The Imitation Game

by

Eric Fritzius

 

 

As writers, finding inspiration to write can be a problem.  Perhaps we have a piece we’ve been working on for some time and it’s hit a wall.  We find ourselves at a loss for how to climb over that wall.  The very act of sitting down and staring at the paper (or screen, as these things go) can feel like the last thing we would ever want to do—no matter how many writers in the past have advised us to do precisely that.  My usual tactic to punch through such “blocks” is to turn to other creative projects, to work on something else for a while and get the creative juices flowing.  This can help with the wall-breaching process for the first project.  And when it doesn’t, at least I’ve been productive on another project.  If you don’t have another project ready at hand (or even if you do) you might consider another technique: inspiration by imitation. 

This is the point where many of you will be put off if not horrified by the idea of imitating the work of another writer as inspiration for your own work; writers often bristle at the notion that they are anything less than completely original in all output.  This is, of course, the fecal byproduct of a horse.  We learn through imitation in all aspects of life, but particularly in writing.  Don’t believe me?  Go back and have a gander at your earliest output and you’ll likely find a pale version of Janet Evanovich staring back at you (or, for me, Douglas Adams).  As the writer Voltaire once said, though: “Originality is nothing but judicious imitation.  The most original writers borrowed from one another.  The instruction we find in books is like fire.  We fetch it from our neighbors, kindle it at home, communicate it to others, and it becomes the property of all.” Even in the face of the words of a learned master, we resist the notion.  Plagiarism is, after all, a truly vulgar crime, and writing something that another person might point a finger at and say “that’s someone else’s idea” can fill us with dread.  Plagiarism is also not what I’m talking about.  I'm talking about imitation, not theft.

In the creative writing classes I regularly teach, imitation is part of the curriculum.  I direct my students to pieces of writing that contain, at their core, a universal concept that can be applied not only to the original author’s life, but to the lives of each and every person walking the planet.  The concept can be rewritten, customized to the life and experiences of a new writer and will produce an outcome that is completely different from the original, yet retain the basic format. 

For instance, there’s a wonderful prose piece called “The Things I’ve Lost” by writer Brian Arundel.  It’s one that is included in the text book I use for my class, The Practice of Creative Writing by Heather Sellers.  (Full disclosure, Ms. Sellers is the one who hipped me to the Voltaire quote above.  Hers is an excellent text on writing.) 

Please go now and read “The Things I’ve Lost” online.

Back?

Pretty awesome, wasn’t it?  In fact, it’s the sort of piece that should make you mad that you didn’t think of it first, because it’s so simple and perfect in concept, yet easily lends itself to nuance.  Mr. Arundel does a fine job of listing off actual physical items he has misplaced throughout his life, alongside observations of beliefs, ideals, illusions, and opportunities he’s similarly “lost” or abandoned along the way.  It becomes an autobiographical sketch of major aspects of his life in six paragraphs.  And I found it to be the kind of piece that, when I first read it, I wanted to get to the end of it quickly so I could rush away and start my own version because it just seemed like it would be fun to do so.  My students almost always choose to write their own versions too.  And because I’m generally a positive person, I also invite them to try their hand at a similar topic called “The Things I’ve Found.”  Both produce impressive results. Each is completely original while at the same time using Arundel’s basic format as its basis.

There are thousands of other pieces of writing out there that this technique be applied to as well.  You may find you start to see such opportunities without even looking for them.  However, another that Heather Sellers specifically cites for this treatment is the poem “Genealogy” by Betsy Sholl.  It’s another concept that we can each plug our own details into, re-configuring the format as we see fit. 

Imitation is, if nothing else, a great technique for writing warm-ups. You may find it can help in breaking through your creative blocks as well.  And, if not, you have at least been productive.  

Sellers' book includes other techniques for imitation games, such as using poems as scaffolding for producing new work.  I have not found this to be effective in my own writing, but your mileage may vary.

Now, if you still feel at odds with borrowing the format and ideas of another writer, you’re always welcome to credit them.  Poets and writers often include an (after…) parenthetical in their title to indicate the work they’re responding to, or by which they were inspired. 

I wish you impressive results.

Writer Cocktail

by

Charlotte Firbank-King

Writers are a cocktail of madness. We’re psychotic, bent on killing those we love with as much impunity as those we hate. We wallow in death, misery, and general mayhem. Couple that with being pathological liars and master manipulators, then top it off with a dash of perpetual fried-brain and, oh, did I mention that we also have scant regard for laws and rules—of the English language or of social etiquette, that is. We fabricate words and foist them on unsuspecting readers who can’t even refer to a dictionary or Google to find out what the words mean. So that also makes us narcissistic deceivers. But we really don’t care as long as what we write is believable—and even that isn’t a given—we don’t care if it isn’t believable, because we will turn the reader into a believer.

Writers are a lone species of Homo sapiens. Okay, maybe we aren’t actually human.

Alice was an amateur when it comes to disappearing down rabbit holes. We probably shouldn’t marry and should definitely be neutered. The truth is, there’s no room in a writer’s life for anything except the characters we live through vicariously. But we gird our loins and periodically return to real-life like a meteorite hitting Earth. Our family will re-introduce themselves as we try not to call them by our characters’ names or warn them of some impending disaster that’s about to ruin their lives—note to self—that’s your daughter, idiot, not the character.

When we’re on a roll, we writers have this odd habit of ignoring dress code. We leap out of bed with ideas fermenting in our deranged, but very fertile brains, and head for the laptop or pen and paper. The only thing we may do en route is switch on the coffee machine. Five hours later, we’re surrounded by books, along with empty and full coffee cups ranging from cold to hot, and we’re still in our pajamas. We happily beat away on the PC, birthing new characters or killing off others in the most inventive ways. We transport ourselves to a thousand years back or a thousand years ahead. We go to countries and planets never heard of—we live in the realm of the impossible made possible through words. Sigh. What a divine place we live in.

Writers will discuss their characters as if they are real, and to us, they very much are. A conversation between writers could go like this:

Writer 1: “I don’t know what to do about Joe. He wants to head the narc operation, but he’s not ready and he’s too weak.”

Writer 2 understands completely and gives a sage nod: “I agree, he’s spineless. Kill him off.”

Writer 1 runs fingers distractedly through tousled hair and bites lip: “He wasn’t supposed to be a wimp—he’s the damn hero.”

Writer 2 sighs: “I know. It’s a pain in the arse when they won’t behave. My Mary was supposed to be the wilting damsel in distress, and now the slag is taking control. I might have to shoot her. I tried to get Mark to do it, but he’s not cooperating because the stupid sod thinks he’s in love with her.”

If non-writers happen to overhear this rather bizarre conversation, they may think they’ve landed in some sort of twilight zone. And they have—that’s where writers live.

Writers have long since learned to ignore certain responses to questions people ask. Usually starting with, “What do you do?”

“I write.”

“Wow, I’ve never met a writer.” Their brow furrows as they process the information. “Is that a real job?”

“Eh? It isn’t a job!”

“Oh.” Eyebrows rise. “Then how do you make a living?”

“What? Damn, dude, that question is so not relevant.”

Confusion reigns. “Not relevant?”

The person will get a long, direct look as we size them up—how will they fit into the next novel? That one predatory look usually has them backing off nervously, especially when you mutter that they would be a good fit for the villain you need to kill off in the next book. Some people don’t back down, but rush in and tell us about their lives or a friend’s life. Perfect. Absolutely perfect.

People need to understand that writers don’t operate in the same realm as say, a stockbroker, but we sure can write about one.

If one unobtrusively observes a writer, one may see them making faces or speaking to themselves in odd voices. Even getting themselves into weird physical positions. Writers are known for doing crazy things like crawling into a snake pit just to see how it feels—maybe that’s a little extreme, but they may sit at the bottom of a pool to see what it’s like to drown. Writers will certainly cut themselves to see what blood tastes or smells like. All experiments are toward one end—instilling realism into a story.

If you find a person watching you intently at an airport, shopping mall, or any public place, it may not be a psychotic stalker—not that there’s much difference—but it’s probably a writer, especially if he is making notes on any available scrap of paper. Cause a scene and make his day.

Writers will buy books worth hundreds of dollars for one paragraph of information. The books will probably sit on a shelf for the rest of the writer’s life. We don’t part with books—ever, especially reference books. You’d have to kill us first.

The moral of this convoluted discourse is: don’t become a writer if you value your sanity.

I RESOLVE TO . . .

I RESOLVE TO . . .

Resolutions for Writers

by

Rhonda Browning White

Turn the calendar page. Better still, break out an entirely new calendar. We have more than a new month ahead; we have a whole new year in front of us! Blank squares waiting to be filled with important appointments, blank lines waiting to be filled with significant words. The year 2014 presents a fresh start—a chance for growth and improvement—for every writer, so let’s resolve to do something vital and vivacious with each new day that’s given to us. What good is a New Year without a few resolutions, anyway? Print out this list, and make it yours.

·         . . . Write five days a week. If you’re one of those writers who lives by the mantra, Write every day, then goody for you! I live in the real world, however, where writing is a job—my career—and like any job, I do it five days a week, reserving the other two for my family and myself. Besides, life gets in the way, and it’s unrealistic to think we can (or would even want to) write every single day. We set ourselves up for failure when we insist we must write 365 days a year. Don’t fail. Allow yourself a couple of days off, but write the other five.

·         . . . Write 100 words a day (five days a week). Anyone—anyone!—can do this. You pound out several hundred words a day on Facebook, a thousand or more via email and a dozen at a time on Twitter. One hundred words a day is nothing. Nothing! A few of my friends and I started this 100-words-a-day challenge, and we hold each other to it. We report in daily, sometimes admitting defeat (kid is sick, car broke down, computer on the fritz), but more often gloating that we wrote 200 words—or 2,500 words. You’ll find that, more often than not, 100 words leads to 500 words, and soon you’ve written multiple pages. Even on the busiest days, you’ve accomplished something toward your goal, even if it’s only 100 words.

·         . . . Read, read, read! You can’t be a great writer unless you’re an avid reader. Read the genre in which you want to write. If you write romance, read the latest romance novels on The New York Times bestseller list. Be sure to read the masters. If high school was the last time you read Hemingway, Hawthorne or Flannery O’Connor, you’ve done yourself a great disservice as a writer. Works by these canonical writers are still around for a reason. Figure out what that reason is, and apply those lessons to your own work.

·         . . . Study the craft of writing. Resolve to read six books on the craft of writing this year. That’s only one book every other month. Easy-peasy! Some of my favorites include The Lie that Tells a Truth by John Dufresne, Reading Like a Writer by Francine Prose, and Making Shapely Fiction by Jerome Stern. Especially good for beginning writers is Sandy Tritt’s Tips and Techniques Workbook  (available for automatic download online HERE), which includes fill-in-the-blank worksheets and direct examples to help improve your writing. Take a writing course at your local college this year, or attend a writers conference that offers courses in writing craft.

·         . . . Type “The End.” Have a file full of half-finished short stories? Seven different novel beginnings? Three memoirs that total less than a hundred pages each? Stop procrastinating, and finish something! This is where the 100-words-a-day challenge can help you reach the end of your first draft. Butt in chair, fingers on keyboard. Write!

·         . . . Have my work professionally edited. What’s the difference between a traditionally published author and an unpublished writer? Many times, an editor. What do author-editors have in common? We have our work professionally edited. Yes, editors hire editors. It’s true that we can’t see our own mistakes in our writing, so it’s important to have trained eyes look over our final drafts. Professional editors will do more than find typos and grammar mistakes; they’ll point out that your character has green eyes in chapter one and blue eyes in chapter twenty. They’ll remind you that you left a loose sub-plot thread dangling back in chapter eleven, and explain where the middle sags. They’ll show you where you forgot to include internal conflict in a scene full of external conflict. In other words, they’ll help you make your writing much better.

·         . . . Network with other writers. Join a writers group in your area. Don’t have one? Start one. Your local library is a good place to begin, or post a bulletin on Meetups.com. Attend a writers conference where you can meet writers at your same skill level, as well as network with professionals in the field from whom you can learn. And by all means, support other writers. Write a positive review on Amazon.com or Goodreads.com of any novels or books you’ve loved, especially if those books are written by new or up-and-coming authors. One day, you’ll want someone to return the favor and write a review of your latest novel.

·         . . . Submit. Writing a novel and having it professionally edited will do you no good at all if you allow it to molder on your laptop. Whip out a polished query letter (which, of course, you’ve revised, edited and proofed), and send that manuscript out the door. Realize up front that you’ll receive rejections, and know that you may have to send out a few hundred queries to land an agent or publisher. Still, you must submit your work in order to have it traditionally published, so you may as well get started this year.

Make 2014 the year you take your writing to the next level. Start today! 

How to Keep Writing

By

Rhonda Browning White

The most ardent, self-disciplined taskmasters occasionally have weak moments when we find it hard to write, but it’s important to work through those feeble hours. How do we do it? How do we make writing a priority and encourage ourselves to put words on the page? These easy steps will keep you going through the driest days of writing drought (and doubt).

• Give yourself permission to write. To whom does this dream, this life-goal, this road to success belong? It belongs to you! So why do you need anyone else’s permission to pursue it? Simply put, you don’t. You only need your permission. What are you waiting for? Go write!
• 
  
•  Beat your doubt into submission. Face it; you’re not going to wake up each morning eager to jump headlong into writing. In fact, most days you won’t even want to get out of bed without hitting the snooze button at least once. Don’t wait for the Muse to sit on your shoulder. She’s a fickle little witch, anyway. You don’t need her. Write without her, just to spite her!
• 
  
•  Write down your dreams. Start big! New York Times Bestseller list? Fine. Now break it down. Might need to write a book first, right? That’ll mean finding an agent, as well. How will she know you’re any good? Ahhh, yes, she’ll see your list of bylines. Don’t have any? Time to write some short stories, articles or poems. Have you already written some good ones? Then send them out! Breaking your dreams into manageable pieces is the first thing to do. Then take one step toward completing those steps each week (or each day). And keep writing.
• 
  
•  Accept that you’ll never see the bottom of the laundry basket. There will always be clothes to wash, pots to scour, floors to mop and bathtubs to scrub. And they’ll be there after you’ve finished writing today. (Trust me; the housecleaning fairy doesn’t exist—I’ve set many traps for her, to no avail). If dinner isn’t started on time, order pizza, and keep writing. Ask your family to pitch in and help with chores. If they ignore your pleas, they’ll figure out that someone needs to go to the grocery store when the cupboards are bare. In the meantime, keep writing.
• 
  
•  Learn to accept rejection. Realize that a rejection of your manuscript isn’t a rejection of you, as a person. It doesn’t mean you’re a terrible writer. It may simply mean that your work was too long, too short, too funny, too sad, or didn’t fit the space or theme of a particular magazine’s forthcoming edition. Or it could be that the agent or editor simply doesn’t like the genre or style in which you write. The next agent might think it’s the best thing she’s ever read! Rejection happens. Get over it, and keep writing.
• 
  
• Submit your work. The best thing I know of to inspire more writing is publication. Of course you must take a moment to dance your way back from the mailbox, and you may have to crack open a bottle of champagne, or go out to dinner tonight to celebrate your success. But as soon as you return home, start writing. It’s important to feed the excitement of inspiration with words and more words. And more words. Your words. Build off your own momentum. Keep writing!

Deadly Sin Two: Telling Not Showing

by Sandy Tritt

The First Rule of Writing is Show, Don’t Tell. That sounds easy, but what, exactly, does show mean? It means we must act out our scenes using action and dialogue in such a way that our reader can visualize exactly where he is and who he’s with—all while keeping him on the edge of his seat. Let’s look at an example:

Carey ate breakfast, then he took a shower and went to the store. At the store he met a girl and they talked for a long time. Carey liked her but she blew him off. Then he went home.

Tells you a lot about Carey, huh? Okay—so this example is exaggerated, but it hits home the necessity of showing and not telling. What can we do to fix it? We need more detail, especially in dialogue and action. Consider:

     Carey studied the frozen dinners. He’d had turkey and dressing for the last four days, so Salisbury steak would be good for a change. But did he want the “Big Man’’ or the regular?
     A scent teased his nose. Not the overwhelming smell of fish and frostbite, but a fresh smell, like the smell of skin just out of the shower. He glanced sideways and saw the most perfect arm he’d ever seen in his life. Long, slender, graceful, full of sinewy muscle and smooth skin. His eyes followed the arm to the shoulder and then the head. Her head. A head covered with long blond hair and containing a face that made his heart stop.
    “Hi,” she said, her voice rich and melodious.
     Carey’s mouth didn’t work. He tried to return her greeting, but only a grunt came out. He tried to smile politely, but his face erupted with a grin as large and toothy and goofy as a cartoon character’s . . .

So now you have the idea. We need details. We need to know thoughts, feelings; we need to smell the perfume, taste the wine, feel the cashmere. It is especially important to act out emotions and emotionally-packed scenes. This is the writer’s opportunity to shine. Never tell us what a character is feeling. Show us. Anything less cheats the reader from experiencing our imaginary world.

Bad: John was angry.
Good: John’s eyes narrowed. He slammed his fist on the table.

We also find the “show, don’t tell” problem in less-apparent ways. For example, in description.

Bad: Mary was a pretty girl, with blue eyes and blond hair.
Good: Mary’s blue eyes glistened with joy, her blond hair bouncing with each step.


Bad: Molly is a wonderful person.
Good: Molly is always there when anyone needs her. She’s the first to arrive with a casserole when someone is sick, the first to send a note of encouragement to those who are troubled, the first to offer a hug to anyone—man, woman or child—at anytime.

Instead of saying Sam is a talented musician, let us hear the crowds cheer, let us feel his passion. Take us into his head as he strokes the piano keys:
     
     Consummation of the soul. That’s what Sam called the gratification he received from music. When his passion became so intense it begged to be satisfied, pleaded to be released, and he was helpless to resist its urges. When his fingers assumed a life of their own, titillating the ivory keys with the complex music of Bach and Mozart and Beethoven, and he became one with the cadence, breathing with the crescendos, his fingers caressing the melody, until everything else faded, everything else disappeared, and only the music existed.

Dialogue is another area where we have the opportunity to show or to tell. “I love you,” she crooned. “I love you, too,” he sputtered. And I cringe. First, using creative dialogue tags (crooned, sputtered) is telling, not showing. Let the power of your dialogue and the accompanying action show your readers the tone of voice and the emotion. Consider:

     “I love you,” she said, her voice smooth as her fingers massaged his Rolex.
     “Love you, too,” he said. His glassy eyes roved over her naked body, his mouth too wet and limp to properly form words.

You can’t tell us someone is a wonderful person, a talented musician or a spoiled child. We won’t believe you. You must show us. Throughout your manuscript, look for any opportunity to show us in real time, to act out, to let us feel.

But—does this mean we should act out absolutely everything? Uh-uh. Let’s face it—if we showed everything, our novels would run tens of thousands of pages—and readers would die of exhaustion. So what do we do? We must decide what information the reader needs. Just because we know everything about our characters and just because we spent weeks researching, it isn’t necessary to share everything we know with our reader. We must choose only the details we need to authenticate our story and omit everything else.

One of the most difficult and most crucial elements in story-telling is knowing when to give play-by-play action and when to back off and summarize. Play with this. If a scene doesn’t hold your interest, maybe it is better to summarize it in a sentence or two and go on to something more important. However, if it is a pivotal scene in the plot or critical to our understanding how our character reacts in a given situation, go for it. Give us action, give us dialogue, and let us experience and savor every single moment of it.

BONUS TIP: Never name an emotion. That’s a sure-fire giveaway that you’re telling and not showing.

© 2008 Sandy Tritt. All rights reserved.

For more tips visit www.InspirationForWriters.com