New Blog Series? · 3:49am Aug 5th, 2015
I really hope I don't sound egotistical here, but my follower count has grown into a pretty good-sized number. I think it's safe to say I have some level of influence, even though I obviously don't have all 247 of you hanging on my every word. (Probably not more than one or two of you... at best.) But I'd assume that a lot of you are interested in my writing, and I feel like I should at least do something to help newer writers out. However, I'm no master of the craft. I only know so much, and that's pretty much limited to what has worked out (or not) for me.
So my question is, would any of you like to hear me explain some of the techniques I use in my writing?
The blogs would be purely style guides, not hard and fast rules on how to write. I'm not saying my writing is how everyone should write. Heck, I'm not even saying it's how anyone should write. But if you guys want to know anything about how I write, it's an opportunity to learn. If there's something you really admire about my writing (a lot of people seem to like how I wrote Pinkie in Icky-Sicky Pinkie Pie, for instance), just ask me, and I'll write it.
If no one's interested, eh. I just thought it'd be fun for me and possibly a useful or interesting resource for you guys.
I've already thought up a couple of topics: one-sentence paragraphs, minimizing dialogue tags, and showing versus telling. Maybe one of those sounds like something you'd like to hear me explain. Or, again, maybe you have your own ideas for topics.
Just let me know one way or the other, please. 'S all I ask. I even made a nice little two-question Google Form sheet, if that's a more convenient way to respond.
You guys and gals take care now, and have yourselves a swell day.
You know I love to see everyone's perspective on writing. It's so cool to see what others view the craft as.
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I like to see people's thoughts as well, although not too many people really explain their style. I dunno if it's arrogant to do that, or if it's just easier to stick to the more cliched questions, but I think it'd be helpful if, say, Stephen King explained how he builds up tension in his horror fics. Could be a proprietary thing, I guess. Not too many authors want to see people come up behind them and try to blatantly rip off their ideas or their style. Or maybe they just figure that if you want to know how to write like them, you'll just study their books and find out on your own.
I could be making a mistake, but I'll see what others think of this. I'm guessing I'll get my normal half-dozen or so responses. Maybe a bit more if I'm lucky.
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Cliched questions are solved problems. Answering them is like starting a review series by reviewing MLD: sure, it is a review, but what is going to be said that has not been said before? Better to talk about new/less discussed things. Or cut/paste from the best of what has already been done and save yourself some time.
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That's what I was thinking. It's just generally frowned upon to use your writing as an example when giving people advice. But I figure it should be fine if I'm not endorsing my style or anything. (Not that I really would; I seem to be above-average, but I'm no literary genius. Based on the 10,000 hour theory of mastery, I'm probably not even a fifth of the way done with learning the craft.)
I haven't received any sort of negative feedback yet, although I've only received two formal responses. People seem to either be on board with it or indifferent/not opposed.
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Odd. Never happened across that norm. You could always write a new, tailor-fit, example paragraph whenever you needed one if you are worried about coming off as a self-promoter. Maybe if you have previous drafts laying around, you could even use them for a before/after/why you changed it thingy once and awhile.
Otherwise, so long as it is clear you are quoting yourself in service to your overall point, I see no reason people would have a problem. In fact, better to suggest techniques that you have actually used yourself for fame and glory than reiterate whatever second-hand "advice" you stumbled across recently.
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I've generally seen people make comments in small chats about the subject, especially when discussing writing panels. Especially when discussing Pen Stroke, who has a tendency to use his work as examples of what he's talking about. I'd guess it's similar to the stigma on self-insert OCs--most people are only going to mention their upsides and ignore their own flaws.
I could. But I find that my off-the-cuff examples of things are never as good as I think they are. I've bookmarked a passage or two of others' works for the time being, in case I need an example that isn't mine. I think it'll be fine, since people seem to not mind, but we'll see how it goes.
Hoersfame is such a vague concept. I doubt anything except Icky-Sicky Pinkie Pie counts as an unambiguous success in the category of fame and glory, and all I could glean from that, really, is a character study of Pinkie. Time will tell whether people want that or not.
I would absolutely love to see what your thoughts on writing are, and I could honestly use the advice to help improve my awful stories. Specifically, could you explain a bit about how you write characters that already have a defined personality, like the mane six and other canon ponies? I've always had a problem with trying to write characters I didn't create while staying true to their personality.
How do you keep a character in character?
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I could try explaining that, but I'd probably need to go on a character-by-character basis. It's a bit difficult to make broad, sweeping rules for characterization when all characters are different.
At the very least, I'd need to break it into short sections for each character.