#beginning writing

[thewritershelpers]

For those of you out there who feel stuck or hesitant to start writing again. 

Best of luck, 

TWH Admins 

[xpouii]

Hi! Do you have any advice for anyone who wants to start writing?

Hey there!

My first piece of advice is to *write*! Don’t wait around to be “good enough” or until you “have time” write what you want to write now! Get the whole chapter or story or poem out and then go back and *rewrite*! Editing is your friend. It’s how you learn more about yourself and how you nail down your voice and style!

*Read*! Read a lot of different things, different genres and different authors (fan works included because literature is literature!) and this will help you pick up on things you do and don’t like as a reader. If there’s something obvious that doesn’t work for you, you’ll avoid it when you write your own work. If there’s something you adore, try implementing it!

*Don’t ever apologize* for your work! Don’t post saying “this is really bad but” or “don’t read this it’s bad” and hope for pity likes/comments. Your writing is your art, your work and you present it with pride or in the very least don’t comment on its quality at all. The readers decide for themselves whether they like it or not. Your job is done once it’s presented and it is out of your hands. Make a good first impression!

*Enjoy yourself!* Make a fun routine out of writing. Have a cup of coffee or tea or your favorite thing to drink and sit down, put on some good music and just disappear into your story. Editing is the time for worrying about quality. Writing is the time for opening up your soul and pouring it out into words.

And that’s about it! Get started and keep going! The world needs more writers—always!

[nixdragon]

oh my dudes! my writing peeps! I am teaching a creative writing elective class and can do whatever I want. What are some things you would have wanted help or wanted to know when starting out? Or like any good prompt or idea generators? My plan is to have them do quick writes every day and then a bigger project based on what they want to get better at but they’re so tiny i’d like to have something for in case they stare blankly at the horrifying expanse of possibilites.

[writtenwordsalive-blog]

Life, yellow sunflower Death, red rose Both primary Contained in a vase Better to let go,  Live and Die To be reborn again  Somewhere new Free within the same cycle With a backdrop of blue

Primary, Emily Griffith 

[the-scar-factory]

How to Write When You’re Scared to Write, a novel by me: Someone who is terrified of writing.

I always read advice to beginners from professionals and they make it sound so goddamn easy: “Just do it!” “Start now!” “Just write a bunch/film a bunch” - It’s great advice and we should all follow it, but it’s more than that. Starting shit is scary as fuck y’all. 

So here’s my advice as a beginner to beginners: 

Keep a little notebook with you and write down every idea. Every. Single. One. You think you’re gonna remember them - “This is such a fantastic idea, it’ll stay in my brain, I don’t need to write it down.” WRONG. Write that shit in your little notebook because before you know it you’ll start thinking about what you want for dinner and it’ll be gone forever. I favor the little 3 pack Moleskine notebooks because they fit into my back pocket. 

Alternatively: Get a voice recorder. And get used to looking like a weirdo when you talk in it. I drive a lot for work, so I can’t always pause to write down an idea. THIS one is only $40 for a ton of memory. Also, the little buttons are nice so you’re not fumbling with the voice recorder app on your phone while you’re driving. 

Now for the fun part- 

Writing exercises. Just beginning to write your own shit is scary as fuck. You have to make up characters and plotlines, witty dialogue... Incredibly rewarding, but scary. Some more good advice I’ve heard is to “Just write a sentence. You don’t even have to keep it in the story, you can edit it out later. Just write a sentence.”

However, sometimes you gotta warm up your creative juices. Just get all them juices nice and warm. Ew. And it’s easier to do this with a throwaway story, or some creative exercise that doesn’t require you to create characters or plotlines. This is the reason I primarily write fanfiction. It’s nice to just WRITE and use characters who are already developed. 

One of my favorites is- If you’re warming up to write a screenplay, pick a scene in a book you love, or even some random book off the shelf, and write it in screenplay format. Not word for word, that doesn’t count. Imagine the scene and write how you see it. How the audience would see it. I’ll attach an example. 

On the other hand if you’re writing a novel, pick a scene from a movie or TV show and write that in novel format. Pick up on the subtext, what the characters might be thinking, decide whose point of view it is, how do those characters feel? Describe this visual scene in your own words. If you wanna take it farther, you can unpack the sentences. How?  

These are good ways to get into the writing mood without having to stress out too much. And now you’re warmed up and all ready to write your own shit. 

Okay that’s all I have for now. Time for me to go write some throwaway sentences. 

In the meanwhile, listen to this episode of Scripnotes https://johnaugust.com/2017/getting-stuff-written And then go and listen to ALL the episodes of Scriptnotes because they’re fantastic. And go look up John August on Youtube. 

My novel to screenplay exercise example under the cut. It’s a scene from Tithe by Holly Black that I like a lot. I didn’t edit it or do much besides write what I saw in my head. 

[writtenwordsalive-blog]

Love a furnace or a flame A coal simmering or a spark flying In the dark night is it not seen but felt  Or does it explode, ignite, an unabashed prideful light?  Love a steam or a tsunami  A steady course, put my hand right through, water seeps in the spaces of my fingers in a creek  Or thrashing in a dizzy spinning whirlwind gasping for air kind of storm leaving my body weak Love a rock or an earthquake  Is it the steady state, always there, steadfast and fair  Or is it the shake and crack of what you thought you knew to be,  no longer true?  A place to sit and feel at home  Or a place to fall over again and again no matter how many times you try to run,  I don't know if I'll ever know  But I'll etch it out in the sand somewhere  Letting elements be elements  And I an observer to the weather

Am I Supposed to Know or Just Watch, Emily Griffith 

[merrybond]

Writing for the joy of it

  Have you ever looked at something either in your own life or that of someone else and said, “that would make a great story”? Do you play (or have you ever played) Dungeons & Dragons, Pathfinder, or any other role-playing game? If the answer to either of these questions is yes, then why aren’t you writing these stories down? Or if you have tried and then given up, maybe it’s time for you try…

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