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Posted by Jeesh (Member # 9163) on :
 
I was bored one day and wrote this:

The Worst Pain

What happens when your dreams come true,
And you can touch Sky Blue?
You feel the joy, you feel the love.
It’s like you’ve flown like a dove.

What happens on an ordinary day,
When all you want is to play?
But you’re destined to crash and burn,
When it comes to your turn.

What happens as you have fun,
And you hope you’re never done.
But you start to trip and fall,
As pain rushes at the call.

What happens when you get false hope?
Or when you reach the end of luck’s rope?
The pain has left, but you are broken,
Your dreams are tossed, like a token.

What happens when you wish and pray,
That you’ll get better soon someday?
As the verdict comes around,
You never want to hear a sound.

What happens when your dreams go down the drain,
Leaving you with all this pain?
But that’s still not the worst,
For you have only been lightly cursed.

What happens when a nightmare comes true,
And it hits and runs straight at you.
The pain is there, you feel it all.
But you’ve yet to meet your downfall.

What happens when you’ve nothing to gain?
Then you’ve felt the worst kind of pain.
Not a dream, a life, not even a smile,
Even when you’ve gone the mile.

What happens as you feel that pain?
It will pour on you, just like rain.
You’ll watch your dreams fly away,
Because there is nothing that you can say.

What happens when you know this pain?
You’ll have nothing to lose, nothing to gain.
But now I have warned you, so you will dream,
As I watch mine, fly down the stream.

Is it good?
 
Posted by Tante Shvester (Member # 8202) on :
 
Honestly? Well, it rhymes a lot.
 
Posted by Jeesh (Member # 9163) on :
 
Is it good?

Yes, honestly.
 
Posted by Tante Shvester (Member # 8202) on :
 
I'm sorry, Jeesh, but it isn't really my style. I know that lots of other people like this style of writing. It is very popular. But good? Well, not very.

You may want to read some good, contemporary poets, and learn from them. You're style is more, um, Hallmark than highbrow.

But, hey, Hallmark is popular, too. Lots of folk like it.
 
Posted by Jeesh (Member # 9163) on :
 
Hallmark? Can you explain that?
 
Posted by Reticulum (Member # 8776) on :
 
Eh, it's okay. It's a bit too Cheezy for me.

Can you write?
Yes.

Can you write very well?
Not really. I have to agree with Tante.
 
Posted by Tante Shvester (Member # 8202) on :
 
Well, not the subject so much as the rhymed couplets. It's kind of a trite presentation of your message, no?

Also, the rhythm is a bit of a mess.
 
Posted by GaalDornick (Member # 8880) on :
 
I think it's just too...superficial? It just doesn't seem to have much depth to it.
 
Posted by dantesparadigm (Member # 8756) on :
 
If you want to be an artist no one's allowed to understand you.

Also the rhyming scheme comes off as a little puerile and distracts from any value the message might have.
 
Posted by Jeesh (Member # 9163) on :
 
If anyone is wondering about the "subject" I was rollerblading at school, fell and broke my leg. Track season is coming up, I can't try out, and I love running.
 
Posted by GaalDornick (Member # 8880) on :
 
That's what I meant when I said it didn't seem like it had much depth to it. You should write about something more important to you, otherwise you're just writing for the sake of stringing words togethor. No matter how "beautiful" you write, if there's no point to it, it's not going to be good.
 
Posted by Dante (Member # 1106) on :
 
It's a fine start for a teenager.

Now, if you want to be good, read and write poetry every day for the next five or ten years, and you've got a shot.
 
Posted by Jeesh (Member # 9163) on :
 
Track is importent to me! Imagine what you love most, then lose it. (With the exception of family members) I was on the volleyball team too, when I broke my leg. And there was a dance troop tryout and a swim party for my choir. I think my poem has a point.
 
Posted by GaalDornick (Member # 8880) on :
 
"You may want to read some good, contemporary poets, and learn from them"

Could you, or anyone else, suggest some good contemporary poets to learn from, or a good website that has good contemporary poetry or a guide on how to write poetry? I'm also interested in learning how to write poetry.
 
Posted by Reticulum (Member # 8776) on :
 
Not to the reader.
 
Posted by Jade Peat (Member # 9230) on :
 
I don't know about anyone else...but I've always found poetry to be hard. It looks simple, but when you try it it's hard to put depth into it--you get distracted by the form, if it rhymes, has meter, etc. so you lose the meaning because you can't find the best words for your meaning that also fit into the rhythem and rhyme. So you make poor comprimises which don't work. And also, beginning (and pro!) poets sometimes confuse "mysterious" and "artistic" with "obscure", "cryptic", and "makes no sense". IE, random splats of words are supposed to be deeply profound, but nobody but the poet thinks they're anything other than incoherent, which sort of defeats the purpose of writing being a medium to convey meaning and ideas.

I find that once I learned to write prose, (in my case, SFF stories!) I broadened my vocabulary enough and learned how to form similies and metaphors well enough that those skills carried over into poetry, so even though my poetry form and rhythem are still fledgling, my vocabulary is not so limited as it was a few years ago. I have more "wiggle room" to work on improving my rhythem, meter, and rhyming because I don't have to worry so hard about the meaning I'm trying to convey.

Anyway...if you want to learn poetry, find out what the pro poetry markets are and see if they have any publications, find books of good poetry (look for poetry-related forums on the internet, they'll be the most helpful), and also, song lyrics (which I believe are modern poetry, and have many traits that poetry-poetry has), and study them.

You might want to try filk too--writing different words to a song's melody. That way the rhythem and maybe even rhyme is taken care of for the moment, and you can concentrate on your words. Later on you can graduate to doing it all on your own. I used to filk to the Phantom of the Opera tunes!

"Wishing you were some-how dead again / wishing you were six feet under / too many years / watching your tears / why don't you goooo and diiieee!" was me and my friend's version of "Wishing You Were Here Again" once we had played it so much we were sick of it. (We were 12 admittedly). If you're familiar with the melody--the filk words fit the meter and rhythem, but tell a completely different story! [Big Grin]

And also? Write what pleases you. Just because others think whatever they think doesn't mean that you are wrong, or that your poem is horrible. Keep on writing, and you'll eventually figure things out. Experience is the best teacher. [Smile]
 
Posted by signal (Member # 6828) on :
 
Jeesh, don't take this the wrong way, but it comes across as trite and the rhyme scheme doesn't help any. You wrote it about yourself so you understand it, but it means nothing to anybody else. I think great poetry conveys to the reader a picture, and emotion, an event. There's a connection that makes it a two way street instead of being only one sided.

I agree with all the others who have mentioned this, but go find good poetry to read. Shell Silverstein only one of many writers who have been successful with rhyming type of poems, though the subject matter you'll notice is for a younger audience than you will find here on hatrack.

Don't get discouraged by this. Just keep reading and writing and you'll grow from it. I'm not a writer, but if it makes you feel any better, I occasionally write what I call "wordplay sketches" where I might use a ton of rhymes or a certain meter just for the fun of it.

Besides, writing as well as Deerpark takes a considerable amount of drug use. jk. [Razz]
 
Posted by Kristen (Member # 9200) on :
 
I think you have done a good job of fitting an AABB rhyme scene . However,I think that the scope of poem didn't carry through in that while each verse rhymed and spoke to a certain type of emotion, I didn't find an overarching theme which carried my interest.

You can clearly work within structure. Perhaps if you investigate other types of poetry with more flexible rhyme schemes, you will be able to show your underlying intents more easily than when you are hampered by the need to make everything sound perfectly rhymed.

Good luck. I really admire your courage in posting your work in a public forum. Also, that you can come up with a fairly complete work when you aren't fully focused is equally impressive. Like any other talent, with poetry, practice makes perfect. [Smile]
 
Posted by Orincoro (Member # 8854) on :
 
One tip to keep in your conscious process when composing your ideas in meter, is that English speakers have a tendency to favor Anglo-Saxon words in metered ryhme schemes like this one, and much more so than in ordinary speech.

Pain-Drain
Fun-Done
Hope-Rope

All Anglo saxon or other non-latinates. And all occuring in just three stanzas. The problem is we have heard these words a Gazillion times in our lives, and they aren't terribly difficult to put to together. This obviously makes the work less interesting and more common-seeming if you get my drift.

This kind of poetry IME, as a college english student, is seen as pedestrian because it employes such an archane form, AABB and so on. If you want a better understanding of the vast possibilities of form which exist, my advice is to take a music appreciation class. If you aren't a student anymore, try some kind of musical enrichment class for adults, or read a book for the general reader on musical form and history.

The reason I am pushing the music agenda is that to a large degree, the earliest examples of poetry's evolving forms are found in the works of composers, not authors. Composers from 1300 on had a need for an expanded vocabulary of forms to fit new and expanding texts and harmonic possibilities as western harmony, and polyphony evolved. What we are left with are truly epic 9,000 line poems from french composers like Machaut and Philipe de Vitry, which explore and expand versification techniques we still use today.

Even if you have NO interest in doing any of that research, just pick up a copy of the complete works of Poe, or T.S. Elliot, or Tennyson, or a hundred other poets from the last two hundred years and take a look at their use of rhyme schemes, and you'll quickly see what they avoid, and what they can't get enough of.

Kristen is right, practice practice practice. But if your going to practice, do it well too, do the work, put in the hours and it'll pay dividends.
 
Posted by Jeesh (Member # 9163) on :
 
Thanks for your help.
 
Posted by Uprooted (Member # 8353) on :
 
Jeesh, first I read your explanation of what the poem was about and what it meant to you, then I read the poem. One thing to keep in mind is that writing can be a purely personal exercise. Even if it isn't something the world appreciates, for you to take a painful experience and create a poem out of it is a very positive way for you to deal with your emotions. I think you should keep this poem and any others you might write--someday your children will probably be glad to read it and have a glimpse into your thoughts and feelings as a teenager. They'll probably make fun of you because that's just what kids do to their parents! But it doesn't mean they won't be glad to have it. (But it might help to add a note like the one you posted above about what prompted the poem.)
 
Posted by Princess Leah (Member # 6026) on :
 
quote:
It's a fine start for a teenager.
I wouldn't go that far.
 
Posted by SteveRogers (Member # 7130) on :
 
Its rather sad that the first thing I did when I saw this thread was scroll through and see if TomD made a mean comment.
 
Posted by Orincoro (Member # 8854) on :
 
Its rather interesting too that we tend to give people, even particularly awful examples, the benefit of the dought in alot of areas of art. In music for example or painting and scuture, we accept wonderfully metiocre creations because they are "personal" and "unique." Not so with poetry, and I think we are more right in this regard than in other genres; we recognize metiocre work when we see it/ hear it, and we are more judgmental. I think the "accepting" nature of our society, interestingly willing to welcome metiocrity and compromise so often, really degrades common understanding of artistic forms. Not so, yet, with poetry, we can all still see that this particular example doesn't represent anything more than the ability to produce a steady hard ryhme. Sorry- Jeesh, keep on truckin.
 
Posted by signal (Member # 6828) on :
 
I think we give the benefit of the doubt to mediocre spelling as well. [Wink]
 
Posted by Epictetus (Member # 6235) on :
 
Jeesh, keep at it, I mean that honestly. The first time I let some people read my poetry, I was confronted with "well, no offense, but this is pretty crappy." So I went to a local writing conference, read a lot of poetry, and wrote a LOT. I'm much better now, I may not have published anything yet, but I've been able to improve tremendously.

One of the best pointers I was given as a beginning poet was "avoid abstractions like the plague." Abstractions are words like love, hope, desire, hate, angry, guilty, pain, joy, happy, etc. These are words that have a plethora of meanings and don't have a concrete connotation. Instead, whenever you come to a place in the poem where you'd normally use the word love, write a concrete image that conveys how you feel.
 
Posted by Orincoro (Member # 8854) on :
 
quote:
Originally posted by signal:
I think we give the benefit of the doubt to mediocre spelling as well. [Wink]

Oh yes, we do...
 
Posted by Orincoro (Member # 8854) on :
 
quote:
Originally posted by Epictetus:

One of the best pointers I was given as a beginning poet was "avoid abstractions like the plague." Abstractions are words like love, hope, desire, hate, angry, guilty, pain, joy, happy, etc. These are words that have a plethora of meanings and don't have a concrete connotation. Instead, whenever you come to a place in the poem where you'd normally use the word love, write a concrete image that conveys how you feel.

I would say that the purpose of a poem is sometimes just to describe your definition of ONE abstraction. For instance, you want to define what "Love" is to you; the only way you can accomplish this is by paring away any meaning-laden flotsom that distracts from your goal. If you are successful as describing one thing, like love or loss, then you can use that in context, and bring to bear the entirety of your poem in one statement.

For example, a poem that is pretty fresh in my mind is "The Raven" by Poe. Think of what the word "nevermore" means by the time Poe actually gets around to saying it. The word is not special, but in context, and upon repetition, it is a sumation of the poem's entire meaning. Think of how you treat that word in your own thoughts afterwards; you will see that it has left a lasting effect on your use of the word. So I agree, avoid abstactions, EXCEPT for those which you intend to explore in detail.
 
Posted by Celaeno (Member # 8562) on :
 
quote:
Originally posted by Epictetus:
One of the best pointers I was given as a beginning poet was "avoid abstractions like the plague."

"Go in fear of abstractions." Ezra Pound.

It's the piece of advice that helped my poetry to mature the most.

You don't have to completely avoid abstraction, but you do have to be wary. As Orincoro suggests, you need to carefully consider any abstractions you intend to use.
 
Posted by Mirrored Shades (Member # 8957) on :
 
Everybody starts somewhere. Most people start off with rhyming poems a lot like this one. This actually reminds me of a lot of things I wrote when I was much younger -- and since then I've improved, and I hope to continue improving. Is this great poetry? No. But you've got something here, and it takes serious guts to post poetry in public forums. Congrats for that.

As for poets I'd recommend reading: any of the classics -- all of the classics, though that could take a lifetime. Specifically, for younger poets: TS Eliot, Maya Angelou, WB Yeats, Edna St. Vincent Millay, and Langston Hughes. They're all easily accessible, and will teach you a lot. I'd personally also recommend Jane Mead, E. Ethelbert Miller, Saul Williams, Tony Hoagland and Kamau Daaood. If none of them appeal to you, go to bookstores and libraries and flip through the poetry section, see what catches your fancy. What some people really like others will find incomprehensible or childish, and personal views will change as you grow older.

Most of all: keep writing, and keep everything you write. You'll see the improvement.
 
Posted by Dante (Member # 1106) on :
 
I don't know that I've ever heard T.S. Eliot described as an easily accessible writer who would be good for younger poets. Or Yeats. Jeez, I'm working on a Ph.D. in European lyric poetry and I don't know that I'd say I've got a firm (figurative) grasp on Yeats.

Other than that, I like MS's post. <grin>
 
Posted by Tante Shvester (Member # 8202) on :
 
Yeats rocks. [Big Grin]

And T.S. Eliot is a yenta. You DO know what the "T.S." stands for, don't you?
 
Posted by Dante (Member # 1106) on :
 
I do know what it stands for. However, I have no idea what a "yenta" is.
 
Posted by Mirrored Shades (Member # 8957) on :
 
I'm not saying that the full meaning and symbolism of TS Eliot is easy to get, because I'm fairly certain his poems could be analyzed and re-analyzed and re-analyzed again, and maybe years later you'd think you'd finally come to an understanding of what he was trying to say. But the vocabulary and rhythm are easy to read, and when you're young, I think rhythm and vocab are best learned by osmosis. [Smile]

Same for Yeats, or at least SOME of Yeats. I started on both of them at a fairly young age, and it did, at the very least, make me feel really smart.
 
Posted by Celaeno (Member # 8562) on :
 
I think Robert Frost is great for younger poets. I remember finding him quite accessible. And Auden might be excellent if you're looking for rhyme and meter.

Eliot's great to read when you're younger and you think you're so smart and you really get it and then to read again and realize that you were way off the mark. I loved reading Eliot aloud in my high school Am Lit course. His sense of rhythm is just...genius.
 
Posted by Jeesh (Member # 9163) on :
 
OK, soon as I can, I am going to the library [Big Grin]
 
Posted by Sterling (Member # 8096) on :
 
When I was nine or so, and vacationing in Maui, I got slammed into a beach by a wave, breaking my collarbone. I loved swimming, and I couldn't do it for the next three weeks of the trip- I could just watch my sisters do what I couldn't.

You have my sympathies.

As far as the poetry goes, it's a good start, but you need to be cautious with the format, especially when you're trying to express something important to you. A rhyme scheme can make you choose words that are less than ideal, especially when the rhymes come so close one onto the other. In poem of some length, like yours, at ten stanzas, it becomes almost certain that some of the words chosen will appear forced, which creates some of the appearance of "triteness" that others have mentioned: is this a good way to state what you're trying to say? Or was it simply the best rhyme you could come up with at the time?

Still, I'd say it's a good start. Keep practicing. I personally am very fond of Shakespeare's sonnets, which make for pretty quick reading.
 
Posted by Katarain (Member # 6659) on :
 
Hmm... Yeah, I'm gonna have to go against the popular opinion and state that I liked the poem. It's not professional or vogue, but so what? It's nice. You have many years of life ahead of you, and I'm sure your poetry will only get better, unless you lose your interest in writing it--which is okay, too. Reading other poets and practicing are, of course, great ideas. But I like this one anyway. Sure, parts aren't that great, but for the parts I do like:

quote:
What happens when you get false hope?
Or when you reach the end of luck’s rope?
The pain has left, but you are broken,
Your dreams are tossed, like a token.

This is when I started liking the poem. I guess because this is where I started seeing some real creativity. I liked the phrase "the end of luck's rope." I think it was a clever use of a rhyme--I have a feeling that you thought of the rhyming word first and the way to use it second. That's not typically a good thing to do, and as you get better at poetry, you probably won't do it anymore--if you even use rhyme at all. But for a beginner, I thought it was a nice phrase.

Okay, the last line... not as good. "Token" really is forced. I like the emotional response I get from "you are broken," but it is too cliche. But again, you'll get better. Everybody (I think!) writes with cliche's at first!

quote:
What happens when you wish and pray,
That you’ll get better soon someday?
As the verdict comes around,
You never want to hear a sound.

I liked this part, especially the last line. It shows that you're learning to say something without actually saying it. Again, you'll get better at that, too.

quote:
What happens when your dreams go down the drain,
Leaving you with all this pain?
But that’s still not the worst,
For you have only been lightly cursed.

I especially like the last line of this one because of you're not simply cursed, you're lightly cursed, which brings to mind the frustration of just being hurt enough to not participate, and the real pain is emotional.

I feel about the same about the end of the poem as I do about the beginning. There are a lot of cliche's, but I felt that it conveyed your emotion pretty well right now. And if that emotion is immature, well, that's okay. You're still doing this whole "growing up" thing.

Anyway, I wanted to tell you some things I liked about the poem, since most people are giving you pointers on what to avoid. The only way you learn is by trying, and while your responses have been upbeat, I didn't want you to feel depressed or embarrassed because you shared. And my responses are completely genuine.

Keep on writing poetry, start reading other poets, and you will improve. But above all, accept that sometimes you'll just need to write poetry just for you to express all of your hurt, love, pain, delight, and other emotions. That doesn't need to be good.
 
Posted by Jeesh (Member # 9163) on :
 
Thanks Katarain.

I usually write stories, (I have a few in Word if anyone wants me to post them)I don't usually finish them though...
 
Posted by Sterling (Member # 8096) on :
 
Oh, please do! I'm much better qualified to judge fiction than poetry anyway. [Smile]
 
Posted by Jeesh (Member # 9163) on :
 
OK, I will at my next chance.
 
Posted by Jeesh (Member # 9163) on :
 
OK, here's one:
(Most of mine are really short. I'm trying to make them longer) (I tend to name my characters after me and my friends [Big Grin] , can you tell me what I need to work on? This one isn't finished yet)

The Ultimate Friendship

Before man was created a friendship was made. A friendship of power. This friendship was more than Man or Demon. But of friends who hold a true power. They were no gods or goddesses nor sorcerers or sorceresses. But great friends.
And it all started one day…


1. The Road unto Destiny

“Hey guys!” Anne said as she came up to her friends. “Hey Anne!” “Did you finish summer homework yet?” Anne asked. “No” they all groaned “This summer is so unfair!” complained Dan. “I’ll help. I finished today,” Anne offered. “Can 50 be divided be 12?” asked Taylor. “No” Suddenly they heard a crash near by. “Shannon?” Dan asked. “Yeah?” “Ever hear that before?” “No way. Come on let’s go see what it is,” Shannon said “Summer homework can wait,” Then she led the way. CRASH! “That came from over there!” Taylor said pointing to a construction site. “Are you crazy? We can’t go there! They’ll kick us out. Plus they probably know what it is and stopped it by now!” Meg said. CRASH! “Please Meg! Come with us! Don’t you want to know what that noise is?” Taylor asked her. “Hurry!” CRASH! “This thing is crashing faster and faster!” Tony yelled. “I’ll go Taylor,” Meg said “Let’s go!” Then they ran to catch up with the others.

“Whoa. That is huge.” Tony said in amazement. The others ran past him. Anne stopped by him. “Strange isn’t it? Some 10 year olds trying to help a construction site. We aren’t normal. Are we?” CRASH! “I don’t know.” was the reply. “Well let’s get moving, the others are there already, and I think they found something.” Anne ran back followed by Tony. “Get a look at this!” Dan exclaimed. “Holy cripe” Anne said. CRASH! “What is that?” Tony whispered. “Looks like a market.” Shannon said. It was true. They saw stores filled with people. There was what looked like fruit, clothes, games, and even people for sale. “Slave market.” Taylor managed to get out. That frightened all but Meg. She had seen this place before. She had dreams about this place. It showed her the people she cared about on those platforms. She was ready to fight it. “Let’s go” She whispered and got up.

2. Guidess
“Hold up one second!” Anne hissed. “Meg, we don’t even know if this is real!” CRASH! “It’s real enough for me” Meg stated. “Get down! I think they saw us!” Karyn said. The people were staring at something. The group gasped when they saw what. It was a huge demon! “My people!” He bellowed “There will be a drastic change.” There were yells among the market. “Silence! This is only happening because the Ancient Power has been brought on the world! We have large advantages and disadvantages. They are children, but the powers they posses are extraordinary…” The kids didn’t here the rest because they were thinking too hard. Who and what was he talking about? They had no idea. “Do you think it means us?” Tony wondered. “Probably not. What’s this ‘Ancient Power’?” Meg asked, almost forgetting her dreams. “Whatever. C’mon let’s go” Taylor said and ran silently to the building. “Taylor! Wait!” Karyn said. “We need a plan” “I got one. Wait for a while then drop in kung-foo kicking everyone” Dan said. “Keep dreaming Dan.” Anne retorted. “Well for one thing,” Taylor said as she walked back “The crashing stopped” They looked down. Everything had returned to normal. Except for one thing. “Hey! All the people are gone!” Karyn exclaimed “What happened to them?” “Follow me” Meg said .
 
Posted by Sterling (Member # 8096) on :
 
Hmm. It sounds like you've got an interesting premise. And you have me curious about where this is heading, which is a good sign.

A handful of things I will note:

1. As written, this is a little hard to read. I don't know if it's just because the transfer from word processor file to Hatrack message space condensed everything and removed your formatting. If not, I'll note you generally start a new paragraph when a different character starts speaking:

“Hey guys!” Anne said as she came up to her friends.
“Hey Anne!”
“Did you finish summer homework yet?” Anne asked.
“No.” They all groaned.
“This summer is so unfair!” complained Dan.
“I’ll help. I finished today,” Anne offered.
“Can 50 be divided be 12?” asked Taylor.
“No...”

2. The word "crash", when used to describe a repetitive sound, bugs me a little. It's not big, but it's distracting, at a time when I want to be pulled in by the story. You see, when I imagine a "crash", I generally imagine something like a car crash- one sound, very loud, but final and resounding. Even if you say "a crashing sound" or "two heavy objects being slammed together" or "a loud impact", it doesn't have that effect. It's much easier, for me, to consider such a noise being a repeated one.

3. "A demon"? How do they know it's a demon? Even if it looks exactly like one might expect a demon to look- say, it has skin of an inhuman color, horns, cloven feet, and a tail, I should get to read that, simply so I know why all the characters we're following immediately came to the conclusion that they were beholding a demon. Perhaps the most important rule of fiction writing: when possible, show us, don't tell us.

4. Along similar lines, start differentiating the characters. Part of that is recognizing that not everyone witnesses events in quite the same way. Maybe Anne hears a "crash", because she was once in a minor car accident. Maybe to Karyn it sounds like a gunshot, because her father has taken her hunting. Tony probably shouldn't use the same word your narrator uses: "This thing is crashing faster and faster!" The friends know what he's referring to without him calling it a crash, so maybe he'd say "That noise is getting faster!"

A common mistake I see, even among a lot of professional writers, is presuming that their characters naturally all come to the same set of conclusions, and draw from the same pool of information (whether they should actually have access to that information, or however unlikely it might be that they'd come to the same intuitive leaps, let alone that those leaps would be exactly correct.)

...And, that said, I'll say I've certainly seen worse writing from published professional writers. By all means, keep writing! Maybe you'll be the next Paolini.
 
Posted by Reticulum (Member # 8776) on :
 
No, that's what we DON'T want. DON'T be like horrible, aweful, disgusting, BAD authors. By god, I'm 13, and I can create more interesting premisises then him, and write better as well.
He is the worst author I have ever read.


1. As for your writing. Too much he said, she said. You should limit it down to a few characters, to improve your dialogue, and create longer thoughts of speech for single characters.

2. Your writing is very rigid. It needs to flow more, feel more natural.

He did this. She did that. He went over there. Then he said that. They were amazed.

You see?, Try to make your writing more flowing, and inviting.
 
Posted by Jeesh (Member # 9163) on :
 
quote:
Originally posted by Reticulum:
No, that's what we DON'T want. DON'T be like horrible, aweful, disgusting, BAD authors. By god, I'm 13, and I can create more interesting premisises then him, and write better as well.
He is the worst author I have ever read.

Than why is Eragon a Rebecca Caudill nomine? (sp?) It's going to be a movie later this year too.
 
Posted by Sterling (Member # 8096) on :
 
Easy, Reticulum. You can be Paolini success-wise without having to emulate the writing style.
 
Posted by Orincoro (Member # 8854) on :
 
quote:
Originally posted by Tante Shvester:
Yeats rocks. [Big Grin]

And T.S. Eliot is a yenta. You DO know what the "T.S." stands for, don't you?

HOW DAAAAaREEEE YOU!!!!

I should have been a pair of ragged claws
Scuttling across the floors of silent seas.

SO THERE WITH YOUR YENTA
 
Posted by Katarain (Member # 6659) on :
 
Jeesh, I haven't read this yet, and I'm not sure I'll have time to in the near future. I'll try to remember soon, though.

But my biggest recommendation would be to click the link on the top of this page to Uncle Orson's Writing Class. There are some awesome tips there.
 
Posted by Jeesh (Member # 9163) on :
 
I will.

I'm starting a new story. I'm working with some of the tips and advice you guys gave me. I'll post it when I can. (My comp doesn't have a floppy disk drive, that's what my story is on. The only comp in the house with one is in my parent's room, they HATE it when I go on that one for some reason)
 
Posted by Sterling (Member # 8096) on :
 
Suggestion: does "your" computer have a USB port, by any chance? A flash drive that can easily hold several books worth of writing can be had these days for ten dollars or less. Perhaps you could convince your parents it would keep you off of "their" computer?... [Smile]
 
Posted by MidnightBlue (Member # 6146) on :
 
Another thing you can do if you're working on something on several computers is to email it to yourself each time you make changes or additions. That's what I did in high school when we were given class time to work on essays in the computer lab. It was much easier than remembering to bring a floppy disk, which would invariably get broken in my bookbag, or printing it out and retyping what I'd already done when I got home.
 


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