I'm no influential writer or editor, but I have been around the block a couple of times in both departments. Several obstacles to good writing seem to pop up, over and over again. I've made a quick catalog of the rookie mistakes I've seen, and hopefully my analysis is edifying:
1. Writing Genre
The claim: "I don't write [insert genre here]. That's not where my imagination goes."
It's all well and good to characterize yourself by the story you prefer. The problem comes in when you're so stuck in a genre rut, and limited by the confines of your particular hobbyhorse. I think the problem here is that writers forget that they write stories, not genre. In other words, they confuse the medium with the message. Think of stories as tetrapods - birds, mammals, or reptiles: they might have some huge differences between them, but as you dig down through their anatomy, you'll see that they have all the same basic parts. Whether swine or lizard, the armbone's still connected to the wristbone. All stories have the same basic skeleton - it's just what you build onto that skeleton that defines each story.
I'm not saying every writer needs to write all genres; if you specialize, you specialize. I'm more of a sci-fi guy myself. But I also think writers need to expand their horizons. Dipping into other genres will help unlock your own. For instance: what would Star Wars be without the Rom-Com element of Han and Leia? Answer: Episodes I-III. Zing! But seriously, the charm and magic of Star Wars comes not from the space ships, but from the injection of other genre elements. If you're really trying to write "The" story, be it the Great Sci-Fi Story or the Great American Novel, you might want to play with other genre elements for a while. Don't limit yourself!
2. Starting with a Scene
The claim: "Oh man, I got this great scene in my head and I just started writing it!"
This is a recipe for writer's block.
I'm not going to lie, my stories often grow around a scene - like a tree grows out of a seed. But I don't just start writing around it. That's like nurturing a tree growing in the foundation of your house: it's unplanned, unruly, and ultimately destructive. Instead, I put the scene on a table somewhere, under a harsh light, and examine it. I ask myself: what about it is so compelling? Why is this character performing this action? How do they get in this position? Who are the supporting characters, if any? Where is this scene set? It is only once I see the connections that I'm able to judge whether this scene is worthy of being developed. Nine times out of ten, naturally, it's just a passing thing.
And yes, you'll mourn the loss of your Scene. But it has to die. Just like a seed, a Scene isn't all that precious in and of itself, since there are thousands of them being cast all over the place in the hope that they will find receptive soil. If you're going to build stories around Scenes, you need to be able to generate a ton of them, and then select only the good, strong ones for development.
3. The Big Idea
The claim: "I got this great idea for a story/comic/movie..."
Here's the bad news: ideas are a dime a dozen. Your great and wonderful idea you've been cherishing and working on for umpteen years? The guy next to you on the bus has come up with three better ideas and discarded them, all in the space between bus stops. That's harsh. When you're a beginning creator, you tend to treat your ideas like children, to be swaddled and coddled and doted upon. It takes time and practice to realize that only the fittest ideas survive...and that you need to subject them to merciless attrition.
Here's the good news: ideas are a dime a dozen. Is your Big Idea dragging you down? Feeling depressed because you can't break through that development wall? Kill it! You'll have two new ideas to replace it.
A final word on ideas: each idea is only as good as its implementation. The real work of a creator is not to think, but to create. What we sometimes forget (or choose to ignore) is that creation, while fun, also requires fanatical dedication and work ethic. Develop that work ethic, and you'll be amazed as your stories come to life.
4. The "Sunk-Cost" Fallacy
The claim: "I've been working on this story since sixth grade..."
I'm going to admit right off the bat, I've got at least two stories I can't give up on - one from sixth grade, the other from ninth. I'd put a lot of development into them, and I'm still working on them. So that means they must be really good by now, right?
We've all seen those movies that say, "Ten years in the making!" or have five brilliant writers attached to them, or that video game (Duke Nukem Forever, anyone?) that's been in development hell since forever. Invariably, the end result is never worth the time and trouble. So why aren't these stories killed before they can grow into deformed disappointments? Why do creators (or producers, or what have you) get so attached to them?
Enter the "Sunk-Cost" Fallacy: the perception that the more (money, time, whatever) you put into something, the more valuable it is. Like $150 wine, it's probably the same product you could get for $20, but the massive cost makes it taste better. It's our human inability to come to terms with wasted effort. If a movie mogul has sunk $15,000,000 into a film, and has whimsical directors and difficult actors and skeptical producers to please, he feels compelled to complete the project. No matter what. No matter that the end result might be a bloated, cobbled-together, incomprehensible mess.
My advice for stories (and life in general): some things weren't meant to be made. You'll feel a lot better and freer if you give up the stories you've been rehashing since sixth grade - they'll fall like anchors off your creative feet. Who knows? Maybe their carcasses can be rendered and turned into new worlds to explore, like in Mesopotamian and Norse creation myths.
Now if you'll excuse me, I've got a couple of old stories I need to beat like dead horses...
5. The Sacred Character
The claim: "My character doesn't do this or that. That's not how I conceived them."
Ever heard the phrase, "Kill your darlings?" This means, simply, that the more attached you get to a particular aspect of your writing, the less essential it is. I think it applies to characters just as well: they aren't nearly as interesting as you think they are.
This relates to the Sunk Cost Fallacy, but there's a nuance here that puts it in a category all its own - namely, that the Sacred Character is an aspect of the author, and therefore receives more aggressive guardianship. Trying to suggest a change in the Sacred Character's actions contrary to the narrowly defined rut the author has put them in will result in a quick upbraiding.
Unlike the Sunk-Cost Fallacy, the Nuclear Option isn't always the best. An overdeveloped character might have one or two unique features to them; why not bring out those features? A character is not meant to be a real person anyway, i.e. full of infinite conflicting impulses that cancel each other out. Rather, characters are integrated into the story, with one or two characteristics locking into the shape of the story, the way proteins temporarily combine to transfer energy. A character's dynamism (to stretch the analogy) comes from the way a story's "protein" folds or changes them, and they change the story in return.
The point is, characters can be as nuanced as you like, but one or two defining characteristics need to stand out. My editor Joe puts it this way: "Each character has a motivation - what does your character want?" This can apply on many different levels, and can be a good source of internal conflict: for instance, what if a character has always wanted to settle down and have a family, but is attracted to a person who represents neither of these things? One one level they long for future happiness and stability, but on a different level they crave sex and excitement. Is this just shallowness, or is it primality? Or is it both? And is the longing for domesticity a product of culture, or a real, heartfelt yearning...or both? Thus character is explored.
I think there's also the problem of equating character with backstory. Backstory isn't a character trait. Obsession with backstory, on the other hand, can be a character trait - but you see the difference: present actions and speech versus what occurred in the past. And this brings up another famous writing quote: "What is the most interesting event in the character's past, and why aren't you showing me that?" If a character was once a supersoldier mercenary, your current story had better be more interesting than their war days.
6. The Critic-cum-Author
The claim: "I'm a critic. I've seen all the bad things writers do...I'll write my own story and correct their mistakes!"
This attitude is great in theory - who better to make a great story than a critic, who will give us a fresh look at a genre and avoid its mistakes? But in practice, this is like a food critic deciding to be a chef and "show them how it's done". Food critics have no desire to go back into the kitchen (never ever learn how your food is made); they're only interested in the presentation and taste as an end result.
Now I'm a critic, and an editor, and a writer all at once. But I didn't get into writing as a result of being a critic; I write for the pleasure of it. While I try to avoid cliche and bad technique, my aim is to tell a story, even if a convention or trope is upheld in passing. Stories are stories. They come out of the heart, rather than being dictated to from the head. And with a lot of stories by critics, the desire to flip convention and "correct the mistakes" results in stories with interesting elements that ultimately have no heart.
This is not an airy-fairy complaint, either - heart is the essence of any story. It's what makes a story likable and compelling. Even if your protagonist is a total shitheel, they have to draw you in somehow - otherwise you have no investment in the story. Same goes for the tired conventions. There's one known as the "Dog/Kitten Trope": an otherwise horrible human being shows their soft side through their love of a pet. It's an awful, manipulative cliche (especially if the pet dies later)...but it works. The cute kitten (I'm a cat person) serves as the gateway between our mind and that of the otherwise unlikable protagonist. It's a shorthand for empathy, a quick way to get the viewer/protagonist connection out of the way so we can move on to the meat of the story.
A critic, having grown frustrated with such tropes, will attempt to do away with them. What you end up with is no connection. The story reads like an intellectual exercise. You might read it for the interesting conceptual acrobatics, but otherwise it's forgotten as soon as you set it down.
Conclusion:
I call these "Rookie Mistakes", but the fact is that even experienced writers will fall into these traps. And there's nothing wrong with that! It's part of the creative experience. The difference between a good storyteller and a bad storyteller is, the good storyteller checks themselves and realize where they go wrong. And to be honest, a lot of good writing has come out of rookie mistakes - a lot of great novelists somehow powered through all the obstacles I've mentioned above to deliver seminal works. But they're the exception. The majority of us aren't genius enough to outwit the traps once we're in them; we need to sidestep the traps to begin with.
The great theme of these mistakes, I think, is inflexibility: writers get into their heads that their idea/plot/characters should be this way, and then can't deviate from that rut. It may seem mercenary, but it's best to keep your loyalties fluid. Allow the aspects of your story to transform organically, rather than forcing them into your initial mold. And above all, churn and burn - try to write as many stories as quickly as possible, never getting stuck on one. This will teach you how to let go.
And remember: just because you've "killed" an idea, story, or character doesn't mean it's completely gone. They'll always be kicking around somewhere in the ether, and when you're finally ready to implement them, they'll be at your service.
- Rick Out.
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