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Post by cephalopodlover on Jan 7, 2024 7:21:25 GMT
So I’ve been wanting to learn how to write for a while! I have an extensive story I’m developing with my sibling and of course am a oc creator and enjoyer of shows and such but I’ve never really been good at writing. I can summarize stuff just fine but as soon as I try to write something original all my words just seem flat and uninteresting, aren’t woven into the text well, or have grammar mistakes forever and ever. Any tips for writing? That aren’t just practice.
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eternalpuppetmaster
In-Training
nothing compares to the existential terror that is Funzo
Posts: 88
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Post by eternalpuppetmaster on Jan 7, 2024 12:10:02 GMT
Its hard to say anything because practise is genuinly the best and only way to become truly good at writing. Apart from that though, reading is important - short stories as well as longer books, search for varying styles of writing too.
Some quick general tips as well: -A unique metaphor is a thousand times more effective than an adjective -It is not a terrible thing to say 'and' or 'said' -Reading what you have written out loud helps root out places where the flow of writing staggers -If flow is bad then ajust sentance lengths and types -Grammar mistakes are ok and will be fixed later in second, third, forth, etc draft but you need the first draft to get to those
But seriously, there is no way to avoid doing practise. Reading really helps but you don't get good and knitting by looking at other's stitches.
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Azure
Member
No matter what changes - will no longer change me! ♪ ⋆*。
Posts: 58
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Post by Azure on Jan 7, 2024 13:45:42 GMT
I second everything that eternalpuppetmaster said!
I'd like to especially emphasize the importance of the messy first draft. Your first draft is just to get your ideas down, and nothing more. In a first draft, your words can be as uninteresting, incorrectly-spelled or poorly-woven-in as humanly possible, because you can just go back and edit it later.
Some people find writing their first draft discouraging, because they can't get it right on the first try, but here's a trade secret: nobody in the entire writing world gets it right on their first try!
In regards to drafts and editing, I'd also like to put the disclaimer that you shouldn't, under any circumstances, go back and edit your first draft while it's incomplete. See an obvious spelling mistake? Leave it. "Oh, but it'll just take a second-" That's the devil talking. If you change one thing, you'll go back and edit the entire incomplete first draft, and end up in a loop of polishing and polishing that, and never actually finishing your first draft.
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Post by cephalopodlover on Jan 7, 2024 16:39:56 GMT
These are all helpful! Ty! Also I’ve fallen victim to the changing one mistake then changing everything before ~_~ truly the worst.
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Post by mrsmoe on Jan 8, 2024 7:42:06 GMT
- It's okay not to go into deep description mode for everything. I used to think that to be a good writer you had to describe every single little sensory detail about everything when I was a kid. As you'd expect, it made writing miserable for me. In my opinion, you should only be descriptive when it's beneficial to the atmosphere or emotional impact.
- When coming up with stories and characters, try to analyze your own taste in fiction. What resonates with you? What makes YOU excited? What makes YOU feel seen? If certain tropes or archetypes really do something for you, you can emphasize their power by putting your own personal spin on them.
- It's okay to bend the rules of typical story structures if you feel like you need to. Studying the hero's journey or the third act structure when you're stuck can very helpful, but don't throw away ideas you really like just for the sake of adhering to them. Sometimes, subversion is necessary for the themes or general vibe you're trying to get across.
- Try to think about words abstractly. When you hear a word (for example, let's use the word "euphoric"), what do you associate with it? What emotion does it sound like? If it had a color or an energy, what would it be? Words have ambiance and tones to them depending on how they sound and how strong they are. You wouldn't use a word like euphoric to describe something in a mildly pleasant or mundane scene. You would want to save that for a story beat tied to intense relief or catharsis. Similarly, words like "twisted" or "gruesome" are powerful in the context of horror because they bring general feelings of unpleasantness just from thinking about them or saying them out loud.
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Post by cephalopodlover on Jan 8, 2024 22:28:26 GMT
the word one is really helpful, I generally struggle choosing words but when thinking like that it’s a lot easier to decide what to use and how. Thanks for all the tips :3
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jelly
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Post by jelly on Jan 16, 2024 17:13:30 GMT
I am a very amateur writer so don't take anything here to heart, but what's helped me a lot is writing, for lack of a better term, a bunch of drawerfics. It's something I'm not doing to show anyone, so I'm more free to mess around with style, presentation, and re-doing the same scene 50 times. XD I know you said you didn't want practice to be included in the advice, so take this as more advice to "mess around with things more" I suppose. Another thing is analyzing what you like in other people's writing, like what mrsmoe says! This is typically me taking a scene or chapter I like and going paragraph by paragraph, picking out what things are common for the writer to use. "How much do they describe the environment?" "What do they do to breakup long dialogues?" that sort of thing... Writing something in their style is also a fun exercise! If you're feeling like the words you're using "seem flat and uninteresting" what usually helps me a lot is to use the POV of someone with a very strong voice! This could be sarcastic and opinionated or someone so happy-go-lucky that it colors how they see the world! Not to say that it has to be in a 2nd POV, I usually write in 3rd person limited (which, if you're unfamiliar, just means that it's third person that's following a particular persons perspective and has no knowledge of other peoples perspectives unless there's a "POV switch") -- another thing that helped me a lot is to drop "They thought XYZ" If it's limited 3rd person the reader will assume all narrative opinions are of the person the POV is following. Describing things in a way that tips the hand of the person's opinions are a great way of spicing things up! "A yellow flower" is a yellow flower, so the person has no opinion of it, describing it as "pretty," "the sunlight shining through the petals", or a "sickly pale color" shows you what the person thinks about the item. (Think about connotation!) Of course there's a way of overdoing this and all, sometimes you just need to describe something quickly and move on, but take a moment to think about how the POV character would think about something! Another thing that can make writing seem flat is pacing! Think of how much you're describing or lingering on something as akin to something like screen time. If character is in a fast pace fight, there's no time to describe things, but if they've released a way to get the upper hand and it's a bit like a "slow-mo moment" before they do something dramatic, taking time to describe the people and place around them that they can see wouldn't feel out of place. Saying that they took a moment to look at each other is one thing, but describing what a character see's and to slow down the pacing so that it does take the reader "a moment" to linger on the look is another. Using sentence length can also be used for pacing. (like eternalpuppetmaster talked about!) If something is happening quickly, it makes sense that sentences would be short and choppy. If a character is cutting off their own internal monologue so that they've prevented themselves from realizing something they don't want to realize, it's fine if the sentence cuts off suddenly with a period. Grammar is something that can be broken for dramatic effect + whatnot. Sentence length variation in general also helps with making something seem less flat, as well. Also, everyone writes things differently. I heard of someone who would write basically everything in their head over the course of a couple of weeks/months and then type out and publish a one-shot in one sitting (How scary! Too powerful in my opinion!) Not being able to go back and change things wouldn't work for me, since the way I write tends to be in a way where everything flows into the next scene and I tend to have a hard time going back and figuring out what exactly I wanted to say if I don't change it when I decide to. (I also can't write things too out of order for this reason, although I can outline things I want to happen in future scenes...) Some people need to go through a bunch of drafts and some take months or years letting the idea grow before even making one draft! Just find whatever process works for you and have fun with it!!!!
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