Writing: So You Want to Write Fiction, Eh?

[nayad]

Here are the things I think a person who wants to write fiction (professionally) ought to do, and I will guarantee you right now that the list will be missing things I don't know about, but anyway

Comments

[ex_maehymn]

dude, thanks for the fabulous advice! i am currently right now applying it to art and music.

thanks. i need to give myself permission to flail around in Reason and in Photoshop like a drunken monkey more often. my rough drafts need to stop being exercises in failed perfection!

ciao!

[bzdchris]

Great post! I hope you'll answer #11 for us sometime soon, re: yourself and your writing.

Two things:

I read that Joyce Carol Oates, a disgustinly prolific writer, writes longhand on legal paper every day, recopying what she wrote the day before and making revisions at the same time. It's her discipline. I don't know if this is applies, and it sounds really tedious, but oh well, she's a successful professional writer.

The other is that Stephen King once said that writing for him was not optional, that he had to write every day in order to get those things out of him and there was no other outlet. If he didn't write, he'd go mad. Considering his writing, some would say he's already gone mad but I liked the way it wasn't optional for him, that he HAD to write every day.

[suibhne_geilt]

I would say critique others' writing. The act of picking through a piece of somebody else's fiction to find out what works for you and what doesn't, and of making yourself articulate those impressions in concrete terms, will build your editorial eye for your own material. It will also help you understand why things in fiction do or don't work.

Great List

[sea_gaagii]

This is a great list, where did you get the idea for it

[webfarmer]

Lotsa good stuff there, Ms. Nayad.

Goal assessment, planning and execution is the key to getting anything done in an efficient manner. That's not to say that the random and spontaneous has no place in the process but it must be harnessed to the greater good at some point.

The balance between reading and doing for newbies is important. It's one I have problems with at times and not just when it comes to writing. Analysis paralysis hits far too often. Falling in love with the research as if it's the end in itself.