On writing: Run fishy, Run! · 9:33am Nov 13th, 2021
As a writer, I’m well aware of my weaknesses; but I fail to fix it in my writing, and thus I’m stuck as a lousy writer with pitiful prose.
I know the mistakes are in there, but with a direct access to the source (my vivid imagination) while I’m editing; I see my story as I imagined it, instead of how I’ve written it.
Sadly, my words fail to create the imagery on its own; and I can’t provide links and references to my imagination, and hope some Inception-Team rides the Dream Tour Express, to see what I had in mind.
As a storyteller, the only thing I know, is how to build a foundation. I can construct a storyline populated with characters, which have a place in the world and a purpose in life. It may not be an interesting story, and the characters may be bland, but they all form a very solid foundation, to prevent logical leaps or epic fail.
If we were to liken a good story with a Christmas Tree; then building a world and a storyline, is akin to finding the perfect spruce. But you still need to decorate it, to look great. The decoration is the prose and the delivery. The tree is hidden, but still required, to carry the glitter and candy.
What I do, is I spend a huge amount of time getting the perfect tree, and then dump it on the floor, making everyone having to climb over it, instead of enjoying it. The tree may look great, but lying on the floor it’s trash, instead of eye-catching.
Successful writers can be the other way around. They decorate a couple of torn cardboard boxes with so much glitter, people don’t care about the garbage it hides. (And the readers who notice the core is dirty, broken, and stinks, are attacked by Patrick’s fans for ruining the hype.)
I believe my background is to blame. As a young teenager I started playing role-playing games with my friends. The kind of RPG you play with dice, pen and paper. Stuff that requires you to think and interact verbally, instead of point and click (but I played those too).
I spent most of my teenage years as a GM/DM, building worlds, outlining scenarios, and then tossing a bunch of my friends in there, to wreak havoc upon it, to the best of their ability.
The world I designed had to withstand every devious trick my players could think of. As I wasn’t intimidated by friendship-threats or bribes, they had to resort to ingenuity and lateral thinking. (Scenarios impervious to Hack & Slash.)
In the end I became specialized in creating worlds, but now I realize I was never a storyteller. I never had to tell a story. The players yelled with fervent enthusiasm, and I would just act as the arbiter and hand out verdicts.
So now... I’m really struggling to learn how to write compelling stories, instead of designing boring worlds. I now know that creating a long captivating monologue, is so much more difficult than responding in a dialogue.
And to me, writing a book, is a monologue, since nobody is hanging over your shoulder and pointing things out as you type them, or speculate on what happens next, to act as your muse.
You are on your own, with nobody there to lead you; and that is why I fail. I’m out of my element when I need to do it by myself. In summary: You can pick a fish out of water, but you can’t make it run.
(I saw pictures. I added text. But my text wouldn't be fun without the pictures.
My writing suffers from the same problem. The reader must draw all the pictures.)
What you need help with?
You can make a fish run if you're Asian enough.5606696
I want to be able to stitch words together like a surgeon; treat them according to how they are read, instead of how I think of them.
Helen Keller never saw anything, she didn't hear anything, but she was given text, and from how the words were used, she figured out how to write books.
I wish I could do that.