 Fantasy: September 01, 2010 Issue [#3938] |
  Fantasy
This week: The Basics Edited by: Robert Waltz  
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The greater part of the world's troubles are due to questions of grammar.
-Michel de Montaigne (1533-1592)
Grammar is a piano I play by ear. All I know about grammar is its power.
-Joan Didion
Me fail english? Thats unpossible.
-Ralph Wiggum ("The Simpsons") |
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The Basics
In an effort to continue my quest to become a well-rounded individual (and attract women), I've taken up guitar lessons.
I'm no stranger to music, but this is the first time I've picked up a guitar in... well, I won't say how many years. I'm finding the process of learning something from scratch both exhilarating and frustrating at the same time - which is weird to think about, but even weirder to feel.
Okay, Waltz, what does this have to do with the fantasy genre?
Well, apart from the usefulness of incorporating music into your stories - which I covered nearly a year ago in "Fantasy Newsletter (November 25, 2009)" - not much. But it occurred to me that anytime someone learns something new, aside from a very, very few exceptional individuals, they spend a period of time sucking.
That's part of the learning process - to suck. It means you're learning. And really, I'm convinced that the best at anything never get over feeling like they suck, and so they end up working harder at it, not being complacent, so they just keep on getting better. This has been my experience in pretty much everything I've learned: complicated stuff like engineering and martial arts, and even basic, supposedly simple stuff like reading. Hell, hardly a week goes by without me learning, one way or another, a new word.
Learning never stops, if you're doing it right. And it all builds on what's come before.
But the point is that everyone has to start somewhere, and it seems a lot of people start their writing careers with some variant of Fantasy - hence the relevance to this newsletter.
So this week, I'm going to address one of the first things a writer should learn, and something that even experienced writers would benefit from reviewing, and that's grammar.
I've heard the argument that grammar - along with related basics, such as spelling and punctuation - are irrelevant and unimportant, that as long as you can get your point across with free-form writing, you've done your work.
False.
It's okay to make grammar, punctuation and spelling mistakes, especially when you're just starting out - remember, at first, you're going to suck, whether you like it or not.
If you want to stop sucking, actively work to improve your writing, both the technical aspects and the creative ones. The creative aspects are something that, perhaps, no one can teach you: pacing, characterization, etc. You can get feedback on these things, and take it or leave it, but the guidelines are ultimately subjective.
Not so with the technical aspects. Those have, mostly, hard-and-fast rules: where to use a comma (and where to not), how to use a semicolon, spelling, noun-verb agreement, sentence structure, how to avoid homophone errors, etc.
There's a lot to learn, and I'm not going to cover it in this newsletter.
Fortunately, you don't have to learn it all at once. When you're just starting out, and you suck, yes, it's okay to just write what you're trying to say. But here's the thing: Don't subject the rest of us to it, yet. The impulse - and I have it, too - is to run to your friends, waving reams of paper, going "look what I wrote!" (Or, at least, post it on WDC.)
Not yet.
You see, to many of us, reading something with oodles of spelling, grammar and punctuation errors is the equivalent of listening to a piano that's out of tune (or to a guitar player who's just starting out). It's dissonant.
It sucks.
The first thing you should do after writing something - and here we, with computers, have a huge advantage over prior generations of writers - is to go back, very carefully, and fix all of the spelling, grammar and punctuation errors you can find. Remember, most of these are purely technical; there's little, if any, judgment involved.
Don't trust your spell checker to catch everything, either. The most egregious errors don't involve things like spelling "embarrassment" wrong (which I always do unless I use a spell checker) but things like misplaced apostrophes, mixing up 'to,' 'too,' and 'two,' and that sort of thing. And don't get me started on those useless grammar checkers.
Learn it.
Eventually, it'll become second nature to you. You'll still make mistakes - I do, all the time - but you will, at some point, internalize this stuff. And then reviewers can focus on the important parts of the story, like plot and dialogue, without wincing from the amateur errors.
In other words, don't waste a reviewer's - or, gods forbid, an editor's - time with technical mistakes.
Again, I want to emphasize: just write. Fix the technical stuff on a second draft. Then get reviews to help you with the more subjective aspects.
If you work at it, you will get better.
And maybe, one day, I'll be able to play a barre chord without the strings buzzing. |
A few random fantasy and science fiction picks for the week:
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Last time, in "Fantasy Newsletter (August 4, 2010)" , I talked about the need to find a place to sit down and write.
Ladyoz  :
Insane as this may sound, I find the most peaceful method of writing is wearing a set of headphones blaring loud heavy metal music. It doesn't work with radio, it has to be CDs or an MP3 player with predictable playback. After a few moments the music fades into the background and allows me to focus. It's the most effective block for aural distractions, you can't hear the phone ringing, the dog barking, the kids fighting, etc. It also helps set the mood for whatever scene I'm writing. The anthem from "Top Gun" once wrote a dragon flight scene I still love, LOL. I believe I'm in good company with this quirk, as I hear Stephen King does the same thing. If I waited for quiet around here I'd never write a thing.
It's good you know what works! Like I said, each person has his or her own way of making it work. Some folks haven't found it yet, so they should try different things.
Hatsuda  :
Robert, Your sign-off statement for this article had me blowing coffee through my nose! Please give the reader advance notice before sneaking one like that in on us again!  Great article; very germane!
Now, what kind of comedian would I be if I telegraphed my punch lines? Just because this is the Fantasy NL and not Comedy doesn't mean I can't use the techniques of one in the other! 
Thylacine :
Do you know of any magazines that pay to publish fantasy short stories. I know of one sci-fi one, Analog, but no fantasy ones. Fantasy is just more to my personal taste.
Some readers might have a better answer for you; I haven't really tried to get fantasy published, just science fiction (and that unsuccessfully). But you might check this website.
And that's it for this time. A big happy 10th birthday to WDC! Plug: Be sure to check out "The Writer's Cramp" [13+] for extra daily prizes during Birthday Week! (And in that daily contest, spelling and grammar really don't matter!) Until next time,
DREAM ON!!! |
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