4 Common Writing Tips You Should Ignore

This article was originally posted here.

If you’re anything like me and follow a lot of writing blogs (as you should) you’ll read a lot of great advice from established writers, publishers and the like. However, you’ll also come across a lot of truly awful advice. And it can be hard to separate the great from the godawful. Often the worst offenders are found in posts listing an obscene number of “Writing Tips”, many of which are repeated ad nauseum on every single list.

Here are four common writing tips I’ve encountered that you really should ignore:

“Writing is rewriting.”

No, no it isn’t. Writing is writing; rewriting is rewriting. They are two entirely different processes with different skills required to do them well.
Writing a first draft of anything is an unbridled creative experience, whether you have an outline or an in depth plan or no plan at all. It’s writing, it’s what you live for.
Rewriting is more controlled. You know where you’re going and what you’re doing. You’ve done it, now you’re doing it again having learned the lessons of the first draft. Rewriting can be a great thing, but it’s different to writing.
And it’s not always necessary.
Let me be clear: you should always go back to edit your work. Always. If you don’t, you’re putting too much pressure on yourself to get the grammar, punctuation, sentence structure etc. right the first time and that will distract you from writing creatively. But rewriting? That’s an extreme action, to rewrite a whole piece.
And very few people are suggesting you rewrite everything at least once, which is why “writing is rewriting” is awful advice. It’s snappy, memorable advice, but taken at face value it can be very damaging to an inexperienced writer.
Better advice would be: “Rewrites revive dead writing.”

“Just write, even if it’s bad.”

Sure, if you hate yourself. Now, I’m being a little unfair, this is a great way of overcoming writer’s block, but it’s not much use for someone who’s perfectly able to get the words out. In fact, it’s quite damaging.
If you write and write and all you’re doing is turning out bad work then you may as well not be writing for all the good it’s doing. There are better ways to spend your time. Write a paragraph. If it’s bad, analyse it and work out why you feel that way, then write it again. It’s better to slow down and fix problems, while improving your craft through self analysis, than to write something bad and dig yourself a hole that only the delete key can solve.
Even if you have writer’s block and feel like you just need to power through, this advice isn’t specific enough. It is much better when trying to get through writer’s block to just free write. Better than that, use your free writing productively, by doing a character’s inner monologue or riffing on a topic. By nature that kind of writing is mostly throwaway,  but it can produce some gems, insight into your character or a snippet you can use in dialogue or even a new story idea.
You can always make use of your writing, but use it wisely. The point of the advice “just write, even if it’s bad” is to keep you writing all the time, and you absolutely should keep writing as often as you can. But slowing down and making sure it’s good, learning from when it’s not, is far more productive. And utilising free writing to generate creativity and support your writing is infinitely more useful than writing a few pages that you’ll be deleting tomorrow morning.

“Tell people you’re a writer.”

Now, I’ll temper this before I say it: it’s perfectly fine to call yourself a writer. However, you should be one first. Deciding to try to make a living as a writer doesn’t make you a writer, it makes you an aspiring writer. If you start calling yourself a writer straight away you’ll give yourself a sense of accomplishment for doing literally nothing towards making a living as a writer.
And that’s the point. If your goal is to “be a writer” then you’ve made a huge mistake already. Your goal is meaningless. Your goal should be an actual accomplishment, like writing a novel, or collection of short stories or poetry, or to make enough money as a writer to support yourself on writing alone. Because that’s what you mean, probably.
And none of those goals require you to call yourself a writer. Not a single one.
This advice probably comes from the idea that telling yourself and others that you are a writer will put you in that mindset. But it’s not necessary, and underneath what is quite an empty statement you’ll feel like a fraud for calling yourself something that you don’t believe, truly, you are.
So call yourself an aspiring writer, or say that you are trying to pursue a career as a writer. Then, one day, you’ll finally achieve your actual goal and realise you’re a writer.
Which is an excellent excuse to treat yourself to a self indulgent celebration.

“Get feedback on your work.”

Unless you have the ear of an accomplished writer or editor, feedback is not going to be useful. Again, I have to temper it, as having people read your finished work is a perfectly fine idea, but asking for feedback beyond “did you like it?” is not going to yield good results.
Here’s why: your friends, family and coworkers have absolutely no idea how to write a good novel. Just no idea. They know whether they like something, but they absolutely do not know why they like it. But they will try to give you advice, because you asked for it and presumably they like you and want to help.
It won’t.
Specific feedback from non-writers will only breed insecurity in you. If someone tells you “I think Hilda should die at the end” don’t take that advice. If everyone who reads it says they liked it but hated the ending, then maybe you should think about killing poor Hilda. But remember, you need to follow your gut, maybe Hilda just needs to lose a leg.
Having an honest first reader is great to get a guage on how others may react, but if you want specific feedback on craft you need writers on or above your level.
Feedback isn’t gospel, and most readers have no idea what they like.

Those were four of the most common writing tips that you should absolutely ignore. As with most bad advice, there is some truth to the original point but through repetition and bastardisation that truth has been lost, so the well meaning tip becomes less than helpful. Have you heard any other writing tips that are just plain awful? Leave a comment below.

As always, keep writing.

Enjoy this post? Want more? Join our mailing list to receive a weekly roundup of posts we think you’ll enjoy, as well as news and special offers! It’s free, takes less than a minute and you can unsubscribe at any time with the click of a button.

Traditional Poetry Forms 101: The Sonnet

This article was originally posted here.

This post is part of a series on traditional poetry forms. This instalment focuses on one of the most famous forms of poetry, and a personal favourite, the sonnet.

Background
The sonnet originated in Italy in the 13th Century. Its invention is credited to Giacomo Da Lentini. Since its invention, the sonnet has been a staple of poetry across many cultures and has been utilised by a great number of the world’s most renowned poets. There are two main types of traditional sonnet in English: the Italian (or Petrarchian) and the English (also known as the Shakespearean, after its most famous practitioner).

Form
The traditional sonnet consists of fourteen lines and follows a variable rhyming scheme. When written in English, the lines usually employ iambic pentameter, though not always. A main characteristic of the sonnet is that it deals with one thought or sentiment, ending with a “turn” or reflection with its closing lines.
This is the basic form of the traditional sonnet in its entirety, nothing else is prescribed. However, as mentioned earlier there are two main types of traditional sonnet, and they are described below.

Petrarchan
Named after its most famous practioner, Petrarch, the Petrarchan sonnet is the prototypical sonnet. It divides the fourteen lines into two stanzas, an octave with the rhyme scheme ABBAABBA and a sestet most often following a rhyme scheme of either CDCCDC or CDECDE. Early Petrarchan sonnets employed a problem-solution idea, where a problem would be outlined in the octave and a solution would be proposed in the sestet. This is not a requirement however, but the turn on the ninth line typically is. The turn should indicate a change in the mood or stance of the poem.
A good example of a Petrarchan sonnet in English is “On His Blindness” by John Milton:

When I consider how my light is spent
Ere half my days in this dark world and wide,
And that one talent which is death to hide
Lodg’d with me useless, though my soul more bent
To serve therewith my Maker, and present
My true account, lest he returning chide;
“Doth God exact day-labour, light denied?”
I fondly ask. But Patience to prevent
That murmur, soon replies: “God doth not need
Either man’s work or his own gifts; who best
Bear his mild yoke, they serve him best. His state
Is kingly. Thousands at his bidding speed
And post o’er land and ocean without rest:
They also serve who only stand and wait.”

Shakespearean
The English or Shakespearean sonnet was not invented by William Shakespeare, but introduced by Thomas Wyatt. It is known as the Shakespearean after its most famous practitioner. The Shakespearean is one stanza consisting of three quatrains and a concluding couplet, typically in the rhyme scheme ABABCDCDEFEFGG. The third quatrain holds the turn and is called a volta, indicating a change in the poem in terms of theme or imagery, though Shakespeare himself preferred to do this in the couplet.
One of Shakespeare’s most famous sonnets is “Sonnet 116”:

Let me not to the marriage of true minds
Admit impediments. Love is not love
Which alters when it alteration finds,
Or bends with the remover to remove:
O no! It is an ever-fixèd mark
That looks on tempests and is never shaken;
It is the star to every wandering bark,
Whose worth’s unknown, although his height be taken.
Love’s not Time’s fool, though rosy lips and cheeks
Within his bending sickle’s compass come;
Love alters not with his brief hours and weeks,
But bears it out even to the edge of doom.
If this be error and upon me proved,
I never writ, nor no man ever loved.

Note that the rhyme scheme doesn’t hold with modern pronunciation, but would have done in the pronunciation of the time.

And that, my friends, is the sonnet. Of course there are many variations and poetry, as a rule, has no rules, but these are the typical features of the traditional sonnet and they are a fun challenge to write. Perhaps you would like to have a go at writing one yourself? If you do, feel free to post it in the comments below. If this post has been helpful please share via social media and if you’d like to see more content like this please subscribe/follow and if you would like to get updates via our newsletter you can join our mailing list. Look out for the next instalment in this Traditional Poetry Forms series.

Keep writing, folks.

How To Utilise Poetic Techniques To Improve Your Writing

This article was originally posted here.

No matter what kind of writing you are looking to improve, from prose to screenplays and everything inbetween, an understanding and appreciation of poetic techniques can take you to the next level. Often when we write we are trying to communicate, as simply as possible, our characters and our story. But we’re constrained by the rules of grammar and sentence structure and the format we’ve chosen to write in. Poetry has no constraints. The creative freedom granted by poetry allows us to exercise our creative cores, strengthening our writing and breathing new life into it.

This post will detail some of the ways in which writing and reading poetry can strengthen our writing skills in other areas. Even if you’ve never enjoyed poetry and have no intention of ever pursuing it as a creative outlet, you can use poetry as an extra tool in your writer’s toolbox.

Metaphorical Thinking
Our characters, if they are well written, are complex beings with conflicting emotions and motivations. In order to show these to the reader we have to put them in situations where these emotions and motivations are brought the front. If our main character, let’s say his name is Jack, is claustrophobic we can’t simply say so, we have to have him experience that claustrophobia in front of us.
So we write a scene where Jack gets stuck somewhere, perhaps in a cupboard or an elevator. It gets the job done, but it’s not a desperately interesting scene. Here is where we can employ metaphorical thinking, as we would in poetry. We could think about claustrophobia and what equivalencies we can find in the way Jack thinks. Perhaps he values freedom, his claustrophobia just being a manifestation or metaphor for a fear of losing freedom. How he reacts to being in an enclosed space may be the way he reacts to being forced to do something against his will. Then again, his claustrophobia may be a metaphor for his anxiety, always needing an escape route because he assumes something will go wrong and he wants to be able to get out as soon as it does.
These extra traits linked through metaphor to his claustrophobia make his fear of enclosed spaces more poignant and relevant to the fabric of who he is. Now if you want to write a scene where Jack gets stuck in an elevator you can link it to him facing his need for freedom or him battling his anxiety.
So what we’ve done is taken a character trait and thought about what other traits we can draw parallels with. Do that a few more times and you have a collection of traits that play off of each other and follow a central theme. That’s basically how you compose poetry, linking ideas with metaphor, and that’s also how you can add depth and coherence to a character’s traits.

Imagery
Imagery is often underutilised outside of poetry. This is a shame as something as simple as word choice when describing a moment can greatly affect how it is imagined in the reader’s head. Imagery is any figurative language in prose, so includes metaphor and simile most commonly. It can change a moment from a dull necessity to an emotive and memorable scene with little effort.
Consider the following: “Daisy looked out at the fields before her and had a sudden urge to run and play.” What do we know after reading that sentence? We know that there are fields in front of Daisy and that she suddenly had an urge to run and play in them. That’s pretty much it, exactly what it says. Maybe we can infer that Daisy is playful, or enjoys nature, and that the fields look nice.
However, inject some imagery and we get this: “The fields sprawled out before her, inviting her in with the promise of sweet-scented flowers and butterflies to catch.” This says so much more. She doesn’t just have a sudden urge to run and play, the fields are inviting her and it is irresistable. They sprawl out, evoking images of long summer days perhaps during summer holidays. We learn that she loves nature, she is tempted by the flowers and the butterflies, perhaps she remembers her childhood summer holidays playing in the fields for hours on end.
Of course, imagery can be used for any emotion, so to make a haunted house scarier or a villain more menacing or a love interest more alluring. It is to be used with caution, however. Imagery should be reserved for the highly emotive moments in your story. When your character discovers her best friend has died, use imagery to describe those moments to make them charged. When two characters sit down for coffee, as they regularly do, he should not be sitting on “a wooden embrace for his buttocks”.

Meter
Lastly, there is meter. In prose we can think of this as sentence or clause length along with word length, and the variance in it. In screenplays we can apply an awareness of meter to the dialogue to help give our characters unique voices. In poetry we use meter to provide rhythm. There is no reason why attention to meter can’t give our prose and our screenplays the same rhythm and flow in the same way it does for our poetry.
To be clear, you don’t need to count syllables. The best way to achieve good meter is to read it out loud. Does it sound a little stunted? Add a word or two. Does it sound a little stretched? Shorten the sentence, maybe split it in two. Use shorter words for a more punchy rhythmic sound, longer words for a more flowing high-headed sound. “The dart struck him in the back. Blood spread on his shirt.” is sudden, violent, whereas “The projectile arced through the air, puncturing the target. Blood started dripping, spreading out like a puddle on his back.” sounds like a far more glorious, heady moment, drawn out in slow motion.
The choices are very intuitive, we all have an innate rhythm that we use in language every day, so it’s very easy to do if you pay attention to it. A proper study of meter while reading and writing poetry can help you take it to the next level by imbuing your language with real memorability and poignancy for use during those key moments in your story.

And that’s about it for this post. Hopefully you will take away some ideas for how you can improve your writing with poetic techniques. Has employing these techniques helped you improve your writing? Leave a comment below. If this has been helpful please follow, like and share and if you want to you can also subscribe via email to get these posts delivered straight to your inbox. And if you would like to get updates via our newsletter you can join our mailing list.

Oh, and keep writing.

How To Format Your Screenplay

This article was originally posted here.

When reading about screenwriting you’ll notice a lot is made of the importance of formatting. How your screenplay looks on the page can make or break its chances of being read at all. With the rise of the internet and reams of readily available screenplays available online, the screenplay format has become standardised internationally. This post will run you through what you need to know about screenplay formatting.

As a preface, it is important to note why it is so important to format your screenplay properly. Think of it this way: everything you write is geared towards an audience. The audience for your screenplay is primarily script readers and producers, perhaps even directors and actors later down the road. These people read a lot of screenplays. But the final product is a film or a television episode, not the screenplay itself. The most important thing therefore is to make it as easy as possible to understand what is happening on the screen by making it absolutely clear to the reader what is action, what is dialogue, where a scene is taking place and which characters are present. Ultimately it is your story and your characters that will determine whether your screenplay succeeds or fails, but in order to effectively communicate those things you have to have a firm grasp on the screenplay format.

Font
Use Courier 12pt, single-spaced, no excuses. The reason for this, aside from plain readability,  is that one page of a screenplay written in Courier 12pt single-spaced roughly translates to one minute of screen time. This is useful for everyone involved, including you of course, to approximate the length of a screenplay.

Margins
The left margin should be 1.5″ and the other sides should be 1″. This is primarily to leave space for binding and notes.

Page Numbering
The first page shouldn’t be numbered but all subsequent pages should be to ensure that scenes don’t get shuffled around accidentally.

Title Page
The title page for your screenplay should bear the name of your screenplay, “by” or “written by” and your name, on three seperate lines in the centre of the page. In the bottom left hand corner you should put your contact information, including an address. If you have an agent, you should put your agent’s information there instead. The bottom right hand corner can be used for any copyright information but it is not required. Everything should be in Courier 12pt, like the body of your script.

Fade In
Your screenplay should start with the phrase “FADE IN:” on the left hand side, flush to the margin and in all-caps. This lets the reader know that this is the beginning of your script.

Scene Headings
This is a short description of the scene. All it should contain is “INT.” or “EXT.” depending on whether the scene is an internal or external location, where the scene takes place and “DAY” or “NIGHT” depending on when the scene takes place. For example, if the scene takes place in a coffee shop during the day your scene heading should read “INT. COFFEE SHOP – DAY”. Note that it should be in all-caps, flush to the left margin and can go all the way to the right margin (although you are probably putting in too much information if it is).

Action
Action, or scene description, reaches from margin to margin and describes what is happening in the scene. Use the present tense, preferring the active voice. It should be in mixed case, like prose, but unlike prose it need not be in full sentences. Try to keep it simple and concise, describing only what can be seen and heard on the screen. When introducing a character in a scene, type their name in all-caps. Subsequent mentions of that character in description can be mixed case.

Character
When a character speaks, type their name in all-caps. You should indent it 2″ from the left margin and can stretch to the right margin if needed. A minor character may not need a name and can just be referenced by their profession or identifying trait, like “DOCTOR” or “NERVOUS MAN”. One important thing to note is that the character names must be consistent throughout the screenplay to avoid confusion.

Extension
This goes after the character name, on the same line, and is placed in parentheses. Extensions are used to indicate how the dialogue is heard. For example, if a character is doing a voiceover, you would put (V.O) as the extension. If they are off-screen, but still physically present, you would put (O.S). If instead they are heard over the phone or an intercom or radio it is better to use a parenthetical.

Parenthetical
Parentheticals go after the character name, on the next line. They should be indented 1.5″ from the left margin and 2″ from the right margin, placed in parentheses and lower-case. They are typically used to denote the way in which a line is delivered, or the medium through which it is heard. For instance, if we hear the dialogue through a phone it can be denoted in a parenthetical, whereas if the dialogue is clear as though the character were just out of frame it would be denoted as off-screen and go in the extension. Parentheticals denoting the way a line should be delivered may be used sparingly, though it is best to consider if the dialogue needs to be rewritten in order to make it clearer.

Dialogue
Character dialogue includes anything that the audience hears that a character is saying, whether they are on or off screen. It appears on the next line after a character name (or a parenthetical) and should be indented 1″ from the left margin and 1.5 ” from the right margin. Dialogue is written in mixed case.

Transitions and Shots
Typically you should avoid putting in transitions and shots unless they are absolutely crucial for the scene to make sense. These are added to shooting scripts to streamline the production process and are none of a screenwriter’s concern in the vast majority of situations. On the very rare occasions that you do need to use them, transitions are indented 4″ from the left margin, go all the way to the right margin and are appended with a colon, and shots are flush to the left margin and followed by two hyphens or a long dash. Both should be in all caps.

And that is just about everything you need to know in order to properly format your screenplay. You may like to bookmark this page for a quick reference on the different screenplay elements, how they should be laid out on the page and what purpose they serve. Of course it is unlikely you’ll need to remember the specifics as most screenwriting software handles formatting for you, but it is useful to refresh yourself on the basics occasionally so that you aren’t entirely reliant on that software in order to write.

If you found this helpful or have any questions then please leave a comment below. If you want to keep up to date with all the posts on this blog then you can also subscribe via RSS or follow on WordPress. If you think others may find this helpful then please share this post by email or social media. And if you would like to get updates via our newsletter you can join our mailing list.

Most of all, keep writing.

Amazon’s 3D Smartphone Launch Event Announced

This article was originally posted here.

Amazon stirred up speculation over its new 3D-enabled offering to the smartphone market on Wednesday with an event page, for a June 18th launch event, featuring a mysterious video(below) and a page banner seemingly containing a partial photograph of the new device(left).

Link to Video: Amazon 3D Smartphone Video Release

The video shows consumers very little about the details of Amazon’s new smartphone, though users seem to react with true, marketing-inspired enthusiasm to the motion control offered by the device. Previous details released about the device detail that this motion control is achieved through four front-mounted cameras that track various head movements using Okao facial detection and tracking software.

The 3D features of the phone are reportedly unique, with no need for the user to wear 3D glasses. However, the smartphone will likely have very limited 3D technologies out of the box, with the onus on 3rd-party developers to provide extra features. In fact, it seems very much like Amazon are pulling a Sony and are simply looking to get a next-gen smartphone, with an Amazon logo and Amazon e-commerce platforms inbuilt, into as many pockets as possible, possibly making a loss or merely breaking even on phone sales. Amazon may make their money here not on the actual device, but through secondary sales of software and digital content made possible through this new smartphone.

Whatever the plan from Amazon’s point of view, tech enthusiasts will be eagerly anticipating the details of Amazon’s new smartphone on June 18th.