing. Second, you can always fix things later.

Incidentally, when talking about plot, Jack talked about the story question and how the ending must answer that question. When talking about characters, Jack talked about their self-concept, and how hard characters will struggle to protect their self-concept. Now, what is the most frightening, motivating development to face any character? Something that threatens that self-concept? And what threatens it the most -- change! That realization of change is at the core of most stories. That's what we mean by the moment of change that starts a story.

So, if you're not sure where to start? Take a look at your descriptions of the characters personality, and think about opening situations that would threaten that. Something that threatens their self-concept.

Jack talks about one writer who always started her first draft with her main character getting off of a train or bus in a strange town in the middle of the night. She said she has never used that opening in a finished story, but throwing the character into that moment of profound change always got the first draft going.

"Find the change and start writing from that point."

Jack also has several suggestions for keeping yourself on track. First of all, keep reminding yourself of the story question and the story ending answer. That's the framing for your story, and everything needs to move from the story question towards the story ending. Second, remind yourself of your character descriptions as you work, and keep your characters consistent. Third, work with your scene sequel chain. Fourth, if you start fretting about the prose or find details, drop back to writing a detailed synopsis. Just add details to your block diagram, your scene sequel chain.

Fifth, Jack recommends that you proceed in a sequential order. As he points out, if you skip around, you're most likely to write the easy parts and the ones that you see most clearly. Eventually, you need to write it all. But starting with the easy stuff can leave you with an intimidating pile of hard parts to do. I'm not sure that I agree with this, but it is an interesting point.

Last, but far from least, Jack points out that short stories may have given you experience with intense short bursts of writing. But for novels, professional production, you can't afford to wait for that. Instead, you need to regularly produce. Write every day, and keep track of your writing. You're training yourself for marathons, not sprints. So start clocking those miles!

Write the draft. Don't stop to do a lot of revision now -- that's the next step. Right now, you just need to produce pages. False starts, messy transitions, limp dialogue, characters that even their mother wouldn't trust, and so forth are all part and parcel of getting the first draft down so that you can fix it later.

When you get stuck, take another look at your story question. Then ask yourself what is happening right now in the story, and how does it relate to the story question? If nothing is happening, kickstart the actions, thoughts, feelings and get moving again. If whatever's happening doesn't matter to the story question -- skip it and move on to something else.

All right? So step five is really sit down and generate that first draft. Take all that background material, and start turning up pages (or filling screens?).

Write! And we'll be back to revise it soon...

original posting 8 July 2009

I think someone asked about this...took a bit of pondering to get here. Hope it helps.

Where to start, where to start?

A bit long, and probably confusing. But take a look, and let me know what you think. Ready? Set?

Creative thinking, lateral thinking, critical thinking -- isn't it all just thinking? Well, yes and no. It's a bit like common sense. It may seem obvious, but common sense is not always common. In the same way, thinking, and especially the creative or lateral thinking flavor, is something that anybody can do, but far too often they don't. We'll talk a little bit about what trips us up along the way.

In fact, one of the first points that I like to make about creative thinking is that it is important to try to identify and separate several different kinds of thinking -- particularly what we sometimes call black hat thinking, critical thinking or criticism. Writers often think of this as the internal editor, the part of us that says this won't work, here are all the little pieces that are wrong, and so forth. Black hat thinking often blocks or stops our green hat thinking -- creative, new ideas, exploratory, imaginative thinking. But we need both.

And in fact, we also need our red hat thinking, our feelings and emotions -- white hat thinking, where we deal with information and data in a very objective way -- yellow hat thinking, where we explore how to do things -- and blue hat thinking where we pop up and look at the process, worry about overviews and summaries and models. We need all these, but we need to be able to say right now I'm going to do green hat thinking and put the others on the hat rack for a while. Postpone the criticism, feasibility, emotions, measurement, and even process thinking and focus on new ideas, alternatives, exploration and imagination.

Give yourself a chance to be creative. Unfortunately, a lot of our education, business experience, and even life experience focuses on teaching us to be critical, to quickly point out problems, reasons that something won't work, and so forth. Creative thinking gets squashed when we do that. Give it a chance. Put your green hat on, set the black hat aside for a while, and take a look at the world as it might be.

So, first point -- when we do creative thinking, we postpone criticisms, questions of feasibility, and other roadblocks to the imagination. Put your green hat on and ride your imagination into the world of alternatives and possibilities.

Second point. The human brain loves to grab the first thing that looks semi-reasonable, and then fret and worry about how to make it fit. And we'll defend that choice, even when something better was just a little further away. It's funny, the same person who very carefully goes through an entire menu before making any choice, when faced with a problem or question, often jumps to the first available, easily remembered and visible, solution. Far too often, these are not the best answers.

So one of the responses is to decide to always challenge yourself to develop a quota of alternative answers before picking one. As a writer, you're often trying to figure out what problem your character faces. Now before you pick one and start madly expanding it, decide that you are going to come up with 10 potential problems. If that's too many, aim for five. Or if you find 10 potential problems is too easy, aim for 20 or 50. But make your list of potential problems quickly, without locking into the first one that looks reasonable. Put some down that are unreasonable. Remember, point one -- no criticism! Unlock the doors of imagination and let the wild ideas in! Push yourself to think of just a few more problems, a few more ideas, no matter how wild, no matter how odd.

Fairly often, we find ourselves putting down a few cliches, the same tired ideas that we've used before. Then we have a few that are a little less common. And then we find ourselves coming up with some odd ones. What if an elephant sat on the car? Wow, the character is not going to get to work now. Put it in the list. What if... Often those last ones will be the really exciting ones. And even if you decide to go with one of the usual ones, at least you know what some of the alternatives are.

So, the second point is to develop a quota of alternatives before making a selection. Build yourself a menu and try something interesting, don't just settle for the same old thing that only sort of hits the spot.

Third point. One of the great strengths of the human brain is forming associations. Metaphors. Give us even a partial image or pattern and we happily fill in the other parts. One of the exercises I used to do when teaching creative thinking was to put up a picture with 6 dots on it. They were carefully constructed using random numbers. And I would ask people in the room what the pattern was. People always saw patterns there. Rorschach tests, the thematic apperception test, visual illusions -- is it a table or is it two faces? -- they all illustrate our ability to find or impose patterns or relationships even on random data. So one of the tools that we can use for creative thinking is to deliberately set up opportunities to form associations. Take five words randomly from the dictionary -- flip the pages and pick the first noun on each page. Now, link those up! Or go to Wikipedia and use the random article link. Visit your favorite quote archive and grab a handful of random quotes. Then let the brain do its dance, finding relationships and associations. Go ahead and follow those out. Or take a set of categories -- I like to use the general metaphors of journey, war, game, organism, society, and machine. For each one, fill in a specific example. And connect those with whatever you are working on.

The third point then is to use your human ability to associate. Random stimulation, a set of categories or metaphors, or whatever you like -- let yourself make the connections. Then use those connections.

Fourth point. As humans, we tend to make a bunch of assumptions, hold expectations, and not look beyond the boundaries. We know how things work. For day-to-day life, it really helps to simplify things. But for creative thinking, we often want to take those assumptions -- make them explicit, and then try reversing them. Or exaggerate things. Or even very simply step into the world of wishes, and ask ourselves what we would like to have happen instead of what we expect.

When I teach project management, one of the exercises we often do starts with assigning people to teams. Then we give out the assignment, which involves each team sending an observer to look at something and report back to the others in the team who try to build a similar object. There are time limits, and a fairly large number of teams fail to build their object. I think that's interesting that the rules do not indicate that teams cannot cooperate or exchange information, and yet I have never had a class where they tried that. The exercise was developed by a professional trainer who has used it for some years. I asked if they had ever had a class where the teams tried to cooperate. No one has ever tried it.

If they did, it would make the exercise much simpler to do. But they assume that the teams are competing, I guess.

Challenge the assumptions, the expectations, the boundaries. What if the sun only came up once a year? I'll bet we'd pay a lot more attention to sunrise. Heck, people might even get up and celebrate it. Or what if...

Fifth and last for now, do you remember those mazes on the placemats? You were supposed to start here and trace a line to the hamburger or the fish or whatever in the middle? Did you ever notice that starting at the middle and tracing backwards to the start was a lot easier? Another principle of creative thinking is to try looking at whatever you're working on from the other end. Or upside down. Change the point of view, and see if it's any easier to deal with. I sometimes think this is one of the best pieces of advice for writers. Starting with the beginning is hard -- you don't know where you're going, and figuring out how to get there can be really complicated. Starting with the ending, and then working backwards -- it might be easier.

So change the point of view. Try different roles or characters. Try different angles -- what does it look like from overhead? Play with it!

Pretty simple stuff really, isn't it? Hold off on criticism. Explore alternatives before making a selection. Use random stimulation or lists to exercise your association ability. Challenge assumptions. And look at things from lots of different directions.

That's my summary of creative thinking for today. There are plenty of articles and books, but that's at least a beginning. And like most things, practice, practice, practice. Remind yourself to spend a little time using these tools regularly.

Hum. Reviewing this, I'm reminded that I usually try to point out that this is the beginning of a process -- create new ideas, prioritize and select, plan, and do it. Just coming up with a list of wild and whacky ideas is good, and lots of fun. But sifting out the good ones, figuring out what to do with them, and then carrying it out... you have to do that, too.

But for right now, green hats on! The next exercise, the next problem, the next time you start a story -- postpone criticism. Set yourself a quota of alternative before picking. Use random stimulation. Challenge assumptions. And try looking from up there!

Creative thinking... by the numbers?

Latest posting 30 May 2008

Here we go! I know, I know, the start of summer is kind of a lazy time, and in pasting up oldies and goodies, I saw this one. So - a goal? A process? Or just a game? Anyway you look at it, write -- soon and often, and don't forget to share whatever here, okay?

original posting: Fri, 08 Aug 2003 11:24:22 +0900

August always seems like a lazy time of year, with vacations and summer heat setting the tone.  But month eight also means two-thirds of the year have galloped past.  So it's a good time to trim the sails and lay out a goal, a process, and some games for the trip.

A goal.  This is, as always, a personal choice, but setting a quota seems to work for many.  Set one that's challenging but reachable, okay?  E.g., one piece (story, chapter, essay, poem) a month?  A week?  Or what tickles your fingers to write?

(Or, of course, you could try the challenge!  Just write one piece a week - write, revise, and mail out one piece every week - for a year.  According to legend, everyone who has tried this has been published.  It's a little like those shot glasses of beer every minute - it seems simple, but the cumulative effect is somewhat larger than the shot glasses appear.)

A process.  Here, too, your preferences may vary.  Some like to brainstorm, then outline.  Others free write, write, write.  Hack and slash - er, revise in one grand frenzy, or perhaps a little every day?

Then finish.  And send it out, even if you still don't think the golden sunset sings quite right.

Then start another.

Or play a game?

1. Pick a phrase - quotation, overheard fragment, first or last line, whatever you may find - and write from it.  How many ways can you stretch that phrase, twist that metaphor, and make your words dance?
2. Ah!  Metaphor and simile.  What is and what is like our topic?  Your love is a green tomato, drowsing in the garden?  Or merely like a snail, slipsliding down the dewy rosebush?  Take a metaphor or simile (or two or three) and expand, twist, and play with it.  Turn those tired cliches on their side and see if there's still a new wrinkle or two left in them for you to show us.
3. Last, but never least, unravel a pop story and redo it as your very own. That movie, old children's story, or whatever you might have around can be the basis for practice.  What's the plot?  Now repopulate it with characters you prefer, change the scenery, and tell us your tale.  Or, if the poetic effect catches your eye, try to imitate it?  What is it about the rhythm, the wording, the imagery, and the moan that makes that line or stanza work?  (p.s.  I'm not sure what moan is doing in there, but it seems to fit, so I'll leave it there.  :-)

So, an antidote for the August doldrums.  Set your goal, refine that process, and play some games.  And see if the winds don't fill your sails, sending you skimming over wordy depths under the blue skies of the Muse.

"Ink runs from the corners of my mouth.
There is no happiness like mine.
I have been eating poetry."  Mark Strand

The writer's job is to get out of the way of the reader.

I've recently acquired a copy of Plot & Structure by James Scott Bell. It's apparently part of a series called Write Great Fiction, and while I certainly should be doing other things, I expect to be reading it over the next little bit. For the fun of it, I thought I might toss some notes up here along with some contemplation. Obviously if you'd like to join in, that will make the trip a bit more interesting. I'll probably forget to cite the book in every posting, but here's the information from the inside page:

Bell, James Scott. Write great fiction: plot & structure: techniques and exercises for creating a plot that grips readers from start to finish. Copyright 2004. Published by Writer's Digest Books.

Okay? So let's take a look at the beginning, the introduction.

The introduction starts out with consideration of what Bell calls the Big Lie. "Writing can't be taught." Or maybe "writers are born" with the implication that you either have it or you don't.  We've discussed this a time or two here on Writers, and I know it is a somewhat sensitive point, but I'm just reporting that Bell considers this the Big Lie.

So what is the truth? "The Truth is that craft can be brought and that you, with diligence and practice and patience, can improve your writing."

Now, Bell does suggest some discipline or practice that you need. Craft doesn't just fall into your lap, you have to work at it. What are his basics?

1. Get motivated. Make the commitment to write. And do it!
2. Try stuff. Writing is not a passive experience. Pen or pencil on paper, fingers on the keyboard, or even dictating madly into a voice-recognition program, you have to try things, do things, put the words out there, watch the reactions, and try again.
3. Stay loose. Writing is a creative pastime, and you need to have fun at it. Too much rigor squashes the innovation.
4. First get it written, then get it right. Go ahead and splash the first draft out there, without worrying too much about whether every comma and diddle is just right. Then go back and revise and tinker as needed. The first draft is just a draft, so let it blow!
5. Set a daily quota. Write, write, write. Most people do well with a certain number of words, although others prefer a certain amount of time. Either way, sit down and do it.
6. Don't give up. Writing requires persistence. To get the stories done, to submit them, to keep going despite rejection, and then to keep going through the long process of publication!

So, that's Bell's introduction. He's going to talk about craft, and he's going to ask us to write. Regularly, with zest and fun, and keep it up!

Sounds like a plan, doesn't  it? So let's go!

original posting: Mon, 5 Jan 1998 12:31:36 EST

Okay, we've recently seen the metaphoric statement "don't beat a dead horse" used repeatedly here on the list.

Think about where this comes from. No matter what you do, a dead horse won't move the wagon...

And then think about current times. Very few of us deal with horses on a regular basis anymore. So what does this saying translate into for our age?

Don't type into a computer that isn't plugged in?

Quit flicking the switch when the bulb is dead?

Don't break the key off, there's no gas in the car!

Work at it. Dream up at least five variations...select the best and work on the wording so that it has some snap, some interest.

Polish an aphorism for our times today, okay?

(and when you get tired of that dead horse stinking up the place, try reworking some of the other cliches that pile up in our common language...)