An article in last Saturday’s Wall Street Journal talks
about the
value of tough teachers, those teachers—we’ve all had them—who expect the
best and have little patience for anything else. Those of us of a
certain age
remember teachers who inspired us and made of work and learn. Many of their
methods would not be allowed in the classroom today.
More interesting, though, was that the author of the
article, writer Joann Lipman, suggested eight principals—she called them a
manifesto—for education. I was surprised how much these observations can also
be applied to successful writers:
A little pain is good
for you—Like good education, in which you study till it hurts, good writing
is not a painless process. Hemingway said it best: “There is nothing to writing. All you do
is sit down at a typewriter and bleed.”
Drill,
baby, drill—I took a writing class in college in which the professor
opened every class with five minutes of silent writing. Didn’t matter what we
wrote about. We seldom shared it. What was important was that we wrote. It was
something to warm us up. The same goes for flash fiction, working on grammar,
or anything else. The good writers have drilled in the basics. They paid
attention in school. They understand the value of taking some time and going
through a few exercises to help develop characters and plot before you dive
right in.
Failure is
not an option—We all know writers who send out to a few agents
or publishers, get a rejection or two, and then fold up and walk away. You
don’t see them at the critique groups anymore and they don’t share their
writing. The successful writers are the ones who don’t give up. They query
agents, they write and rewrite, and then they query again. These are the
writers who get published. A friend of mine who has been published in many
literary journals tells about how he wrote and rewrote a short story for a
year. It got published last month.
Strict is
better than nice—This goes back to my observation, one I have
often repeated when talking about critique groups. You should avoid those
groups that serve as little more than mutual admiration societies. You need
critique groups that will kick your ass, haul you over the coals, and hold you
to a higher standard.
Creativity
can be learned—The more I write, the more I see stories in
situations that I might have once overlooked. There are stories all over. Just
a few weeks ago I saw a middle-aged woman—probably in her sixties—with an
incredible set of legs. From the waist down she looked like a teenager. I can’t
get it out of my head. There is a story there someplace. If I was not actively
writing, I don’t think I would have seen her in the same way. This happens to
me all the time. I know I learned it.
Grit trumps
talent—The writing version of this is that the best writers are not
always the ones who get published. The ones who do get published are those with
the most persistence, who can hear the word “no” from agents and publishers and
still persist. Winston Churchill said it best” “Never give in. Never give in. Never, never, never, never.”
Praise
Makes You Weak—This can be a problem with critique groups. In an
effort not to offend you, members tell you that your writing is great when it’s
really not. Most of the time the new members will listen to more seasoned
writers and gradually come to appreciate what good writing is. Occasionally
this does not happen. Sometimes critique groups have to be more direct, and you
as a writer have to be prepared to take it. Writing is hard, or else everyone
would do it.
Stress
Makes You Strong—Screenwriter William Goldman once talked about
the plight of the writer on the movie set. “Electricians know about
electricity,” he said. “Lighting folks know about lighting. Make-up people know
about make-up. No one ever bothers these people. But everyone thinks they can
write.” Listening to criticism is stressful, and sometimes can be annoying. It
makes you work harder, though, if for no other reason than to prove those
people wrong who say, “Oh, so you write. What a nice little hobby.”
See ya’
later.
WhatIfYouCouldNotFail.com
by Tim Sunderland is licensed under a Creative Commons
Attribution-NonCommercial-ShareAlike 3.0 Unported License.
Recent Comments