I got made fun of as a child by a parent for doing art and just… never did any ever afterwards. I primarily hang around artists tho and would like to relate to them more, but none of them do creative writing. I’ve read numerous grammar books, so that won’t be a problem, but none really go in to how to construct a sentence, paragraph, page, chapter, plot, etc. I’ll happily take any advice on the subject, really anything you can think for someone with actually zero experience.

Good advice I’ve gotten so far is to just write basically whatever. Also, people who are visual artists and creative writers, which was “easier” for you to become fluent?

  • DamarcusArt
    2·
    7 months ago

    I got made fun of as a child by a parent for doing art and just… never did any ever afterwards.

    I can relate bigtime. More than 10 years after I’ve stopped speaking to my abusive parents, and I’m a professional artist/writer.

    My biggest bit of advice is: Don’t worry about it being “bad.” It probably will be pretty awful writing when you start out, but it is a skill like any other. There isn’t some magical “creative spark” that only special people have, there’s no such thing as innate talent. Anyone can do it, but it takes practice to get good at it, like any other skill. Be comfortable with things you write being bad, because being bad at something is the first step towards getting good at something. Bad writing is just the first draft, it gets better as you refine it and improve it.

    I think the reason you’re finding it hard to find a clear “rulebook” for how to write paragraphs and chapters is because it depends very heavily on what you’re trying to accomplish with your writing. There is no “correct” way to write a paragraph, only ways that work for what you’re trying to convey with your writing.

    So for example: if you were writing a very lore heavy and “hard” sci-fi story with a lot of detail as to how the various systems in the fictional world work, longer paragraphs and chapters would probably suit it better than short, punchier stuff. On the other hand, if you were trying to write something very action focused, with a lot of things happening quite fast, shorter paragraphs and chapters would make it feel more punchy. Remember that the audience will take time to read what you write, and the longer it takes to read, the slower the events described will feel. The less time you spend writing about something, the “quicker” it feels like it happens in the story.

    Additionally, writers tend to fall along a spectrum from “Top down” to “Bottom up”, sometimes called “Architects” and “Gardeners.” A top down writer likes to plan meticulously before writing their story proper, they like to plan things out very carefully, work out exactly what will happen in each chapter before writing it. The bottom up approach is the opposite, they start with characters and a general idea of where they want them to be by the end, but don’t have concrete plans the whole way through. Most writers tend to lean a little more towards one or the other, but it is a spectrum, not a binary like some people insist. Some days you’ll want to plan everything out, other days you might just want to write and see what you can come up with on the fly. There is no “one right way” to write, other than…actually writing stuff and learning what works for you.

    Also, this channel is both hilarious and very informative for new writers: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yJNMkroM8zQ