The Writing Craft

The Writing Craft

9 ways of working on your writing craft

Writing is one percent talent and ninety nine percent work.  A writer has to learn the craft of writing. Stephen King "Good writing," he says, "teaches the learning writer about style, graceful narration, plot development, the creation of believable characters, and truth-telling." 

Here are some areas of the text that can be crafted and polished:

1 Story telling and voice

All human beings are natural storytellers.  Listen to stories being told around you.  All people are doing them.  Hear the natural structure.  Writing is recording the story in a natural story telling way.

Fiction has to be alive.  It has to speak. There has to be a tune/ a voice, a certain liveliness that is recognisable.  It has to be alive right from the beginning.

Writing is an invitation to complicity.  It is an exchange, an intimacy.  It is a sharing of things not easily spoken about.

2 Character

Read this description of the artful Dodger from Oliver Twist by Charles Dickens

He was a snub-nosed, flat-browed, common-faced boy enough; and as dirty as juvenile as one would wish to see; but he had about him all the airs and manners of a man.  He was short for his age; with rather bow-legs, and little, sharp ugly eyes.  He wore a man’s coat which reached nearly to his heels. He had turned the cuffs back, half-way up his arm, to get his hands out of his sleeves, apparently with the ultimate view of thrusting them into the pockets of his corduroy trousers; for there he kept them.

Help the writer visualise your characters.

ACTIVITY

Describe people you see in the street

Record the characters who rise up in your sleeping dreams

Describe a character’s actions/behaviour whom you have observed on TV

SUGGESTIONS

Writing has to show a character’s development.  Writing is the RIGHTING of something.  The character has to change.

Get writing to SHOW how a character feels.  You have to let your characters go: they have to think, act and decide.

Make sure that your story contains a central conflict. Something must happen to turn your character's life upside down, and through this experience, a change must take place within your character. If your idea does not include a conflict, you're not quite ready to start writing.

3 Description and scene setting

Read the following description of Peggotty’s Home by Charles Dickens

The bedroom was the completest and most desireable ever seen – in the stern of the vessel ; with a little window, where the rudder used to go through ; a little looking-glass, just the right height for me, nailed against the wall, and framed with Oyster shells, a little bed, which there was just enough room to get into, and a nosegay of seaweed in a blue mug on the table.  The walls were whitewashed as white as milk and the patchwork work counterpane made my eyes quite ache with its brightness

ACTIVITY:  Describe a room.  Think about all the following aspects:

Shape and size? (round, oblong, square or irregular, long, High and wide?)

Walls made of what?  thatch, wattle zinc, logs, brick, concrete?  Thick or thin?  How decorated ?  Painted, panelled, whitewashed etc ?  What pictures, plaques or other ornaments are there on the walls ?

How many Windows are there?  What type and size are they ?  Are they sash Windows, bay or bow, casement, French, latticed or dormer windows?  Do they have curtains or blinds?

How is ceiling?  plain/decorated ?  High or low, rafters?  lighting fixtures?

How is floor?  Earth, concrete, board, tiles, bricks, stones?  Dull or polished, dirty or clean?  covered with mats, linoleum, carpet ?

Is room air condition or heated or have fans?

Is lighting dim or Bright?  Does it have lamps? 

Any furniture ?  Modern? old fashioned or makeshift ?  What kind of wood or metal or plastic is it?

4 Use of strong verbs

Rather than say ‘She went to town’

Try more precise verbs ie. she cantered to town, she lumbered to town, she trotted to town

5 Openings

A good story opening will catch the reader's interest and make the reader want to read on.  Openings can weave in background information, intrigue and tease the reader, suggest that something is going to happen, introduce the main character, introduce the main problem and create atmosphere.

An opening helps to build a world.  They can begin in various ways of ‘where, when, what why who which’ questions.  Example

Time

one winter's evening when the snow fell thick as feathers, a child wandered out of nowhere into a village

Who

John Walker was having none of it

Exclamation

'Michael, stop that whining!' screeched Mrs Smith

Question

'Is that room tidy?' Mr Black yelled up the stairs

Dialogue

'Lets go down to the casino' said Chris

Warning

'listen here you two - you are not allowed to go to the docks!'

Wish

'why couldn't I win the pools, everyone else in the country seem to be having luck but me'

Scene-setter

On the edge of the town stood a factory where no one ever went

Traditional

There once upon a time lived three pigs

The new arrival

Her name was Angela and everyone thought that she was a virgin

Dramatic Action

The car bomb sent a shock wave over the city at two thirty

Introducing the Monster

Julia had an axe to grind from the beginning

6 Showing not telling

Always subtly imply and show.  Never explain or give judgement!

“I was shopping!” she said.  He didn’t believe her.

BETTER “I was shopping!” she said. “Oh?” He raised his eyebrows.

7 Dialogue

Make what people say to each other seem natural.

Write down overheard conversations that you have eavesdropped on

8 Film framing

Film/story board

Sense the progress of events in a visual way, like a film.  Help the reader see and visualise the positions, viewpoints, frame settings of their situation.

9 Creating tension

Short sentences can improve the pace of your writing.  If you are at a point of conflict in the story, shorten the sentences to give tension to the voice.

Other posts of interest:

4 methods of structuring your writing
6 ways to make your writing fresh and original
5 things art can prove
Writer's quotes