Technique vs. Talent

[JamesSD]

If you could have one or the other, which would you choose - writing a technically perfect story where you could dazzle the reader with well-chosen words and perfect writing or a story that wasn't very great writing-wise but affected your readers emotionally?

I read (and write) for plot and character, so I would take the second category over the first. I've read a lot of stories on literotica that fall into both categories (and some that fall into neither or both).

 

[Liar]

Ditto with tapping into your experiences and emotions. You can be taught to reach back in your memory and describe what you remember and know: "Everyone spoke with this flat dialect." But that doesn't mean you can write: "The local accent is barbed with a praire twang." (From: In Cold Blood by Truman Capote).

That instinct, knowing what words will not only bring the twang to people's ears but give them a feel that there is a barbed wire to it which seperates out who belongs and who does not...that's not something that can be taught.

Sorry, but yes, it can. I've learned it, and in recent years I've taught it.

It's what you do, to a limited extent, in creative writing workshops. You expose yourself to the idea of great wrting, example upon example of what it means to be having the gift of the word. You absorb your Shakespeare, your Poe, your Joyce, your Capote, poets, orators, rock artists, journalists... all who have that pen that can unshapen swords. Not to copy what they do, but to understand what it is that makes it what it is, to understand what kind of boldness you have to attempt to go where they went in terms of style and deliverance. You learn a methodology of thinking, a philosophy if you like, that lets you take your own writing to new places. You learn to toss in literary devices, rhethorical figuers, learns the concept of metaphor, stacking, climaxes, anthesis, hyperboles... you learn to use those to express yourself, mechanically at first, until you have made those tools your own, and they become a part of your voice. And by practice (And failing, over and over again, on the way there.), you learn cuases and effects, calls and responses that can trigger emotional response in a reader.

Ain't no voodoo. And people weren't full fledged poets with eloquence in their veins when they started out. They aquired that through hard work.

 

[rgraham666]

Talent is my choice.

Technique can be taught, or better, learned.

I'm a high school dropout. And when I was in school I took sciences and maths. I hated English almost as much as I hated Phys Ed.

I read all the time, but I hated English because it took the fun out of reading.

So all I have when it comes to writing is what little talent I have. My technique is all subcutaneous, picked up from the stuff I've read over the years.

I seem to do OK.

 

[tolyk]

Mal, I meant to say that using or knowing when to use different techniques is a talent all it's own.

 

[3113]

Sorry, but yes, it can. I've learned it, and in recent years I've taught it.

I respectfully disagree. I've taught it too. What you've learned and taught is "technique." TALENT is being able to put that technique to use. If you didn't already want and know how to tell stories on some level, than technique wouldn't help you. It could come off as mechancial--and I've seen stories like that. Dull and Flat as a pancake but with perfectly nice sentences.

A good photograph, as Mal points out, lighting fine, etc. that does nothing. No mistakes, but is nothing special.

I'm not saying, by the way, that writing is voodoo--and I'm not saying that would-be writers, even those with the most natural of talents, don't need to be taught writing skills. They need practice, and experience, and sometimes classes. I'm certainly not saying that only special people can write. What I am saying is that not EVERYONE can write. And the reason not EVERYONE can write--why not EVERYONE can absorb and firgure out how to USE that long-assed list of "methodology" you mentioned, is because not EVERYONE has the talent to GET IT and figure out how to use it.

If everyone did, then no one would have thought much about In Cold Blood. It just would have been another book using the same methodology as any other writer and there would have been nothing at all special about it.

I think Mal's example says it all: Talent tells a sculptor/painter to put a twist in the lips. Technique helps you put in that twist exactly as you envision it ought to be.

 

[Liar]

Well, you said it couldn't be taught.

I disagree with that, as well as were you draw the line between talent (that comes from...nowhere?) and skill. What you call technique is the tools of writing. What you call talent is to put the tools to use. Aka craft. The capote example you mentioned was a minghty fine example of craft.

I believe all people have stories to tell. Some need to work harder to get them out than others. But if they want to, and work on it, they can too be good writers.

Maths. Same thing. For some it comes naturally, and some struggle with it. But give the struggling the incentive, the help and the time, and they will develop that part of their intellect too, and will develop an understanduing for numbers.

(Or rather, like you and me, say 'oh screw that' and direct our energy to other things that make us happier. )

 

[tolyk]

I like math...

 

[Liar]

Yeah, but you're a geek. ;p

 

[tolyk]

Thanks!

 

[kendo1]

You're both geeks.

 

[dr_mabeuse]

*L* What a biased question! "Would you rather be cold and technically perfect or flawed but full of soul?"

Okay. I'll play devil's Advocate. I'm usually not trying to communicate the usual emotions in my stories, especiallly porn, bcause I find the usual emotions tend to be too often sentimental and schmaltzy.

I just wrote my first story where I played the schmaltz card, and I feel kind of bad about it. I didn't mean for it to be especially schmaltzy - it was a means towards another emotion, hopefully - but it's awfully hard to avoid feeling a little greasy and manipulative when you have a lover die in a story.

I don't really read for emotion. I get off on the intellectualism - the poetry, the thing that's said perfectly, the kind of story that makes you look at the world in a new way or gives you a language that lets you think of things in ways you never did before.

Aside from the usual salaciousness involved in porn stories (lust, jealousy, shame, triumph), I wonder, what are the most common emotions you're trying to express in your stories. I'll bet they're either

(1) Love and Joy
(2) sadness and loss
(3) horror

What else?

Is this all we ever feel in life?

 

[3113]

I said talent couldn't be taught, not craft.

I believe all people have stories to tell. Some need to work harder to get them out than others. But if they want to, and work on it, they can too be good writers.

Good, maybe. But not "Talented" writers

I don't suppose we'll ever agree, but I'm troubled by your insistence that what I'm proposing is "magic" or "coming from nowhere." I see Talent as a connection in the head--the right synapses connected in the right way in the right part of the brain. There is nothing magical or impossible about this. We all have different wiring, all a different amount of ease at doing things, all a different way of seeing things (or not seeing things) or understanding things. *Shug* Seems pretty standard to me. Perfectly normal and realistic for human beings, no voodoo involved.

I can take an art class and learn how to draw a basket of fruit just fine. But someone is going to have to teach me how to see the negative space and even after they do, it won't come naturally to me (I know what I'm talking about here; I've taken art classes and I have to really work to see that negative space). But my husband has been seeing that negative space since childhood. Art classes have helped him refine that vision, but he had it all along. He also naturally sees the world as color and form and shape and he's always thinking of ways to draw those shapes. Can I be taught to draw? Maybe. But I can't be given what my husband has, that natural inclination to see the world as art.

In the end, those connections in the brain that give us Talent allow us to know what is right for what we're doing. How and where and when and why, for example, to break the rules (those techniques) to create the effect we want. Teach someone technique all you like--but you can't teach them WHEN to break the rules you've taught them, or use one technique over another for the betterment of the story. They have to have a sense of how to do that--and that takes this insight--which I call Talent. Which is why that Capote sentence is not just a fine example of craft as you suggest. Because Capote surely knew exactly what he was doing; knew to give that sentence that wording not just to reflect the sound of the dialect (technique) but also to reflect the whole FUCKING book (talent).

All the technique and writing classes in the world can't teach a person alone, with a blank sheet of paper, how to see and know that.

Maths. Same thing. For some it comes naturally, and some struggle with it. But give the struggling the incentive, the help and the time, and they will develop that part of their intellect too, and will develop an understanduing for numbers.

But they will never, as my Uncle the mathematican does, be able to write theories on the numbers that take mathemathics in a new direction. Not if they don't have a talent for seeing numbers as he does.

 

[dr_mabeuse]

You can be taught to write a decent sentence and a well-crafted paragraph, or more likely you can learn it yourself like Rob says. I mean, after all, all of us learned to do what we do somewhere.

But talent? Real talent? The ability to see things the rest of us don't and to describe them in ways that no one else has thought of? No. That can't be taught.

If we were talking about music, we might be saying that yes, you can be taught to write melodies on the piano or guitar. But I don't think anyone would claim that you could be taught to have the talent of a Bach or Jimi Hendix.

 

[rthnck]

The three most important things: story,story story

I'll take an emotionally satisfying story over a technically perfect story every time. You can see this is almost every type of writing. Dan Brown's "DaVinci Code" is not technically good by any means but it strikes a cord with readers which is the goal of any writer. Many reviewers consider J.K. Rowling's Harry Potter books to be long and rambling, requiring some serious editing but all the same they pull the reader into the story and don't let them go until the last page.

The same thing applies to movies. Star Wars is technically ground breaking but the dialog is atrocious. Nevertheless the story resonates with the viewer.

If I can grab the reader with my stories, I am more than satisfied.

http://english.literotica.com/stories/memberpage.php?uid=498058&page=submissions

 

[Liar]

But they will never, as my Uncle the mathematican does, be able to write theories on the numbers that take mathemathics in a new direction. Not if they don't have a talent for seeing numbers as he does.

Niether will 99,9% of all people with a natural flair (If there is such a thing, I guess I'm a but of a fan of the tabula rasa idea there - your abilities are mostly results of the directions you chose or are given in life.) for mathematics.

I guess we're mostly disagreeing on definitions. You're not talking about (what I mean by) talent here, you're talking genius.

But talent? Real talent? The ability to see things the rest of us don't and to describe them in ways that no one else has thought of? No. That can't be taught.

I don't know... I've seen people go from not being able to, to being able to, from lacking creativity to developing creativity. If it wasn't just that they aquired, the ability for bilateral thinking and the ability to communicate the results, I have no idea what it was.

If we were talking about music, we might be saying that yes, you can be taught to write melodies on the piano or guitar. But I don't think anyone would claim that you could be taught to have the talent of a Bach or Jimi Hendix.

Same thing as with 3113. Genius?

 

[Weird Harold]

Also, the earlier, related question that so many are missing is - can putting soul in your writing be taught?

I notice that most of us concentrate more on technique here. Most of the feedback or critique that I ask for and receive from authors here is about technique. Does that mean people in the AH generally assume that there's talent and it doesn't need to be nurtured? (Or is it impolite to say, 'you could never make it, you don't have it. Stop writing.' )

And technique does not always mean flashy word useage, complex expressions, or a flowery writing style, or even anything one would notice as "technique". Sometimes the real technique is in writing so that one's writing is transparent, and just the story shows through, in the same way that some painters would rather you notice the image they present over the method they use to present the image.

Too true.

I think all too often we forget that point to the exercise of writing stories is to communicate with the readers, not impress them with big words or technical brilliance.

If you notice the technical quality of the writing over the qualty of the story, then the author has failed in the primary purpose in writing that story! That's true whether you notice a lack of technical brilliance or are overwhelmed by it.

It is possible to learn how to manipulate your readers into seeing and feeling what you want them to see and feel. Those with a "talent" for the language will say, "oh so that's why that works" and those without talent will say, "why didn't I see that before?"

Learning how to tell a story and learning how to write well is more about understanding the psychology of the readers and the physics of reading than it is about learning the "tricks of the trade." The trick is to combine the story and the technique so that the readers never notice that they are being manipulated.

 

[BlackSnake]

Recently I've been thinking about which is more important. I've read stories where I sat back and admired the author for the perfect word used or the way the sentences were put, the editing, the flawless delivery, a turn of phrase and other such tricks, but at the end of it, that was all the story could be admired for. It's like the author concentrates a lot on the words, and in doing so, forgets about the story.

And then there have been stories that were written very simply - no big words, simple sentences, okay dialogue, but were full of feeling and emotions. They moved me by the time I came to the end, and when I thought back, there was nothing special about the writing. Thinking more about it, these stories could be refined by using a good editor, but putting some soul in your story or making the reader 'feel', could that be taught or is it more a matter of being born with talent?

If you could have one or the other, which would you choose - writing a technically perfect story where you could dazzle the reader with well-chosen words and perfect writing or a story that wasn't very great writing-wise but affected your readers emotionally?

Doing my undergraduate work (yes, I have a four year degree from a real University ), I help students learn programming C++. They would sit at the computer, and then I would march their butts down to the physics lab where there was a wall to wall white board. What they really needed was help with problem solving, not the programming language, the software could help them with that.

I think you are under stating the fabulous story with spelling and grammar errors. Great
sentence structure, perfect grammar, and excellent spelling make for a very dry and boring story. I have read stories here that looked like some of the papers my classmates tried to pass by. They always did well with the profs that skimmed over large bodies of text, but failed miserably with the avid readers. See, it takes more than hitting adjectives with a thesaurus.

I think writing can be taught and skills developed. Natural talent is a mystery. I’d say learn the rules, so you’d know when and how to break them. Spelling is a formality, but grammar is subjective.

 

[drksideofthemoon]

I have no technique, my technical skills are sorely lacking. Talent, I don't think I have any...

I read for enjoyment, and I hope people that read my work read for the same reason. There is nothing intellectual about anything I write. I just try to tell a story...

 

[damppanties]

*L* What a biased question! "Would you rather be cold and technically perfect or flawed but full of soul?"

*sigh*

Doc, it's not as simple as that. We all believe we're writers here. In such a case, I think you'll have some small measure of each, not a yawning nothing where one is concerned and perfect mastery over the other. I'm sure a technically perfect writer could put some amount of soul into his writing, or make it appear that way. And likewise, the soulful story will not be completely crap in terms of writing, just simple.

Let me explain it this way. Let's say the highest you could go on talent is 100 and the same for technique. (By the way, I'm starting to hate the word talent now). So you'd have... say 90 on technique and 25 on talent? I'd have 30 on talent and 75 on tech. Of course, the most desirable would be 100-100.

Okay. I'll play devil's Advocate. I'm usually not trying to communicate the usual emotions in my stories, especiallly porn, bcause I find the usual emotions tend to be too often sentimental and schmaltzy.

I just wrote my first story where I played the schmaltz card, and I feel kind of bad about it. I didn't mean for it to be especially schmaltzy - it was a means towards another emotion, hopefully - but it's awfully hard to avoid feeling a little greasy and manipulative when you have a lover die in a story.

Oh no! I'm not talking about shoving your face in the reader's and shouting, look my lover died. That couldn't move me much. I'm talking something more subtle than that. I believe Mal demonstrated this earlier when she talked about her poetry readings and being taught to use the obvious triggers of grief or whatever emotion. What I mean by emotion is that you care about the story, about the characters, not just be impressed by how the author used words in rare combinations. One of my readers sent me a feedback email talking about my character as a real person and asked me if I had it within me to give her (the character) a story with a happy ending, because he (the reader) felt sorry for her and wanted something better for her. That's what I'm talking about. When a story touches you by being real, or echoing something in you or rousing some emotion. Any amount of technical brilliance will not affect this part of story-telling.

I don't really read for emotion. I get off on the intellectualism - the poetry, the thing that's said perfectly, the kind of story that makes you look at the world in a new way or gives you a language that lets you think of things in ways you never did before.

Yes, I kind of thought you'd be there. Yes, that is exciting and I agree that it gets me too. I'm totally in awe of people who can do that. Excellence in language, the poetry, the thing that's said perfectly, yes, I'll admire that and sit back in admiration and jealousy and read the damn sentence again and sigh. But when it comes to the kind of stories that I remember and go back to read again, they're without fail the ones that might not be written with exquisite language and mind-blowing ideas, but ones that strike a chord within me.

 

[dr_mabeuse]

Well, this is a sore spot with me, because Im one of those people who loves big, juicy words and gorgeously turned phrases, and whenever I read about authors who "send people to their dictionaries," I take it kind of personally.

But when I write about his fingers dripping with her "salacious exudations" rather than "pussy juice," I'm not trying to show off and send the readers to their dictionaries. (You really don't go to your dictionaries, though, do you? The meanings should be clear from the context anyhow, I hope.) I'm trying to convey a certain feel and tone and sensuality of language that fits the mood of the piece, as if what you're describing is just so rich and sensuous that the words kind of gush from your mouth like fruit juice. Often it's deliberately over-the-top, like the 14" cock and the 44-DDD tits

It would bother me to think that people think I'm trying to show off, because I'm not. But on the other hand, I love words, I delight in them, and I collect them, and I'm going to use every tool I have in the service of my art and not apologize for it. His "pearlescent ejaculate" is just not the same as his "dirty jizz", and her "humping" is not the same as the "feverish undulations" of her hips. They each have their place. Sometimes you want your story to sound like a locker-room story, sometimes you want it to sound like the things you whisper in your lover's ear, all hot and sibilant and sexy.

I remember Harold saying that there was study showing we should aim our prose at a 6th grade level of reading comprehension because that's what most readers are comfortable with. That horrified me. I don't want to write like that. When I read something, I expect an author to enchant me with language and style as much as story. There are plenty of great stories told in plodding, pedestrian style (someone mentioned "Da Vinci"), but the books I treasure the most, the ones I consider real works of art. have a unity of language, style, and content that puts them head and shoulders above the kind of stuff we pick up from the bookrack in the airport.

Anyhow, I can't help it. That's the way I write, feverish undulations and pearlescent ejaculate and all.

 

[sincerely_helene]

*L* What a biased question! "Would you rather be cold and technically perfect or flawed but full of soul?"

Okay. I'll play devil's Advocate. I'm usually not trying to communicate the usual emotions in my stories, especiallly porn, bcause I find the usual emotions tend to be too often sentimental and schmaltzy.

I just wrote my first story where I played the schmaltz card, and I feel kind of bad about it. I didn't mean for it to be especially schmaltzy - it was a means towards another emotion, hopefully - but it's awfully hard to avoid feeling a little greasy and manipulative when you have a lover die in a story.

I don't really read for emotion. I get off on the intellectualism - the poetry, the thing that's said perfectly, the kind of story that makes you look at the world in a new way or gives you a language that lets you think of things in ways you never did before.

Aside from the usual salaciousness involved in porn stories (lust, jealousy, shame, triumph), I wonder, what are the most common emotions you're trying to express in your stories. I'll bet they're either

(1) Love and Joy
(2) sadness and loss
(3) horror

What else?

Is this all we ever feel in life?

Denial, confrontation, confusion, embarassment, fear, acceptance.

I write my porn as sort of a seven step program. With less steps.

 

[Weird Harold]

I remember Harold saying that there was study showing we should aim our prose at a 6th grade level of reading comprehension because that's what most readers are comfortable with. ...

Anyhow, I can't help it. That's the way I write, feverish undulations and pearlescent ejaculate and all.

Seventh grade level, and i's not a study, but a "Guidleline" promulgated by the USAF in it's "Effective Writing" course for NCOs among others -- including most major newspapers and magazines.

The actual wording of the Effective Writing course's guideline is "write to a seventh grade level or the minimum level consistent with the subject matter."

It definitely doesn't mean writing down to what a typical modern seventh grader can read, either.

Most people misunderstand that guideline to mean it's necessary to "dumb down" their writing by using nothig but short sentences and small words, but that is NOT what it means or requires. "Feverish undulations and pearlescent ejaculate and all" can easily fit into a "seventh grade reading level."

The whole point of writing to the "minimum reading level consistent with the content" is that reading a doctoral thesis is generally hard work and making your readers work harder than necessary inhibits reading comprehension. In the context of writing fiction, the harder the reader has to work, the harder it is to enjoy the story.

Big words and flowery phrases have their place; the trick is to keep them in their place without overwhelming the reader or liiting your audience more than necessary.

...(You really don't go to your dictionaries, though, do you? The meanings should be clear from the context anyhow, I hope.) ...

... I love words, I delight in them, and I collect them, and I'm going to use every tool I have in the service of my art and not apologize for it. ... Sometimes you want your story to sound like a locker-room story, sometimes you want it to sound like the things you whisper in your lover's ear, all hot and sibilant and sexy.

There is nothing I enjoy more than a writer who can stretch my vocabulary by the proper use of words. However, there is nothing I hate more than a writer who tries to impress me with vocabulary -- especially one who doesn't actually have the necessary vocabulary and misuses big words simply because they're big words a thesaurus says mean something close.

Vocabulary isn't really a part of the "technical details" but it's an important consideration and there is a big difference between "vocabulary for vocabulary's sake" and "vocabulary as a pallete of shaded connotations."

 

[Guest]

One of my all time favorite feedback comments was about a story I wrote that touched a lot of hearts.

I just read "Endless" and I both hated and loved it. One of the reasons I read stories from Literotica.com is my love of sexy, erotic stories. While I read a selected story, I let my imagination run wild as I picture myself as one of the characters, or as a fly on the wall watching the words unfold as pictures in my mind. While reading, I usually always get aroused and I start touching myself. I caress myself and I love feeling the pre-cum ooze out of my cock. I must also confess, I love the taste of my pre-cum. I try to time my orgasm to the climax of the story, sometimes during a real hot story, I will cum two times (just so you know, the second is always more intense). I hated your story because I would get aroused and then I would start to tear up like a little girl. Picture me a 48 year old, a 6'-3", 235 lb truck driver reading your story with my pants around my ankles, tears streaming down my face and my nose running like crazy. I absolutly loved your story because I teared up like a little girl while my pants were around my ankles. I enjoyed your story because it was an outstanding expression of true love and tenderness. I am a widower, my wife died in my arms after we were t-boned by a drunk driver four years ago. I loved my wife, she was my everything and "Endless" rekindled many memories of our 22 years together. Anyway, thank-you for "Endless" and thank-you for your other stories. I look forward to reading more from you with my pants around my ankles. Merry Christmas from a fan.

That email and others like it mean more to me than feedback from someone who said my technique was flawless, or I had no spelling errors...

 

[Aurora Black]

If you could have one or the other, which would you choose - writing a technically perfect story where you could dazzle the reader with well-chosen words and perfect writing or a story that wasn't very great writing-wise but affected your readers emotionally?

The story, hands down. I don't need to beat the audience over the head with my intellect or Lit skills, as long as I somehow touch their hearts or engage their minds. That doesn't stop me from keeping my dictionary, thesaurus and style book within close reach, though.

 

[Aurora Black]

Mediocrity sells.

Yuck.