Oh Why Not (Writing M-Thing)

[dawn_felagund]

As seen at heartofoshun's LJ and apparently done by half of everyone ... I have been working hard during the day to get ready for the school year but all work and no play makes Dawn a dull girl, right?

Pick the number(s) of the questions you'd like me to answer about my writing. (Like Oshun, I love talking about writing. Most writers do, I think

Comments

[dawn_felagund]

1) is there a story you're holding off on writing for some reason?

I have multiple stories more or less written in my head (or at least with enough strong images and emotions that I could write them easily in a sitting) from later in the First Age. The problem is that I haven't gotten through parts of the First Age yet where important things happen that I don't want to spoil later on down the line! Which means I really need to get my butt in gear in picking up the AMC series, I know ...

18) were there any works you read that affected you so much that it influenced your writing style? what were they?

Writers who are masterful in their use of imagery and language always inspire me and make me want to write. I can often tell the quality of a story (in my opinion) by whether or not it makes me want to write my own.

As a young 20-something, my favorite authors were Margaret Atwood and Joyce Carol Oates. I still adore Atwood's work, although Oates is starting to wear on me a bit (her newer stuff anyway. I think she's an example of an author too productive for her own good.) They had a way with language that made it seem like their words contained more than the sum of their meanings: I first realized the importance of the different layers of meaning of a word and the rhythm of syntax, which was hugely influential to my own work.

As far as fantasy authors, Ursula LeGuin, Neil Gaiman, and Peter S. Beagle had similar effects on me, as well as quite a few short story authors archived in the Year's Best Fantasy and Horror series that I used to devour while it was still being produced. They inspired me to take a very literary style of writing, with layers of meaning to both story and language, and apply it to speculative fiction. They taught me that fantasy can be serious art, no matter what my professors said, and encouraged by example to take my own writing seriously no matter what I did.

As for nonfiction: Tom Shippey and ... Tolkien! :) They both write almost conversationally and are fearless of using artistry even in scholarly work. After trudging through too many pompous and overblown articles in both the social sciences and humanities, they were a breath of fresh air that encouraged me not to abandon beauty and art just because the subject wasn't fiction.

24) have you ever become an expert on something you previously knew nothing about, in order to better a scene or a story?

I tend to be lazy when it comes to story research and, like the answer above to Sam, fall back on what I know. I admire people (like you!) who can spend days researching the exact kinds of ships or bows or horses a particular character or group would have used, but that kind of research rarely holds my attention long. Writing is such a visceral thing for me, and by the time I'm in a scene where I'd need that kind of knowledge, I either have to plunge ahead or risk losing it. So I often pull from my own knowledge base in such moments rather than stop to do the kind of research needed to expand my horizons.