Now that was fun! It's been a while since I could honestly say that about writing (sad I know) but seeing as I'm making myself stick to the outline and not go wandering down rabbit trails (other than to mark where they are because you never know when that idea might come in handy) with characters and plot points it really hasn't been fun writing. What it has been, is hard work. It's gone grindingly slow.
So slow that I had begun to question whether I had the chops after all or if I'd just deluded myself into thinking I was a writer. Yup, that was where my poor head was until this afternoon.
Why is it that such thoughts all ways catch up to me when I'm by myself, when I'm tired, and when I've been disappointed in something I've done? They never come when I'm around other writers, they never come when I'm bright eyed and bushy tailed, and they never seem to gather when I'm pleased that I did something right.
Interesting.
Anyway, back to the fun part. I got to write a scene with one of my up-and-coming characters that I really enjoyed. I wouldn't want to live what I wrote (yes yes poor Mynas) but it felt really good to write it.
I was working at one level on the technical part; making sure that I didn't lose the reader, checking to make sure that what was happening was necessary to the plot, and double checking that the idea was believable enough to keep a reader turning pages and not go 'oh great the author fell in love with this idea which is so stupid I think I'll put the book back and go find another'. But the majority of my mind was working on a second level. I was lost in the images, my fingers flying to pin the idea to paper, my ears straining to hear how the characters were talking, my nose twitching with the scents of the world and my skin prickled and twinged at the created weather. In that moment I was with Mynas right there in the midst of all his trouble and I felt my heart squeeze in empathy for him. Poor fella.
I realized that in that instant I was the reader as well as the writer. And if I could have kicked myself in the shins, I just might have done so.
That has got to be a first.
Saturday, October 13, 2007
Fun!
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Psalm 49
A Psalm of Repentance
About Me
- everlastingscribe
- I tell stories all day long. Some with my pen, some with my keyboard and if you can find me, buy me a coffee and I'll tell you one too!
4 comments:
*smile* Yup, I write for me. If I'm bored, chances are that others will be too.
Yup. An author friend of mine once said something along the lis of: if your own work doesn't move you, there's a problem.
I was crying when I wrote the ending of one of my short stories. And then when a friend of mine who I had read it told me that I made her cry, I knew I had a winner. *sigh* Now I just have to finish polishing it up and all and find a 'zine that will buy it :p
I've done that too and been proud of myself, teared up or cried over something I wrote and then been delighted when my grandfather told me he cried too when he read the ending. This however is the first time that I've ever gotten mad at myself? I've provoked myself to wrath because of something I did to a character? :-D And, I'm far too smug because of that? You can see the reaction I got in the post above this one. :-D Ooh maybe if I pare this down some I can post it as a 'try' in one of the remaining challenges from m'lord Batson. It's worth a go!
Hehe, I did the same thing with one of my characters in a RPG/collaborative story that's /loosely/ based off of DioM. I basically took away one of the most awesome gifts that had been bestowed upon her at birth, and I don't plan to give it back.
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