To Ly Word or Not to Ly Word: Writing Real Good. No. I Mean It. (Part 1)

In writer’s group (a million years ago), an author read her work aloud. The story was a fantasy and while the plot might have been interesting, it got lost in the words.

That can happen, you know. Too many words. Too many weak words. Too many throw away words.

Your words should work for you. Hard.

“If you do these few things,” I said, offering suggestions because we were in writer’s group, trying to be better writers, “you’ll strengthen the writing. Everything will be more clear. Cleaner.”

“Oh,” she said, waving me off. “My genre excuses bad writing.”

My eyeballs fell on the floor and rolled under an arm chair.

Another published writer in that same group said to suggested changes from us, “That’s what my editor’s for. To catch these mistakes.” We had offered suggestions because we were in writer’s group, trying to be better writers. Get it?

At Writing and Illustrating for Young Readers my hope is every writer learns how to be the best writer she can be. Writing well is a process. I always strive to form tight, strong sentences. I want to be better. We can never know too much.

(Here’s an argument from William Faulkner.  “Let the writer take up surgery or bricklaying if he is interested in technique. There is no mechanical way to get the writing done, no shortcut. The young writer would be a fool to follow a theory. Teach yourself by your own mistakes; people learn only by error. The good artist believes that nobody is good enough to give him advice. He has supreme vanity. No matter how much he admires the old writer, he wants to beat him.”)

“But, said another writing friend of mine, “you know readers are blind to style.”

That may be, Writing Brothers and Sisters, but at this point, I’m still not. And so as long as I write, I plan to write the best I can. And this week on TUW, I wanna talk about a few tips. Here’s one for today.

My mother said, “If you have to pay a dollar for every word you put on the page, you’d trim your writing and use only the best language.” Mark Twain said, “Substitute ‘damn’ every time you’re inclined to write ‘very;’ your editor will delete it and the writing will be just as it should be.”

You can cut some of these words, too–that, well, start, begin, just, was-ing words

Question: What words are throw aways in your opinion?

TO BE CONTINUED

Conflict Quotes

Not all these quotes are from writers. But they get the idea across. And, if you’re interested, there’s some further learning.

 

William Faulkner at the Nobel banquet in 1950

There is only the question: When will I be blown up? Because of this, the young man or woman writing today has forgotten the problems of the human heart in conflict with itself which alone can make good writing because only that is worth writing about, worth the agony and the sweat.

https://www.nobelprize.org/nobel_prizes/literature/laureates/1949/faulkner-speech.html

James Frey

The greatest rules of dramatic writing are conflict, conflict, conflict.

Margaret Heffernan

For good ideas and true innovation, you need human interaction, conflict, argument, debate.

Margaret Heffernan: Dare to disagree

Patrick Lencioni

I don’t think anyone ever gets completely used to conflict. If it’s not a little uncomfortable, then it’s not real.

 

Three Thing Thursday

1. I am reading Fahrenheit 451. For the first time. And quite liking it. I’m not sure if I’m surprised by this. My sister loved Ray Bradbury as a kid (she always out-read me). She read Stephen King, Tolkien and Bradbury long before I did. I was stuck in Steinbeck, Faulkner and Twain.

   This summer I’m reading a lot. A lot more than I have since school

   What have you read recently that you’ve loved?
   What have you read that you missed out on as a kid or teen?
   What is a favorite book that I should read?

2. I am gathering books for the Hopi Reservation. If you would like to donate, please email me at carolthewriter@yahoo.com. These books must be gently used or new. I just looked up at my shelf and saw several novels I will never read again. It’s time to let those go. I have space only for the ones I want to keep forever. Or, maybe not space, but you know.
3. In August, Ann Dee and Kyra and I might be having a writing marathon again. It’s been awhile. Will let you know as we get closer. If you are interested in playing a long, let me know.

Heartbreak at 36–When Life Doesn’t Go the Way You Hoped

(Are these titles bringing in more readers?)

(Can you believe we are at #36?)

Emotion grounds our reader in such a way that the reader should be changed at the end of the book. It is our duty, as writers, to allow the reader to feel. We do that by putting emotion on the page.

Once, many years ago, I asked a few amazing writers, how they put emotion on the page so that their books rang true-so they felt like real life. Jerry Spinelli said this:

“You need to experience that emotion yourself. You don’t have to be experiencing it as you’re actually writing, but you need to be able to tap the keg where the memory of it resides and, so far as you are able, relive it.”

Martine Leavitt gave me this advice: “Create a powerful story, and you will create powerful emotion. Novice writers sometimes try to spoonfeed their readers the emotion they want them to feel, but language has the great knack of diminishing emotion. Put an emotion into words and you will undoubtedly drain it of power. All you must do is write a great story, a story full of love, honor, pity, pride, compassion and sacrifice (Faulkner’s six), and your reader will feel every emotion you want her to feel.”

David Gifaldi answered the question this way:

“For me, emotion comes only when I have become close enough to the character

to feel what he/she feels at every turn in the story.”

#36

List important events in your story.

What do you feel as you write these parts?

How do you want your reader to feel?

How does your character feel?

Are you getting the emotion across?

How?

How can you de better?

Do you have Faulkner’s six in your story?

Do you know how your character feels at every turn?

Are you tapping into your memory keg?