Writing

So, expanding a bit from yesterday's post, writing is something I love to do. I love words and how I can use them to paint images in my reader's head. One of my hobbies is painting and, while I'm no artist, I like being able to bring colour to an object. Watching an artist creating a masterpiece is an experience I enjoy. Being able to do the same thing with words is an achievement I never get enough of.

As I stated yesterday, I try to keep my style light and easy. But I have trouble with short sentences. Sometimes they work, sometimes they don't. So I try to keep from having my sentences be too short and choppy. I also try to keep them from being overly long and complicated. Sometimes I succeed, sometimes I don't.

I like comparing writing to painting because there is so much similar in both creations. Take a good look at a painting. You shouldn't be able to see brushstrokes unless you're really close and analyzing it. But the length of a brushstroke will impart different motions and impressions. A long, gently flowing stroke is great for slow-running water or long grass blowing gently in the wind. Short, choppy strokes are used for rushing water, violent wind gusts, quick motion of any animal or human subjects, showing short hair or small items.

If you take a careful look at those last two sentences you'll see I used the same trick with punctuation. The first sentence flows while the second one gives short burst images. Words in general are my paint, punctuation, syntax, sentence structure, and vocabulary are my brushes, my highlights, my shadows, and my brushstrokes. Like any artist, I started learning the basics then moved on to more complicated and complex techniques.

When I first started painting, I would apply a base coat and leave it. The objects were nice but very flat-looking with their colours. Then I learned about adding highlights and shadowing. And adding more details like trims or jewels. I painted lead miniatures for several years and now I paint plaster houses for my Christmas village. The first miniatures I did were solid blocks of colour. The last ones I did had patterns painted on blank areas like cloaks and tunics. Faces looked wind-roughened or tanned or protected from extreme weather. Eyes had the whites showing behind the coloured irises. Shadows could be seen in the creases of clothing and between fingers. I even added a shield with a heraldic design on it to one miniature because it looked like it needed it. (I cheated and got someone to sketch the design because I can't draw but I painted it on the shield).

Writing has undergone the same metamorphoses. I look at the first stories I ever did (yes I still have some of  them) and my writing is childish. Very much like grades one and two with simple sentences. Except for the fact that I wrote them before I started school, you can tell that they were written by a child no older than 7. By the time I was in my teens, my vocabulary was equivalent to a college student. And my writing style was also comparable to a college student. Looking at one of my writing assignments, my high school English teacher told me I was either stupid or a professional writer and since he knew I was neither I had to stick to proper sentence structure while writing in his class. It was what they called a back-handed compliment.

Strangely enough, that compliment has been the only comment given about my writing that I ever took seriously. At that time I also gave serious thought to being a professional writer. Writing had always been something I did for fun. Yes, I had all these stories and ideas in my head wanting to get out but it was still just fun. Did I have it in me to be a professional writer?

Around the same time (okay, later that school year), we took a class trip to Montreal and Toronto to meet some Canadian authors. I got the chance to ask them how they wrote their books. Did they do one all at once, break it down into so much a day, or simply write when the mood took them? Most of them had a schedule. they knew when their creative times were and they scheduled their working hours around that. Because it took a lot of work to put out a book. I knew some of the steps involved but here was where I learned how much work goes into making a book ready for publication.

And you know something, it didn't sound like fun anymore. It sounded like a way to burn out my creativity by trying to force structure on it. Which was a warning that came through very clearly. Writing without structure did not make you a professional writer. Structure could strangle or kill creativity so you had to watch for the signs and learn when to take a break but you needed to plan your schedule with the breaks to meet your commitments. Most writers would start in another career and write on the sides until they could get themselves known and become popular enough to turn to writing full time.

Nowadays that isn't quite the same. With the Internet a well-written blog can make it's author Internationally known in a few days. And the response of readers can be known instantly. In some ways it's terrifying for a writer and in other ways it's exhilarating. But a tough skin is needed for anyone who posts their writing on the Internet. Not everyone will agree with your words. Not everyone will be polite in their disagreements. Not everyone will respect your views and will attack your opinions as if you had physically attacked them.

For myself, I'm writing again because it's fun. I don't expect to get a huge readership, or if by some strange happening I do then wow, so I write for my pleasure and hope whoever does read these posts enjoys it as well. It also gives me a way of thinking through subjects that come to my attention and puzzle out anything that confuses me. I'm just using a public means and seeing if anyone wants to come along for the ride. :)