Stephen King – Stephen King on Writing: Memoirs of the craft
2nd
Foreword pg xiii: Stephen King recommends reading The Elements of Style by
William StrunkJr and E. B. White. He specifically notes rule 17 (Omit Needless
words)in the chapter: Principles of Composition.
“Vigorous writing is concise. A sentence should
contain no unnecessary words, a paragraph no unnecessary sentences, for the
same reason that a drawing should have no unnecessary lines and a machine no
unnecessary parts. This requires not that the writer make all sentences short,
or avoid all detail and treat subjects only in outline, but that every word
tell.” (Strunk Jr & White, 1999, p.
32)
Pg 29: “…
good story ideas seem to come quite literally from nowhere, sailing at you
right out of the empty sky: two previously unrelated ideas come together and
make something new under the sun.”
Pg 30: “You
job isn’t to find these ideas but to recognize them when they show up.”
Pgs
37&38: Printing process in the 1960s. Hectograph and printing press with
stencils.
Pg 55 & 56: Editor on Stephens sports article.
He supports the “omit needless words” rule.
“‘When
you write a story, you’re telling yourself the story,’ he said. ‘When you
rewrite, your main job is taking out all the things that are not the story.’
Pg 75:
formula for “confession mag” style. The three R’s: Rebellion, Ruin and
Redemption)
Pg 80: Four problems he had initially with Carrie
(before rewrite)
1.
It didn’t move him emotionally.
2.
Didn’t like the lead character. He had
no care/sympathy for what happened.
3.
He didn’t feel at home with the
surroundings or supporting cast. “writing has always been best when it’s
intimate, as sexy as skin on skin.”
4.
It was long and would have to be longer
for it to “pay off” / wouldn’t get entertainment out of it until later on?
Pg 82: What Carrie
taught him.
1.
Writer’s original perception of
characters may be as erroneous as the reader’s.
2.
Don’t stop a piece of work just because
it’s hard. “Sometimes it’s hard to go on when you don’t feel like it, and
sometimes you’re doing good work when it feels like all you’re managing is to
shovel shit from a sitting position.”
Pg 112: “put
your desk in the corner, and every time you sit down there to write, remind yourself
why it isn’t in the middle of the room. Life isn’t a support-system for art.
It’s the other way round.”
Pg 113-117: What writing is –Telepathy. The writer
is the one sending a message to a future place (where the message is read) anda
receiver (the reader). Writers are sending an image through time to the reader.
If they do it correctly, the readers see what the writer does.
Pg 116: “prissy attention to detail that takes all
the fun out of writing.” Too much detail spoils the read and the imagination of
the reader and not all of the detail is important. Further supports rule 17:
Omit needless words.
Pg 118: “you must not come lightly to the blank
page.” If you can’t take writing seriously, don’t bother.
Pg 125: “’I
didn’t know what else I might find to do once I got here, did I? It’s best to
have your tools with you. If you don’t, you’re apt to find something you didn’t
expect and get discouraged.”’
King suggests that if you have your toolbox with
you and come across a hard task, you’ll perhaps be able to pick up the right
tool and get on with doing it instead of discouraged and quit. It’s like why we
research. Our research is our drill bits and screws. Be well prepared.
Pg 128: The first level of the tool box is
vocabulary “... the bread of writing, is vocabulary.” Even words you won’t find
in the dictionary are relevant.
Ph 129: Don’t dress up your vocabulary. “One of
the really bad things you can do to your writing is to dress up the vocabulary,
looking for long words because you’re maybe a little bit ashamed of your short
ones.” On previous pages he offers examples of this.
Pg 131:
Grammar should be on the top shelf too.
Pg 133:
“communication composed of these parts of speech must be organized by rules of
grammar upon which we agree. When these rules break down, confusion and
misunderstanding result. Bad grammar produces bad sentences.” They are what
make a group of words a sentence.He continues to support the idea of writing
being telepathy.
Pg 134: It’s okay to break the previous rule
though if it works to better the writing. Sometimes it is necessary to do so.
He quotes WillamStrunk again: “‘that the best writers sometimes disregard the
rules of the rhetoric.’ Yet he goes on to add this thought, which I urge you to
consider: ‘Unless he is certain of doing well, [the writer] will probably do
the best to follow the rules.’”
King is
suggesting that unless one has a grasp of the basics of Grammar, one will not
be confident that they are doing well and so should follow the rules.
Carrying from the previous page where he mentions
that Nouns and verbs “indispensible” parts of writing, he explains that even a
sentence that only exists of one noun and one verb is a perfectly good
sentence.
“The simplicity
of noun-verb construction is useful” “Strunk and White caution against too many
simple sentences in a row but simple sentences provide a path you can follow”
It supports his and Strunk & Whites rule of
“Omit needless words” to an extent and that writers can break the rules if
it’ll help their writing.
Pg 135:
recommendation for a grammar book: Warriner’s English Grammar and Composition.
Pg 136: Explaining the difference between the two
types of verbs; active and passive. An active verb is when “the subject of the
sentence is doing something. With a passive verb, something is being done to the subject of the sentence”.
“avoid the
passive tense” (referring to Elements of style again)
He suggests
that writers may be attracted to the passive voice because it is safe. There’s
no strength in the sound of a passive sentence but it’s factual, like an
instruction manual so “timid writers” feel it gives their writing authority.
(pg 137)
Pg 137: “The
timid fellow writes The meeting will be
held at seven o’clock because that somehow says to him, ‘Put it this way
and people will believe you really
know.’”
King leads on to say that the writer should be strong, confident
and to put the meeting in charge. “Write The
meeting’s at seven.”
I’ve been
told I write with a passive voice but I didn’t understand it, I couldn’t see
it. I do now. The meeting is the subject of the sentence. In the first one, the
meeting is letting itself be held at seven. In the second sentence the meeting
is [doing it] at seven.
He backs up
the idea that there are exceptions to every rule and that sometimes the passive
voice is okay but continues to say that even in those cases, it’s unnecessary.
“for
instance, a fellow dies in the kitchen but ends up somewhere else. The body was carried from the kitchen and
placed on the parlor sofa is a fair way to put this, although ‘was carried’
and ‘was placed’ still irk this shit out of me.”
He considers
“someone carried the body” out of the kitchen better than “the body was
carried”.
Pg 138: he provides more examples of passive voice
being negative and what I notice with them and the previous examples is that
the active voice is more effective and affirmative. It again supports the “omit
needless words” rule and that “simple sentences work”.
He goes on to mention this – simple sentences work
– when he explains that it’s easier for the reader and, “the reader must always
be your main concern;” following with
“And it’s no easy walk in the park being the guy on the receiving end.
‘[Will Strunk] felt the reader was in serious trouble most of the time,’ E. B.
White writes in his introduction to The
Elements of Style, ‘a man floundering in a swamp, and that it was the duty
of anyone trying to write English to drain this swamp quickly and get this man
up on dry ground, or at least show him the rope.’”
Pg 139:
Adverbs are not our friend. Similar to how the passive voice tells us the
writer isn’t confident that they’ll be taken seriously, adverbs tell us “he or
she is afraid he/she isn’t expressing him/herself clearly, that he or she is
not getting the point across.”
Using “He
closed the door firmly”, King explains that the adverb (firmly) is unnecessary
because context and the prose before this sentence will tell the reader. – Omit
needless words.
Pg 140: Dialogue attribution is when using adverbs
is the exception to the rule, but even then it should be used sparingly. (Again
it’s unnecessary and looks week – omit needless words.)
Pg 142: He
discourages us to avoid using adverbs by using fancier verbs. Using just He
said/she said works best is most cases.
Another
recurring theme I’ve noticed now is that for writing to be good, we need to be
confident – something I notice is evident in my own work. I’ve used the passive
voice, adverbs and a range of other verbs for dialogue attribution in my own
work because I wasn’t confident. As a result I wasn’t happy with my writing.
“I’m convinced that fear is at the root of most
bad writing. If one is writing for ones own pleasure that fear may be mild –
timidity is the word I’ve used here. If, however, one is working under a
deadline – [examples] – that fear may be intense.”
Pg 143:
“Good writing is often about letting go of fear and affection. Affection
itself, beginning with the need to define some sorts of writing as ‘good’ and
other sorts as ‘bad,’ is fearful behaviour.”
Pg 144: Elements of style and form should be in
the next layer of the toolbox.
“beginning
with the rule on how to form possessives: you always add ‘s, even when the word
you’re modifying ends in s” and
“ending with ideas about where it’s best to place the most important parts of a
sentence.”
The end of
the sentence isn’t always the best place for the important parts.
“Paragraphs are almost as important for how
they look as for what they say; they are maps of intent.”
Paragraph
structure tells us if the book is hard to read or not. According to King they
can be as revealing of the reading experience as (I assume) the blurb.
“Open the
book in the middle and look at any two pages. Observe the pattern – lines of
type, the margins, and most particularly the blocks of white space where
paragraphs begin or leave off.”
“Easy books
contain lots of short paragraphs – including dialogue paragraphs which may only
be a word or two long – and lots of white space.”
“Hard books,
ones full of ideas, narration, or description, have a stouter look. A packed look.”
Hard books,
as King describes them, may not actually be best for narrative writing from
what I gather in this chapter and throughout the book. Between pages 144 and
148 he explains why neat and utilitarian structure works for expository writing
– it’s informing of a topic or like an instructional manual. What King
reiterates throughout this book is that story tellers shouldn’t be too
descriptive – that we should show and not tell.
Pg 148:
While expository prose should have a somewhat strict structure, its best for
fictional writers not to think too much on the structure of their paragraphs.
“The more
fiction you read and write, the more you’ll find your paragraphs forming on
their own. And that’s what you want.
When composing it’s best not to think too much about where the paragraphs begin
and end; the trick is to let nature take its course.”
Pgs 150/152:
Fragmented sentences/paragraphs work well in fiction narration.
“but frags
can also work beautifully to streamline narration, create clear images, and
create tension as well as to vary the prose-line.”
“The object of fiction isn’t grammatical correctness
but to make the reader welcome and then tell a story ... to make him/her
forget, whenever possible, that he/she is reading a story at all.”
A good
example of what is immersion.
Pg 154: “Sometimes we fall in love
with all that story, more than any film or TV Program could ever hope to
provide. Even after a thousand pages we don’t want to leave the world the
writer has made for us or the make-believe people who live there.”
Pg 165: “One
learns most clearly what not to do by reading bad prose”
Pg 166: “Good
writing, on the other hand, teaches the learning writer about style, graceful
narration, plot, development, the creation of believable characters and truth
telling.”
King suggests that reading both good and bad prose
is beneficial to the learning reader and I agree with him. My past experiences
of reading, and the fiction I’ve read for research in this project, have taught
me what I don’t like and what I do. It’s inspired me to write - be it because I
aspired to be able to achieve what these writers have or because I knew or felt
I could do better then what I was reading.
“You cannot
hope to sweep someone else away by the force of your writing until it has been
done to you.
So we read
to experience the mediocre and the outright rotten; such experience helps us to
recognize those things when they begin to creep into our own work, and to steer
clear of them. We also read to measure ourselves against the good and the
great, to get a sense of all that can be done.”
Pg 167:
Writers should read. Read a lot and read in variety. “if you don’t have time to
read, you don’t have the time (or the tools) to write.”
So this is
the first task I’ve set myself in regards to research after this book. I do
like to read but I don’t read enough. I’m going to re-read some favourites and
some knew books to see how the books have impressed me, what elements did the
author use to write an immersive story.
Pg 168: King gives his opinion on TVs, saying that
to watch TV is “about the last thing an aspiring writer needs” but I disagree
with him. I do understand the ideas behind TV being considered a waste of time
and a tool to dull the sense but TV can be enriching. Perhaps not as much over
a decade ago as it is now, but still, television, films and games are as much a
source of inspiration and information as a book. Even watching a soap opera can
benefit the writer because we can learn what the script writers have done to
make the characters and the plot grip its audience. The same outcome writers
want for their own work.
In my
opinion, everything should be given a chance which is why I’ll watch films with
the worst reviews and read an assortment of books.
King keeps saying that a good writer should be an
honest writer. To that I say an honest writer is informed and experienced.
Pg 171: “The
sort of strenuous reading and writing program I advocate – four to six hours a
day, every day”
“The real
importance of reading is that it creates an ease and intimacy with writing”
“The more
you read, the less apt you are to make a fool of yourself with your pen or word
processor.”
Pg 175/176:
“Still, I believe the first draft of a book – even a long one – should take no
more than three months, the length of a season.”
He talks
about having a strict routine when it comes to writing and uses examples of
other writers doing the same – having an absolute minimum daily word count
they’ll work to.
Pg 178: For
beginnings, King suggests setting a goal of 1000 words a day.
I’ve decided that I’m going to try to meet in the middle of his goal and the suggested one – 1500 words. This is because the writing I’ll be doing over the course of the project is interactive so I’ll have different scenarios for the same event.
Pg 184: “Book-buyers aren’t attracted, by and
large, by the literary merits of a novel; book-buyers want a good story to them
with them on the airplane, something that will first fascinate them, then pull
them in and keep them turning the pages. This happens, I think, when readers
recognize the people in a book, their behaviours, their surroundings, and their
talk. When a reader hears strong echoes of his or her own life and beliefs, he
or she is apt to become more invested in the story.”
-
Another
supportive comment on immersion (and characterisation playing an important role
in immersion).
Pg 187: “In my view, stories and novels consist
of three parts: narration, which moves the story from point A to point B and
finally point Z; description, which creates a sensory reality for the reader;
and dialogue, which brings characters to life through their speech.”
Pg 188/189:
Over these pages, King suggests that writers should not let plot dictate their
story. That plot should be the last resort and that the characters and story
should lead the way. The plot will develop on its own.
Pg 190: Instead of plot as a starting tool,
writers should use a situation. This is what he does. King starts with the
situation then let the characters (that are flat and unfeatured to begin with)
drive the course of the story. This is what he narrates. He doesn’t let a
predetermined plot control what a character does, instead the plot become what
it is because of what the character has chosen to do when faced with
situations.
Pg 201: King
beings to cover Description, mentioning that it’s a learned skill and one of
the reasons why “read a lot, write a lot” is important. According to King,
description isn’t just about knowing how to describe but also how much to. He
suggests reading will help us learn how much to but only writing will teach us
how to.
“Description
begins with visualisation of what it is you want the reader to experience. It
ends with your translating what you see in your mind into words on the page.”
Pg 202: Too
much description can have a negative effect on the narrative – it buries the
reader into too much detail and images (which I imagine means they lose focus
of what’s important.)
King
suggests that some of the details should be left up to the reader’s
imagination, that we don’t need to give them all the details about a character
for them to work out what kind of person they are.
Pg 203: Here
he goes on to talk about description of the physical features of characters,that
it’s unnecessary and “bad technique”. Examples were: sharply intelligent blue eyes, outthrust determined chin and arrogant cheekbones.“physical
description shouldn’t be a shortcut to character.”
Pg 209: Don’t
use cliché similes, metaphors for imagery.
“Good description begins with clear seeing and
ends with clear writing, the kind of writing that employs fresh images and
simple vocabulary.”
Pg 210: “your job is to say what you see, and
then get on with your story.”
“It’s dialogue that gives your cast their voice,
and is crucial in defining their characters – only what people do tells us more
about what they’re like”
Pg 212: Good
dialogue will indicate many aspects of a character – smart or dumb, honest or
dishonest – but it may take time before the character comes through, is
discovered.
Pg 218: King
has mentioned that good writing needs to be honest. Earlier in the book he
mentions that good writing needs to be honest. At first I didn’t understand
what he meant by that but he expands on it a bit on this page. An example of
being honest is using dialogue a person would actually use, not what is
considered acceptable or pretty. If a character has grown up uneducated they
aren’t going to have the most grammatically correct speech and would probably
have their own slang.
Pg 224: “I think the best stories always up
being about people rather than the event, which is to say character-driven”
The book
suggests making all characters seem like the main character to an extent
because in real life, everyone feels like they are the main character – which
they are.
“Annie
Wilkes, the nurse who holds Paul Sheldon prisoner in Misery, may seem
psychopathic to us, but it’s important to remember that she seems perfectly
sane and reasonable to herself – heroic, in fact, a beleaguered woman trying to
save a hostile world filled with cockadoodie brats.”
He goes on to say that being able to show a reader
who a character is, is far more effective than coming right out and saying it.
If the reader can draw the conclusion from the description and understand why
or what the character is, they’re more effective because they are closer to
real. In real life we make assumptions of a person by their action. Yes a
person may tell us that another person is cruel or funny or mean, but it isn’t
confirmed until we see it for ourselves.
Pg 230:
“make sure these fictional folks behave in ways that will both help the story
and seem reasonable to us, given what we know about them (and what we know
about real life of course).”
Pg 236/237: King touches on Symbolism in
narratives. When I was a kid and I wanted to start writing, I remember I was
put off from it because I was told all stories needed a moral or symbolism. It
was something I couldn’t envision. I had stories but no obvious symbolism. On
these pages King suggests that symbolism does serve a useful purpose to the
narrative but if it’s not there, don’t worry. The same can be said about theme.
Not every book has to be about themes, symbolism or moral but every book should
be about something.
Pg 238: The
writer’s job when working on the first draft is to decide what that something
is, when we work on the second draft, we need to make that something clearer.
Pg 246: For the theme, ask yourself what it is
you’re writing about. The answer may not come right away but the answer is
there, because you’re writing.
Pgs 252/253:
King suggests leaving sometime between finishing the first draft and working on
the second. He suggests about a minimum of 6 weeks (obviously I wouldn’t be
able to for my project) so that we’re looking at it with a fresh mind. He says
it should almost feel like somebody else has written it, that way it’s easier
to critique it – “It’s always easier to kill someone else’s darlings than it is
to kill your own.”
Pg 254: Consistent character
development/characterisation. Motivation – why does a character do something?
And would they really do what they have done – is it in their character?
Pg 255: The
big question of reading the first draft: Is the story coherent? (What are the
recurring elements?)
“ What I
want most of all is resonance, something that will linger for a little while in
Constant Reader’s mind (and heart) after he or she has closed the book and put
it up on the shelf. I’m looking for a way to do that without spoon-feeding the
reader.”
This is what
the second draft is for. Find it in the first draft then build on it in the
second.
Pg 256: Identify who you’re writing for - The
Ideal Reader.
Ask yourself
questions in relation to the Ideal Reader and the Constant reader (those that
continue/will continue to read your writing). Will they react how you want to
what you’ve written?
Pg 265: Ideal Reader can help with pacing. When
reading over the draft with the Ideal Reader in mind, we can determine if a
scene will be boring for them or if we’ve forgotten to resolve an important plot
issue.
Pg 266: Get rid of boring/unnecessary parts –
helps with pacing.
“Kill your
darlings, kill your darlings, even when it breaks your egocentric little
scribbler’s heart, kill your darlings”
Pg 268: “Back story is all the stuff that
happened before your tale began but which has an impact on the front story. Back
story helps define character and establish motivation. I think it’s important
to get the back story in as quickly as possible, but it’s also important to do
it with some grace.”
He gives a
good example of what he means on this page. ‘Hello, ex-wife,’ Tom said to Doris as she entered the room.
It’s one thing to make things simple and easy for
the reader but when it’s too obvious and awkward, it’s messy and throws of the
reading.
Pg 272: Not
all of the back story needs to be written.
“(a)
everyone has a history and (b) most of it isn’t very interesting.”
Stick to the parts that are interesting, keep out
the rest unless it’s really relevant.
Pg 273: Research should be treated the same as
back story – in the back. The story isn’t there to show off our knowledge. It’s
there to tell a story that engrosses it’s reader.
Pg 288: When looking to publish our work, we need
to research into the publications/publishers we’re submitting or work to.
Read through Writers’ journals and Writer’s Market
for finding the right publisher and market for our work and then read the
market. Actually read the work in the market.
It will also help to find a literary agent if writing
more than short stories.
Pg 294: Presentation is important when sending
work out to publishers/agents.
“‘Good presentation, absolutely. When you send
your story out, there out to be a very brief cover-letter on the top of the
script, telling the editor where you’ve published other stories and just a line
or two on what this one’s about. And you should close by thanking him for the
reading. That’s especially important.
You should
submit on a good grade of white bond paper – none of that slippery erasable
stuff. Your copy should be double-spaced, and on the first page you should put
your address in the upper left hand corner – it doesn’t hurt to include your
telephone number, too. In the righthand corner, put an approximate
word-count.’”
Pg 299: Find
out who prospective agents have sold books too. What’s their C.V.
Enter writing competitions and get as much work
published as possible – build up C.V
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