Selrisitai
I hope I've managed to entertain you.
- Joined
- Mar 3, 2025
- Messages
- 78
- Likes received
- 417
I. The Fundamental Misunderstanding
I've had a significant evolution in my writing in the past few months, the kind of change that elevates you to an entirely new paradigm. I can never develop or write a story the same way again because I've eschewed too many of those old ideas (and, in a way, ideals) that I so ignorantly held before.
So now I'm stuck with another realization: Everything I've been told from 5-years-old on is true, but I had to be in my thirties to start making use of it. So what's up with that?
Let me explain. The major difference between my writing and the writing of a professional, especially a traditionally-published professional, is focus. When I've written, I've always just written whatever comes to mind. I'm always trying to make it entertaining, but what I think is entertaining really makes no sense, because I'm not coming at it from a writer's perspective, but a visual artist's perspective, which also makes no sense because I'm not a visual artist in any capacity. I have that classic problem of wanting to "write a movie" or, lately, "write an anime," without realizing that anime also has extreme limitations imposed by the requirements of storytelling.
It's a common sentiment: "I enjoy the parts of anime where they're doing nothing even more than the plot!"
You think that, but the only reason you enjoy the parts where they're doing nothing so much is because 1) they're rare, 2) they're brief, 3) they're usually a respite that we all know will lead into the plot again, and 4) here's the kicker: it's a matter of trust. When "nothing is happening," you know full well that something is going to happen, and that's it going to be very interesting, so you relax and let the slice-of-life digression take you on its transient detour, confident that it's all ultimately going to go somewhere wonderful.
If you want an anime that truly represents "nothing happening," then try watching "Chronicles of the Going Home Club." You'll find out within a few episodes just how dull a lack of progression can be, unless you are really into the humor and are laughing constantly, but even then, I found myself finding it decently amusing but then wishing that there was some kind of plot progression or character relationship progression or drama or something. Nothing ever truly happens, so it's tough to watch much of it in succession.
So that was me and my writing. Chronicles of the Going Home Club, "stuff happening," and then it ended. There was no tension, no drama, no progression, or if I had these things they were not fit together in a proper way. I didn't use the techniques of my craft to build up, release, and then establish another problem to be solved or goal to be met. The equivalent is that after a single chapter, the reader would feel the way he does after season 1 of an anime whose primary conflict has been resolved: "I don't really need a season 2." That's on chapter 1, by the way, time to reassess the opening sentence, I guess.
II. Now I Know Better, but the Time's Gone
What's the point? Well, I was told the correct thing all along, but I rejected it. Of course I rejected it! I had no reason not to, except for blind faith and ten-thousand books that explained how my thinking was wrong through sales, reviews and my own personal enjoyment. That wasn't enough. I "knew" it to be true logically, but I hadn't instilled it in my heart because I didn't understand it! Now I'm looking at a decent opening for a thriller by the guy who invented "the Snowflake Method," with better writing than almost every independently-published book I've ever read, and I can see the focus. I get it now. Not perfectly. I need to study more. But I can see how every action, description and line of dialogue is precision-oriented to develop the character, the scene, the plot and the point. It's not "just stuff happening," it's carefully designed to guide the reader from one idea to the next in a logical progression that holds him fast the entire time.
The fear sets in, then: What else don't I know, or worse, what else do I know that I don't "get"? And how many more years until that also becomes a regretful belated comprehension? We're not talking about subtle intricacies in writing, here, we're talking about one of the most fundamental aspects of writing there is: a dramatic narrative. If you can't set up a scene, build on it, and end with something interesting that compels the reader on, then you might as well discard your three-hundred dollar fountain pen right now and donate your laptop for explosive-detonation experiments, because you've made a premature decision to fail. What are you holding onto? Pride? You lost that when you got to 190lbs, and you plan to get married, so rationality has long gone out the window. Just do it "the right way," and then if you really want, you can bend the rules after that.
III. Denouement
So I'm writing a story right now. The previous story I finished took me 8 years. Eight years of writing a story without knowing what I'm doing, so it's all just guesswork and wishcasting. Think back to what I said earlier. I didn't understand the basic concepts of narrative drama, how to build up a scene, how to focus each sentence on the point, how to logically progress ideas. Eight years working on that.
This new story's got a summary, a basic outline, a detailed outline, character sheets and 30,000 words and I only started writing it about eight months ago. Not only am I going to be done more than three times as quickly, but everything will be stronger because I kind of know what I'm doing now. Of course we all have to learn, and no one said becoming a writer was a quick process, but I still feel like I'm way behind and struggling to catch up. I've studied. I know about the figures of rhetoric and I've practiced them; I know the four pillars of narration and I can write paragraphs using only one at a time; I know the four types of sentences; I can vary the complexity of my syntax; my vocabulary has increased dramatically since writing my NSFW work published on these forums; I can write in a "noun style" or an "adjective style"; I've studied books I love to learn their techniques, and I've read books on writing I hate in the hopes of taking snatches of value from their dull pages.
All of this, over years and years, but still I feel like a mid-level intermediate on a good day. I'm sure there are some hard truths I'm still not accepting that prevent me from taking another leap in skill. I'm a bit of a coward when it comes to criticism, when it comes to self-assessment, when it comes to hard work. I know that.
So maybe if it takes another decade to become an excellent writer, it won't be so bad. I always wanted to go beyond, to really try, to think more about it than others, to want it more, to put in the work, to study, to go beyond. I don't want to be merely excellent but exceptional, to somehow do things others aren't doing, or do it in a way that's just a cut above. I don't know if I believe that's possible anymore. After all, A Confederacy of Dunces exists. That guy offed himself before he was given a chance. Ever read The Return by Joe de Mers? Didn't think so. Brilliant, evocative writing on the sentence level. Fantastic at making villains menacing, main characters inviting and the setting evocative. He's better than me, still, and no one even knows his book exists.
This wasn't meant to end on a downer note. I'm still going to try. I'm still writing. I still have flashes of inspiration where I think I'm a genius, when I can't wait to show my work because I just know it's going to thrill those who read it. I don't need millions of people to read it. Just a few thousand will do. They can be my few thousand, and they'll all be loyal because I can give them what no one else quite can. That's a smaller dream, a more humble dream, a different dream than the one I had before. But maybe it's not a bad one, too.
I've had a significant evolution in my writing in the past few months, the kind of change that elevates you to an entirely new paradigm. I can never develop or write a story the same way again because I've eschewed too many of those old ideas (and, in a way, ideals) that I so ignorantly held before.
So now I'm stuck with another realization: Everything I've been told from 5-years-old on is true, but I had to be in my thirties to start making use of it. So what's up with that?
Let me explain. The major difference between my writing and the writing of a professional, especially a traditionally-published professional, is focus. When I've written, I've always just written whatever comes to mind. I'm always trying to make it entertaining, but what I think is entertaining really makes no sense, because I'm not coming at it from a writer's perspective, but a visual artist's perspective, which also makes no sense because I'm not a visual artist in any capacity. I have that classic problem of wanting to "write a movie" or, lately, "write an anime," without realizing that anime also has extreme limitations imposed by the requirements of storytelling.
It's a common sentiment: "I enjoy the parts of anime where they're doing nothing even more than the plot!"
You think that, but the only reason you enjoy the parts where they're doing nothing so much is because 1) they're rare, 2) they're brief, 3) they're usually a respite that we all know will lead into the plot again, and 4) here's the kicker: it's a matter of trust. When "nothing is happening," you know full well that something is going to happen, and that's it going to be very interesting, so you relax and let the slice-of-life digression take you on its transient detour, confident that it's all ultimately going to go somewhere wonderful.
If you want an anime that truly represents "nothing happening," then try watching "Chronicles of the Going Home Club." You'll find out within a few episodes just how dull a lack of progression can be, unless you are really into the humor and are laughing constantly, but even then, I found myself finding it decently amusing but then wishing that there was some kind of plot progression or character relationship progression or drama or something. Nothing ever truly happens, so it's tough to watch much of it in succession.
So that was me and my writing. Chronicles of the Going Home Club, "stuff happening," and then it ended. There was no tension, no drama, no progression, or if I had these things they were not fit together in a proper way. I didn't use the techniques of my craft to build up, release, and then establish another problem to be solved or goal to be met. The equivalent is that after a single chapter, the reader would feel the way he does after season 1 of an anime whose primary conflict has been resolved: "I don't really need a season 2." That's on chapter 1, by the way, time to reassess the opening sentence, I guess.
II. Now I Know Better, but the Time's Gone
What's the point? Well, I was told the correct thing all along, but I rejected it. Of course I rejected it! I had no reason not to, except for blind faith and ten-thousand books that explained how my thinking was wrong through sales, reviews and my own personal enjoyment. That wasn't enough. I "knew" it to be true logically, but I hadn't instilled it in my heart because I didn't understand it! Now I'm looking at a decent opening for a thriller by the guy who invented "the Snowflake Method," with better writing than almost every independently-published book I've ever read, and I can see the focus. I get it now. Not perfectly. I need to study more. But I can see how every action, description and line of dialogue is precision-oriented to develop the character, the scene, the plot and the point. It's not "just stuff happening," it's carefully designed to guide the reader from one idea to the next in a logical progression that holds him fast the entire time.
The fear sets in, then: What else don't I know, or worse, what else do I know that I don't "get"? And how many more years until that also becomes a regretful belated comprehension? We're not talking about subtle intricacies in writing, here, we're talking about one of the most fundamental aspects of writing there is: a dramatic narrative. If you can't set up a scene, build on it, and end with something interesting that compels the reader on, then you might as well discard your three-hundred dollar fountain pen right now and donate your laptop for explosive-detonation experiments, because you've made a premature decision to fail. What are you holding onto? Pride? You lost that when you got to 190lbs, and you plan to get married, so rationality has long gone out the window. Just do it "the right way," and then if you really want, you can bend the rules after that.
III. Denouement
So I'm writing a story right now. The previous story I finished took me 8 years. Eight years of writing a story without knowing what I'm doing, so it's all just guesswork and wishcasting. Think back to what I said earlier. I didn't understand the basic concepts of narrative drama, how to build up a scene, how to focus each sentence on the point, how to logically progress ideas. Eight years working on that.
This new story's got a summary, a basic outline, a detailed outline, character sheets and 30,000 words and I only started writing it about eight months ago. Not only am I going to be done more than three times as quickly, but everything will be stronger because I kind of know what I'm doing now. Of course we all have to learn, and no one said becoming a writer was a quick process, but I still feel like I'm way behind and struggling to catch up. I've studied. I know about the figures of rhetoric and I've practiced them; I know the four pillars of narration and I can write paragraphs using only one at a time; I know the four types of sentences; I can vary the complexity of my syntax; my vocabulary has increased dramatically since writing my NSFW work published on these forums; I can write in a "noun style" or an "adjective style"; I've studied books I love to learn their techniques, and I've read books on writing I hate in the hopes of taking snatches of value from their dull pages.
All of this, over years and years, but still I feel like a mid-level intermediate on a good day. I'm sure there are some hard truths I'm still not accepting that prevent me from taking another leap in skill. I'm a bit of a coward when it comes to criticism, when it comes to self-assessment, when it comes to hard work. I know that.
So maybe if it takes another decade to become an excellent writer, it won't be so bad. I always wanted to go beyond, to really try, to think more about it than others, to want it more, to put in the work, to study, to go beyond. I don't want to be merely excellent but exceptional, to somehow do things others aren't doing, or do it in a way that's just a cut above. I don't know if I believe that's possible anymore. After all, A Confederacy of Dunces exists. That guy offed himself before he was given a chance. Ever read The Return by Joe de Mers? Didn't think so. Brilliant, evocative writing on the sentence level. Fantastic at making villains menacing, main characters inviting and the setting evocative. He's better than me, still, and no one even knows his book exists.
This wasn't meant to end on a downer note. I'm still going to try. I'm still writing. I still have flashes of inspiration where I think I'm a genius, when I can't wait to show my work because I just know it's going to thrill those who read it. I don't need millions of people to read it. Just a few thousand will do. They can be my few thousand, and they'll all be loyal because I can give them what no one else quite can. That's a smaller dream, a more humble dream, a different dream than the one I had before. But maybe it's not a bad one, too.