How to Write with Style by Kurt Vonnegut

Here is a great piece from Kurt Vonnegut about writing, it has gems such as:

William Shakespeare and James Joyce, wrote sentences which were almost childlike when their subjects were most profound. "To be or not to be?" asks Shakespeare's Hamlet. The longest word is three letters long.


The whole article can be found here.

In summary, the key points made are:

1. Find a subject you care about.
2. Do not ramble, though
3. Keep it simple
4. Have guts to cut
5. Sound like yourself
6. Say what you mean
7. Pity the readers



And here is a little ad from Amazon with one of Kurt's well known book, Slaughterhouse Five

Stephen King and 6 Tools Every Writer Should Have in His ToolBox

Here is a great article about what Stephen King reccommends for any budding writer.

All you will ever need to know about writing from Kurt Vonnegut

Kurt Vonnegut explains drama

Here is a great post  about Kurt Vonnegut explaining drama with charts.

You can read it here.

Storytelling

Here are two links that talk about story structure, you can read them here:

Elements of Story Structure

Tension makes your story interesting.

How to Write a Manifesto

Today, we write a manifesto

Today, our second sentence starts with the first word of the first sentence.

We write a short sentence.

Then a shorter one.

Then a really long one that doesn't make any sense but is immediately followed by

One.

Word.

Sentences.

Then we make our point even more clearer

By using fragmented prepositional phrases.

By repeating that first preposition.

By doing it a total of three times.


And then we have a really long sentence that builds up excitement from our overarching concept that is summed up in a word that makes absolutely no sense.

Source.

How to Write a Novel in Twelve Weeks

A great plan on How to Write a Novel in Twelve Weeks, can be found here.

Here is the text of the post, just in case it disappears:


PLAN TO SUCCEED. TEN STEPS TO SUCCESS. WRITE THAT NOVEL IN TWELVE WEEKS

There are times when writing your first novel can seem like trying to push an ocean uphill. But it doesn't have to be like that. Novelizations of TV shows and movies are often written in as little as twelve weeks or even less. So, how can these people bang out novels in such a short time when for everyone else writing one seems like all the labours of Hercules rolled into one?

The answer's all down to planning. And here's where I'm going to show you how you can use planing to turn novel writing into a far simpler task than you might have thought possible.

1. First decide on your genre.

2. Select your favourite book or movie from that genre.

3. Quickly scribble down a synopsis for that book or movie. Don't put any great care into it. Do three drafts, aiming to end up with a synopsis of half-a-page to a full-page in length.

4. Now have a sit down. Without putting too much thought into it, think of the main characters and settings in that synopsis and how you'd like to change them. Maybe you'd like to turn that island into a city, or that man into a woman, or that doctor into an astronaut. Go with your first instinct. When it comes to these things it's often right.

5. Go back to the synopsis you wrote, replacing the original settings and characters with the settings and characters you've decided to use. You should find the story immediately starts to become a noticeably different beast when you do this. Again, take no great time or care over it. Again, do three drafts. Again, you're looking for a synopsis of around a page.

6. Armed with this new synopsis, devote more thought to the main characters, writing a short biography for each of them. Who are they? Where are they from? What do they do for a living? What have they done in the past to get to where they are when we first meet them? Why are they unhappy? What do they want, both in life in general and in the story? What obstacles stand in their way? How do they get on with the people around them? Imagine them talking to people, dealing with things, just living their lives. Also write a potted history for the main settings, so you have a sense of the book's background.

7. Now that you have a clear idea as to what your characters and settings are about, have a lie down, close your eyes and run through the story in your head, as though you're watching it on a cinema screen. Don't go into too much detail - or you'll be at it forever - but enough to develop a firm idea of what happens. Do this three times, scribbling down notes as you go along of anything you might forget.

8. Get yourself a pack of standard size index cards from any stationers. On the cards, scribble a one or two sentence summary of every scene in the book, using one card per scene. Once you've done this, read through what you've written, adding any extra scenes that occur to you, chopping out any you no longer need and changing their order if necessary. Three or four run-throughs should be enough to have the whole of the main story planned out.

Now you've got the main story planned out, think about what the other characters are getting up to when your central character isn't around. Use index cards to plan out their scenes and insert them into the main story where they're needed.

Read through your pile of index cards to make sure the story all fits together and, if it does, you now have everything you need to start writing your novel.

9. Start to write the novel but don't start at the beginning. That's the most complicated part of the book, where you're having to juggle several balls to introduce the characters and the set-up. Therefore leave it till you've written the rest of the novel. The same with the ending. Leave that till last, so you have something to look forward to. Start at the point where the characters have already been introduced, and use the index cards to guide you. Stick to that plan like glue, only changing any plot points if you really have to. Remember, it's changing the plot that eats up writing time.

Don't write the whole book before revising anything. Instead, do three drafts of each scene before moving on to the next one because things are much easier to do if you break them down into bite-sized chunks. Aim to write a thousand words a day. Write the first draft of each scene with the idea in your head that it's going to be the one you show the world. It isn't but it does focus the mind wonderfully on what you're doing.

10. Now that the novel's written, go through it one more time to tidy it all up, and then start to look for a publisher.

Everything You Need to Know About Writing Successfully: in Ten Minutes

I will not claim to know everything aobut writing, but I will let the bestselling autor Stephen King tell you. The secret can be found here.

Lecture by Kurt Vonnegut on Writing

Here is a great lecture from Kurt Vonnegut where he dissects the different ways of writing with blackboard illustration. You can find it here.

How to write an incendiary blog post

Perfect formula to writing an explosive blog post from the Boston Globe. Article is here.

Now sharpen your pencils, or rather flex your typing fingers and start shocking people.

The Kuwait Contract - Het Koeweit Contract

While strolling down a flea market in Amsterdam, I came across this used book placed among a pile of others.



The book had the insignia for Kuwait and was titled "Het Koeweit Contract", published in 1987. I don't speak Dutch but I guessed that it could be a translated official contract. It turns out I was mistaken. I looked up the name of the book and it is a thriller about Kuwait with different dutch contributors. I would be interested in finding a translation for this book. Here is the translated link that I found on geocities.

Anyone familiar with this book ?

Kurt Vonnegut Writing Style

Here are some tips from Kurt Vonnegut about how to write. I will keep it short and simple so here are the tips.

No more please

J K Rowling, the Billionaire author of the Harry Potter series is writing a two new books.

Personally, I think Harry Potter was a combination of Oliver Twist, Enid Blyton's St. Clare series and Ursula Le Guin's Wizard of Earthsea Magic, with a little messiah story thrown in.

Hell, I am going to mash up a few old books and come up with a best seller, maybe.

Cool New Punctuations

We all learned about punctuation marks in school, I hope. Punctuation marks such as the full stop to end a sentence. The comma to provide a little pause within a sentence, and help you digest what was said. The question mark to ask a question, such as where do I use a question mark? Exclamation mark! for indicating a strong feeling or higher volume when read aloud. I just learnt about two punctuation marks that I feel can be very useful and appropriate for a multitude of sentences.

Introducing:

‽ The Interrobang. The Interrobang combines an exclamation mark with a question mark, A sentence ending with an interrobang either asks a question in an excited manner or expresses excitement or disbelief in the form of a question. This would be equivalent to having a WTF at the end or beginning of a sentence but in a more refined eloquent way.

The Irony mark (؟) (French: point d’ironie) is a punctuation mark that purports to indicate that a sentence should be understood at a second level. It is illustrated by a backward-facing question mark. An irony mark may sometimes be referred to as an irony point, snark or zing. Its usage is extremely rare but I feel it could be very useful.

Sentences that you could use the irony mark in could be:

Life is short, then you die ؟

or, If love is blind, why is lingerie so popular؟


There are other punctuation marks that are underused but the Interrobang and Irony mark I find very appealing. Forget the LOL, BRB, WTF, ROFL,LMAO, and assorted smileys symbols and abbreviations that crept into the English language and use these instead to sound eloquent and kash5a :-)

Kurt Vonnegut, Jr. (November 11, 1922–April 11, 2007)

Wikipedia Entry

New Yotk Times Article

Rest in Peace

Girls versus Boys

Or rather the title should be Girl writing versus Boy writing. By reading the different blogs by boys and girls, I noticed that girls write about their feelings, what happened to them, their thoughts, etc. Boys write about gadgets, weird things, their super powered computers / cars / bikes, etc. As a perfect example of the different styles of writing, read this exercise that an English proffessor at the University of Phoenix gave his students. It is a long read but hilarious:

---

An English Professor assigned his students to a joint writing exercise that quickly degraded -check it out...

"Today we will experiment with a new form called the tandem story. The process is simple. Each person will pair off with the person sitting to his or her immediate right.

As homework tonight, one of you will write the first paragraph of a short story. You will e-mail your partner that paragraph and send another copy to me. The partner will read the first paragraph and then add another paragraph to the story and send it back also sending another copy to me.
The first person will then add a third paragraph, and so on, back and forth.

Remember to reread what has been written each time in order to keep the story coherent. There is to be absolutely NO talking outside of the e-mails and anything you wish to say must be written in the e-mail. The story is over when both agree a conclusion has been reached."

The following was actually turned in by two of my English students:



Rebecca (last name deleted), and Gary (last name deleted).

THE STORY:

(First paragraph by Rebecca)
-----------------------------------------------
At first, Laurie couldn't decide which kind of tea she wanted. The chamomile, which used to be her favorite for lazy evenings at home, now reminded her too much of Carl, who once said, in happier times, that he liked chamomile. But she felt she must now, at all costs, keep her mind off Carl. His possessiveness was suffocating, and if she thought about him too much her asthma started acting up again. So chamomile was out of the question.



(Second paragraph by Gary )
--------------------------------------------------
Meanwhile, Advance Sergeant Carl Harris, leader of the attack squadron now in orbit over Skylon 4, had more important things to think about than the neuroses of an airheaded asthmatic bimbo named Laurie with whom he had spent one sweaty night over a year ago. "A.S. Harris to Geostation 17", he said into his transgalactic communicator. "Polar orbit established. No sign of resistance so far..." But before he could sign off, a bluish particle beam flashed out of nowhere and blasted a hole through his ship's cargo bay. The jolt from the direct hit sent him flying out of his seat and across the cockpit.



(Rebecca)
---------------------------------------------------------
He bumped his head and died almost immediately, but not before he felt one last pang of regret for psychically brutalizing the one woman who had ever had feelings for him. Soon afterwards, Earth stopped its pointless hostilities towards the peaceful farmers of Skylon 4. "Congress Passes Law Permanently Abolishing War and Space travel," Laurie read in her newspaper one morning. The news simultaneously excited her and bored her. She stared out the window, dreaming of her youth, when the days had passed unhurriedly and carefree, with no newspapers to read, no television to distract her from her sense of innocent wonder at all the beautiful things around her. "Why must one lose one's innocence to become a woman?" she pondered wistfully.



( Gary )
---------------------------------------------------------
Little did she know, but she had less than 10 seconds to live. Thousands of miles above the city, the Anu'udrian mother ship launched the first of its lithium fusion missiles. The dimwitted wimpy peaceniks that pushed the unilateral Aerospace Disarmament Treaty through the congress had left Earth a defenseless target for the hostile alien empires who were determined to destroy the human race. Within two hours after the passage of the treaty the Anu'udrian ships were on course for Earth, carrying enough firepower to pulverize the entire planet. With no one to stop them, they swiftly initiated their diabolical plan. The lithium fusion missile entered the atmosphere unimpeded. The President, in his top-secret mobile submarine headquarters on the ocean floor off the coast of Guam , felt the inconceivably massive explosion, which vaporized poor, stupid, Laurie and 85 million other Americans. The President slammed his fist on the conference table. "We can't allow this! I'm going to veto that treaty! Let's blow 'em out of the sky!"



(Rebecca)
---------------------------------------------------------
This is absurd. I refuse to continue this mockery of literature. My writing partner is a violent, chauvinistic semiliterate adolescent.



( Gary )
---------------------------------------------------------
Yeah? Well, you're a self-centered tedious neurotic whose attempts at writing are the literary equivalent of valium. "Oh shall I have chamomile tea? Or shall I have some other sort of F***ING TEA??? Oh no, I'm such an air headed bimbo who reads too many Danielle Steele novels."



Rebecca)
---------------------------------------------------------
A**hole.



( Gary )
---------------------------------------------------------
B****.



(Rebecca)
---------------------------------------------------------
Get screwed.



( Gary )
---------------------------------------------------------
Eat sh**.



(Rebecca)
---------------------------------------------------------
SCREW YOU - YOU NEANDERTHAL!!!



( Gary )
----------------------------------------------------------
GO DRINK SOME TEA - *****.

***********************************************

(TEACHER) A+ - I really liked this one. Only group to get an A.

Writing Fiction Part V

Writing Fiction - Part I is here.
Writing Fiction - Part II is here.
Writing Fiction - Part III is here.
Writing Fiction - Part IV is here.

George Orwell has earned the right to be called one of the finer writers in the English language through such novels as 1984 and Animal Farm, such essays as “Shooting an Elephant,” and his memoir Down and Out in Paris.


George expressed a strong dislike of totalitarian governments in his work, but he was also passionate defender of good writing. Thus, you may want to hear some of George’s writing tips.*

A scrupulous writer, in every sentence that he writes, will ask himself at least four questions, thus:
What am I trying to say?
What words will express it?
What image or idiom will make it clearer?
Is this image fresh enough to have an effect?

And he will probably ask himself two more:
Could I put it more shortly?
Have I said anything that is avoidably ugly?

One can often be in doubt about the effect of a word or a phrase, and one needs rules that one can rely on when instinct fails. I think the following rules will cover most cases:
Never use a metaphor, simile, or other figure of speech which you are used to seeing in print.
Never use a long word where a short one will do.
If it is possible to cut a word out, always cut it out.
Never use the passive where you can use the active.
Never use a foreign phrase, a scientific word, or a jargon word if you can think of an everyday English equivalent.
Break any of these rules sooner than say anything outright barbarous.

* From “Politics and the English Language” by George Orwell.

Copied from here.

Writing Fiction - Part IV

Writing Fiction - Part I is here.
Writing Fiction - Part II is here.
Writing Fiction - Part II is here.

I talked about the overall Arcs in Part III covering the different flow a story can take. What about the basic plot? You need to be original, but there is no shame in following the classics. Let us take Snow White, a beautiful girl with a pure heart that gets sent off to the woods by her evil Stepmother to be killed. Her innocence and beauty saves her and she is left wandering the woods until she finds the seven dwarves who are charmed by her, she also takes care of the cooking, cleaning, laundry and assorted household chores which is always a good thing when you have seven messy guys living in one small house. Stepmother discovers Snow White is still alive through her magic mirror. Stepmother also knows that if she sends any man to get rid of Snow White, he will be charmed by her again and spare her. Some jobs, only a woman can do, so Stepmother transforms herself into an old hag and goes over to give Snow White the poisoned apple. Snow White bites into the apple but, in a twist of fate does not die, but falls into a deep sleep, or coma if you like. Prince Charming is riding along and gives her mouth to mouth and Snow White awakes for a grand wedding and happiness ever after.

The point here is that all stories are fairy tales with someone good and pure being challenged and surmounting different obstacles sometimes by luck, sometimes by fate and sometimes by their own purity and goodness. As the end nears, all is lost and a final disaster strikes our hero. Through pure luck, fate intervenes again and our hero rises and vanquishes all her enemies and has a happy ending.

Take Romeo and Juliet, the story is boy meets girl, boy falls for girl, girl falls for boy, parent problems, boy and girl get outside help, outside help gives them a plan, plan fails, tragedy, or plan works, household bliss. How many popular stories are based on the Romeo and Juliet model? Too many to count.

The advice here is to deconstruct the well known fairy tales and follow their themes; you can also combine different fairy tale themes together.


Think about it.

Writing Fiction - Part III

Writing Fiction - Part I is here.
Writing Fiction - Part II is here.

What structure must you follow in writing your fiction? There are no hard and fast rules, a lot of talented authors just sit down in with their feather quill, biro pen or word processor and produce masterpieces. A lot of successful stories follow a standard structure. Carolyn Wheat defines it as the Four-Arc System for Organizing your Novel.

Basically, the structure starts off with a Ten Minute Hook, which is an opening scene that is similar to a very short story and gets the reader's attention. It is like a quick look in the book's world and sets the tone for what is coming. I noticed this is also done in movies. It could be a scene from the past or a different location and makes you wonder what this has to do with the overall story, it becomes clearer as the story unfolds and reaches its climax.

The book is divided into four parts or Arcs with each Arc having a specific purpose.

The First Arc sets up the problem, the event that gets the story started. The book characters are introduced here. The characters' needs, quirks and conflicts are also established. The subplot is started. No flashbacks are allowed in the first Arc, the reader is only told what he must know. You end the First Arc one with a crisis, a scene that changes everything and sends the main character pursuing a new goal.

The Second Arc. Flashbacks are allowed here but only to emphasize the present. The main character takes one step forward and two steps back towards his goal. Each gain leads to a bigger loss. The subplot deepens. Character conflicts start and grow. A deadline is set where all would be lost if not reached on time.
Arc Two ends with feelings of desperation and helplessness. The character changes his approach from reactive to proactive, from emotionally detached to passionately involved. The character can only move forward with full force.

The Third Arc has a quicker pace. Sentences are shorter and action packed. The story moves into overdrive. Events come together; subplots are resolved in the end. The character's need to reach his goals increases greatly with every step forward. The deadline gets closer and closer. The character is challenged and learns and grows from his experience for the ultimate confrontation.
The Third Arc ends with a crisis, either the lowest point possible or a life and death confrontation to solve the problem.

The Fourth Arc is the grand finale, the confrontation between good and evil and only one will remain standing. Subplots are resolved and support the main plot. The character undergoes internal and external transformation. Something he might not have done at the beginning of the story, he would do now after learning from his experiences and becoming a better person inside and outside. Introduce an ending situation that brings the story to a full circle with the beginning if possible.

Looking back at the Arc structure described here, I can recognize a lot of excellent books and Television episodes that follow that same pattern. I especailly like the part where when Evil has been vanquished, the last scene shows that Evil still exists, weakened, defeated but starting again in a full circle just like the start of the plot.

Writing Fiction - Part II

Writing Fiction - Part I is here.

The setting for your fiction work needs to be interesting. It could be be a peaceful idyllic place where the order of things has been disturbed by a brutal event like a murder, or it could be a bad corrupt world where wrongs happen in every dark corner. You need to take the reader into this new world and have him wanting to return again and again. Do not fill him with details and lose the point of the book which is solving the crime but make him familiar gradually with this new perspective on the hero's world.

Good advice from Carolyn Wheat is "Write what you love", deconstruct the books you read. What did you like in this book? Was it the new world you discovered? Was it the obscure scientific fact that made what was on first sight impossible, possible and plausible? was it the protagonist's overcoming his human failings and succeeding?

Think from the criminal's perspective. What made him commit the crime? how did he plan for it? how did he cover himself? did he get the right guy? is he an insider or outsider to the protagonist's world? Is he still active and commiting more crimes? Once that is clear you can shape your story from the protagonist's view.

The event that the story revolves around does not need to be a crime, it could be a heart broken and the girl's way of getting revenge and finding her prince charming all at the same time. It could be someone righting a wrong in a corrupt world.