#13 Are Writers Born or Made? How to Finish a Book, Cliché Alert, Change Your Commute
"The Mower"/George Seurat
Are writers born? Or made? Can writing be taught? Can it be learned?
Sometimes when people ask me this, I sense they’re looking for me to support their decision to give up on themselves or someone else. If stories aren’t good enough, the reason must be that the writer simply doesn’t have the innate talent to be excellent. But there are too many autodidacts out there, people who have taught themselves to do things they wanted to do, for me to agree.
There is one quality that must be inherent, and that is desire. You have to want to write, because the world, and your own doubts and fears, will array a battery of resistance.
I had a good-natured debate on the subject years ago with my friend Ged Carbone, a former award-winning journalist-turned-historian. You can teach someone to be a good writer, he argued, but great writers are born with that special blend of creativity that sets them apart from the rest of us. He may be right, but I’ll be satisfied to be a good writer, especially if experience teaches me that the learning never stops.
Elizabeth George, the mystery writer who created the Inspector Lynley series, has little patience for the question. In “Write Away: One Writer’s Approach to the Novel,” she writes:
“I've long believed that there are two distinct but equally important halves to the writing process: One of these is related to art; the other is related to craft. Obviously, art cannot be taught. No one can give another human being the soul of an artist, the sensibility of a writer, or the passion to put words on paper that is the gift and the curse of those who fashion poetry and prose. But it’s ludicrous to suggest and shortsighted to believe that the fundamentals of fiction can’t be taught.”
So how do you learn to write?
You could go to school, of course. Most schools of higher learning, from community college to universities, have courses in creative writing. There are MFA programs all over the country, many of them low-residency.
But not all these avenues are cheap. Nor does everyone have the time or resources needed to attend school.
In that case, there are two options that writers have used for centuries.
First, read.
Read as a reader first, enjoying the story and the skill of the writer. Then read as a writer does, getting up close to see how the writer creates the effects that you found so captivating.
Second, write.
It’s that simple and that hard. But it can be done. Some are born geniuses; others have to work hard to cultivate their natural gifts. Not everyone will succeed.
Ged Carbone may be right that great writers are born that way. But with patience, hard work and steady devotion to their craft, good writers can be made, if not great, certainly better.
CRAFT LESSON: This is a story about...cliches
"The first man to compare the cheeks of a young woman to a rose was obviously a poet," Salvador Dali said. "The first to repeat it was possibly an idiot."
Dali, of course, was an artist, but he had an ear for one of the worst literary crimes: the cliche
.
He was harsh, I think. Writers who rely on worn-out phrases, hackneyed plots or stereotypical characters aren't stupid. But they are lazy and weak.
It's easy to use the first word or idea that pops into your head. The problem is that yours is probably not the first head it's popped into, as humor columnist Mitch Broder once observed.
"Cliches are flabby. They weaken the power of prose. They can cost you readers who are looking for writing that is fresh," this week's Craft Lesson, "This is a story about....cliches," points out.
In "The Sound on the Page: Great Writers Talk about Style and Voice in Writing," the finest book on style and usage on my bookshelves, Ben Yagoda defines cliches, broadly, as "the use, either unconscious or in an attempt to write colorfully or alluringly, of hackneyed, or worn-out words, phrases or figures of speech."
Have you ever begun a story in any of these ways?
"Webster defines...
"It's that time of year again."
"This is a story about..."
Does your novel or screenplay feature a rebel without a cause, a snarky girl who saves the day or estranged parents reunited after their child is kidnapped?
You can do better.
Clichés are an understandable refuge when you’re struggling to make meaning out of words, especially on deadline. Don't be too hard on yourself when the public domain of words, phrases and tropes automatically pop into your conscious mind. It's not all your fault.
"Cliches are prominent features of everyone's first drafts..." Yagoda writes. "How could they not be. We hear and read them all the time and our brains are filled with them."
Cliches aren't limited to news writers, though they are prime offenders. They're a trap for other writers, too, Yagoda says.
"Journalists' worst writing comes at points when they haven't done enough reporting and have to fudge or generalize; critics and essayists when they haven't fully worked out their points or are parroting someone else's; novelists when they haven't done the imaginative work necessary to make types and stock situations into real people doing real things."
To dodge cliches, ask yourself if you've ever heard a phrase before and where you heard it. Think hard if a plot or character idea derives from something you've read before. Don't be satisfied with lifting tired ideas. Try to put your own spin on them.
Your ears may be the best weapon you have.
"Revision is all about reading," Yagoda says. "And you need to be a good reader to hear your own cliches and the other ill-advised compositional decisions you make."
You can never go wrong by following the first of George Orwell's rules in "Politics and the English Language:"
"Never use a metaphor, simile or other figure of speech which you are used to seeing in print."
INTERVIEW: Three Questions with Bruce DeSilva
At the Providence Journal-Bulletin, where I worked from 1977-1985, Bruce DeSilva was one of the fiercest figures in the newsroom. He was an investigative reporter with the fangs of a bulldog and a narrative writer of immense power. Away from journalism, he has forged a new career writing award-winning novels starring an investigative reporter named Liam Mulligan.
His crime fiction, which includes "Rogue Island," "Providence Rag," and most recently, "The Dread Line," has won the Edgar and Macavity Awards and has been published in ten languages.
The most important lesson I took away from our interview in "Three Questions with Bruce DeSilva" was how he gets the work done.
"My years in journalism taught me that writing is a job, something you do whether you feel like it or not. You do not wait to be inspired. You do not search for your muse. You just plant your ass in your chair and write. The corollary for a novelist is to set a daily goal and stick to it. For me, that means writing 2,000 good words a day. If I do it in two hours, I get the rest of the day off. When the writing comes hard, I stay behind the keyboard until I reach my goal. That's the only way I can finish a book."
In our interview, DeSilva speaks with passion about the influence of music and musicians on his craft and describes himself as a "scent hound."
"I stop to sniff at every bush, every character, every turn in the road. Like a dog on a walk, I explore the world I am creating, discovering my story as I go. If I knew how it was going to end before I started, my desire to write the book would evaporate."
Like DeSilva's novels, the interview is a captivating and inspirational read.
"The Forest at Pontaubert"/Georges Seurat
WRITERS SPEAK
"Part of becoming a writer is the desire to have everything mean something."
- Louise Erdich
Bonus Quote:
"I feel that punctuation is simply like the flats and sharps on a musical score, that punctuation has to do with the ear."
- Margaret Atwood
TIP OF THE WEEK
Always take a different route to and from work. You'll discover stories you didn't know existed.
h/t Vidisha Priyanka
It's easy to get into a rut. Commuting routines may be efficient, but they're also mindless as we drive that all too familiar route, focused on music, news or that favorite podcast. But we miss the chance to see neighborhoods in transition, what high school kids are wearing, new businesses or monstrous condos going up, all of which you'll see with fresh eyes. Everyone has the potential for a good story.
BOOKBAG
With the holidays just around the corner, it's never too late to find the perfect book for a writer or reader in your life, whether it's a friend, family member or yourself. Slate has made it easy by curating the "The 50 best nonfiction books of the past 25 years." There's something for everyone: biographies, investigations, social history and memoir. Take your pick. Whoever your recipient is, it's doubtful they'll be disappointed.
The young woman's body found in small Longview, Tex, in 2006 was so badly burned she couldn't be identified, so she was called "Lavender Doe" after the purple shirt she was wearing when she was found. Then a group of dedicated amateur sleuths working from their living rooms and Internet cafes took on the case. Using traditional genealogy and new online DNA tools, after 12 years they finally gave her back her name: Dana Lynn Dodd. "What It Means to Name a Forgotten Murder Victim" is a sad, haunting tale of detective work told with style and compassion mystery by Atlantic staff writer Sarah Zhang. (Subscription required, but a handful of reads are free each month.)
"The Gardener"/Georges Seurat
Chip in Your Ear
Bolero/Maurice Ravel
youtube/Wikimedia Commons
Sign up for Chip in Your Inbox.
Newsletter archive.
Question? Comment? Email me at chipscan@gmail.com or send a reply to this newsletter.
May the writing go well.
"Chip in Your Inbox participates in the Amazon Affiliate links program, which enables sites to earn commissions from the sales of books listed here. Many of the books are also available in public libraries.