On Writing

[tamaranth]

Last night, having self-medicated my cold with pink drink (which works!) I found my brain was too active to get to sleep, so I ended up scribbling notes for exciting new SFish novel-thing. Today, of course, I find it is the same old plot that permeated nearly all my SF short stories -- character goes mad with help of technology -- and thus will probably not bother writing it. The scenario is quite interesting even in the cold light of day, and I'd like to do something with it: but not this, and not yet.

Questions for writerly types (and anyone else with thoughts on the matter):
- do you end up exploring the same themes over and over?
- if you have a tendency to write the same story over and over, how do you stop?
- am I being unnecessarily reductionist?
- how do you plot? ("Where do you get your ideas?")

Comments

[yonmei.livejournal.com]

- do you end up exploring the same themes over and over?

I don't think so, but I'm not sure I'm the best person to ask.

- if you have a tendency to write the same story over and over, how do you stop?

I don't know. See above.

- am I being unnecessarily reductionist?

I think so. If you'd enjoy writing it, do. If not, don;t.

- how do you plot? ("Where do you get your ideas?")

I scribble and see what's on the top of my mind. If it doesn't work, I discard the scribble and try again.

[tamaranth.livejournal.com]

If I just want to write for enjoyment (ideally other people's, as well as my own) there's plenty waiting to be written in my head -- mostly pretty formulaic, but good clean fun nevertheless. This feels like a more original, and perhaps much more entertaining, setting: but I don't know what happens in it, so perhaps I'm just not ready to start writing it.

Re the scribbling, with you on that: I write 3 pages (A5) longhand every (well, nearly every) morning, as per Julia Cameron's The Artist's Way, and it certainly gets ideas flowing. Except this one, which just goes around in circles!

[sbisson.livejournal.com]

Yes I do - most of what I have been working on recently has been on the downside of a Vingean Singularity. I think it's an idea I'm fine-tuning until I'm ready to start work on The Ruins Of Breakfast - short stories exploring the idea from different viewpoints that will help me refine my vision.

Of course that's after-teh-fact rationalisation. Perhaps I just enjoy ending the world...

There's no need to stop writing a story - it sounds like it "wants" to be written...

Plotwise I start with random ideas, images, and I start to write the story that the image is giving me - trying to find out where it came from (hence the deepships stuff I keep dumping in my LJ, as I try to work out how I can write an archaeological space opera in an empty universe with nasty machines as the bad guys).

[tamaranth.livejournal.com]

There's not so much a story wanting to be written as a scenario wanting to be explored. Perhaps I'm just not ready to start writing down events and progressions! Typing up notes and free-associating gave me a nice little 500-word vignette, but I would hesitate to term it a 'story' yet.

OK, so you like ending the world, and I like driving people mad. You may have a point!

[fastfwd.livejournal.com]

Hiya, doll--

If you feel that you're trapped in the same story every time you start writing, then a good way to break out of it is to try a new technique. If you lay out the plot in detail before you start writing, back off and make your outline a lot sketchier and vaguer, forcing yourself to create more as you are writing.

If on the other hand you plot vaguely and sketchily in the first place, try thinking it out in more detail. Or, start planning the story from a different perspective entirely--a minor or even tangential character to begin with. Someone who's bound to get the wrong impression of what's going on because they don't have the right information.

Or start the story in an unlikely place--choose a new place to begin, somewhere you wouldn't have previously--and see what happens.

If you come out with something overly long, don't worry--you can cut it later.

xoxo

[tamaranth.livejournal.com]

I think the problem is that I have a setting rather than a story. In those short stories I mentioned (the last of which was written over a decade ago) the 'plot' was often just a slow exposition of that basic premise: look, look, someone's going (or gone) mad.
I've recently written a fanzine article on why I find SF much more demanding (and perhaps less suited to the way I write now) than historical fiction. I'm wondering if I can fool myself into pretending I'm writing about the past ...

[moral-vacuum.livejournal.com]

But if it'll a good novel, why not write it? You've already explored what the concepts can do in your short stories, but putting it on a broader canvas could take you in unexpected directions.

[tamaranth.livejournal.com]

Not sure it is a good novel: I don't know what happens in it, because really what I sketched last night was a single scene, without any resolution. Lack of plot can work in some literary settings, but SF (and SF-reading audience) is more demanding.

[moral-vacuum.livejournal.com]

But how do you know until you write it? It does seem that you can't let this idea go until you've worked it through. And by working on it, you might find that this segment is just part of a wider plot. And if it's crap but marketable, sell it under a pseudonym...

[jhaelan.livejournal.com]

- do you end up exploring the same themes over and over?

Yes, most certainly. Usualy pseudo-philosophical commentary of the most-uninformed sort

- if you have a tendency to write the same story over and over, how do you stop?

Don't, it's just the same themes thankfully

- am I being unnecessarily reductionist?

Potentially, yes. People, specifically whom I cannot remember, have claimed there are only fourteen basic plots (or somthing similar). Potentially true but there are ways and means of exploring things that make it interesting

- how do you plot? ("Where do you get your ideas?")

Everything. That's my problem, too many idea, not enough finishing

[puabi.livejournal.com]

I hope you don't mind that I've friended you. When I saw Paul Hazel under your interests I was happy; then when I saw your Amazon wishlist I was happier. So. :)