You say that you want to be a writer someday that you dream of being one but you know as well as i do that we cannot dream ourselves into being anything.We can though trough work and acceptance of the discipline shape ourselves into being what we want to be.In the middle ages young boys were apprenticed to master craft men for a period of years seven generally to learn their skills.You might think thus of thesse immediate years during which you will be accquiring skills for later work.Your apprenticeship however will not be to a single master but the great master of English prose whose words have moved and enriched and delighted people for a very long time
You say that you like to read.That goes hand in hand with your dessire to write and will help you more than anything else.
An apprentice must learn first of all how to use well the tools of his trade and books will be one of your tools-books that have stood trough the years books that stretch your mind and make you reach high above yourself and stir you the world in which you are part.
Savor Good books
What books do you like to read? Take one of them and read it again not rushing along with the story to see what happens but savoring it.Its a good book of thay you are sure.But just why is it good? Wher e did your interest quiken?What Happened to make you feel you were an actual part of the story? With what character did you find you were identify ing you self and why? At the end perhaps there were tears in your eyes perhaps you were smilling but was it so satisfying that what ever happened you felt right about it?Did you feel as you put the book back on the shelf that you would go on living with it for long time that something of it had became yours forever?
How was it that you felt all this and perhaps much more? If you can begin to discover some of the reasons you will be laying a sound foundation for your own approach to writting. Its not easy this endeavor to reduce a book to its structure.It might be compared to reducing a house that now is being lived in comfortably to the architect's before the house was built.To study the plan will reveal much that is taken for granted in the finish structure.Read this way with a particular book and it will be quiken your sense of it as a story; it will also sharpen your eye for the shape sentence the content of the paragraph.Your inner ear will begin to respond to the sound of the words and the way they are used in relation to each other.Their aptness and the way they conveyed beauty and spoke truth were all part of what held you to the book.
Expand your Vocabulary
Notice particular words perhaps new to you or new in their context and add them to your own vocabulary.Here again are tools and sensitive craftsman will care for words as for any valued piece of equipment.Try your newly acquired word s in different combinations; experiment with them as an artist does with colors.Word serve their purpose when well employed .This is done when their meaning is clearly understood.One book that should be within your easy reach is dictionary.Add to your store of words constantly but no faster than you can master their meaning.
Every skill impposes its own discipline.That word many seem a hard one but it is rewarding .See how the divtionary defines it and how it applies to your desire to be a writer. Discipline: training or experience that corrects molds strengthens or perfects.
Youre Notebook:A Rich storehouse
The reading of the books the gradual mastery of words are generals tools.Your own highly personal ones are the jottings you make in your notebook.Always keep a notebook handy.You never know when you may see something unusual or provoking or beautiful and if you jot it down you can think more about it later on.Use your notebook as an artist does a sketchbook drawing something in a few words that can be elaborated on with more time.You may hear an exchange of conversation on a street corner that would fit well into a story.You may catch yhe curious up.There will be times when you will want to dash down a home.Impression should be caught as close to the time of seeing, hearing, feeling,or discovering as possible so the emotion can be captured with the image.I deas may come to you out of the blue and in the oddest moments, so jot them down for future exploration .This is all raw material for writting and your notebooks can be rich storehouse form whicy you may draw at will.
