The Writing Life
The writing life – and the life of faith – are ones of continual exercise. Paul tells Timothy to exercise in God daily (1 Timothy 4:6-10, The Message). No spiritual flabbiness is allowed. For the writer who holds her art as a means of exercising both her talent and faith, the same holds true. She has to exercise. She has to train because it makes her fit “both today and forever.”
[Read more…] about How to be a Better Writer: Exercise Your Writing
A freelance life, a life in the arts, is sometimes like putting messages in bottles on a desert island, and hoping that someone will find one of your bottle and open it and read it, and put something in a bottle that will wash its way back to you: appreciation, or a commission, or money, or love. And you have to accept that you may put out a hundred things for every bottle that winds up coming back. – Neil Gaiman, “Make Good Art”
“Never want to say anything so strongly that you give up the option of finding something better. If you have to say it, you will.” – Richard Hugo, “Nuts and Bolts”
When you start writing a piece, you have a certain direction in mind. You know you want to talk about a specific idea. You may even have some thoughts regarding how to write about that idea. If you aren’t careful, those thoughts will imprison you. You will be stuck with a darling that will kill your writing if you don’t kill it first.
The first word is hard. The second one is a little easier. The third? The third should be even easier, which is why I say to write it. Don’t worry about the first word too much. Just start. Let yourself reach the third word, then the fourth and fifth. Don’t spend a lot of time obsessing over the words. Just get them on the paper.
Richard Hugo says to write with the tool that brings the writer the most sensual satisfaction. For Hugo, it was a number 2 pencil. He felt good putting the words on paper when he used one or two or more. Hugo liked to be prepared. He would sharpen about twenty pencils before settling into the act of writing. When one pencil dulled, he grabbed another.
I don’t much toy with rhyme schemes or meter, but I love rhythm. I think it might be my background in music or simply that I love the way words sound. I like to hear them and to think about how they roll around in the mouth or off the tongue. Strange? Perhaps, but I’m not alone in my love of sound and rhythm.