Interesting quotes

[Kelliezgirl]

Sneaking up on it sometimes helps: I've found I can be very productive for an hour before dinner, because there obviously isn't enough time to really do anything, so I can tell myself I'm just screwing around.

Michael Crichton

 

[XerXesXu]

"Bad books on writing tell you to "WRITE WHAT YOU KNOW", a solemn and totally false adage that is the reason there exist so many mediocre novels about English professors contemplating adultery."

"The worst advice a young writer can get is "Write what you know." Imagination is more important than experience."
Joe Haldeman
Comshaw

"The worst advice a young writer ...' Note the word 'young'. It carries a lot of weight here. A young person knows little and would have little to write about. An aged writer's been there, done that, got the tea shirt - plenty of fodder to write from what you know - no need to fly to Mars to have sex with an octopus.

 

[YmaOHyd]

But it may help if I give you an idea of how I go about writing.

I'm about 10,000 words into my next book. Do I know what it is about? Yes, I do know what it is about, it's just that I'm not telling myself. I can see bits of the story and I know the story is there. This is what I call draft zero. This is private. No one ever, ever gets to see draft zero. This is the draft that you write to tell yourself what the story is.

Someone asked me recently how to guard against writing on auto-pilot. I responded that writing on auto-pilot is very, very important! I sit there and I bash the stuff out. I don't edit -- I let it flow. The important thing is that the next day I sit down and edit like crazy. But for the first month or so of writing a book I try to get the creative side of the mind to get it down there on the page. Later on I get the analytical side to come along and chop the work into decent lengths, edit it and knock it into the right kind of shape. Everyone finds their own way of doing things. I certainly don't sit down and plan a book out before I write it.

There's a phrase I use called "The Valley Full of Clouds." Writing a novel is as if you are going off on a journey across a valley. The valley is full of mist, but you can see the top of a tree here and the top of another tree over there. And with any luck you can see the other side of the valley. But you cannot see down into the mist. Nevertheless, you head for the first tree. At this stage in the book, I know a little about how I want to start. I know some of the things that I want to do on the way. I think I know how I want it to end. This is enough. The thing now is to get as much down as possible. If necessary, I will write the ending fairly early on in the process. Now that ending may not turn out to be the real ending by the time that I have finished. But I will write down now what I think the conclusion of the book is going to be.

It's all a technique, not to get over writer's block, but to get 15,000 or 20,000 words of text under my belt. When you've got that text down, then you can work on it. Then you start giving yourself ideas.

Terry Pratchett speaking to Writers Write.

 

[Areala-chan]

[N]o need to fly to Mars to have sex with an octopus.

Well, technically you're correct in that it's not, you know, a need, per se, but if I'm gonna have sex with an octopus, why would I pick Earth if Mars is on the table?

 

[YmaOHyd]

Well, technically you're correct in that it's not, you know, a need, per se, but if I'm gonna have sex with an octopus, why would I pick Earth if Mars is on the table?

Question! Is Jupiter an option?

 

[Kelliezgirl]

Question! Is Jupiter an option?

Jupiter is always an option.
It's Uranus that's hit or miss.

 

[XerXesXu]

Well, technically you're correct in that it's not, you know, a need, per se, but if I'm gonna have sex with an octopus, why would I pick Earth if Mars is on the table?

Swings and roundabouts. Why would you? Why wouldn't you? Many people would find the story world more comfortable and relatable if set on Earth (an accidental encounter on the Great Barrier Reef) many would find it more so if set on Mars (an accidental encounter with Elon Musk?).

 

[Comshaw]

"The worst advice a young writer ...' Note the word 'young'. It carries a lot of weight here. A young person knows little and would have little to write about. An aged writer's been there, done that, got the tea shirt - plenty of fodder to write from what you know - no need to fly to Mars to have sex with an octopus.

You are correct, UNLESS you take into consideration a part of the first quote: "...false adage that is the reason there exist so many mediocre novels about English professors contemplating adultery."

Writing what you know, coupled with a fertile and expansive imagination, can lead to some great stories. Writing ONLY about what you know, most will run out of story fodder in a short time.


Comshaw