DO THE WORK: TWO STRATEGIES FOR IMPROVED WRITING

By Jerry D Pate

 

In his Fiction Writing Master Class, William Cane encourages new writers to copy the styles of various writers until they find their own voice. He notes the practice is common in music and art, so why not writing?

John Lennon and Paul McCartney, he notes, began playing together in 1957 performing songs done by other artists until they perfected their own style and songs; and were suddenly discovered six years later. They did the work.

Painters are encouraged to study and copy the works of others until their skills are honed. Writers could do the same.

Cane’s point in all of this is keep working at it.

I thought, Do the work.

A few years back I sat in on a class an English professor/instructor at UofSC opened to the public. The professor read various passages from a book and made comments.

After one reading she observed, “Here the author is using this as a metaphor for…”

I thought, Metaphor? Writers use metaphors?

The next day I was in the gym on a treadmill next to Pat Conroy’s brother and was still puzzled about the professor’s comment. I asked him if Pat ever said he was looking for a metaphor to use in one of his books.

He gave me a strange look. “Metaphor? He never asked about metaphors. Hell, when Pat was working on a project he would write and write until he came out the room and said, ‘I got three pages done today’.”

I thought, Maybe you just have to write to be able to write?

My own creative process at times gets stymied by the don’ts, do’s, and you musts of punctuation, grammar, voice, etc. Perhaps getting the story down first and worrying about the format later, might help.

But only if I’m willing to do the work. Writing is a process, not an event.

Resource:

To master the fundamentals of writing, try emulating the work of great artists – William Cane, Fiction Writing Master Class, Writers Digest, 2009, 2015.

ISBN-13:978-1-59963-916-1

 

 

READING and WRITING

By Jerry Pate 

When working on my book recently I hammered away over several days thinking Wow, this thing is moving! only to discover I had morphed into default Radio-TV narrator copy…again. It was interesting but lifeless and didn’t encourage readers to continue. Additionally, I was having difficulty with point-of-view.

On the web I found several articles on narrative voice and POV which were helpful. One of the most interesting for me was a November, 2017 post by Rae Elliott. In it, Elliot provides definitions, examples, and advice on various points of view: 1st person, 2nd person, and 3rd person both omniscient and limited. Elliot’s advice was to consider each character in the story and examine how framing the story from that character’s viewpoint would affect the narrative.

My own work-in-progress has several compelling candidates for POV and as I consider which character or characters to focus the story on, I thought to read some compelling narratives and see what I could learn.

And, while realizing I was not reading nearly enough books, I picked up From Russia With Love (Ian Fleming, Glidrose Productions, Ltd. 1957). It is a great example of Limited Third Person Narrator.

The first three chapters flesh out the book’s primary evil character from the viewpoint of: a masseuse, a flashback to the character’s transformation into a brutal unfeeling teenager, and the impressions of him by a Russian security officer all while carrying the story forward.

After reading the early chapters I realized I must read more books. So, today I have begun to establish a schedule for reading and writing and other activities. Feel free to ask me how I’m doing on this in the coming weeks. Writing is a process, not an event.

Readio

TRUTH TO FICTION

By Jerry D. Pate

I have written an historical-fiction account of a cotton mill based on the inspiration of my late mother-in-law. She had to work in a cotton mill near Joanna, SC, when she was 8-years old during the Great Depression. While the plot is complete, the story is not.

My experience as a broadcast news reporter was very helpful for researching the process of turning raw cotton into cloth. Clemson University provided great information.

But writing fiction was hampered by my default setting of writing everything as if it were a newscast, or narrative, in passive voice, i.e. no flora or fauna, sounds or smells and certainly no descriptions of people.

My story is based upon SC history of the Civil War, the myth of the Lost Cause, the 1876 elections that restored the old blue-bloods to power who enacted Jim Crow laws, and the murder of seven striking textile workers at Chiquola Mill in Honea Path, SC, in 1934.

I’ve used information about these but translated the events into fictional accounts featuring characters I’ve created.

Thanks to suggestions from our writing workshop I’ve been able to turn my original, documentary-like, draft into a story of living, breathing characters with colors and strife. Not done yet. More work is needed.

Again with a nod to the writing group, I’ve also realized that writing is a process…not an event.

THE LATEST ADDITION

Meet a New Columbia II Blogger

JERRY D. PATE

Jerry D. Pate is a retired trade association executive and broadcast news director, reporter, anchor. He has written nearly 20 short stories and is working on a book about a South Carolina cotton mill and its people. 

Jerry's first post on this page follows.

MASTERING PLOT TWISTS

By Jerry D. Pate

This week’s contribution comes from Jerry Pate, new member to our Columbia II Chapter. He takes some lessons in character & plot development from “Mastering Plot Twists” by Jane K. Cleland (full citation below).

“A Three-Question Assessment Model Delves into People’s Longings:

1. Who longs for what?

2. What are those people willing to do to satisfy their longings?

3. Who or what opposes them? (Pp 22-23)”

“Actions and Reactions Propel Your plot:

Incidents exist in a vacuum until the people involved react. Once people care about a situation though, an otherwise benign incident transforms from ho-hum to captivating. If people don’t care, a conflict is averted but you have no story. If they feel passionate about an issue, the opportunities to create conflict abound  (Pg 25).”

“Homing in on the Relationships Between Key Elements:

      Once you know what a person longs for and what they’re willing to do to satisfy that longing, you can identify a worthy opponent –which, by definition will create a conflict. You can ensure that conflict is significant enough to carry your story by confirming it aligns with a prime motivator…

“Examining works you admire enables you to identify patterns. Adapting this approach to your chosen genre equips you to make informed decisions about your plot… (Pg 53).”

“CAPITALIZE ON PERCEPTION GAPS:

Whatever we believe, it rarely occurs to us that we might be wrong, just as it rarely occurs to us that other people, as fair-minded and principled as we are, might look at the same events or facts and reach different conclusions. Yet it happens all the time. I call this dichotomy a “perception gap,” and capitalizing on its potential reveal meaningful information about your characters is a reliable way to develop believable characters and intriguing plots….

“Perception gaps encourage readers to delve into your characters’ motivations, to become more involved in your story, and to place themselves in the incidents you describe… (Pp 73 & 74).”

“ICE DOWN TRDs FOR MAXIMUM IMPACT

TRDs = Twists, Reversals & Danger

“At their best TRDs tap into strong emotions. However, you can’t randomly select emotions to tap into. Only those emotions that ripen organically from your stories and characters will work…”

Cleland suggests using the acronym ICE as a guide:

· Intrigue. Your goal in developing TRDs is to create tension through the unexpected. The word intrigue combines two irresistible facts that drive readership: curiosity and appeal…

· Credibility. Credibility requires more than creating believable situations: credibility demands trust. Readers must trust you are revealing emotional truth through believing incidents, and those incidents must relate to your [overall] narrative question…

· Evidence. One of the most oft-repeated pieces of writing advice is to show and not tell. As Mark Twain put it: “Don’t say the old lady screamed. Bring her on and let her scream.” Don’t report on events: present them. By consistently challenging yourself to provide evidence of what you’re describing, you’ll be certain to write episodes readers can see, hear, feel, smell and touch. It is these sensual references that bring your story to life…(Pg 152).”

Full citation:

Cleland, Jane K. Mastering Plot Twists. Writer’s Digest Books: 2018. Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data: ISBN-13:978-1-4403-52331.