Don't worry I wont give tips on how to write better, I myself need those.
We are always writing something in our mind, because we are thinking all waking hours and the thoughts can only take the form of words. It is just that we are not putting everything on paper. Starting from the morning when we are discussing something with our family members, to talking to office colleagues or friends or shopping or eating out, we are creating thoughts which pour out as words.
So to be a writer first we have to be a thinker. For being a professional writer one has to be a deep thinker.
But when it comes to structured writing as we do here we face the most difficulty. It starts with what to write, what to add and what not to add, whether I am going beyond the topic or is it getting boring, the creativity aspect and many such things. We may try many strategies but not all work and those that work may not work all the time. Sometime the flow comes automatically and sometimes it just doesn’t. And when it comes to writing daily as most of us do here then we start running out of topics. For me it is a great problem, what to write tomorrow?
A few famous writers have said about writing and I will mention a few here.
JK Rowling said ‘You’ve got to work. It’s about structure.
It’s about discipline. It’s all these deadly things that
your school teacher told you needed… You need it.’A professional writer and an amateur one is separated by the level of discipline they have. Whatever may be the case it is important to keep on writing. Such discipline will come when we actually love what we are doing.
Ernest Hemmingway said “All you have to do is
write one true sentence. Write the truest
sentence that you know.”This is quite true; when we falter in finding the first few lines then we think deep and we find that true sentence which can kick start the article. The first few lines are the most original ones and the rest just follow it.
James Baldwin said “I read everything. I read my way
out of the two libraries in Harlem by the time I
was thirteen. One does learn a great deal about
writing this way. First of all, you learn how
little you know. It is true that the more one learns
the less one knows. I’m still learning how to write.
I don’t know what technique is. All I know is that
you have to make the reader see it. This I learned
from Dostoyevsky, from Balzac.”Reading is important because it gives the knowledge about how famous writers think and process that on paper, how that are able to catch and retain the attention of readers.
Stephen King said “Never use jargon words like
reconceptualise, demassification, attitudinally,
judgmentally. They are hallmarks of a
pretentious ass.”This is a common mistake which we do. We think putting difficult words increase the value of the writer and the writing but it is not so. This mindset is more applicable with non English speaking regions who think that using hard language will give the more acceptance among the English speaking regions. Though for me it is not much of a problem as I know very few such types of words. Once I started reading ‘An argumentative Indian’ by Amartya Sen, a Nobel laureate and I had to leave it after a few chapters because the language was too difficult for me.
Ray Bradbury said “When I started writing seriously,
I made the major discovery of my life—that I am
right and everybody else is wrong if they disagree
with me. What a great thing to learn: Don’t listen
to anyone else, and always go your own way.”Though this sounds to be controversial but our writing should be a reflection of our thoughts and not to satisfy others. So it is better to be honest with self than make others happy, for we never know that even if we change our style others will be happy or not.
Now whatever they said, may be they are for the professional writers and not for the hobby writers like us but we still can draw some lessons out of it.
For me, I have never written so much for so many days continuously but it is a challenge to keep pushing on and a great learning process. A professional writer makes a whole time living out of his works, for us it is a source to supplement our income. But still a few from this platform may one day become a full time professional writer based on the time and effort he or she put here.
Many of us here would like to write a novel later in life. Writing a 700 worded article which seems difficult now, will with time increase to 7000 thousand words if we keep on pursuing it.
Thank you Telesfor sir