On Writing: A Memoir of the Craft
I find it hard to write about books I read. Damn, I find it hard to write about other things too. My best output to this date are technical work-related documents. What I can say for certainty though, is that Stephen King’s writing is a delight.
On Writing is a memoir, guide for aspiring writers, and a showcase of what mastering the craft means. It starts with snippets of Stephen’s life, from childhood to adolescence. From wiping his ass with poison ivy, to facing his alcohol and drug addiction. And all of it is fun, honest, and not nearly as long as I would love it to be.
If Stephen’s life is a starter, writing itself it the main course; and Stephen is brutally honest about who will be eating. There are good writers, and those can get better. There are great writers, and those can get exceptional. But not everyone is born a writer, and bad writers will, in large, stay bad writers.
Stephen says to “Write with the door closed, rewrite with the door open”. First, write for yourself, and an imaginary IR (Ideal Reader) - be that your wife, friend, or deceased relative. Once you get your story right and out there, it belongs to any who wants to read it.
Take a noun, put it with a verb, and you have a sentence. Write with active voice, avoid adverbs (especially in dialog attributions), and stick with the first word that comes to you mind if it’s appropriate and colorful. If you do the basics right, and got a story to tell, you are on the right path. For all the other rules, there’s The Elements of Style.
“Every book you pick up has its own lesson”; On Writing is lesson in witty writing, story telling, and fulfilled life. A worthwhile read.
Notes
- Writing it telepathy. The writer has an image in their mind, and if they do good enough job, their image is translated through paper and time into the readers mind.
- Cardinal rule of fiction - Show, don’t tell.
- Good fiction begins with a story and progresses to a theme. I like to imagine that Neal Stephenson begun his Seveneves) by jotting The moon blew up without warning and for no apparent reason_ on a napkin and ended up with a novel a year later.
- You learn the best, as with any other craft, by writing a lot and reading a lot.
- Best form of dialog attribution is “he/she/they said”.
- Best writing comes from observing how real people behave, and then telling the truth about what you see.
In my view, stories and novels consist of three parts: narration, which moves the story from point A to point B and finally to point Z; description, which creates a sensory reality for the reader; and dialogue, which brings characters to life through their speech.