/wrt/ - Writing General

[Anonymous No.14547567]

Here we discuss anything concerning the practice of writing. You can ask for tips, post works for critique, and so on.

Beneficial because these threads individually do not tend to last long.

[Anonymous No.14547574]

>Is it bad writing if a protagonist of a story is not at all likeable, or is it merely just a bad business practice?
It is infinitely more important for your characters to be interesting rather than likeable.
'Likeability' is for the low-IQ and """mid"""-IQ.

[Anonymous No.14547589]

>Methods of writing
First what I do is come up with the premise behind the story I wish to write.

I've got a line of business focus stories I have planned. One of them is of a guy who becomes an e-merchant. He goes around, probably in the Chicago area, looking for random stuff to sell on eBay, Craigslist, Grailed, wherever applicable. Of course, he wants to turn a profit, so he looks for semi-valuable things that will fetch a decent price, but which he himself can get for lower than their value and then make more expensive. He puts his store on as many platforms as possible to cast the widest net of audience.

Okay, so having settled what the premise is, then I have to figure out what sort of person the protagonist is going to be. I decided that he's a young man of his mid-20s just about, tough-minded, hard-working, articulate, intelligent, short-tempered.
His background is a bit murky at the moment, but what will I let the audience know about it? I suppose that his parents have a sizeable store of money he could use, but didn't let him see a dime of it, forcing him to go into business for himself; and that required leaving his unimportant flyover hometown for the big city.
His quirks? He puts on a fake New England accent to make himself sound rougher than his Midwestern accent would betray, and he plays up his impatience in order to help make deals when interacting with buyers in person.
His goals? What's he driving at? Where could the story end with an accomplishment of his? These are questions you need to ask about your protag in order to give you a sense of the plot's structure, to prevent meandering and filler and general aimlessness.

And then finally, you have to ask yourself what the point of your story is. What are you trying to say with it? Or at least, what kind of contribution to literature are you trying to make? For me, the themes run the gamut from the importance of merchants in history to the desirability the lifestyles of wealth can afford, so I can contrive all kinds of different situations and conversations to achieve this. But overall, it is a tale of man who runs a general store in the postmodern age, and the challenges one would need to overcome to succeed in that enterprise.

Once you have the bones, it's just a matter of you inspiring yourself to write random scenes here and there, come up with new characters and events, that gradually accumulate into a full story. Immerse yourself steep in the aesthetics of your saga. Note everything that comes to your mind even when not writing, and come back to the typewriter to flesh out those shower ideas when you can.

[Anonymous No.14547595]

>Need help for character developement
You have to familiarize yourself with Astrology and personality psychology (namely, Myers-Briggs and Enneagram).

Once you've done that, not only will you need to be able to write a character fitting one of the molds, but you will need to be able to combine the molds in such a way to turn that 2-Dimensional character into a 3-Dimensional one.

So, if you have an ESFP, for example, you will need to follow this supplementary formula (choose only one):

>1. In giving them a secondary personality, you choose one (1) that deviates by three letters, and combine that with the primary personality. So an ESFP that has traces of an INFJ, e.g.: a fun-loving goofball with a deep concern for the world's well-being.

>2. In giving them a tertiary personality, you choose two (2) that deviate by two letters, and combine that with the primary personality. So an ESFP that has traces of an ISFJ and ENTP, e.g.: a fun-loving goof-ball with a caring heart but tendency to make fun of people.

>3. In giving them a quaternary personality, you choose three (3) that deviate by 1 letter, and combine that with the primary personality. So an ESFP that has inklings of an ISFP, ENFP, and ESFJ, e.g.: a fun-loving goof-ball with an artist's spirit, alluring and charming aura, and tendency to control the pace of a party.

From there, you pick and choose which traits to imbue the character with, which will help you understand how they would act and react in any given situation you want to put them in. These systems will do the heavy lifting for you in terms of creating believable and logically-constructed characters.

[Anonymous No.14547600]

>The greatness of literature is commensurate with "aesthetical" beauty. How can you debate this?
Taking whole consecutive pages at a time just to describe scenery, or peoples' appearances, or other irrelevant nonsense while
>1
Not advancing the plot
>2
Producing no dialogue
>3
Giving no meaningful insight into the world / setting / characters the book is taking place in
>4
Saying nothing philosophical

is not good writing. Scarlet Letter's and The Hunchback of Notre Dame's openings are excellent examples of everything wrong with conventional artsy modern novel-writing.
It is boring and pointless regardless of how "tight" or "lyrical" the prose is---the author has said nothing of the actual story. Just wasted your time.

[Anonymous No.14547603]

John Gardner, from "The Art of Fiction", keeps talking on that book about young, ambitious writers, but what age is young for a writer?

[Anonymous No.14547615]

>>14547603
>what age is young for a writer?
~23 is about the age when ideally you would have written and had *something* published.

Any younger, especially in your teens, and so long as your work isn't shoddy, you could be reasonably considered something of a prodigy.

Most writers however never get going until they're ~30 years old, so you're still in the clear in that 8 year span of time from age 23 to 31.

Getting started at least by then gives you a good 3 decades to get a career going.

[Anonymous No.14547750]

When writing characters, you have to have the faith that they know things about themselves you don't know.

[Anonymous No.14547788]

What makes protagonists extraordinary?

[Anonymous No.14547839]

A decent plot will have a clearly defined endpoint with the steps toward it outlined before they begin.

Subverting this structure is having a fake endpoint that is not the real ending, having the plot continue on to a new endpoint never hinted at before.

[Anonymous No.14547874]

If your story will not be superior to what came before it, then it is not worth writing.

[Anonymous No.14547885]

>>14547567
"A retarded poet hears someone say syphilis"

Syphilis?
Syllables in triplets
Gentle harmony in three's
I have no idea what the word means

It's smooth but slick
Feels like a reptile's lick
It stays long on your lips
But saying its a pleasant itch

I shall add it to my list
Of words that feel good
Maybe, if carefully woven,
I could fit it into a love poem?
One she would never forget.

What do you guys think of my poem? I have had the word syphilis stuck in my head for three days.

[Anonymous No.14547899]

>>14547567
I wanted to start a story with the decription of a landscape. I had posted a few paragraph to a /crit/ thread, and many anons liked it, so I wrote some more and took a screenshot. Any criticism and feedback will be well met.

[Anonymous No.14547907]

>>14547839
Does this hidden plot go on beneath the fake plot, or does it start with the ending of the fake plot?

[Anonymous No.14547936]

>>14547885
I like its rattatat for a rap / hip-hop track. Allow me:

Syphilis?
Syllables in triplets
Gentle harmony in three's | {What does this line mean? Why is it a "gentle" rhythm?}
Clue-less what the word means

It's smooth but slick
Like a reptile's lick
Lingers long on your lips
Post to my list
Of words that scratch an itch

My new vocab'-brushed tongue
Could eke out a love poem
To never set my (be-)loved's sun.

Just an attempt to get a better rhythm going.

[Anonymous No.14547986]

>>14547899
I'll give it a shot.

>no song to stir the air
Why would there be any music?
>no light to color the world
good
>Wooly clouds
use a better descriptor---they're 'wooliness' doesn't add anything to your setting of the scene
>spotted
come up with a better way of describing their presence
>deep violet sky
I like "violet sky" but 'deep' is cliche here and not particularly meaningful; use a different, more evocative word
>innumerable
that implies you'd want to count them, and I wouldn't, so use something without that implication like 'myriad' or 'infinite'
>flickered
"flickered dim"
then you can axe the 'dim' you use in the next sentence, because you've had the perfect opportunity to say they're dim here
>"fair countryside"
another meaningless cliche
use a different word from 'fair', and honestly, consider calling it something more than "countryside", like "woods and pastures"
>"deep night"
again, use something other than "deep"
>Grass in that place grew tall
*Grass there/here grew tall
>and many animals
*and many creatures
>curled up
en-wrapped
>hid in the flora
I like your use of flora but I'd use a different phrase than "hid", because if they're sleeping, then they can't be hiding---they're more like "tucked away", which evokes sleeping imagery
>Below, round hills rose and fell
*Below, round hills waved
>going outwards
*out to the horizon
>ripples in dark water
ripples upon a murky pond

[Anonymous No.14548014]

>>14547907
That's a good question. It could go both ways. But let me think about it.

Do you have any ideas?

[Anonymous No.14548066]

Critique.

Darkness had swallowed the land only moments before. Not by hours, but whole ages. The crest of the mountains began to gain their Earthly glow not from the light of day, but by nature’s breath, and from there brought the winds North down onto the valleys. At a transitory phase beneath the radiance of daybreak, the mountains would begin their slow stir from the languish of the night. Some still laid unbroken—the quiet stream beside the fir bough, the cacophony of the night owls far into the wooded steppe, and in the notch the draft howled so vigorously that it was as if the hymns of some ancient ritual were taking place. Already haunted were the lands that man had roamed, already was man’s feet supplanted on the corpses of the vegetative masses, already were man’s ears filled with echoes of cries from the primeval forests, already the fiery stars man so gazed at were at their last blink. So then was the natural world which man lived in a spirit of itself, died as it had done a thousand times, and to die a thousand times more.

[Anonymous No.14548083]

>>14548066
Do you prefer editing or a commentary on what you wrote?

[Anonymous No.14548092]

>>14547595
>You have to familiarize yourself with Astrology and personality psychology (namely, Myers-Briggs and Enneagram)
Is this what autism looks like?

[Anonymous No.14548128]

>>14548083
Both. If you can explain what you edited it would be benificial to me. Ty anon

[Anonymous No.14548307]

>>14548066
>Darkness had swallowed the land only moments before
Why "swallowed"? Why not "enveloped"? "Swaddled"?
>Not by hours, but whole ages.
"whole ages" works but consider "aeons".
>The crest of the mountains began to gain their Earthly glow not from the light of day, but by nature’s breath
I'm not following how that's possible.
>At a transitory phase beneath the radiance of daybreak, the mountains would begin their slow stir from the languish of the night.
Mountains don't even seem to move let alone actually do so, so this line's not impactful.
However, if you stick to trying to describe a day as a "whole age", then you should say more about how mountains grow over time as like a person rousing from prone sleep, sitting up in their bed.
However, the rest of your passage seems like it's describing a literal day, and not a metaphorical one.

[Anonymous No.14548364]

>>14548307
not him but can you critique this please and suggest edits for the second draft?

The Winter burned my cheeks, despite my curled up back and wrapped up face in the boisterous class. I hugged my face harder and hoped to warm up. Over the flutters of dialogue that poured out of the class, my frigid ears possessed the clock’s tick down to its last second before the lesson ended. I hit my head in grief: my father hired a science tutor, of whom I’d have to attend for two hours. If only I had the ability to both doze off in class and acquire the grades necessary to satisfy my father.

An elbow suddenly fingered my ribs and heavy arms pushed down on me. “What are you doing?” I slurred, my mouth not yet functioning properly from my slumber. It was awhile before my faculties were restored, even the teacher’s nasally lecturing did not register, nor the damp smell of the toilet across the hallway. Thirty black blazers clung to the floor and the teacher was sprawled across his desk. I had no time to play games, and so I walked out the classroom, assuming the bell had already rung. As I walked down the corridor, it was eerily silent.

[Anonymous No.14548395]

I have a question for you guys. Say you had moderate success as an author. Say you had a novel published in a small indie press. Say a strapping young up-n-comer in Hollywood got his hands on your novel, and adapted it into an eerily-similar screenplay without your knowledge or permission. Say that screenplay became a multi-million dollar, critically acclaimed movie, all of this happening behind your back. How would you feel? What would you do?

[Anonymous No.14548405]

Do you think a writer can write something good about a culture that they're not part of? Say writing a book from the perspective of an African when you're from Europe.

I've read a few interviews with writers who say that it'll always feel off if you try and write anything from an outsider's perspective.

[Anonymous No.14548482]

>>14548405
In writing any perspective, you should be true to the person's experience, if not in fact then in feel. You should attempt to recreate the feeling of the subject, give it nuance, and do it justice. You should avoid contrivances and outright lying. Here's an essay by Zadie Smith that talks about the phenomenon much more articulately than I can.

https://www.nybooks.com/articles/2019/10/24/zadie-smith-in-defense-of-fiction/?fbclid=IwAR0E8fGM1ptsXWPeadcFrkDe7P07Xc2eDRzHCYav_jLnrk9m02h2w2AzEnw

[Anonymous No.14548485]

>>14548482
Cheers man, that helps a lot. I'll give this a read.

[Anonymous No.14548498]

>>14548485
>>14548482
sorry, didn't realize that essay was behind a paywall. i was on a university wifi when i read it

[Anonymous No.14548501]

>>14548395
Go public, go on a twitter/facebook page of that movie and post your story

[Anonymous No.14548538]

What do you guys think of this story (outline):

>Open on a royal ball in a castle, time period around 600 AD. Protag is a personal guard to one of the nobles in attendance. The noble is charming, eloquent and popular; the protag is his shadow--silent, invisible and near. We understand that the Protag has guarded the noble's family for many years and considers him something like a son.
>During one of the dances, the noble has a seizure and collapses. He doesn't die however, and over the following days even seems to make full recovery
>Protag and noble return home. We learn the protag lives a fairly solitary existence, feeling that personal attachments might affect his duty to the noble. He believes he has to a maintain a readiness to die at any time. Soon, the noble begins exhibiting strange behavior, paranoia, delusions, violent outbursts. It begins to affect his rule.
>Doctors are brought in but none are able to help the noble. A traveling wizard claims he has a cure and the protag convinces the hesitant noble to try it.
>The cure seems to work, the noble regains his clarity. His sudden recovery spurs an attempt at his life by a faction he had wronged in his earlier madness. The protag is able to intervene and save the noble's life.
>In the aftermath, the noble has another seizure. We learn that the wizard was a charlatan and his cure only masked the illness and made it worse. As his ward slips into insanity, the guilty protag debates and finally settles on killing the noble himself.
>Protag kills the noble in his sleep and allows the other faction to take over. As he flees the chaos he contemplates suicide, having not only lost but betrayed his only purpose in life.
>In the morning, while traveling by carriage, one of the other traveler's asks him his name. He offers an alias and in the process realizes how liberating it is not have his identity fused with his occupation. He decides to live on.

[Anonymous No.14548556]

>>14548364
>The Winter burned my cheeks
Fine.
>despite my curled up back and wrapped up face
I refer you to the synonyms I mentioned here >>14548307 : 'swaddled' in particular.
"Wrapped up" is too mundane.
And I assume by "curled up back" you mean that you're bunched up / hunched down into your clothing to keep warm.
But "curled up back" itself doesn't make as much a sense as a phrasing.
>in the boisterous class
Wait, so you're indoors? How would it be cold inside a classroom? And why are you specifically mentioning its "boisterousness"?
Perhaps you mean to say that the amount of activity should be generating a good deal of heat, and yet you're still chilly?
>I hugged
*I cuddled
>and hoped to
*hoping to
>Over the flutters of dialogue
The use of "flutters" contradicts your earlier use of "boisterous" by implying that the conversations are happening in hushed tones or at least are not very harsh, and certainly not loud.
>that poured out
This also does not meld with your use of "flutters" as well as being just a cliche'd verb to use in this case. I wish I could suggest something more fitting but what it'd be hinges on "flutters" being there or not.
>of the class
Personally I don't like to use the same "pronoun" twice in a row---so instead of saying class again, I'd say "my peers" or "my classmates" or something like that.
>my frigid ears possessed the clock’s tick down to its last second before the lesson ended
*my frigid ears were pricked by the clock's ticking each second down to its last until the lesson (whatever it was) concluded.
>I hit my head
*I smacked my head
>of whom I’d have to attend for
*whose own session/lesson I'd have to attend
>If only I had the ability to both
Consider:
*Had I only the ability both to
>suddenly fingered
*suddenly prodded
>and heavy arms pushed down on me
I'm not sure what's going on. I'm not getting a clear picture what's happening here.
>“What are you doing?”
*"What're-you-doin'...?"
>I slurred, my mouth
*my mouth slurred,
>It was awhile
*It took several moments
>before my faculties were restored,
*before my daze faded;
>Thirty black blazers clung to the floor and the teacher was sprawled across his desk. I had no time to play games
Yeah I have no clue what's going on in this scene now.

[Anonymous No.14548576]

>>14548395
>What would you do?
I'm pretty sure there are copyright laws protecting me in this case, so I'd file a lawsuit to acquire the earnings. Ripping someone off like that is unpermissible.

[Anonymous No.14548601]

>>14548405
>Do you think a writer can write something good about a culture that they're not part of? Say writing a book from the perspective of an African when you're from Europe.
You're asking too broad of a question.
But at any rate, the answer to this broad question is that anything is possible with sufficient research, whether from books or real life experience as necessary.
>it'll always feel off if you try and write anything from an outsider's perspective.
If their target audience is not from that culture either, then it won't matter because they won't know how they should feel.

[Anonymous No.14548655]

>>14548538
>Open on a royal ball in a castle, time period around 600 AD.
You ever read Beowulf? A party taking place in 600 AD would not be elegant, and there wouldn't be castles of stone or otherwise.
>Protag is a personal guard to one of the nobles in attendance.
They're aren't necessarily "nobles" so much as trusted and respected fellow warriors.
You definitely would not have status just being an ass-sitter who talks a lot.
So either you mean to set this like 400 or 500 years later during the actual medieval period, or you have the wrong conception of what the dark ages was like.
>Doctors
There wouldn't have been "doctors" as we'd imagine them.

[Anonymous No.14548681]

>>14548655
I assumed he meant it to be set in an arthurian-type chivalric romance setting rather than being historically accurate, what with the wizard.

[Anonymous No.14548682]

>>14548655
Yeah 600 AD is too early. Should be 11-12th century AD. Really it's more the aesthetic I'm going for, it's not a strictly historical novel.

[Anonymous No.14548788]

tfw decent at thematics, plot and characterisation but not good at writing prose or dialogue
FUCK

[Anonymous No.14548809]

>>14548788
post some shit here for practice
I think I'm good at dialogue so I can give your mess a readover and critique

as for prose, most people are not good at prose period

[Anonymous No.14548824]

What I learned from Zombieland: Adding women to your story won't automatically make it better. In fact, it may make it worse.

[Anonymous No.14548869]

Unimportant details should be explicitly marked as unimportant, so as to prompt readers' interpretations to help fill in the blanks.

For example, if your character is from some no-name small city that's not worth you trying to pin down, have them say they are from "some shithole", or that where it is exactly "doesn't matter".

[Anonymous No.14548882]

Well OP one of the first lessons I took when i started college was to stop wearing so many sweat pants - use to be a big timer in this field. I stopped wearing sweat pants and suddenly I started noticing girls again, before this I was questioning if maybe I'd become asexual. The first time I wore jeans was in my sophmore year, I was masturbating heavily around that time and reading James Joyce and Vonnegut (alternating per day). I got to that passage in Angelas Ashes where he ejaculates over a hill top and decided to wipe my cum in the book binding and throw it away. Never finished it, but that's when I stopped masturbating. I also threw away almost every book I owned and then bought a couple new ones mostly about Number Theory (these were not interesting).

So maybe she should just try to find out whats wrong with her approach to making friends. The first time I asked a girl out who was probably like your sister a lot (young ,excited, hoping for a good time in college) I took her to Applebee's and didn't pay for her bill. I could tell she was really let down by that fact, I knew I could have paid for it but I thought maybe it would be more fun to see how she paid for the bill. She did it and we met a couple times after that. I slipped a small book of poems by Yeats in her purse when she went to the toilet and she never called me again. The joke is on her because I rubbed my cock on the first page which she probably touched. I saw her in school some times but I didn't even make eye contact because it was so funny.

I didn't really meet a true girl until I was in Junior year and then we dated for about 5 days before I knew I'd met the one. Needless to say we're now on day 22 and things can't be better for me.

[Anonymous No.14548901]

>>14547874
The worst part about your post is I can't even remember my first blow job. I know I've had at least two but for my first one I just don't remember it. I was in High School at the time with a serious bed wetting problem, I also had been taking some prescription medication to help with some "bacne" problems that had sprouted up due to a surge of unstable hormones. I went to a party where some kids had a small bonfire in the back yard, they were okay but it wasn't anything special. We had Bud Light and some Amstel's, I think there was Rolling Rocks too.

I remember drinking a "Jack and Coke" and thinking how bad it tasted. I wanted to go home about an hour into the gathering but decided to stick around. There was a girl there who I had a couple of classes with, we made jokes about the teachers and home work. I told her she looked nice and she said thanks, we talked for about an hour and she was drunk. You can tell a girl is drunk because she starts becoming more physically animated with light flushing around the cheeks and glossy eyes. I knew I'd scored a winner, the problem was it was late and I knew I needed to sleep.

We went inside and started making out. I remember running my tongue along the front of her teeth to see what it felt like. She was so drunk she didn't even care. Sometime after that I fell asleep, but I woke up with my pants undone and my dick was lightly wet. She had vomited at some point, because her breath smelt bad and she had some stains on her shirt. We didn't talk much after that night, I think she is studying in a community college but hasn't declared any real major yet. I can understand that, life is a challenge.

[Anonymous No.14548918]

>>14548882
>>14548901
wrong thread?

[Anonymous No.14548931]

>>14548918
One time we had a Nature walk for a biology class. It was pretty nice, an autumn day that's just in the early "golden hour" of its peak. There's a real great time to go for a walk. I remember I was stuck with a partner (the assignment involved cataloging) who could barely speak English. She was from Moldova and at least 30 years old. She had a funny name I can't recall even if I tried now. I remember her breasts and flat face, she had brown hair that was put up in a tight bun. Her breasts were the perfect size and had a good firm grip to them. I touched them "on accident" when I feigned tying my shoe lace. I recall apologizing to her but she laughed, I think she was just confused. I notice most people are confused when they get sexually assaulted for the first time, I can understand that because it's not something they assume automatically.

Later on in the walk our group got a bit lost. There were a series of paths around the campus and our professor was one of those "hippie" types that never leaves their mansion. A real grassfed burger if you ask me. The Moldovan girl got sexually assaulted twice that day, because I gently rubbed my hand across her ass when she bent over to pick a rock up. She didn't know this was me because I hid behind several other students. I masturbated to this when I got home (It was around the time I was masturbating heavily and reading Vonnegut and James Joyce). It was an okay feeling.

I tried asking her out on a date the next class but her English was simply too poor. I realized I could tell her anything and she would barely understand. Sometimes I used to speak "pig latin" to her and tell her that I wanted to see her naked and urinate on her stomach. She used to laugh then. I wonder if she's laughing now.

[Anonymous No.14548966]

The Weebs of /a/ are usually incredibly reserved when it comes to giving out recommendations of new anime or manga to people who ask for it, to the point of having an unwritten rule that anyone asking for sauce is to be ridiculed and, preferably, banned for a couple of days, so that they may lurk and find the tools necessary to secure sauce on their own. However, despite this attitude, they have a type of thread on the board which has been a standard for years that seems to go completely against this otherwise hostile notion of not sharing; the OPT. In these rather discussion-lacking threads, the inhabitants post a single page from a manga, the page itself cherry-picked to catch the attention of other anons. It's usually something interesting like a beautiful two-page spread, or some inexplicable scene taken out of context that will make you want to know what lead up to that particular thing happening. These threads will usually last for days with hundreds of different pages shared, and many thanks given by those introduced to something new and entertaining. It's remarkable how an otherwise hostile board can get together and hold these events, which seem to be bathed in a glow of warm, communal spirit, but it goes to show that no matter the elitism, people interested in a topic will always want to spread their knowledge to others who, as them, share an interest in whatever thing it is.

A.N. Onymous
Professor of Chantropology

[Anonymous No.14548970]

>>14548931
I think this thread >>14535541 is more suited to your intent.

[Anonymous No.14548978]

>>14548931
>I wonder if she's laughing now.
Me too, buddy. Me too.

[Anonymous No.14548992]

>>14548966
That's not elitism, that's getting ticked off with people asking stupid questions with answers they'd easily be able to find themselves.

/a/ is not an elitist board
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Oe9ATA0hZCY

[Anonymous No.14549002]

How should I rewrite this?

I dragged myself to Mr Gardner’s desk and tore open the bottom left drawer. It took three tugs before I managed to unhook it from its hinge. Dust flew out like trapped pigeons and coated my hand. I spotted a locked drawer at the top and I pulled myself closer after I searched the pockets of my former teacher for the key. The sound of the key clicking into place gave me relief but the drawer would not open despite my best efforts. A strong wind came rushing into the classroom and pushed against the desk. It flew to the floor in a rush with me on top of it. The right side of my upper back was crushed by the large desk and I heard a whipping sound emit loudly. “Ah” I cried. A surge of electrifying pain jolted throughout my spine and I flopped momentarily. My eyes almost burst out of their sockets and they beat red like my cheeks.

[Anonymous No.14549013]

>>14548970
Wow great this is exactly what I was looking for thanks a lot I really love this board I can express myself

[Anonymous No.14549015]

>>14548992
/a/ is super elitist when it comes to adhering to board culture.

[Anonymous No.14549129]

>>14547595
anything you write is certainly awful. you're not making fully realized characters, just cardboard.

[Anonymous No.14549153]

>>14549002
>tore open
try finding a way of expressing this more particularly evocatively
>tugs
that's too weak to flow with your previous action of "tearing" it open; choose a stronger verb
>unhook it from its hinge
how about
*unhinge it
>Dust flew out like trapped pigeons
noice
>and coated my hand
decent, but I'd say something more committal like "tarred", which in this case would be "ashed"
>after I searched
*after searching
>former teacher
Is he deceased or something? "Former" is not the best term to use for any case other than you graduating (or otherwise leaving their tutelage) or they retiring.
>me relief
*me relief,
>my best efforts
I'd say something else.
>pushed against
*blew against
>It flew to the floor
What flew to the floor?
>I cried
*I shrieked

So if I've got this straight, the protag is injured and in a classroom or office with his dead teacher. He opens a draw for some reason but then moves to a locker? And then suddenly some magic wind blew in? But was the guy crawling on the floor or on top of the desk when that happened? And how could it be simultaneously so powerful to flip the teacher's desk over but not powerful enough to send the protag flying far enough away from it not to have it fall on top of him?

[Anonymous No.14549161]

>>14549129
What's your method hotshot?

Jackshit, I bet.

[Anonymous No.14549173]

how the heck is writing decent fiction even possible

[Anonymous No.14549185]

>>14549161
I'm not claiming to be a good writer and I'm not trying to spread bad advice. No seething from you is going to make your advice any better.

[Anonymous No.14549189]

>>14549173
what would you consider decent fiction?

[Anonymous No.14549202]

>>14549185
Already knew you'd accuse me of seething.
I'm cool.
I just get a tad annoyed when a smoothbrain comes along arrogantly talking down things they don't understand.

[Anonymous No.14549208]

>>14549189
you just know

[Anonymous No.14549215]

>>14549173
Start by not giving a fuck. You have to tell the story that's in your head using the words that fit you the best, that is, your own style. And you can't express that if you're scared of how people might react to it. So write shit for yourself, not for others, and once you have enough, maybe it can become popular.

[Anonymous No.14549283]

>>14548307
I like critique threads but sometimes anons are so narcissistic, instead of trying to improve the post they just say how they would have written the passage.
>Why "swallowed"? Why not "enveloped"? "Swaddled"?
Why not swallowed?

[Anonymous No.14549297]

>>14549153
Thank you so much man.

How do I write more evocatively?

[Anonymous No.14549301]

>>14549202
you are telling people to great characters based on astrology and nerd astrology. a great novel is going to feature well-realized personalities formed from complex and human motivations that work holistically with the rest of the novels content which it is inseparable from.

[Anonymous No.14549322]

>>14549301
About you do research on complex matters before you start making assumptions about their information.
>well-realized personalities formed from complex and human motivations
Sure; but not everyone possesses the talent of being able to read and understand people intuitively from experience alone.

[Anonymous No.14549344]

>>14549322
>assumptions about their information.
what assumptions? the astrology? its in the post clearly spelled out. i have assumed nothing.
yes many people are not good at writing.

[MRXWBHSTC !pyWc79jpj2 No.14549360]

>>14548809
Well, here's two extracts of my writing with pretty different subject matter and narrative voices so you can triangulate the commonalities and problems between them- a chapter from something and a short story. The latter is pretty long so I don't expect anyone to read the whole thing but I posted the first couple of pages in a critique thread before and someone said "Let me guess, X happens, that's such a cliche" and 'X' isn't what happens, so for reasons like that I've never been sure where to crop extracts.

https://www.dropbox.com/s/2b7o3yzzx4ib7dp/two%20extracts-%20I%20don%27t%20expect%20anyone%20to%20read%20the%20whole%20thing%2C%20dw.docx?dl=0

I don't know what I can give to the thread in return but there's this: my current template for constructing a story is like pic related, in my head.

[Anonymous No.14549372]

>>14549283
It's not narcissism. I recommend you go read a before and after of Mary Shelley's Frankenstein when Percy was editing it for you to see the importance of embellishing the prose.
You need to treat your writing posted here more like a rough draft which first and foremost aimed to get the point across, admitting that the way it's composed now is not necessarily ultimately the best for it.
>Why not swallowed?
Because it animates the darkness in a way you are doing nothing with. Creatures swallow. You're not treating the darkness like a creature here, so the metaphor is lazy. Aside from the fact that swallowing means the thing being swallowed goes or sinks down---hence the common "The sea swallowed the ship" type set-up---which is not the case with this scene.

[Anonymous No.14549378]

>>14549344
>what assumptions?
Ultimately, that there's nothing to gain from learning about astrology and personality psychology for the purpose of learning how to develop realistic and interesting characters, which is false and exceedingly ignorant.

[Anonymous No.14549401]

>>14549372
Anon I'm not the person that posted that excerpt, I would never be so ungracious if someone took the time to critique my piece of writing.
Swaddled gives the rest of the passage a completely different tone than swallowed. I don't even think swallowed is the perfect word, but dismissing it offhand with the assumption anon used it without intent is what I'm talking about.

[Anonymous No.14549424]

>>14549401
>Swaddled gives the rest of the passage a completely different tone than swallowed.
Then I'd recommend "smothered".
Like I implied, I kind of checked out because I couldn't quite pin down what point he was trying to get across.

[Anonymous No.14549434]

>>14549208
that's a cop-out dude

[Anonymous No.14549539]

>>14549297
>How do I write more evocatively?
It's all about picking the right words and not relying on cliche's to carry your writing.
Like the conversation going on about darkness swallowing stuff, you need to get in tune with what is happening and how every element of your story is an actor with a precise purpose and appropriately costumed character.
So, in the case of having "tore open" a drawer, you need to think about contexts where you usually hear "tear open": when you have mail, like an acceptance letter to a college; when you giddily unwrap a Christmas gift; etc.---tearing typically involves rippable material.
I'm not saying it wouldn't do---it makes good sense for a drawer to be torn open, and it's certainly more evocative of what the mood and the action is than the pedestrian "pulled open" would be. But the question you need to ask yourself is, "Could I do better?"
For example, you could say "yanked open"---but that word carries zany undertones more befitting a comedy than is appropriate for your thriller, so that's no good either.

In times like these, in all serious, I whip out this trusty tool:
https://www.thesaurus.com/browse/yank

And ah! So we have it: a decent selection of options that had slipped our mind which come closer to perfection than "tore open" did.
Personally, I'm favoring "jerk", "snatched", and "wrenched". "Snatched" has the same problem as "tore" in not fitting this action like a glove. "Jerk" is far better, but is used typically for smaller range of motions than pulling open a whole desk drawer (those are kinda too long and heavy for jerking), and even also body convulsions.
So that leaves "wrenched" as my personal favorite substitute for "tore" here, as it says exactly what we want it to say with no confusion.

Writing more evocatively is a process of finding the perfect thing to say, because that will express in one word what would normally take a whole 'nother clause.

[Anonymous No.14549558]

>>14547567
Where do I start if I want to write poetry? In all honesty all I can think of is reading other poets.

[Anonymous No.14549578]

He wrote another potboiler,
his fridge grew furry, artichoke hearts mushy,
the accelerometer on his phone broke
after a 3 AM fender bender.
He flossed his typewriter's teeth
with black widow silk, and replaced the ribbon.
Alley Cat tapped at his window
three weeks ago now (today is Wednesday).
The teleprompter slowed to half-speed,
the audience coughs; rainy season is over.
"It's shorter than your last one," his publisher,
sweating through his shirt, winked at Leanne.
The grocery store ran out of oranges
and all juice from concentrate—
tonight the locusts will shock the horizon
with a calm blurry, a water color splat
(the cover slipped, boiled over with noodle).

[Anonymous No.14549614]

>>14549578
Very lyrical, I like it. Wish it rhymed.

[Anonymous No.14549657]

>>14549558
I began by reading various poets until I found a few which I particularly enjoyed. Then I just began aping their styles, trying to emulating their assonance, rhythm and rhyme. Sometimes I would just literally re-write their poems with my own words, slightly changing the themes when necessary. I still do this sometimes, but since then I have at the very least began naturally developing my own voice. I'm still not any good though, so take this as a grain of salt. Perhaps this method is entirely antithetical to developing proper skills.

[Anonymous No.14549774]

>>14549378
it's not an assumption. astrology and science astrology are not going to help you write good characters because they are both nonsense.

[Anonymous No.14549777]

>>14549360
>"It’s a high-air-pressure day today."
Why on Earth would he mention this? It's not natural at all for small-talk.
I'd sub it for some other observation or just axe it entirely.
>"I met this man, and he was in a time machine, right?"
I'd substitute 'guy' for "man" or drop the "right?"
They both lean in to two different tones: "man" belongs to a formal tone that clashes with the "right?"; "guy" belongs to an informal tone that works with the "right?"
>"ketty"
I'm not familiar with this; I assume it has to do with drugs.

Anyway, so far so good, but then...

>"Sounds like a normal Saturday night to me."
That's just really cheesy; someone saying this would get a "Really?" look rather than a genuine laugh.

Nikky's following passage goes pretty naturally until "morose"---normal people wouldn't be busting that in an emotionally charged conversation with a friend.

>"we were stood"
*we stood
/
*we were standing

Then you continue writing Nikky well enough.

But for some reason, everytime we get to the protagonist, he just says some awkward stuff he shouldn't have:
>"So more of a Doctor Who sort of a deal than a Back To The Future set-up"
At this point that's obvious; does he not get that? And if he does, why bother mentioning it, or at least this late when it's already self-evident?

So I continued reading up to the part where he apologizes for interrupting, and my conclusion is that you're pretty decent at writing dialogue, but Nikky is so much better written than whatever you're doing with the protagonist. Maybe that's just their character, but they come across as just poorly written lines to me.

The narration is okay, nothing remarkable.

[Anonymous No.14549783]

>>14549774
You are literally assuming stuff you know jackshit about.
Your uninformed opinion duly noted.

[Anonymous No.14549809]

>>14549558
>Where do I start if I want to write poetry?
That depends on where you're coming from.

[Anonymous No.14549819]

>>14549578
Overall solid enough for what it is.

[Anonymous No.14549820]

>>14549777
Thanks
The "air pressure" thing is relevant to another part of the same story, rest I agree with

[Anonymous No.14549849]

>>14549820
Cool.

[Anonymous No.14549851]

>>14549783
Name five (5) prominent male authors well versed in astrology. Also, tits or gtfo.

[Anonymous No.14549904]

>>14549360
Pretty good my man, I'm jealous of your talent. However, sometimes you get a bit longwinded with the detail. I get its your style but you need to give some breathing room. This is especially prominent in the second short story excerpt but appears all throughout. You should start submitting if you haven't already.

[Anonymous No.14549970]

>>14549783
if astrology helps with writing why are women so bad at it?

[Anonymous No.14550055]

>>14547899
it was really good, i dont like that you got lazy with me by saying crashed together like ocean waves

[MRXWBHSTC !pyWc79jpj2 No.14550241]

Excuse for cycling trip on/trip off, I'm going between laptop and phone for different tasks atm.

>>14549904
submitting to what? I've got a piece in the /lit/ Quarterly coming up. I have four short stories including the one there planned that are on similar themes so I plan to group them together and send the lot off together to various places as a single work when done.

I agree, I drop in a lot of ancillary detail and description of minor actions etc., partly 'cause it's how I think and partly because I'm trying to give the first draft as much life and detail as possible so I can clearly imagine it in my head and see if the scenario, characters' actions, etc. ring true. I'll probably cut some of those longwinded details out in subsequent drafts but the trick is going to be learning what to cut and what to keep, and keeping the prose nice and flowing afterwards like it's not stitched together.

Do the characters' words and actions ring true at present, aside from some wobbly word choices I already know I'm going to replace? Anything leap out as "I don't think that person would say/do that thing in that situation" or characters sounding like the author's mouthpiece like Tarantino dialogue? And is the prose approaching a professional standard on the clause/sentence level, even if it needs more work on the larger scale in the way you've described? These are some of my key concerns.

>>14547595
I REALLY don't put much stock in overwrought character profiles such as these. The biggest thing as far as I'm concerned is "What do the thematics of your story call for?" Most people I know if you ask them their biggest fear would change between "dying", "loneliness", "dying alone", "pain", "cancer cause my mum had it" etc. depending on the day or moment. Every character motivation is about love or death at the end of the day, arguably it all reduces to death/mortality as the urgency of desire springs from that. Stuff like favourite foods etc. only need to come up if it has a specific reason either related directly to the plot or necessary characterisation. It's good to know a simple biography for a character if you need it but I find playing with archetypes much more satisfying.

[Anonymous No.14550261]

>>14547574
Even more so, interestingness is followed by likeability, whereas not the other way around.

[MRXWBHSTC !pyWc79jpj2 No.14550272]

>>14550241
Take an example from cinema, and I know not everybody rates the screenplays but it's one of the most clear-cut examples: Nolan. Interstellar, we learn practically nothing about Cooper other than the who's who of his family and that he was a NASA test pilot. What's his first name? He's a Chuck Yeager archetype, the calm spirit of exploration who puts the GREAT HEROIC CHALLENGE above all else, even willing to sacrifice being a good family man. We know all this by 10-15 minutes into the movie and learn practically nothing afterwards because they're too busy trying to grapple with the duality of Romilly/Mann's characters that represents Nolan's optimistic view that humanity CAN overcome brute instinct, but it's not a given, etc.; no further detail necessary. Same with Cobb in Inception, who is literally just a man in a suit who wants to see his kids and needs to do "one last heist" to buy fake papers to get past immigration authorities, and has a dead wife, that's it; and Angier and Borden in The Prestige. We find out more about Angier's home life and background *when it becomes relevant to the story*. Borden we find out zilch about other than his actions as a protagonist within the story, because it's all that's needed. If it's not necessary, it's not needed. It's good to have some 'tip of the iceberg' word-of-god stuff in your head/notes to get a firm grasp on a character's voice but going overboard will just bog you down in Excel tables and endless planning, speaking from experience. You can't construct an entire, real person with your head for the purpose of fiction. All you need to construct is a decent enough illusion of one for the bounds of the story. IMO. Look at how people act IRL, try to understand it, and copy it.

[Anonymous No.14550311]

>>14550261
That's total bullshit. Don't ever think this again.

[Anonymous No.14550433]

>>14547750
Thats a pretty cool thought

[Anonymous No.14550556]

>>14547589
C Ool pic

[Anonymous No.14550655]

>>14547750
Nice...
I would add: let your characters surprise you.

[Anonymous No.14550687]

>>14549401
Thank you, these are all good points you've mentioned, and I wanted to see just how esoteric I can be before a new reader gives out. I wouldn't blame you if you didn't get the message right away, maybe that's your reason for not explaining any editing like >>14549283 says. "Smothered" is good because it is somewhat antagonistic, which is more amoral than "swaddled".

This is my introduction. I wanted to establish the idea that life and death existed in unity. Their eternal drama is similar to Nietzsche's concept. I wanted to illustrate this concept by comparing the dawn of a new day to the dawn of time. The "morning" that appears on the horizon is symbolic of that. Some features of life exist before the arche: sustenance (the stream), predators (the owl), and shelter (the cave). But the end result is inevitable.

Through losing everything, the main character will ultimately become engrossed in this idea, and try and escape from Earth itself, seeking true beauty in the stars, despite the wishes produced from a (somewhat homoerotic) relationship.

[Anonymous No.14550700]

I’ve just destroyed 40k words of my writing and don’t know what to do. I loathed it, I wanted to start over, but now I regret having done it. There were salvageable sections and some paragraphs still move me when I think of them. Fuck, guys. How do I recover a file after shift+delete’ing it? It was a Scrivener folder.

[Anonymous No.14550726]

>>14550700
photorec or recuva

[Anonymous No.14550761]

>>14550700
Don’t sweat it. I used to write on notebooks and burn them after. Once I had five filled notebooks and my backpack was stolen. Then I started writing on docs n word, I keep three folders -shit writing/ shittier writing/ writings.
I usually write in writings, if I feel they are shit they move to the other folder, if I figure that I’m not going to work on it anytime soon or I feel like there is nothing salvageable, I put it on the next.
Don’t delete your stuff, but if you do, don’t worry about it too much, just start writing again.

[Anonymous No.14550869]

>>14547899
i hate when writers write like this, gay and retarded

[Anonymous No.14551121]

>>14550761
But it’s hard to let go anyways

[Anonymous No.14551221]

>>14547899
This is your first chapter and nothing happens for three paragraphs, no characters are introduced. You're asking a lot from a reader to sift through National Geographic b-roll trying to find a story.

[Anonymous No.14551575]

.

[Anonymous No.14551588]

Doing my first big editing pass on my script and realized that despite not intending it, the protagonist is severely shamed and condemned by the script, and would absolutely be loathed for the recontextualization of his actions in the third act.
I didn't plan for this direction, but I am finding it more interesting and stimulating than the happy ending I had originally planned. Is it worth taking a week off to reflect and decide on editing to play to this accident of my psychology, or should I stick to my original plan and change the details to better match that original sappy stuff?

tl;Dr better to stick with your original plans or to pivot after noticing a potential better direction?

[» ƷѪƸ « No.14551598]

>>14547899
I would have a prologue that introduces characters if you are really set on this being your opener

[Anonymous No.14551634]

I'm writing the story for a game I want to make around solving a mystery/conspiracy in a small, isolated community.
What do I do when I already have some characters, locations and scenes in my mind, but can't for the life of me figure out an interesting conspiracy for the player to solve?

[Anonymous No.14551744]

This is my first time writing some semblance of a story since highschool, and my first time writing just because I wanted to.

A light rapping on the apartment door woke him instead of the alarm clock. He squinted through the early morning bleariness. The digital clock flashed 12:00 AM on a cycle. The electricity must have gone off sometime during the night, either intentionally to mitigate risk of an air raid, or there simply wasn’t enough supply to meet demand.
Light shown through the bedroom window, aiding him in finding his glasses. Another round of rapping came from the door.
“Just a moment!” He cried, as he slipped on his regular dark denim pants and white button-up.
He exited the bedroom and entered into the apartment’s modest living space. A kitchenette and the door to the hallway were to his left, a bathroom on the opposite wall, and a dining table and chairs, along with a window and balcony, were to his right. He caught a glimpse outside on his way to answer to door. Fog and an unoppressive snow had continued through the night. Out in the bay the blockade continued. Warships on the horizon bellowed black smoke like a chain of volcanic islands, and airships patrolled the air like rebellious clouds. No doubt below, unseen to him unless he were on the balcony, crews manned shore batteries and anti-aircraft emplacements, eyes fixed on the sea and sky; his side of the uneasy standoff.
He knew he didn’t look well enough to answer the door, but did anyway. Before him was a small, thin man with short brown hair and blue eyes, a wool coat made him seem larger than he was.
“Citizen Lijaf, you are late for your interview.” The small man said. Despite his words, he seemed unannoyed, almost cheery.
“interview?” Kivfegan Lijaf asked, still groggy.
“Have you forgotten? Your Party membership interview.” The small man tapped his Party badge, a blue X on top of a silver laurel.
He had quite forgotten
“My alarm didn’t go off.” Kivfegan said.
“Ah, that’s what we figured had happened.” The man paused, “It’s twelve now, your interview was to begin half an hour ago. I was sent to retrieve you.”
“Right, I’ll just be a second to get ready.”
“Take your time.” The small man was genuinely unannoyed.
Kivfegan left the man in the hallway and entered the bathroom. He did what he needed to get himself looking decent, brushed his teeth with what little toothpaste remained in the sad bottle, combed his hair. But he spent most of the time looking into the mirror, examining himself. The dark bags under his eyes, the slight crookedness to his teeth, strands of long, dark hair that refused all discipline. And he hoped that if he did this long enough, then maybe he wouldn’t have to leave.
“Almost ready to go, citizen?” he heard from the hallway.
But he would have to get this over with, and so resigned himself to this.

I want to try and create a world that's a comfy shithole, if that makes any sense

[Anonymous No.14551899]

>>14549002
You ever heard of a comma?

[Anonymous No.14551905]

I have a story about a cyborg space marine, augmented and conditioned to be a perfect war machine with little in the way of emotions, who is stranded on an unfamiliar alien world where the relatively primitive locals are by contrast very peaceful and innocent. He slowly rediscovers his humanity (ironically through aliens) as he interacts and befriends the locals and other travelers from all over the stars. He begins to reevaluate the terrible things he has done in the past and creates a new identity for himself in the local community where he becomes accepted and cherished.

But in the end it's revealed that an accident onboard his ship caused a decompression. Everything happened in his imagination, a dream induced by a drug specifically designed to give the user fulfilling delusions in their final moments as he died painlessly.

[Anonymous No.14552141]

>>14547567
no crit thread so posting here. something i've been working on since i got feedback on the last thread.
any further comments would be greatly appreciated.

oceans parting resin altars
lone apostles yearn for succour
tune in quick, they see her shoulders
razor thin, yet somehow supple

camera tilts below the neckline
bust synthetic, round and heavy
passes shaft of former lifeline
spread apart beneath, her glory

bored disciples tithe for showcase
goddess partly, partly plaything
housed by each in tiny screen-space
steps away, revealing nose ring

caked in greasepaint, hiding blemish
into duckface, mug contorted
reaching out with lips coquettish
swollen, painted neon scarlet

taking cue from distant mistress
mass begins, all reaching downward
couches, chairs and floors and mattress
wet communion, priest on record

hands engaged in rite of rapture
dazed but frenzied meditations
wanton rush toward the border
souls enchanted, puppet actions

soon declaring near ascension
thus commanding brothers follow
perspiration, flushed complexion
poking out her tongue to swallow

beckoned, white and blooming tulip
minds destroyed together, groaning
holding onto joy with death-grip
evanescent bliss dispersing

queen of cyber dregs anointed
respiration slowed and steadied
spirit healed and sin ejected
gaze upon her, now unhurried

truth revealed in naked horror
sham anele undoing voodoo
lesser cretin fit for collar
kill with ‘x’, reduce to curfew

[Anonymous No.14552153]

>>14552141
forgive me... the 4th line was originally 'razor thin but soft like butter', but it i didn't like so i changed it before uploading without checking if it rhymed...

[Anonymous No.14552170]

>>14552141
I kind of want the context for this but this many quality rhymes has me impressed.

[Anonymous No.14552255]

>>14547600
Fuck you now im going to condense my 1400 word paragraph into one scene

[Anonymous No.14552267]

>>14550869
this but said in a nicer way

[Anonymous No.14552764]

>>14547567
How long should a short story be? I'm sitting at around 1400 words. Expecting to have around 3000 when im done. Is that long enough to qualify as a genuine short story, or is that a fragment that needs more added to finish it?

[Anonymous No.14552789]

>>14547788
The most extraordinary protagonists are those which we have no idea did anything in the first place. These characters are ever present and generally receive zero credit for what they do. Thus, they are the most extraordinary.
Here's the quote.
“When you do things right, people won’t be sure you’ve done anything at all.”
I have no examples. It would defeat the purpose.

[Anonymous No.14552943]

>>14547885
This is actually really good anon. I like it anyway.

[Anonymous No.14553049]

words words
tend to say more than silence
but sometimes silence says more

silence is never here
the air reminds you
that the world is still in motion
and youre not

just laying there
in a rock floating in space

sometimes silence says more
than an idle interruption
quietness is loud in itself
quietness is loud
it screams that something isnt being said

and theres a reason
words say more than silence
sometimes words are worse

buzzing in your ears
silence screams
and its saying nothing nice

[Anonymous No.14553075]

>>14549539
Thanks man this really helped.

Saved.

[Anonymous No.14553236]

Are there any real serious pros and cons between writing in first or third person?

[[e-mail] No.14553448]

should I write more in this style?

[Anonymous No.14553499]

how come most people just drop in to get help for themselves and don't bother trying to help anyone else?

are you all really that selfish?

[Anonymous No.14553506]

>>14553448
Don’t use an email as a trip. That’s cringe as shit. Seriously you look like a weapons grade newfag

[Anonymous No.14553512]

>>14552789
>I have no examples.
Let me help.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WqH4Bpe7Mjk

[Anonymous No.14553537]

>>14553499
>are you all really that selfish?
he asks in the writing general

[Anonymous No.14553553]

>>14553537
I don't get what you're insinuating.

[Anonymous No.14553581]

>>14553553
Writers are inherently narcissistic and selfish people that live inside their own heads.

[Anonymous No.14553592]

>>14553581
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Eo9pU1q8sy8

[Anonymous No.14553796]

List some good resources for writers.

>Onelook: A dictionary/thesaurus aggregate that lets you search by definition
>yWriter: Free scrivener-esque feature rich writing software
>Scribophile: Free critique exchange
>Europeana: Archive of historical art and artifacts
>I Remain: A digital archive of letters and manuscripts
>Libgen: Pirated books

[Anonymous No.14553996]

I have a story whose plot and themes require it to be set in 1710 in Dartmouth. But all the historical resources I can find are about life in stately homes of the era etc. I'm not writing a documentary but how can I best look for resources to write such a specific setting in a grounded way- knowing what had or hadn't been invented and become widely available to commoners yet, what ordinary peoples' houses and jobs and food looked like etc.

It's a sci-fi drama set around the invention of the commercial steam engine

[Anonymous No.14554018]

>>14553996
Obviously you go to the University Library archives.
This is a no-brainer.

Get ready for a road-trip.

[Anonymous No.14554080]

>>14547595
This is an interesting approach that I have never thought about, thanks

[Anonymous No.14554379]

>>14554018
I went to one of the top unis in my region but that was 4 years ago and they don't allow the general public, you need a university ID card to pass the manned turnstiles (I live in the UK)

[Anonymous No.14554473]

>>14554379
I went to a small liberal arts college in America that's peered with a bunch of others across the nation; I could easily walk into any of them with my ID, and if they're any like my own, they'll let me walk in without one

if your university actually is respected, then you should be able to get a pass into Dartmouth by flashing your ID

[illiterate (www.larthurhunt.co(...) No.14554479]

>"The highway stretches on forever. When viewed from above, even the exits look like infinity."

Pic related.

Is this decent, or am I a complete simp?

[Anonymous No.14554497]

>>14547936
I like your version. The word is interesting because it describes a miserable disease obtained through pleasurable means, and the phonetics of the word match that so well. It's pleasant to say but because of the S's it sounds a little gross too. I played with it and that shit poem is what I ended up with.
>>14552943
Wow thank you anon.

[Anonymous No.14554568]

>>14554473
There isn't a university in or around Dartmouth, where Thomas Newcomen was from. I'm talking about Dartmouth, Cornwall not Dartmouth, New Hampshire in case I wasn't clear.

[Anonymous No.14554694]

ESL here. No experience in writing whatsoever. I wrote poems to my mother on her birthday and mothers day last year. I regret writing it because cringe writing.


Birthday poem:
Ticking hands weave each passing day.
Interlaced by its threads ever renewing,
promised with its ministrations unknown,
we venture through hand in hand, undaunted;
for our love outlives its tolls.

Mother's day:
Difficulties impend apace
Its aftermaths swiftly effaced
by tender warmth of an embrace
I can only seek in a mother's grace.

Anything off putting, needing refinement or culling in my failing grammar, sentencing, wording, prose, vocabulary, tone, narrative, and concision, please feel free to point it out.

I can never learn enough.

[Anonymous No.14554881]

>>14554694
>Difficulties impend apace
>Its aftermaths swiftly effaced
>by tender warmth of an embrace
>I can only seek in a mother's grace.

Meter is messed up in this one (unless that was on purpose, I can never tell with poetry).

[Anonymous No.14556233]

pathetic, you all can't even keep a general writing thread going

it deserves to die then, but I'll give it one last shot

[Anonymous No.14556370]

How do you guys start planning a book? Do you plan each chapter or do you just have a general plot and see how it goes? I feel like I have loads of half-ideas and the ability to have a decent go at writing them but then they run out of steam after a chapter or two. I'm not sure whether it would be better to plan out the entirety of the book in advance or just take it as it comes.

[Anonymous No.14556814]

The music and light of evening revelry have died down, and Johnathan sleeps peacefully in his shack. He dreams, but the dreams will not be memorable. His dreams are of the violet sky. His dreams are of great, mountain-sized clouds, reaching between the earth and sky. His dreams are most of all of size and colorless enormity, but they repeat in his sleeping mind, and they will be gone by morning.

He dreams of this night, where mountain-sized clouds do populate a violet sky.

There are animals sleeping beneath shrubs dotting the valley. Where trees grow, animals also sleep. In the dark water of the small streams which cross again and again the tall grasses, fish swim, passing in and out of what they might have which pass for dreams. They think night thoughts, as Johnathan thinks night thoughts.

All the valley sleeps as Johnathan sleeps, even if it does not dream as he does.

And his dreams are changing.

From between the mountain-clouds of his dreams come other shapes, other things of great size, but congealed, condensed into figures which can reach across space, which might twitch and twist and grasp for each other, like wrestlers at the end of a match. As he dreams, the mountain-clouds over the valley thicken, though they do not become the figures of his dreams, and they cover what little violet moonlight peers between them. The hours from the changing of Johnathan's dreams to the break of dawn are passed in perfect darkness.

As Johnathan wakes, he remembers these last dreams. He remembers the sense of size, the sense of control. He remembers how the position of the dream shifted, the perspective turned the sky downward, and it was as though he looked down from a great height at the vast, writhing figures down below. He felt enormous, as though he were a great figure inscribed in the sky, and these figures were the small dreamers gazing up at his enormity.

He lies in bed for a few more minutes, pondering whether this new dream is worth remembering. He feels that if he were to forget it, he would regret the fact, though he can't frame why this might be, so he passes over the images, the sensations they evoked, and he attempts to affix them in his memory.

But the sun continues to rise, throwing spears of light across his small bed, and he can smell the frying of rashers and bacon by his nephew below, and he knows there will likely be coffee boiled by this time. These small concerns vie against his memory, and as he pulls himself out of bed, setting himself in his worn slippers, the images of his night's vast figures, their pleading hands, his height, all begin to slip away, and they are forgotten by the time he opens his bedroom door.

[Anonymous No.14556884]

Looking for feedback on this, it's from my novel

Frost crackled beneath the shoes of the smokers in the courtyard. Low and menacing, the winter sun eked out shafts of forlorn light. Every patient with smoke break privileges sat there huffing, fingers chapped and aching, under the hawklike panoptical gaze of a Program Specialist. This was their respite. Twice a day, they’d take the elevator down from West 2 Ward, enter the courtyard and eagerly gulp their cigarette rations, huddled, shivering, stung by shrill air. Ice fangs dangled from the benches and rooftops. It was a merciless January.
“Life’s a bitch and then you die bro,” Mason said, his thin lips curling. Under his buzzcut his sunken eyes darted.
“NO IT’S NOT! NO IT’S NOT!” José shouted.
“Yes it is bro.”
“NO IT’S NOT!”
“Yes it is.”
“NO IT’S NOT!”
“Guys,” the Program Specialist said.
Katy’s gossamer feline figure sat on the frozen bench, smoking and reading. Slender white fingers coaxed her book’s pages smoothly. From her elfin button nose a septum ring hung motionless. Jonah, buried in layers of coats beside her, glanced quickly sideways to view her dulcet form. His eyes widened in sudden recognition.

[Anonymous No.14556928]

>>14556884
>panoptical
This word is awkward here--it's also kind of implicit in hawklike gaze--if it's hawklike, isn't it sort of all-seeing?

>sat there huffing
Are they sitting or standing? In the first sentence, you indicate the frost is "beneath their shoes"--is this them walking?

General: you've bookended character description with scene description, which requires a bit of footwork for the reader--try to consolidate the scene description at the beginning of the scene, then describe characters/actions.

>Katy's
Is this the Program Specialist? If not, make clearer.

>Katy's... dulcet form.
All of this is noticeably more detailed than all previous character description, making it kind of odd. In the bleak context, it's also a bit florid, with words like "gossamer," "feline," "slender," "elfin," and "dulcet." She had better be your main character, or all this is a bit awkward.

[Anonymous No.14556950]

>>14547567
Moral support. Trying to write fiction is hard for me today.

[Anonymous No.14557000]

>>14556814
1) I hate dreams in writing
2) Starting your story with someone waking up is bush league

[Anonymous No.14557009]

>>14557000
Why do you hate dreams in writing? Genuinely curious

[Anonymous No.14557019]

>>14547899
I was with you for the first paragraph but then I quickly realized this description of the scenery was going to continue for the next two and I instantly lost interest.
Gonna echo these two
>>14551598
>>14551221

[Anonymous No.14557023]

>>14557000
This isn't the beginning of the story.

[Anonymous No.14557042]

>>14556928

Thanks for the feedback, you make some great points here. I should mention that this isn't the opening of the novel, just a passage I'm uncertain about. It's hard for me sometimes to find the balance between a description that's too bland and too flowery.

[Anonymous No.14557058]

>>14557009
Obviously there are exceptions, but dreams in real life are rarely-remembered nonsense and dreams in writing are lazy, shoehorned attempts at conveying theme or whatever it is you're trying to convey. Honestly the only things that a character should be experiencing in bed are dying or coitus.
>>14557023
Even still, would you want to read a story about some dude farting around in bed all morning? Does your story's success hinge upon including this wordy little fantasy? Also, you write like some old limey dandy.

[Anonymous No.14557096]

>>14557058
Noted, and thanks.

>you write like some old limey dandy

kek

Seriously though, can you expand on this? I don't actually know what part of the style you're describing here, but it sounds useful.

[Anonymous No.14557127]

>>14557096
It's just stilted and passe. Let's take a look at this sentence.

>He lies in bed for a few more minutes, pondering whether this new dream is worth remembering. He feels that if he were to forget it, he would regret the fact, though he can't frame why this might be, so he passes over the images, the sensations they evoked, and he attempts to affix them in his memory.

It's like you're parodying how they wrote in the 19th century. There's no testosterone.

[Anonymous No.14557139]

>>14557127
You didn't really take a look at the sentence at the level of stylistics--you just quoted it and reiterated your impression. What about the style evokes this response?

[Anonymous No.14557164]

>>14552141
use punctuation, use sentences, use articles. Stop galloping toward your end rhymes. Vary your meter. This poem is word salad and you know it.

[Anonymous No.14557177]

Amid the peanuts
Was a treasure undeserved
A Five Guy's French Fry

[Anonymous No.14557203]

>>14552141
This just seems like a collection of noun and verb phrases that don't "go" anywhere.

No stanza conveys a distinct impression.

It sounds like a bunch of rejected verses for the Death Grips song "Big Dipper," and I do not mean that in a good way.

Out of curiosity (and quoting every ass-pain English teacher), what's the dominant impression you're going for here? Like, what are you trying to DO to your reader with this poem?

[Anonymous No.14557247]

https://pastebin.com/45EUaK7L
An excerpt from a light hearted fantasy romance

[Anonymous No.14557283]

>>14557247
This shit's actually kinda' fun.

Two things: 1) try to mark passage of time as the scene progresses--I wasn't sure of the timeframe for these events, and 2) simplify complex words in the narration, especially multi-syllabics

[Anonymous No.14557336]

>>14554479
>The highway stretches on forever, like my luck. When viewed from above, even the exits look like clovers.
>The highway expands to the horizon. When viewed from above, even the exits look like deltas.
>The highway twinkles in the distance. When viewed from above, even the exits look like four-pointed stars.
>The highway was quiet like a ninja. When viewed from above, even the exits look like shurikens.

[Anonymous No.14557344]

>>14554694
Yeah, you should read ten poems before writing one. Ten poems to earn each turd you churn out.

[Anonymous No.14557671]

>>14552170
Thank you

>>14557164
Yes, punctuation and sentences sound like a good idea; as for articles, I am not really sure how to go about it. I think it ties in somewhat to varying the metre, which is something I have no idea about (just starting with poetry).

Is there a good resource that I could go over to somehow break down the process of varying the metre, or is it just a case of having to read a bunch of different poetry and getting the 'feel' for it?

And as for 'galloping' toward the rhymes, how do I go about manipulating this? Does this again have to do with the metre?

>>14557203
Yeah, I actually got a faux-DG feel reading over it, but it wasn't intentional...
I am trying to convey a camwhore session as a sort of 'religious'/spiritual practice, but one that ends meaninglessly in further descent instead of an uplift; I suppose one of the problems is that this is just an 'image' that I am depicting, rather than something I want to 'DO' to the reader (i.e. make them feel disgust, sorrow, etc.) <- Is this what you meant?

[Anonymous No.14558367]

>>14547567
I finished my short story. What do I do with it?

[Anonymous No.14558512]

>>14547567
>want to write
>working fulltime, going to the gym, and studying for career stuff 2 hours a day on the side, plus job hunting and interviewing
>writing is on the back burner until I get established in a better career
Fuck. All I can manage right now is to keep up reading. I'm fucking wiped.

[Anonymous No.14558581]

Hi /lit/ from /ic/ and /hyw/ here. I'm not sure where to ask beside here. I can handle the character design and world building stuffs, but I can never understand how to structure my plots or connect my arcs from head to tail. Is there a formula or type of resource that can help me to learn the basic of writing a journey? I plan to draw a comic mainly about exploration in a fantasy world. For now I only have scattered fragment of scenarios for each arcs but no foundation or structure to hold them together.

[Anonymous No.14558695]

>>14558581
Characters some with plots already built into them. Your character should have a concrete goal and a flaw/obstacle he needs to overcome to get it. The plot is just the process of him doing that. If you want a longer plot, just add more contortions and setbacks. Add subplots to taste (you'll probably need at least one just for pacing).

Think of it like this.
>character wants goal so he does something proactive to bring him closer to achieving it
>it doesn't work and things get worse, OR it works but things still get worse somehow
>repeat for a while getting steadily worse and more dire (rising stakes, rising tension etc)
>character eventually learns from the setbacks he's experiencing how he needs to change so he can get the goal (usually this happens at the most dramatic point where everything is at its worst)
>character changes
>does something different
>it works
The end.

Weave in subplots so that you can take a break from the main plot and also so you can explore things not relevant to the main plot. For example if the story was about a big bad trying to take over the world I might have the main plot of the big damn hero in search of the resistance to rally them in the jungles, but I might have a subplot of some biddy in the big city who has to live under the eeeevil rule of the big bad so that I can show why he's evil and really make the reader hate him even if the main character would never see that directly.

A plot is just a character pursuing a goal, so you will have as many plots as you have goals. One character can be part of like 3 different plots if they have 3 separate goals, is what I'm saying.

[Anonymous No.14559042]

>>14558581
>>14558695
This, IMHO if you have 0 clue about how to write a compelling character watch Breaking Bad, I really don't care if you think it's overrated or if it's leddit, point is both Walt and Jesse's character arcs are both really well done and very easy to understand. If you really need a babby's first character study I'd start there, it also helps that the story takes place in a contemporary setting because, in my experience, writing characters in the context of a fantastical setting is easier albeit blander and done to death at this point, unless you have a legitimately interesting idea for a protagonist.

[Anonymous No.14559210]

>>14559042
>characters in the context of a fantastical setting is easier albeit blander and done to death at this point, unless you have a legitimately interesting idea for a protagonist.
Not that anon you responded to, but what do you think of >>14548538?

[Anonymous No.14559369]

>>14551744
hm, how do you plan on evoking that comfyness in the story?

[illiterate (www.larthurhunt.co(...) No.14559602]

>>14554479

But, do you not see the infinity symbol in the picture?

[Anonymous No.14560543]

>>14558367
self publish it, hope it blows up, try again when it doesn't, kill self when you've had enough

[Anonymous No.14560645]

>>14547907
Take KOTOR II as an example. Players are led it believe the game will conclude after the confrontation on Dantooine, but in fact it continues on after that with pivoting into the real plot that had been surreptitiously taking place alongside the fake one---and it did not come out of the blue, it was hinted at repeatedly---nevertheless, it came unexpected.

That is a good example of how to subvert the conventional plot structure.

[Anonymous No.14560942]

>>14549161
If u need to rely on weakly empirical templates to construct characters instead of simply imagining them during the process of plotting, you're not gonna make it

[Anonymous No.14560968]

>>14560942
Remind me what you've posted when your """intuition""" is rewarded with the praise of millions of adoring fans for your intricately designed characters---in a million years and 1 day from now.

[Anonymous No.14561019]

>>14560543
How much I sell it for on Amazon, 1 cent?

[Anonymous No.14561045]

Criticism is such a pile of wank. It would be useful were its basis anything beyond taste and opinion

[Anonymous No.14561068]

>>14561045
People can't think for themselves. They need better-informed individuals to tell them what's good or not, and why. Criticism will never become obsolete so long as humans stay unevolved.

[Anonymous No.14561105]

>>14561068
Most criticism is see-through bullshit though. It operates under the assumption that the person in question, even if they do have a unique voice, has any legitimacy in determining the value of the text. I agree that writing is always social but what truly seems unevolved to me is the "Yeah use this adjective here instead of this one, it's not punchy enough" bullshit. All that matters is whether the author became intimate with their reality and world.

[Anonymous No.14561130]

>>14561105
Ah so you're whining about the editing in this thread? Seems to me like you're personally offended by the prospect of someone believing they know better for your work than you do as the author. That's an ego problem, a source of insecurity.

[Anonymous No.14561145]

>>14561130
No, I know that no one knows what is better for my work, including myself. I would never post something for criticism in the first place. I'm responding to what I see in the threads; I like a lot of the postings, and the responses are tedious and draw unnecessarily from the value of the work. I suppose people asked for editing... that itself seems to be stemming from confusion. There's no need for an editor.

[Anonymous No.14561173]

>>14561145
>There's no need for an editor.

[Anonymous No.14561284]

>>14548092
yes

[Anonymous No.14562077]

>>14547567
Unfinished, but I'd appreciate any crits. I'll crit whoever does mine.
https://pastebin.com/FFuqcnuT

[Anonymous No.14562216]

I'd like to write a short story about a MC who isn't human but is actually an android or full-fledged artificial robot. I have not brainstormed much other than a light YA-approach. Any ideas for stories I could check out to gather ideas?

[Anonymous No.14562422]

>>14547986
Not who you're replying to, but I like your suggestions.

[Anonymous No.14562458]

>>14547986
this implies a good lesson for any writer, be very specific and careful in your word choice. Don't write approximations of things, write what they are. Save the abstract language for abstract ideas and be precise when describing actual things.

[Anonymous No.14562517]

>>14556814
the writing is alright, but the content fucking sucks anon

[Anonymous No.14562610]

>>14556814
not saying much while trying really hard to make it feel aesthetic

[Anonymous No.14562861]

I wrote this as an experiment with using paranthesis in fiction(also because fuck janny), feedback is appreciated

Among the damp bowls of a dark cave(the very same cave rumored to house gods of excrement and pestilence) sits a fat, slugish toad, who spends his days watching over a masquerade of flies at the behest of his butterfly lord; his lips(coated in warts and grease) an eternal sneer, his eyes(dull, black things) droning around in a sleepy, yet smug manner, as if he was so content with his enslavement that he could happily sleep for eternity, his chest(ugly and malformed, reminiscent of an avian's) constantly puffed with the illusion of authority: he was a truly delusional.

[Anonymous No.14562873]

>>14548824
first of all, you're wrong. second of all, back to /tv/.

[Anonymous No.14562905]

>>14554479
it's simp, if it's just for it's own sake.
it's decent, if you're story's theme justifies this symbolism.

[Anonymous No.14562937]

>>14562905
I agree, anyone could make that observation about looping highways, it needs to serve something bigger.

[Anonymous No.14562939]

>>14558695
>>14559042
thanks anons I'll keep that in my note

[Anonymous No.14562953]

>>14559042
madmen is another good exercise for this. The difference between Don and Pete Campbell is really stark.

[Anonymous No.14563397]

bump

[Anonymous No.14563957]

>>14547615
> gatekeeping this hard

[Anonymous No.14563981]

>>14547567

trapped inside the blanket, waiting.
days go by in dizzy time lapse,
all the while enjoying solitude.

someone text me, any time, now.
or leave me be, it’s what I want;
watch me rot away inside my shell.

mantra of a modern hermit.

[Anonymous No.14564057]

>>14563981
spelling out your poem in the last line feels cheap to me

[Anonymous No.14564124]

>>14547615
who cares? I bet you compare yourself to others all the time anon.

[Anonymous No.14564141]

>>14548538
I think it sounds interesting. Does the protagonist kill the noble to put him out of his misery, something akin to 'One Flew Over the Cuckoo's Nest'? Why wouldn't he try to put his master's affairs in order instead of allowing the other faction to take over?
Like what >>14548655 said, the premise sounds more similar to what would happen around 1300-1500, it even reminds me of that general guy in 'The Prince' (I forget his name right now).

[Anonymous No.14564174]

>>14551588
Whatever makes the better story. That's a potential result of revisions and edits.

[Anonymous No.14564195]

>>14551744
The description of the room feels awkward. I like the description from "Out in the bay..." on, but the description before sounds off.
>The small man was genuinely unannoyed.
Sounds awkward, maybe "The small man sounded sincere" or something.
Overall, I'd like to see where this goes.

[Anonymous No.14564196]

>>14563957
retard

[Anonymous No.14564203]

>>14564124
>who cares?
um, the person who asked the question???

[Anonymous No.14564204]

Given the climate of the USA, would it be in poor taste to start a script out with a high-school shooting?

Also, here's a snippet of my writing, can someone tell me what they think?

The white sun sat camouflaged in the china white sky, opposite of its pale milky impostor in some celestial game I wasn't, nor could be, privy to. The wind played with leaves in their impeccable design as they caught onto its musings helping the trees to dance in that open current, all alight with some cosmic rhythm, strung along bead for bead on the great Is.
I wrung my clothes in a clawed, twisting motion, the filtered water expunged being an exhausted gray and listened to the calls of birds unknown but all too familiar while humidity drew from me what moisture it could claim into its collective, hoping to further fuel the hulking greenery that swallowed the land without much of a murmur in its suffocation, my life liquid upon the altar in sacrifice to feed such expansive conquests.
The words of that black sorcerer had bit and left their mark, some vampiric link of sire to child and death and undeath clouded my mind in a sea of worrying tides that churned and bashed upon the soft landing shore of an ego that was already bloated and bumping against obsidian sharp coastal rocks, all the while the sky showed no relief, no evening of red light to warm abysmal circumstances like the Christian Lord sent to lift burdens of those his father damned in their creation and their birth from riotous mud.
Death is nothing to do battle with. Wuxiao was right in proclaiming it as an overlord, as the apex victor in a world that is simply scrambling, meek and improperly developed shambles under any minute scrutiny.
However, death is at war with contemptuous ideals and ludicrous unknowns, death is at odds with killing creators who so immortalize themselves in their labors and their creations, their art and their lineage as so the first man and woman are alive today through some homeopathic dilution of their blood and the names of families are carried on breaths that carelessly recycle air of millennia and there is little death has been able to do to lay siege on that front and there is little it is able to do for some time for even when the dying man sees a dying sun and all is cold and void and light is a forgotten reality within a vacuum there will come to be something else entirely, for the duality of cyclical natures, of parasite and host must have its hand in keeping death alive, for without anything that has an end, then death will all but wander aimlessly without objective and purpose and its meaning will be lost with its existence.
The wash was as done as it could be, as I unraveled soggy clothes from their mummified positions, clenched in their wrung state out into some freshly wrinkled existence where they would be revitalized by the current that so swept through these hills unaware of its affects.
If death is a true horror, has death a fear of itself?

[Anonymous No.14564207]

>>14564204
>would it be in poor taste to start a script out with a high-school shooting?
Nope, it would be interesting. Make it a terrorist attack too.

[Anonymous No.14564209]

>>14564204
>Also, here's a snippet of my writing, can someone tell me what they think?
>>14547600

[Anonymous No.14564243]

>>14564207
it is a terrorist attack, people revolting against a gun ban in the country.

>>14564209
A paragraph from thirty pages is extremely unfair to judge that my story "says nothing". Yeah, I care about my prose, I'm sorry you don't care for prose, but Literally the whole thing is about death, there is a message, there is an argument, its not going to be found in a few passages you twat

[Anonymous No.14564293]

>>14551905
Dream sequences are overplayed. "It's all a dream!" Then what was the point of the story if nothing mattered?
>>14552255
I know it's not really popular anymore, but "Strunk and White," read it. What is important in the scene, and what doesn't matter? Cut what doesn't matter.
>>14552764
I've read short stories that are 2 pages, some that are 30 pages. 3000 words is fine, 1400 words is fine too.
>>14557139
I'm not >>14557127 but it's all 'evoking' and no 'doing'. This could be one small sentence instead of two complex ones:
>He wonders what this dream means, tucking it away for later reflection.
If you're doing your job right, the paragraphs before should evoke what you're going for and you don't need to say again what the person is thinking or considering, that's what the dream sequence was.
>>14561019
99 cents to 5 dollars, or even free eBook.

[Anonymous No.14564326]

>>14564243
>The white sun sat camouflaged in the china white sky, opposite of its pale milky impostor in some celestial game I wasn't, nor could be, privy to. The wind played with leaves in their impeccable design as they caught onto its musings helping the trees to dance in that open current, all alight with some cosmic rhythm, strung along bead for bead on the great Is.
As >>14564209 pointed out, you're writing a lot without saying anything. A lot of anons here think that adjectives and uncommon thesaurus words makes for good writing, but it mainly just muddles the message they're trying to get across. It's very preachy.

[Anonymous No.14564346]

>>14547600
read more novels and less writing manuals

[Anonymous No.14564396]

>>14564346
I invented that list *wholly* on my own.
Are *you* capable of such a thing?

[Anonymous No.14564409]

>>14562077
Any critiques for mine?

[Anonymous No.14564417]

>>14564409
Have you done any for anyone else?

[Anonymous No.14564426]

>>14564326
I'm just not in that camp then. I think literature should help people find new words (not see it as "uncommon thesaurus words" [sad]) and should be about painting a picture in creative ways.

I get the "you're writing a lot without saying anything" because, once again, I gave you a snippet out of a short story, where there is plot and there is a story ans there is diverse characterization.

I will calculatingly cut down on the flowery prose and I thank you anons for the advice, but I really don't agree that its wrong to have detailed metaphors and similes. Take Blood Meridian as an example, there is little plot and a lot of flowery scenery description, but does it "muddle" anything? Nah.

But yeah, I'll cut back a smidgen, thank you

[Anonymous No.14564430]

>>14564417
I explained I would in my post.

[Anonymous No.14564435]

>>14564426
>should be about painting a picture
words on imagination will never be as good as paint on canvas; you're wasting your time on a fool's endeavor

[Anonymous No.14564439]

>>14564409
>https://pastebin.com/FFuqcnuT
I'm reading it rn senpai

[Anonymous No.14564441]

>>14564430
And? Obviously, no one cares since you're going to be so stingy.

[Anonymous No.14564446]

>>14564435
Nah man, literature has a powerful ability to put oddly specific pictures in your head contrived purely of calculated strings of words.

"fool's endeavor" its literature man, calm down

[Anonymous No.14564447]

>>14564441
It's the point of the thread...

[Anonymous No.14564463]

>>14564447
Alright, I'm done reading it, what do you want to discuss specifically?

[Anonymous No.14564474]

>>14564446
>"this is my writing philosophy"
>"why are you taking this so seriously, calm down"

[Anonymous No.14564482]

>>14564463
The style of prose itself. The story and any grammatical errors will be fixed in rewrites.

[Anonymous No.14564492]

>>14564474
> "this is my writing philosophy"
> let me cram it down everyone's throat and reject everything else

yeah, calm down, bucko

[Anonymous No.14564515]

>>14564482
Okay, I can tell you that I neither loved or hated your prose. There were some lines that I liked

> An adderall overdose in the absence of college is a marathon held in a one story house without doors, or windows.

then you have

> an invisible bolt of violet

which, to my eyes, is a contradiction and pulls me right out of your story. Is it violet, or invisible?

I think that you are consistent with your prose too, which is good. I never felt like you would get overboard or be terribly dry.

Do try to trim some sentences here and there and also only keep metaphors and similes if they impress you.

I also have an autistic qualm when specific words are used too much and kindling was used a little too much for me, but I can easily understand how no one else in the world would give a shit about something like that.

[Anonymous No.14564539]

>>14564515
I was thinking that the second line was self-indulgent. And yes, I'm going to be trimming more with each rewrite. I tend to write a lot of metaphors in the rough drafts and then pick out my favorites for the final one.

What made you feel lukewarm about it?

[Anonymous No.14564581]

>>14564539
to be honest with you, it was not having a full picture to go off of, but that's not fair to your growth as a writer, so let me get more in depth if I can.

I think its completely serviceable, which sounds more of an insult than a compliment, but I think what I want to see you do is work on having more of a voice. You could totally have one already too and I just don't have a full picture to go off of.

I don't even have one yet, almost every short I've written appears as though someone else wrote it, the only thing tying them together is death.

So don't think I'm saying you're shit, you're not

> His thoughts mingling and half seen, like eyes, passing across a page, missing the plot, but catching patches of meaning.

there is a good sentence in there somewhere. Shop that for like a day, saving each iteration.

> But instead, ash stirred in the pitch of the place in dull tatters, in the likeness, by Tom’s eye, of autumn leaves falling on absent wind.

Good sentence, but I have a feeling like I want it attached to something? To have a connection?

> The kindling was catching and from its tendrils there came a voice.

Substitute tendril with something that is vivid and unexpected. I like it when authors can pull that stuff off, make a nice image in the mind.

Overall, its not bad stuff. I have faith that you know exactly what to do in a revision.

[Anonymous No.14564585]

>>14547567
I finished my first book a few months back. Wrote it all on a typewriter. I've been writing in notepads for years but nothing substantial, just thoughts, poems and what not. I started picking up a short story that's been running in my mind but just can't seem to focus writing on a keyboard. Something about it idk. Started writing it in hand and wow has it improved my writing. I think I thought at first that I couldn't keep up with my thoughts but now I realize that It was the opposite.
Anyway, what are y'alls preferred method of writing?

[Anonymous No.14564644]

>>14564585
I like to record my thoughts text to speech into my phone's notepad and transfer that whenever.

I really do prefer writing using a keyboard, but hell, I'll try writing on paper and see what happens, what could it hurt?

[Anonymous No.14564701]

>>14564204
Overuse of prose is the ultimate shit writer crutch, being able to write good characters, have interesting themes, understanding how characters change throughout the plot, and great dialogue is really what separates the men from the boys.

[Anonymous No.14564720]

>>14564426
>blood meridian
U fucking wot? McCarthy has no tolerance for the overuse bullshit in his books, if all you got out of BM were pretty pictures then there really isn't much anyone here can do for you.

[Anonymous No.14564722]

>>14564581
Thanks anon, I think I'll develop more of a voice with each completed work. I used to read for enjoyment, but that wasn't enough, so now I do this for fun and I think that's the best way to approach it anyways; the real work for me is in the editing and pruning.

Thanks for the advice, I'll bear it in mind and best of luck to you as well.

[Anonymous No.14564754]

>>14564644
Interesting. I've tried in the past to use a voice recorder but It's hard for me.
Can't hurt any, mate! People always have their own way of doing things.

[Anonymous No.14564760]

>>14547788
Give them a chance to let it go, but they push forward because it's the right thing to do

[Anonymous No.14564816]

>>14547788
They prove an archetypal virtue by either making a mistake or by being a paragon with other flaws.

[Anonymous No.14564827]

I have nothing for you guys, only that I prefer writing as a duo and it's hard to find other people like that IRL.

But meetup.com and a cool group pointed me to someone I'm meeting on Montag so maybe that will be baller.

[Anonymous No.14564847]

>>14564827
Like a novel, or a script? I could see writing a script with someone you have chemistry working out really well. It seems odd that you're seeking out a stranger to write with. What if they're an idiot, or you have conflicting ideas.

[Anonymous No.14565396]

>>14548395
Go to his house and beat the shit out of him

[Anonymous No.14565422]

>>14547874
If your story will not be superior to what came before it, it's not worth reading.

Writing however is intrinsically valuable for the writer and even if it's shit it's how you improve.

[Anonymous No.14565801]

>>14564701
>Overuse of prose is the ultimate shit writer crutch, being able to write good characters, have interesting themes, understanding how characters change throughout the plot, and great dialogue is really what separates the men from the boys.
You realise all those things are expressed through prose? Unles your writing all dialogue on verse

[Anonymous No.14565832]

>>14565801
You knew what he meant. He's clearly referring to self-indulgent styles.

[Anonymous No.14565878]

>>14564141
>Does the protagonist kill the noble to put him out of his misery, something akin to 'One Flew Over the Cuckoo's Nest'? Why wouldn't he try to put his master's affairs in order instead of allowing the other faction to take over?

The murder (and the novel as a whole) is all about occupation, duty and identity. Because the noble cannot perform his duties anymore, the protag at that point sees the noble as someone else. Likewise, the protag feels that, paradoxically, if the noble were himself again, he would have ordered the protag to kill him anyway--of course such an act goes against the protag's own duty as a guard but his part in the illness (convincing the noble to accept treatment from the wizard--which again was done out of duty) and the corresponding guilt, pushes him over the edge.

The guard puts in order what he can after he makes the decision, but these are mostly personal matters related to the noble. He is not a leader. He lets the other faction take over because he believes they are a better fit for the job.

>>14564141
>the premise sounds more similar to what would happen around 1300-1500
Yeah, that was a mistake on my part. I was going for what this anon said >>14548681

[Anonymous No.14566139]

>>14558367
Good question.
Not even sure how one would go about advertising.

[Anonymous No.14566147]

>>14565422
*If your story won't be superior to what came before it, then it's not worth publishing.
We're square now.

[Anonymous No.14566277]

How do you know what good writing is?

[Anonymous No.14566289]

>>14566277
1. Pretend to know
2. Lie
3. Repeat

[Anonymous No.14566358]

>>14566277
You have an objective criteria by which to judge, and build up an instinctual subjective sense through accruing good taste---so it's impossible for nu-4channers.

[Anonymous No.14566449]

>>14562216
>I'd like to write a short story about a MC who isn't human but is actually an android or full-fledged artificial robot.
>Any ideas for stories I could check out to gather ideas?
Don't shy away from screenwriting and you have the Bladerunner / Blade Runner duology and Detroit: Become Human to start with.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dzk3w5cLxnI
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LgjaecH3G1I

[Anonymous No.14566737]

I've been writing (physically) since like January of 2018. I write in 200 page composition notebooks. My question is when is a good time to type it out? I'm not trying to become a published author or anything, but if I ever change my mind, when is a good time to begin the switch to digital as opposed to paper? I'm on page 1223 (yes thousand) as of this post.

[Anonymous No.14566758]

>>14566737
>My question is when is a good time to type it out?
When software comes out that converts photoscanned documents into electronic documents automatically, if it does not exist already.
You won't need to type anything out.

[Anonymous No.14566774]

>>14566737
show a sample. 1000 pages handwritten might equal 300 pages in print

[Anonymous No.14566809]

>>14566737
>when is a good time to begin the switch to digital as opposed to paper
Probably the mid 90's or so

[Anonymous No.14566834]

>>14566809

[Anonymous No.14566877]

>>14566449
AI: A Modern Approach by Norvig
I, Robot
The TVtropes page on AI, Androids and Robots

I hope you write something new and interesting instead of rehashing cookie cutter tropes as most sci-fi does these days.

[Anonymous No.14566903]

>>14566877
>check out writing general, it's been awhile
>guy suggesting TVtropes page

[Anonymous No.14566909]

>>14566877
>TVTropes
>muh originalityfagging
based & checked

[Anonymous No.14567031]

>>14566774
I apologize in advance if this flips. It's in the roughest of rough drafts atm, so don't take what's posted here as the final product. I'll take advice too, if you have any to give though.

[Anonymous No.14567043]

>>14567031
Sigh it flipped again. I have no idea why this happens

[Anonymous No.14567336]

>>14567031
It looks very charming, anon.

[Anonymous No.14567344]

>simplify complex words in the narration, especially multi-syllabics
I'll never understand this place's hatred for hard words.

[Anomynous No.14567605]

I kinda want to write a light novel for fun based on some ideas some anons and I came up with from an /a/ thread where we discuss a fictional anime.
Although I'm mostly interested in the lore and worldbuilding aspect of it, and I don't really have any experience with writing.
Basically I don't really know where to start.

[Anonymous No.14567658]

Narrator, In the winter months of a small Chicago suburb, a dog returns home against the chill morning air, through snow cleared paths she comes, barking all the way, chased by the snowfall picking up behind her.

Agatha: “It’s her! It’s Pammy, she’s back!”

Narrator, Agatha paused her live stream, put down her macbook pro, and hurried down the stairs to retrieve her plush companion from her morning stroll. Pam and Agatha were acquainted before either of them could remember, and although she was the family dog, Pam was Agatha’s, the two were a bond.

Narrator, The girl felt comfortable confiding in Pam, and the Charles Spaniel shurley listened to her every word as they snuggled to keep warm in the softest places. However, as Agatha matured the novelty of such embraces overstayed their welcome, until suddenly she began spending less time with Pam and nearly all of her time with the LED light emerging from her Laptop.

[Anonymous No.14567664]

Narrator, It certainly was becoming a miserable state of affairs, eventually Agatha’s punctuality couldn’t be relied upon, their morning walk an event most precious to Pam became an uncertainty, she could only expect a few necessities in her short life and even fewer so she could share with her love. In the early morning, solitude provided peace to the dog’s flustered mind.

Pam, Perhaps our morning walk is just too great a hurdle. I best get on with myself now, and who knows what benefits my departure will bring me. It’s certainly more exciting to lead my own way, through my own eyes, absolutely.

Narrator, So the King Charles Spaniel in protest of her abuse would remind her abuser why it’s named such a thing, while the family was sleeping, Pam advanced towards the sliding glass door unnoticed, her exit was no obstacle, wiggling her tiny body onto the other side the dog disappeared into the white expanse. Pam and Agatha would be walking alone from here on out.

Narrator, That morning, the family was in a panic, as anyone could have guessed, Pam their beloved family dog slipped past the glass door. The dog made no effort to hide her trail in her protest and the moment it was discovered Agatha’s mother was accusing, her father denying and siblings whining… but Agatha herself was nowhere to be seen in this

[Anonymous No.14567674]

Mom: Knock-Knock Agatha did you remember to leave the screen door locked, I can’t find Pam anywhere and it was open when I came down.

Agatha: Of course not! Where’s dad? I can’t believe this is happening, don’t leave I want to go down and find her.

Narrator, Agatha leaned her soft palms on the warped wooden deck, a shelter which provided little protection from the shivering threats her body gave that morning Pam disappeared. Wherever Agatha looked she found familiar faces, patches of melting snow on the street resembled the black, white, and brown patterns in her lost dogs coat, the fear was more than what she could handle, but for Pam’s sake she would force herself to endure it.

Narrator, Pam’s guide was right between her own two eyes, a creature of intention, Pam the dog certainly knew where she was headed, seizing her inhibitions the dog measured the distance before jolting across an empty street. On the other side was her destination, Molly B’s Sweets, a place Pam fondly remembered as a pup, earning a treat unlike anything she ever tasted before, the sensation of happiness tingled from ears to back and all around looked at her in a shared excitement.

[Anonymous No.14567700]

>>14567605
Initially, there's no secret to starting. Start writing something. Do you like to plan things before you write? If so, start planning. But sooner or later, you're just going to have to just do it, and its going to read like shit. That's part of it. Draft, redraft, edit, edit, edit. Now open up a fucking document and get something down.

[Anonymous No.14567703]

>>14547567
How long should a chapter be?
I know it's somewhat a debatable topic but the general consensus is 3,000 to 5,000 words, but I feel that's nowhere near enough to warrant a new chapter.
I know people can make do without chapters and also maybe it's my fault I can't keep things concise enough but I always feel I want to put more in.
Then again, maybe I'm waffling on for just a story I was aiming towards older kids/teens/YA whatever you call it.
I usually end up at 10,000 words, for those wondering.

[Anonymous No.14567716]

>>14567043
You need to flip the image with an image editor that changes the image itself and not the metadata. Modern devices store the orientation of a picture in metadata, so that the edit made to the image is nondestructive. 4chan, however, strips image metadata before posting, so the orientation metadata is lost and the image is uploaded as it is without any extra data. Open it with gimp and rotate it, a raster image editor should destructively edit the image.

[Anonymous No.14567725]

>>14567658
>all of her time with the LED light
1. specifying "LED" is cringe
2. doesn't make sense for the light to be a companion

[Anonymous No.14567729]

>>14567703
Chapters are the textual equivalent of episodes.
Don't focus on length and instead focus on the storytelling. Let each series of scenes be grouped together and conclude as they should.
The point is to let readers take proper breathers.

[Anomynous No.14567765]

>>14567700
Thanks for the advice. I'll probably plan things out first since I want it to generally follow along some of the plot ideas that we came up with.
As for planning though, is there a limit to how much world-building I should do before I actually start writing the characters and actual story?
I'd imagine that doing too much world-building before-hand would limit the story a bit too much, and that world-building could also be fun to do along with the story.

[Anonymous No.14567776]

>>14567765
>is there a limit to how much world-building I should do before I actually start writing the characters and actual story?
No, do all of it or as much as you can.
Manga artists write as they go and you end up with Bleach and DBGT.

[Anomynous No.14567823]

>>14567776
Good point, I'd at least want my first story to be better than Bleach story/plot-wise.
Any advice for writing characters? I'm confident I can do anything worldbuilding-related decently well, but I don't know where to start when it comes to making believable characters.

[Anonymous No.14567824]

>>14567729
Thanks for the advice man.
I always feel like the word count goes up higher without realising it but I think I'll just keep writing as I do now and see if it becomes a bit of a pain for people to read later, then make cuts in the rewrites
However, thanks again, much appreciated.

[Anonymous No.14567833]

can someone tell me how to judge writing?

[Anonymous No.14567851]

>>14567823
>Any advice for writing characters?
>>14547595

[Anonymous No.14567861]

>>14567824
You're welcome.

[Anomynous No.14567869]

>>14567851
Finally all that stuff about personality types I learned about will become useful for something.

[Anonymous No.14567887]

>>14567869
It already was doh.
Use it to get into peoples' heads and understand where they're coming from and where they're going. It's the easiest way to craft consistent characters.
Don't underestimate personality psychology, and you'll get far.

[Anonymous No.14567896]

>>14557177
formerly underserved

[Anonymous No.14567910]

>>14567887
>>14567869
>>14567851
>>14567823
And remember, ignore the false prophets of modern astrology handing out terrible, dangerous advice and write three-dimensonal characters who serve your core theme. Read Lajos Egri. Avoid online tests.

[Anonymous No.14567952]

>>14567910
Trying to research astrology on the internet is a minefield and you must always be wary of whether or not the person you're reading really knows what they're talking about.

Here's just a smattering of reliable enough resources to read through
https://archive.4plebs.org/x/search/text/astrofix/

https://theastrocodex.com/
https://www.alabe.com/
https:/cafeastrology.com
https://www.astro-seek.com/
https://www.astrology.com/
https:/astrolibrary.org
chaosastrology.net
https://www.alwaysastrology.com/
https://astrofix.net/
https://astroligion.com/zodiac-sign-best-leader/
http://astroarena12.blogspot.com/
https://astromatrix.org/
https://www.astrology-zodiac-signs.com/
https://astrologyking.com/
https://aquarianastrology.org/
http://astro.angeleowyn.eu/index.php/
http://www.lynnkoiner.com/astrology-articles/
http://beyondthestarsastrology.com/
https://trustedpsychicmediums.com/
http://www.thedarkpixieastrology.com/
https://cafeausoul.com/astrology/
http://astrologyk.com/
https://astrostyle.com/
https://astrologyyard.com/
https://www.allure.com/
https://www.starslikeyou.com.au/your-astrology-profile/
http://www.san.beck.org/Astro.html
https://www.liveabout.com/
https://trans4mind.com/personal_development/astrology/toc.htm
https://www.sunsigns.org/

[Anomynous No.14567985]

>>14567952
I don't think I'm really interested in using Astrology for writing characters, I think the personality types thing should be enough for what I want to do.

[Anonymous No.14567997]

>>14567985
Either way, they're there. Note it.

[Anonymous No.14568034]

>>14567952
if, one day, I see a review such as "this story is so not believable. that's just not what an aquarius would doooo" I will punch through my fucking screen.

[Anonymous No.14568060]

>>14567952
I don't think you understood me. You should stay the fuck away from astrology in order to write real characters.

>>14567985
>I think the personality types thing should be enough for what I want to do.
Don't fool yourself; that's just the modern astrology, and just as bullshit.

[Anomynous No.14568111]

>>14568060
What does it matter if it's bullshit as long as it's useful for making characters?
What do you suggest?

[Anonymous No.14568120]

>>14568111
Creating characters that serve your central theme and which you know well enough as your real acquaintances; making real, breathing people; reading Lajos Egri's advice on three-dimensionality.

[Anonymous No.14568142]

>>14568111
>What do you suggest?
He doesn't have anything, he just comes here to tip his fedora.

[Anomynous No.14568146]

>>14568120
I'll look into Lagos, is there a specific book of his I should read?

[Anonymous No.14568152]

>>14568142
Do you often answer for others?

>>14568146
The Art of Dramatic Writing

[Anonymous No.14568153]

>>14568034
you don't need to brofist that hard, a simple small round of applause would do for such intellectual criticism

[Anonymous No.14568162]

>>14568152
You've already demonstrated twice before you're full of shit, aside from the fact pseuds such as yourself never have as much of a grasp as they mistakenly believe they do to either understand what they're trashing nor recommend valid alternatives.

[Anonymous No.14568170]

i wanna write something

[Anonymous No.14568173]

>>14568162
>nor recommend valid alternatives
You mean what I did, schizo?

[Anonymous No.14568189]

>>14568173
>schizo
another redditor zoomer exposes themself

[Anonymous No.14568204]

What do you listen to while writing to get the juices flowing? For me it's surf rock

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dhJhyZ7lZyg

[Anonymous No.14568224]

>>14568153
Funny droog, aren't you! Would you like a fine tolchok on your gulliver before I play the good ol' in-and-out ultra-violence to end your final horror show?

[Anomynous No.14568228]

>>14568189
>>14568173
>>14568162
>>14568152
I don't even know what this argument is about, but at least one of you gave me useful advice so thanks.

[Anonymous No.14568229]

>>14568204
I listen to whatever fits the aesthetic of the story I've decided to focus upon at that moment, for the purposes of immersion in the setting and inspiration for the tale.

[Anonymous No.14568250]

>>14548882
Absolutely based

[Anonymous No.14568497]

>>14556370
>just have a general plot and see how it goes
>plan out the entirety of the book in advance
I do these

[Anonymous No.14568599]

How do I make biblical depictions not come out as pseudo-medieval stylized cringe?

Basically I have 3 chapters depicting a biblical story that integrate in a project I'm working on. My problem is that whenever I write in that "timeline" it just comes out as game of thrones type cringewriting, I am trying to write it in a sort of way that would make the reader feel like it's a biblical story but also enhance it dramatically and kind of make it my own, not some shitty fantasy novel. So far I've only been able to use the master and Margarita as good reference, and looking for other books to draw inspiration from.

[Anonymous No.14568616]

>>14547574
Do they have to be 'likeable'? No.

But they have to be relatable to the audience/reader.

[Anonymous No.14568728]

>>14568599
>How do I make biblical depictions not come out as pseudo-medieval stylized cringe?
Write in the style of English used from 1700 to 1899.
>My problem is that whenever I write in that "timeline" it just comes out as game of thrones type cringewriting, I am trying to write it in a sort of way that would make the reader feel like it's a biblical story but also enhance it dramatically and kind of make it my own, not some shitty fantasy novel.
You have to come up with solid plots and then write what is essentially a fable.
Samson:
Strong man whose power is his hair.
Falls in love with seductress who convinces him to cut his hair.
No longer strong and gets captured and put in chains, woman abandons him.

Moral of the story: don't let yourself let women destroy you by diminishing your talent.
Modern take: Pootie Tang.

It's very simple. You can write anything.

[Anonymous No.14568921]

>>14567344
It comes off as pompous and useless. Sure, sometimes a "hard" word is the right one, but more often than not it's just someone 'thesaurusing' to make themselves sound smart. A 5¢ or 10¢ word is usually sufficient, only bring out the 50¢ or $1 words sparingly.
This usually means using Saxon words instead of French or Latin words by the way.

[Anonymous No.14569001]

Is there a secret to creative writing that creative writing courses and seminars teach you, or is it just pretentious ramblings from light-weight authors? I want to learn to write better, but I don't understand the best way to approach that learning. When I think of learning, I think of things that can objectively be taught, like maths, and so I want to know these "objective rules" to writing, if that makes sense.

[Anonymous No.14569033]

>>14569001
The real benefit of a creative writing course is having a well-read prof critique your work. Any rhetorical, or narrative structure lessons can be learned via books on writing and reading fiction. You do the class to get specific feedback on your work.

[Anonymous No.14569038]

>>14569001
I just learned through intuition.
It helps I went to college though.

I would never trust writing advice sold to me.

[Anonymous No.14569052]

>>14569033
I see, so it's more like having a one on one opportunity to have someone give instant feedback.

>>14569038
>It helps I went to college though.
Explain further.

[Anonymous No.14569186]

>>14564720
You made a mountain out of a molehill in such autistic fashion

[Anonymous No.14569239]

>>14569052
>Explain further.
Lectures, being forced to read high level material even if you don't like it, having conferences i.e. discussion-based classes, having to write multiple essays as long as 16 pages per semester, and having thorough critical commentary on your writing by your professors all serve to force you to critically evaluate the writing of what you're reading---you learn what is good and not through experience and lessons that come naturally through what is essentially conversation augmented by reflection.

Note, this is applying to a small liberal arts college with *at least* midwits for classmates.

[Anonymous No.14569264]

how do I make money writing?

[Anonymous No.14569268]

>>14569264
That's a bad reason to write

[Anonymous No.14569274]

>>14569268
it's not the reason i write. but if i'm going to be writing for hours a day anyway i might as well try and make money at it, and have to divide my attention less between "work" and "creative work".

[Anonymous No.14569315]

>>14569264
You could have tried to YouTube it.
Conventional wisdom says publishing on Amazon.

The truth is that it's no longer very clear what the best avenues are.

[Anonymous No.14569331]

>>14569315
I've YouTubed it among other avenues of research. I put a foolish amount of faith in anons to 'know things' and 'tell it like it is' for some reason.

[Anonymous No.14569341]

>>14569331
If you know it's foolish why do you do it?

[Anonymous No.14569354]

>>14569239
Thank you for expanding on that point. It seems these group-based exercises on critical thinking and reflection are what develop good writing (to oversimplify what you were saying). I took CS, so my "arts" college exposure is almost nil. I think I could possibly create a similar environment by critically analyzing books I read, joining some sort of book club, and writing essays on books (even if I don't share them with many people, if at all). My "group" reading exposure is small, but I'm not against reading high level material, or required reading lists.

Thanks for getting back to me. You and the other anon both talk about the importance of group exercise. I'll brain storm other ways I can put myself into a similar situation.

[Anonymous No.14569368]

>>14569331
You misunderstood me.
I meant YouTube it as in put your writing on YouTube and monetize your videos; but specifically, in the past before monetization had been rendered unprofitable.

But you are correct that there is virtually nothing to be learned from /lit/.

[Anonymous No.14569370]

>>14569354
Could you audit a course?

[Anonymous No.14569379]

>>14569368
/lit/ is only useful for niche reading charts. The people here are autistically good at organizing some of those.

[Anonymous No.14569381]

>>14569370
This is a high quality suggestion, and I appreciate it. Thinking about it, I might try just that. Thanks, anon.

[Anonymous No.14569392]

>>14569379
>The people here are autistically good at organizing some of those.
Most of the charts passed around today were composed 3+ years ago from an entirely different userbase.
The current userbase of zoomers are more selfish and ignorant.

[Anonymous No.14569393]

>>14569381
Auditing courses is super underrated, more life long learners should know about it.

[Anonymous No.14569402]

>>14569392
That explains a lot. Most of my interaction with /lit/ nowadays is browsing the wiki looking at pre-bronze age charts, etc..

[Anonymous No.14569417]

>>14569402
>>14569392
>>14569379
>>14569368
>>14569331
Stop acting like you're above the place in which you're posting; it's embarrassing.

[Anonymous No.14569432]

>>14569417
What have you learned from /lit/?

[Anonymous No.14569434]

>>14569432
I've received great criticism on the stories I've posted.

[Anonymous No.14569437]

>>14569417
i'm not. I'm the one putting faith in /lit/ above all else to give me the DL on making money in a competitive industry. It's only part of my mind my superego or something like it telling me that's stupid.

[Anonymous No.14569444]

>>14569417
>Stop acting like you're above the place in which you're posting
I am. I just happen to be particularly generous with my time and knowledge.
>it's embarrassing
Stop seething.

[Anonymous No.14569447]

>>14569434
That's like 5% of what this forum is about, he said "virtually nothing" to be learned. I'm not saying it's impossible to use this site in a smart way, but in reality, the majority of threads are either superficial posturings, or shitposts.

[Anonymous No.14569448]

>>14569444
You're really impressive, anon.

[Anonymous No.14569475]

>>14569448
Thanks for checkin' 'em.

[Anonymous No.14569601]

>>14547899
Readers who dislike purple prose would close the book and return it when they read this. It's really laid on thick. So thick it feels like its not about the story or even the landscape but about YOUR writing skills. Could be just me though but I can't stand purple prose because it instantly creates suspicion that you are hiding a shitty foundation with a fresh paint job and loads of neat accessories.

[Anonymous No.14569621]

>>14569601
if it's explained within the narrative I can forgive it. Lolita is a good example of an author being self aware and using it for a purpose.