What makes us want to keep turning the page? Why do we want to get invested in a story? When I was in graduate school at Illinois State University (Go Redbirds!!!) I would talk to friends of mine and we would discuss what it was that made people want to read a story. When picking up a book at your local Barnes and Noble, why pick up Book A instead of Book B? What was it about this text that caught my eye over that text? For me, when I read the first few paragraphs of a book story, that can tell the tale.
When I was first writing stories (on a notepad in my bedroom before bedtime), I always thought that whenever you start writing, you start at the beginning. At that time, I knew all there was to know about writing and no one could tell me anything (I long for those days, I think I’ve gotten stupider over the past few decades). Where does a story begin? Most European/American writing is linear. You begin in a chronological order and continue until the story ends. However, a lot of stories have broken that tradition. Take a look at Pulp Fiction: a film about several intersecting storylines that converge/diverge at different points in time. How about Memento (a murder mystery done backwards)? The myth of “beginning at the beginning” has long been debunked. This makes me think of the ingredients of a good opening.
“It was the best of times; it was the worst of times…”
“Call me Ishmael…”
“In the beginning, God created the Heavens and the Earth…”
Whether it the opening lines of A Tale of Two Cities, Moby Dick or the Bible, each of these lines represent a different way to involve the reader. “It was the best of times; it was the worst of times…” This opening line makes me want to read about a different time, a different world, and a whole new story. It makes me wonder the possibilities that are endless with a story.
“Call me Ishmael…” This line makes me wonder about this narrator. I want to know who Ishmael was, what did he care about, and what put him on a ship ran by a madman. It wasn’t the story that made me want to read this novel called Moby Dick, it was Ishmael and Ahab.
What greater line evokes an epic grandiose feel than the opening words from The Bible? The opening passage induces an atmosphere of awe and discovery. It lets us know that the words that are within its pages will educate and entertain. No matter if you see the Holy Bible as a religious text or a collection of stories there is no mistaking the power and lush reality that it conjures for a reader.
Here’s a quick exercise: close your eyes and imagine what comes after “Once upon a time” or “It was a dark and stormy night.” These lines (albeit cliché), are still powerful lines that can vividly call to mind a wooded glen where elves and fairies traipse through life granting wishes, harboring secrets, or even telling a tale as old as time. Or, they can cause our hearts to speed as we imagine rain showering over us while moving timidly through a midnight forest hoping that something within the shadows does not grab us and pull us away into our deepest, darkest nightmares. That is the power of an opening line.
When it comes to writing (whether they are essays, novels, short stories, etc.), I sort the pieces into two categories: character driven and plot driven. Those that have compelling protagonists, whose evolution/development tend to become a driving force of the story, are referred to as character driven. Works such as Forrest Gump, Batman Begins, Fight Club or Atlas Shrugged are excellent examples of excellently written character driven pieces. Stories that have plots that are quite complex, and tend to overtake our attention are plot driven. Stories such as The Matrix, Saving Private Ryan, or the Odyssey are great plot pieces. With beginning lines, the writer can show (without stating verbatim) if the piece is plot driven or character driven. However, before you even sit down to write an opening line, it is important to ask yourself if your work will be focusing on the character or the events that occur.
An opening line can be what makes the difference between a character that I want to continue to read about, and one that I decide to place back on the bookshelf. Opening lines can act just like first impressions. They are great to break the ice, and can introduce you to a new friend. Just remember to think of the appropriate way to introduce them. Whether it is a person or a plot, readers want to be teased enough to want to learn more.
Wednesday, November 30, 2011
Thursday, November 17, 2011
Smashing My Head Against the Writer's Block
"Nulla dies sine linea"
- Horace
Have you ever heard that old adage “If you don’t use it, you lose it”? Well, it turns out that it is something that affects writing just as much as it affects everything else in life. Writing ability is just like muscle development; the more you exercise it, the stronger it gets.
Whenever I teach a freshman composition class, on the first week of class someone inevitably approaches me apologetically, and informs me that they haven’t written anything in a long time and to “go easy on me.” Said student usually approaches me when others are out of earshot and they seem very sorry or upset to let me know this (as if I will be angry). Unfortunately, I tell the students, “No, I can’t go easy on you. I’m a mean person,” which usually results in laughter since I look and act as one of the meekest people you will ever want to meet. Afterwards, I reassure them that writing ability is something that develops the more that the writer does it. Also, I tell them that the process is different for everyone and the journey is just as different. As such, there isn’t a “right” way or a “wrong” way to go about writing.
One of the biggest reasons that I find myself wanting to turn on the television instead of writing something productive is that Law and Order: SVU is on. Benson and Stabler (played exceptionally well by Mariska Hargitay and Christopher Meloni) are more than able to pull me away from my writing tasks. I even find myself sabotaging my writing when I enable the distraction. “It’s great storytelling!” I tell myself. “If I watch the show, I’ll learn about plot pacing, character development, and realistic dialogue.” As such, it won’t be a waste of time. Of course, by the end of the episode, I am so wrapped up with how horrible the villains on the show were (not to mention the depression in knowing that the Benson/Stabler duo will soon to come to an end).
- Horace
Have you ever heard that old adage “If you don’t use it, you lose it”? Well, it turns out that it is something that affects writing just as much as it affects everything else in life. Writing ability is just like muscle development; the more you exercise it, the stronger it gets.
Whenever I teach a freshman composition class, on the first week of class someone inevitably approaches me apologetically, and informs me that they haven’t written anything in a long time and to “go easy on me.” Said student usually approaches me when others are out of earshot and they seem very sorry or upset to let me know this (as if I will be angry). Unfortunately, I tell the students, “No, I can’t go easy on you. I’m a mean person,” which usually results in laughter since I look and act as one of the meekest people you will ever want to meet. Afterwards, I reassure them that writing ability is something that develops the more that the writer does it. Also, I tell them that the process is different for everyone and the journey is just as different. As such, there isn’t a “right” way or a “wrong” way to go about writing.
Sometimes that is a bitter pill to swallow when on the receiving end of it. I freely admit to not writing on a daily basis (as I feel that I should). I admit to feeling like a hypocrite when writing this blog posting knowing full well that I find it difficult to write every single day. Where does this problem stem from? Where does it stem from for college writers? I would guess the same place.
One of the biggest reasons that I find myself wanting to turn on the television instead of writing something productive is that Law and Order: SVU is on. Benson and Stabler (played exceptionally well by Mariska Hargitay and Christopher Meloni) are more than able to pull me away from my writing tasks. I even find myself sabotaging my writing when I enable the distraction. “It’s great storytelling!” I tell myself. “If I watch the show, I’ll learn about plot pacing, character development, and realistic dialogue.” As such, it won’t be a waste of time. Of course, by the end of the episode, I am so wrapped up with how horrible the villains on the show were (not to mention the depression in knowing that the Benson/Stabler duo will soon to come to an end).
As the example shows, it is easy to be swayed by outside stimuli to forego writing for that day. One day can turn into two; two can turn into three. Before you know it, you haven’t written in a month and when you return to write something, the process is much more difficult to do than it has ever been before. To get in the habit of writing, keep a journal. When I began working on my journal, I foundt hat the more I wrote, the better my writing became and the easier it was to write on something else. Upon reflection, as I looked at past papers that students turned in, on the first essay, students would not meet the page range. When the second and third essays were written, I found that more students met (and exceeded) the page range. Writing is infectious. Writing begets more writing!
Another problem that forces me to stop writing is when I am working on a piece and right in the middle of the essay (sometimes even while writing!), I will not know how to continue. What word should I use next? What was I writing? I lost my train of thought! At that moment, I will panic. On a few occasions, I would feel this way when I wrote Demon in My Head. There was a reason that it took exactly one year to write that first draft!
This problem still plagues me, however, a wise professor of English taught me a trick over fifteen years ago, and that still helps me to this day. “Don’t finish the sentence,” he told me (and about twenty other undergraduate English students). His thinking is that if the writer returns to the piece the next day, they will be able to finish the thought and continue the next one. On many occasions, I have been able to pick up my thought and continue to the next thought. Most writing is linear. If the line is broken, the writer may be able to continue the logical line of thinking.
It is my intention to give these tips and tricks to help the writing process move along for you. Ultimately, this would be futile unless you are motivated to write. There has to be a message that you have that fuels moving that pen on the paper (or those fingers on a keyboard). Keep writing! The adage is true: if you don’t use it, you lose it.
Here’s to keeping it.
Wednesday, November 9, 2011
Conversing with a Figment of Your Imagination: Getting to Know Your Characters
“Good writers define reality; bad ones merely restate it.”
-Edward Albee
“If you're writing about a character, if he's a powerful character, unless you give him vulnerability I don't think he'll be as interesting to the reader.”
-Stan Lee
“How do I know vampires exist? Because I see them!”
-Gabriel Brimstone
I am a person who has done a lot of quirky things just to see how other people react. On a crisp summer afternoon, while grocery shopping; I would push my grocery cart on the left side of the lane, just to see how people would react. On each encounter with another shopper, I would get a grumble, a few choice (four letter) words, and a disapproving sneer.
An assignment that I give students in my Workplace Communications class is to go into a business or organization, observe their surrounds, and record the reactions of the customers/employees/supervisors and analyze how they interact with one another. The day they turn in the assignment, my students and I get into a brief discussion (aka debriefing) of their findings.
On occasions when I am traveling, I make a habit to take a tape recorder with me to record conversations with other people and listen to the rhythm of their language. Afterwards, I play the tape over and over to hear accents, pauses, and other “quirks” in the wording.
What do these three things have in common (other than the fact that it solidifies my weirdness)?
It means I am trying to learn and understand people in order to learn and understand my characters. The characters that I write are people, too. They think, feel, love, and hate just like anyone else. I want my characters to be as three dimensional as the person who I pass in the hallway, the student in the classroom, or the person ringing up my groceries in the checkout line. My characters may have the same hopes, dreams, aspirations, or obsessions as a person I speak to at the bank. In order to understand them, I need to understand people.
In the novel that I am currently writing, I have a multitude of characters and I want to get to know each and every one of them. In order to have true authenticity, I need to know what the character’s innate desires are. I have protagonists who are selfish, villains who have had troubled pasts, and characters in-between who are more than just “cannon fodder” or are “disposable”. Even those characters that are merely in the opening prologue or a single chapter (and are brutally killed off) have desires as well. In order to know how tragic their passing is, I need to know who they touched and who would mourn their passing.
Some writers create “character profiles” of their major protagonist (or antagonist) to get to know who they are. They have a “file” (of sorts) that lets them learn who their subjects/characters are. They act as if they are therapists or physicians for their characters. I, on the other hand, act in the similar way as a friend or confidante would. I have “conversations” with these characters. I sit down with them and I “talk” to them. Yes, this does seem quite “schizophrenic” (hence the title of my first blog). Acting as their best friend, I can learn different things about them. I learn if they have fetishes that they haven’t told their significant other; I learn where the bodies are buried (literally, in some cases). And by listening to them tell their story; I can learn of the patterns of dialogue and speech impediments that they may have.
This allows me to explore a part of my psyche that I haven’t explored since I was a child. If you have ever had an “imaginary friend”, this is the exact same exercise. I am sure this exercise is no less socially acceptable as when we were children, it is a very good way to get to know the characters that you hope other people will believe in.
If you want to create people that the reader will believe in, then you must first believe in them.
-Edward Albee
“If you're writing about a character, if he's a powerful character, unless you give him vulnerability I don't think he'll be as interesting to the reader.”
-Stan Lee
“How do I know vampires exist? Because I see them!”
-Gabriel Brimstone
I am a person who has done a lot of quirky things just to see how other people react. On a crisp summer afternoon, while grocery shopping; I would push my grocery cart on the left side of the lane, just to see how people would react. On each encounter with another shopper, I would get a grumble, a few choice (four letter) words, and a disapproving sneer.
An assignment that I give students in my Workplace Communications class is to go into a business or organization, observe their surrounds, and record the reactions of the customers/employees/supervisors and analyze how they interact with one another. The day they turn in the assignment, my students and I get into a brief discussion (aka debriefing) of their findings.
On occasions when I am traveling, I make a habit to take a tape recorder with me to record conversations with other people and listen to the rhythm of their language. Afterwards, I play the tape over and over to hear accents, pauses, and other “quirks” in the wording.
What do these three things have in common (other than the fact that it solidifies my weirdness)?
It means I am trying to learn and understand people in order to learn and understand my characters. The characters that I write are people, too. They think, feel, love, and hate just like anyone else. I want my characters to be as three dimensional as the person who I pass in the hallway, the student in the classroom, or the person ringing up my groceries in the checkout line. My characters may have the same hopes, dreams, aspirations, or obsessions as a person I speak to at the bank. In order to understand them, I need to understand people.
In the novel that I am currently writing, I have a multitude of characters and I want to get to know each and every one of them. In order to have true authenticity, I need to know what the character’s innate desires are. I have protagonists who are selfish, villains who have had troubled pasts, and characters in-between who are more than just “cannon fodder” or are “disposable”. Even those characters that are merely in the opening prologue or a single chapter (and are brutally killed off) have desires as well. In order to know how tragic their passing is, I need to know who they touched and who would mourn their passing.
Some writers create “character profiles” of their major protagonist (or antagonist) to get to know who they are. They have a “file” (of sorts) that lets them learn who their subjects/characters are. They act as if they are therapists or physicians for their characters. I, on the other hand, act in the similar way as a friend or confidante would. I have “conversations” with these characters. I sit down with them and I “talk” to them. Yes, this does seem quite “schizophrenic” (hence the title of my first blog). Acting as their best friend, I can learn different things about them. I learn if they have fetishes that they haven’t told their significant other; I learn where the bodies are buried (literally, in some cases). And by listening to them tell their story; I can learn of the patterns of dialogue and speech impediments that they may have.
This allows me to explore a part of my psyche that I haven’t explored since I was a child. If you have ever had an “imaginary friend”, this is the exact same exercise. I am sure this exercise is no less socially acceptable as when we were children, it is a very good way to get to know the characters that you hope other people will believe in.
If you want to create people that the reader will believe in, then you must first believe in them.
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