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McAnally's (The Community Pub) => Author Craft => Topic started by: Dom on November 26, 2006, 05:13:38 AM
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Do any of you have to "work against yourself" when you write at all? Do you have any tendancies/quirks/whatever that you know are bad for your writing and you work to overcome?
One of my biggest flaws as a writer is that I very deeply want people "to get along with one another". I don't like conflict in real life. That's a problem in writing, where it only gets interesting when there's conflict! So I have to work really hard to get my main characters disliking one another. I want all my "baby" characters to play nicely, even to the detriment of their own personalities. But that would hurt the quality of the writing.
The reason I fight it is because I don't want to be bland and boring with everyone being friends. There are some good writers who do well without interpersonal conflicts between major characters, but I always think they could have been greater if they'd thrown more conflict in. Anne McCaffrey for example--love her books, don't get me wrong, but her characters are generally very nice to one another unless they're specifically cast as a villian. I would have liked to see Robinton, for example, be more vicious at times to underline his political mind (everyone knows politics holds no prisoners). It would have been interesting to see villians have more mud to sling at him aside from "He drinks like a fish!" and "Robinton and Lessa are so close they're probably sleeping together".
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one of the biggest problems i have is making my brain shut up. i sit down to write, but many times drift off as the story continues in my imagination..and i forget to actually write.
in the actual story (when i finally get to the writing) im still struggling to make the character's lives a little bit harder for them. Part of it is similar to you, Dom...i like people to get along with eachother, and i like things to work out for them. But...sigh..it's not always going to.
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I too have a "can't we all just get along" mentality. I also tend to use too many characters when merging a few makes things simpler.
Oh yeah. I'm also hanging out on boards when I should be working toward my December 15 deadline...
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I have a problem with wanting everyone to be good inside, so a lot of my villains become good guys or at least not-so-bad. I'd like to think of it as "character development" but there are many ways a villain can develop...
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I too have an issue with putting my ideas on paper. The brain works faster then I can type!
My big issue with writing stories is having characters do "stupid" things based on thier personality quirks. Having do things that they know will cause them issues later on but they don't care and do it anyways. I'm working on getting over it in my head, but putting it down on paper is hard.
I also unconciously borrow ideas from my own stories. For some stories it's okay (they are basically fan fics that will never see the light of day) but for stories set in my own world, it causes issues. I hope that when I actually get a complete story out, it will stop happening.
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My biggest problem is getting myself to sit down and write. I tend to wander off and do other things when I should be writing (for example; I have a 6 page report due tomorrow that I should be working on... right now).
As for making everyone get along, or wanting everyone to be good... I don't really have that problem. A lot of my characters are bastards. And among the good guys, I like to play off of polar personalities (e.g. I have two main characters in one story; one is an overly flamboyant wizard, and the other is a dark and reserved warrior); that tends to breed a good, healthy amount of conflict.
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I tend to let my mind wander around until it got stuck in the kitchen. It won't come back until I bring along my stomach. I really am easily distracted. This happens when I try to get new ideas when I'm stuck and so I look for references online or from other fiction or pc games. Three hours later, a ton of references but not a word written. Oddly enough, inspiration comes best when I suddenly wake up at 3am.
Story-wise, I tend to get hero and heroine misunderstand each other. It's conflict but now I'm older and have read more, this kinna conflict is cliche'. I've decided to try a different writing style, where everything should be more focused on the heroine and let the plots draw out whose's the end-story hero.
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I have a problem with wanting everyone to be good inside, so a lot of my villains become good guys or at least not-so-bad.
Very few people are villains from their own viewpoint.
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Other than getting distracted, or having more story in my head than I do on paper, my biggest problem is descriptions. In real life I look at people... Oddly. Not in some deep sense, but literally. Most people see the strongest attribute a person has like redhair, or good looks. I tend to notice jewlry, the way a person walks, the persons mood. I notice the facial expression before I notice the face. I think it is because of being an actor that I look at people this way. But in writing it just doesn't work to leave out identifying factors and give all the subtle stuff. The only other thing I have to work against myself on is explaining too much back story. So much of a persons life is tied to the past, and my characters are the same way, where if you knew their past the way I do (in my head) everything they did would be perfectly understandable. Everything else I have trouble with is not so much me activly working against my self, but just working, period.things like word choice, and making sense to the reader, leaving important stuff out, I hope everyone has those problems every now and again, or maybe I just suck. I don't know yet?
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I have a problem with wanting everyone to be good inside, so a lot of my villains become good guys or at least not-so-bad.
Very few people are villains from their own viewpoint.
True. But I usually have them start off doing nasty dastardly things and then do nice things later on. Occasionally dying a martyr's death. Things like that. If I kill them off early they stay evil.
Perhaps they mellow with age...
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Aside from putting all the chaos in my head on paper, and getting distracted by the overly shiny internet, and books, I have trouble not making my characters Supermen. Not that I don't want them to have powers, but, I have a real problem letting them loose, at all. The best I've been able to do is a very painful draw so far. But that is progress... I dream of the day when my character is bruised and bloody, maybe tied to somthing with no genuine hope of escape... That's when I'll know I've made it...
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I have a problem of introducing too many characters at once, but my major problem is that I want to know everything about every character with a decent sized part, and you just can't freaking do that when you're writing from first person POV. I have real problems focusing on my one main character, not because he doesn't interest me, but because I try to make all my characters interesting and I keep going "Hey, wait! YOU! Get back here! Why'd you do that?!" and trying to figure out every detail of their minds while my main character is neglected and sitting forelorn, asking "But... What about me?" Because of this little habit, I know less about my main character and how he thinks than anyone else, a slight problem when you're writing from his perspective...
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I have a problem of introducing too many characters at once, but my major problem is that I want to know everything about every character with a decent sized part, and you just can't freaking do that when you're writing from first person POV. I have real problems focusing on my one main character, not because he doesn't interest me, but because I try to make all my characters interesting and I keep going "Hey, wait! YOU! Get back here! Why'd you do that?!" and trying to figure out every detail of their minds while my main character is neglected and sitting forelorn, asking "But... What about me?" Because of this little habit, I know less about my main character and how he thinks than anyone else, a slight problem when you're writing from his perspective...
I'm familiar with this issue, also. In my method, I start with story concept, not character, then I try to come up with some characters that would compliment the story. Kind of a clunky way to work.
I was having a discussion about character backstory with my roommate last night and we came to the conclusion that some stories don't need backstory. Or, a lot of it, at least. The one I'm writing now isn't a backstory piece. It's just a story.
The Dresden Files, however, is a backstory piece. Lots of vibrant characters with all kinds of histories.
I've often thought that character personality is sort of a two way street. You can either build the character outline, get to know him in your head, have all the traits and reactions and quirks laid out beforehand and then make him/her act accordingly as you write...or, the reverse: just write and let the character live in the story, and then his actions/reactions build the character outline naturally.
Try to think of yourself as a character. Did anyone write an outline for you? What makes you act the way you do? Do you always act consistently?
In other words, I think the way I act makes up my personality more than my personality governs the way I act. I try to apply that to my characters, too.
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Oddly, a lot of my consistent troubles come from the actual mechanics of writing. I am famous for comma splices, using contractions outside an informal context, run on sentences... I recently went back through the first chapter of my current fiasco and eliminated all contractions that weren't in speech, cut up some of my lengthier sentences, and generally polished a little. It added almost 200 words to the length.
These are problems I know I have, and yet I can't seem to stop doing it. I know the "team" of editors that I rely on are about ready to strangle me because they keep having to point out "Here, you did it again..."
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Wait a minute -- we're NOT supposed to use contractions? ???
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Yes, If you use contractions you must be Lore in disguise. I am afraid we will have to deactivate you.
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Interesting. Not using contractions was something I did on my own. Well, in dialogue and stuff I'd use contractions, but in the rest of my writing I try not to.
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It depends. *puts English major hat on* Technically...no. But for character speech, and for things that are written in first person (which is really just more character speech), it's more acceptable. Pretty sure you could probably get away with it some, I doubt there's any contraction police that are gonna come around and bust you for it (except the people that do my editing for me. Oi.)
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It depends. *puts English major hat on* Technically...no. But for character speech, and for things that are written in first person (which is really just more character speech), it's more acceptable. Pretty sure you could probably get away with it some, I doubt there's any contraction police that are gonna come around and bust you for it (except the people that do my editing for me. Oi.)
Voice is character. Sam Spade and d'Artagnan will use contractions in very different ways. Do what's right for the character.
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I continually work against myself. Working on one story and get an idea for another, end up abandoning Story A to work on Story B and then - lo and behold! - here comes idea for Story C.
I just get too many ideas and want to work on them all but don't have the ability to. Very frustrating. And the cause of many old stories sitting idle on my harddrive for years.
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I continually work against myself. Working on one story and get an idea for another, end up abandoning Story A to work on Story B and then - lo and behold! - here comes idea for Story C.
Trick is to find something you really should be doing, and then with that firmly fixed in your mind, be productive on something else. It works for me in writing and day job alike. And even if it doesn't work, getting something done on any story is certainly more productive than sitting around playing Civilization II all night, and that's temptation enough that I can feel all happy when I manage not to do it.
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What neurovore said earlier--character is voice. That's how I write, so I use all sorts of odd things in my narration that wouldn't fly if I were, say, writing an article for a newspaper. Fiction is fiction...doesn't need to follow the Chicago Manual of Style in every way. I choose my words for effect, and if breaking a rule gets me the effect I want, I break the rule.
It makes for good fiction writing, but I've found out that it's ruined my objective writing...I tend to sound far, far more opinionated/hot-tempered/etc then I really am when I am discussing theories of things. I just automatically word things with "oomph" and it can rub people the wrong way.
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Trick is to find something you really should be doing, and then with that firmly fixed in your mind, be productive on something else. It works for me in writing and day job alike. And even if it doesn't work, getting something done on any story is certainly more productive than sitting around playing Civilization II all night, and that's temptation enough that I can feel all happy when I manage not to do it.
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Civilization II is awesome! I spend my writing breaks on Civ 4, though. You should check that one out if you haven't yet. It's the best one so far.
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Oddly, Civilization III is the one that keeps me up at night when I should be writing instead... ;D
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Oddly, Civilization III is the one that keeps me up at night when I should be writing instead... ;D
Civilization II is awesome! I spend my writing breaks on Civ 4, though. You should check that one out if you haven't yet. It's the best one so far.
Pfft. Civ III completely broke the trade system, which was one of the best things about Civ II, and messed with the diplomacy, and I'm not enamoured of its changes to combat, though I like the way it handles culture. Civ 4 is very pretty but that's not a substitute for gameplay, and the new combat system with all the promotions is to my mind even further from fun.
Mind you, I speak as a player who most enjoys building globe-spanning empires mostly peacefully, and there are lots of other ways people enjoy playing Civ-type games for which I'm entirely willing to concede that other iterations may be better. [ The freeware Civ-clone communities seem to attract an awful lot of people whose primary interest is in the games as wargames. ]
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Yeah, My favorite one is still probably Call to Power, because of the combat system. I liked the way you could stack units in one tile and attack as a force. In 4 you can stack them, but they still only attack as one. I do like that it's much more difficult to take over a city, however. I find 4 a lot more challenging.
Erm...so anyway, about writing...
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Erm...so anyway, about writing...
Got a thousand words done last night, in the course of which I realised a) that I was writing the protagonist worrisomely young for his actual age, b) that something I thought went in this bit actually goes in the next bit, which unfortunately means c) that this bit will be pretty much unmitigated adolescent doom and gloom. Which is necessary for the story but is going to be bloody depressing to write. Think that counts as having been working against myself enough to bring this back to pretty tightly on topic.