The Writing Life: reflections by a working writer. The Writing Life

Reflections of a working writer, a university screenwriting professor, and the editor of Oregon Literary Review.

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Charles Deemer

Editor,
Oregon Literary Review

MFA, Playwriting, University of Oregon

Writing faculty, Portland State University (part-time)

Retired playwright and screenwriter.
Active novelist, librettist and teacher.

Email: cdeemer(at)yahoo(dot)com

The eagle flies!

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"Can We Talk About Me For A Change?"
Playwright Debra Neff Nathans

Inkygirl
Debbie Ridpath Ohi, a weblog for writers (resources)

Silliman's Blog
Ron Silliman, contemporary poetry and poetics

Maud Newton
literary links, amusements, politics, rants

Darren Barefoot
Technical and creative writing, theatre, Dublin

Rob's Writing Pains
Journey of a struggling writer.

Mad, Mad World
Cara Swann, fiction writer, journalist, "reflections on humanity, random news & my life."

Writeright
Random musings on a writer's life and times.

Flaskaland
Barbara Flaska's compilation of the best online articles about music and culture.

Write Of Way
Samantha Blackmon's written musings on writing (composition and rhetoric).

Alexander b. Craghead: blog
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Rodney Bohen's daily commentary "on the wondrous two legged beast we fondly refer to as mankind." His pen runneth over.

Frustrated Writer
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scribble, scribble, scribble
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The Unofficial Dave Barry Blog
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The official blog of science fiction / horror author Terence West.

William Gibson Blog
Famed author of Neuromancer and Johnny Mnemonic: The Screenplay.

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Joe Clifford Faust's "blog of a working writer: tracking writing projects, musings on the creative process, occasional side trips into music, media, politics, religion, etc."

A Writer's Diary
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Official site of occult fiction author Sean-Alonzo, exploring symbolism, alternative history, philosophy, secret societies and other areas of the esoteric tradition.

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Maunderings of Alex Epstein, tv scribe, about life, politics, and the tv show I'm co-creating.

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Hebrew modern literature at its best, by Corinna Hasofferett.

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The Writing Life
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It Beats Working 9-5
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The Writing Life...
"An artist's only concern is to shoot for some kind of perfection, and on his own terms, not anyone else's."
J.D. Salinger

"All my best friends are writers and are dead."
A friend over beer, Berkeley, winter, 1959

"And it came to pass that all the stars in the firmament had ceased to shine. But how was anyone to know?"
The Half-Life Conspiracy

After October 31, 2006,
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The Writing Life II

(Posts archived here are from 01/10/03 - 10/31/06)

 
Tuesday, January 28, 2003  
Finding voice
Perhaps the most important decision a novelist has to make is the "voice" in which the story will be told. From whose point of view? With what attitude? With what level of rhetoric?

Many writing textbooks will tell you that such an important parameter must be clear before you start writing but this actually isn't the way many writers work, including myself. In my screenwriting textbook I define two creative styles, which I call "tree people" (the planners) and "forest people" (the sink-or-swimmers). Virtually all creative writing textbooks are written for tree people.

But you can figure out voice and other things along the way. Of course, you'll have to go back and change everything most likely but forest people are by nature less tidy in their drafts than tree folks, who have figured out much before they start writing. I like to jump right into the writing as early as possible.

I began my new novel, for example, in the third person, then switched to the first person, then changed the first person to a higher level of rhetoric. I started over with the first change, figuring it was major enough (and because I wasn't very far along yet) but I didn't start over with the second, just changing the level of rhetoric in mid-stream. Now I am having doubts about changing to first person at all but I blunder forward anyway, figuring this will all work itself out in the end.

A forest person like myself uses the first draft as the process by which I figure out what the hell I'm doing. Tree people take notes, write outlines and character sketches, to learn this; I just start writing and figure it out on the run. Textbooks say this is not the way to do it and yet many writers are on record as doing it just this way.

As a writing teacher, I understand the bias for the "tree" approach: it is easier to teach. It's left-brained early in the process, there are steps to do, and the method is easier to talk about. But as a forest person, I have great sympathy for my students who are lost most of the time, stumbling through their manuscript in the process of figuring it out.

The thing is, you have to try different approaches when you begin and discover the creative style that works naturally for you. I write first drafts as a forest person but I rewrite (the essential activity) as a tree person. In my screenwriting class, about 90% of my students announce they are forest folks and about 3/4 of these change their mind within a month because they are totally lost. They back up and start planning. All of us are probably a little of both, sometimes planning and sometimes winging it. I think it's more fun when winging it is working -- and more frustrating, even depressing, when it isn't.

1/28/2003 02:43:00 PM | 0 comments

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