Q: Where to get a new brain & how to learn from mistakes

jinkang · Oct 1, 2009

I tell myself that I should write short stories and learn the craft...but clearly, what I really should be doing is go shop around for a new brain.

Barring that, I'd like to know how to learn from my writing mistakes. How do you do it? (or how did you do it?)

This year, I've finally started revising my drafts. But as Uncle Jim said on another thread, I feel like I'm not learning from any of my mistakes.

I write, I revise, and few months go by. I finally produce what I think is a solid piece of a short story. A good yarn, if you will. And of course, at this point I have forgotten my previous critiques.

So humming along, I submit the story to my first reader or send it out to critters. With me so far?

The readers know bad stories at the first glance, of course, and my story comes back with lines after lines of corrections (I do thank the readers, btw).

There are tons of grammar, plot, characterization, and pace issues. (that's pretty much everything a story is, I think.)

So obviously, I haven't learned much...and I do not want to spend another month or two writing and revising and thinking I've learned something...all the while just repeating this horrible cycle over and over and over.

So again, if there are any survivors from this vicious cycle, please drop me a hint on how you got out.

Thanks!

RJK · Oct 1, 2009

I hate to burst your balloon Jin, but it's the month or two of revising and thinking about your mistakes that help you learn. You become a better writer by practicing good writing. Correcting your mistakes is good writing.

jinkang · Oct 1, 2009

RJK said:
I hate to burst your balloon Jin, but it's the month or two of revising and thinking about your mistakes that help you learn. You become a better writer by practicing good writing. Correcting your mistakes is good writing.

Thanks for the reply! And no, you didn't burst my bubbles.

I guess what I want are some technical answers.

Would keeping a list of mistakes I had made in front of me help? Instead of putting up the whole red-ink smudged MS in front of me, I'm thinking about categorizing the issues, with as much detail to fit on a single line for each.

I guess what I want to know is HOW you learned from your mistakes? I don't want to just correct this story based on what someone else tells me, then turn around and make the same mistake on the next piece... (my bad memory doesn't help, of course)

If I don't make same mistakes twice, I think the months of thinking wouldn't feel so wasteful.

DeleyanLee · Oct 1, 2009

jinkang said:
Would keeping a list of mistakes I had made in front of me help?

Instead of a list of mistakes, how about a list of things you should think about as you're writing and/or before you hand it over to anyone? Accompany this with any grammar hints that connect to the problem.

For instance, a friend of mine had the world's largest problem with commas. She simply could NOT figure out where they went, so she put them in tons of places they didn't go and rarely in the places where they should be. What she did was type the comma rules from her favorite style manual, (reading it aloud as she typed--extra reenforcement), and then printed up a copy (tiny print) and kept it taped to her monitor until she KNEW them inside and out. Took her years to get to that place of confidence--some things are like that for some people--but now she knows them and she doesn't need the reminder.

That works for some people, and what do you lose by trying? Pretty much nothing.

But if you do this, focus on only one or two things until you learn them. Having your entire monitor coated with things to learn and remember is overwhelming and self-defeating. One step (and lesson) at a time.

I guess what I want to know is HOW you learned from your mistakes? I don't want to just correct this story based on what someone else tells me, then turn around and make the same mistake on the next piece... (my bad memory doesn't help, of course)

If I don't make same mistakes twice, I think the months of thinking wouldn't feel so wasteful.

How I learned? By getting kicked in the pants time and time again by my betas until I realized that the time to think about much of this stuff was DURING the writing process, instead of AFTER the writing process. This means that I do extensive revising every time I write a scene, sometimes when I write a paragraph, to make sure I've got all the bases covered. Yeah, it means that I write slowly--but what I have is GOOD instead of fatally flawed.

Then I go through afterward and do it all again, just to make sure that I've gotten everything covered before I even think about handing it over to my betas. If I'm still making the same mistakes, then I open a discussion with them to see if it's exactly the same or if the flaws have altered from before. Dialogue with good betas is priceless.

Good luck. It won't be easy, but you've got one testimony that it's well worth it.

Elonna · Oct 1, 2009

My grammar is often times atrocious. I don't worry about it so much when I'm drafting the story.

One suggestion is when you finish your revisions to the point you think the piece is ready to go to the readers, don't send it out. Just step away from it for a week or two and work on the next thing. Then go back and re-read it. You've then had time to become more detached and can look at it with a more critical eye yourself. Things that didn't seem obvious before (Because in your mind you knew what you meant) will be more obvious to you. Reading the story aloud also helps with punctuation. Be sure when you read it, you exaggerate the punctuation marks you have so you know if it sounds right.

HTH

jinkang · Oct 1, 2009

DeleyanLee said:
...then printed up a copy (tiny print) and kept it taped to her monitor until she KNEW them inside and out. Took her years to get to that place of confidence--some things are like that for some people--but now she knows them and she doesn't need the reminder.

Hmm.. That's actually a pretty neat idea! Even though I can always look it up, seeing it in front of me should definitely help.

DeleyanLee said:
Then I go through afterward and do it all again, just to make sure that I've gotten everything covered before I even think about handing it over to my betas. If I'm still making the same mistakes, then I open a discussion with them to see if it's exactly the same or if the flaws have altered from before. Dialogue with good betas is priceless.

I always thought revising 'while' writing was BAD... I'm guessing you do this UNTIL you are good enough? Or does this just change the style of your writing process?

jinkang · Oct 1, 2009

Elonna said:
Be sure when you read it, you exaggerate the punctuation marks you have so you know if it sounds right.

I think that's why I need a new brain. I actually revised the story, waited a few days, then actually had the PC read it back to me. Couple of times.

And each time, I found a word or two wrong but it seemed to flow.

So at this point in time, I don't trust my ears. And my brain.

stephenf · Oct 1, 2009

Can't help with the new brain. However, as for "how do you learn?" I do not think there is a ,do it this way and you will become a good writer .Not many writers are born fully formed and have to develop their talent by, studying all aspects of writing , reading as many books by as many authors / genres as possible and with the time leftover,write.

Danthia · Oct 1, 2009

Read. Study. Write. Find the mistakes. Start over. We learn by doing and that takes time and practice. A good writer's ear takes a while to develop (unless you're just born with it). It can be overwhelming to try to do it all, so you might try picking a few things and working on them until you get them right. Look for threads on the forums, read blogs, magazines, how to books, whatever info you can find on that topic. Study books you admire and analyze how they do it. Highlight and make notes on the pages if it helps (I did this).

A good crit group can also help, and they'll help you pinpoint what needs fixing in your work.

sunandshadow · Oct 1, 2009

You can ask your beta readers, "Is there a type of problem you are seeing in my work over and over again?" Then, when you are doing your self-edit before sending your new story to beta readers, you try to look for that problem. Me for example, I have recently learned that my sentences and paragraphs always tend to be too long, so I make an editing pass where I look for long ones and chop them into smaller bits.

DeleyanLee · Oct 1, 2009

jinkang said:
I always thought revising 'while' writing was BAD... I'm guessing you do this UNTIL you are good enough? Or does this just change the style of your writing process?

It's only "BAD" if you use it as an excuse not to finish what you're working on. I know many published authors who revise as they write. It allows them to have a very polished first draft and seriously cuts down on revisions.

Mara · Oct 1, 2009

Here's what I've done to solve my past problems. (I'm not very experienced in narrative writing, but I'm pretty good at analytical writing. My old enemies were overusing the semicolon, trying to use section headings as topic sentences, and citing at the end of paragraphs.)

It's hard to correct a lot of bad habits at once. Pick a few of the worst ones, write them down, and work on not making those mistakes in the first place. It will slow your writing at first, but it's worth it.

Once you've got those bad habits replaced by good habits, find some more common mistakes. Write them down. Practice writing without making those mistakes.

Repeat as necessary.

Some habits may be very difficult to break. If they're especially harmful habits, you'll just have to fight through them. If they're not as bad as other habits, focus on the more important habits first. (For example, I was taught to type two spaces after every period, because my keyboarding teacher was born in the 1800s or something. Two spaces has become the wrong format now, so I have to use Find/Replace to fix them after I finish writing. I'll work on it eventually, but it's not as important as my habit of "telling" instead of "showing.")

Ruv Draba · Oct 1, 2009

You're right, Jinkang. You do indeed need a new brain -- or at least a new mind, and so do most people who try to write.

You need a mind that observes, and doesn't just see, that can describe the particular and not just put things in boxes, that can taste words and not just gobble them. That takes retraining.

While a writer's mind can publish stories, I don't believe that trying to publish stories is very good training for a writer's mind. I believe that observation exercises, reading and critique are much better training.

Beyond the power to observe, the most important sense a writer can develop is to know when his writing is falling short without anyone needing to tell him. We develop this sense by reading and analysing a lot of other writing -- especially very good writing. Once we have it we don't need to check our manuscript against rules. We check it against how it makes us think and feel instead.

Until we have that sense, revising our own work is worthless. But once we have that sense, we can start learning technique and experimenting.

My suggestion: if you feel like you need a new mind, don't keep a list of mistakes by your screen. Keep a pile of books by your bed instead. Add to that a notepad and go for walks. Take note of the particular, the different, the unusual. Try to find why your home, your street different from any other. What makes this pedestrian at this time and place unforgettable. What makes this moment in your life unique.

Hope that helps.

Libbie · Oct 1, 2009

Have you tried critiquing others' work? I've found that to be a great way to learn. In addition to what the other folks here have already told you, of course.

jinkang · Oct 1, 2009

Libbie said:
Have you tried critiquing others' work? I've found that to be a great way to learn. In addition to what the other folks here have already told you, of course.

Hi Libbie.

I have joined critters early this year and have critiqued other people's pieces. I do notice what's good and bad in other people's writings now...though it's quite tricky with my own piece.

When I leave my own piece alone and come back to it after a few months, I'm too horrified to pick it up and revise it. :tongue

For the time being, I'm marking my story with red pens using the critiques from critters. So far, seeing it on the hard copy makes a lot of difference. With more than a few, I'm hoping to cover the pages with red.

And I also realized I didn't read aloud as thoroughly as I should have.

Thanks for the tip~

jinkang · Oct 1, 2009

Ruv Draba said:
My suggestion: if you feel like you need a new mind, don't keep a list of mistakes by your screen. Keep a pile of books by your bed instead. Add to that a notepad and go for walks. Take note of the particular, the different, the unusual. Try to find why your home, your street different from any other. What makes this pedestrian at this time and place unforgettable. What makes this moment in your life unique.

Hope that helps.

Hi Ruv Draba. Thanks for the tip. It's a very different suggestion and perhaps somewhat along the line of my own concerns.

I'm thinking of 'typing' a good book. Think this aligns with your suggestions?

jinkang · Oct 1, 2009

Mara said:
Some habits may be very difficult to break. If they're especially harmful habits, you'll just have to fight through them. If they're not as bad as other habits, focus on the more important habits first. (For example, I was taught to type two spaces after every period, because my keyboarding teacher was born in the 1800s or something. Two spaces has become the wrong format now, so I have to use Find/Replace to fix them after I finish writing. I'll work on it eventually, but it's not as important as my habit of "telling" instead of "showing.")

Hi Mara,

I had the same issue...though it wasn't that hard to leave off that extra space.

I do think I'll put up a short (less then two or three) list of my biggest issues so I'm aware of them when I write. I'll probably even use Deleyan Lee's idea and throw some definitions/rules/examples even...as long as they are not too long.

But before that, I'll probably go through the critiques and figure out what should be on that list to begin with--I don't think staring at it by myself will help since if that could have improved the piece, I wouldn't be having this issue in the first place.

Thanks!

Bufty · Oct 2, 2009

Matera the Mad · Oct 2, 2009

Go through your work looking for ONE thing. See how many variations on one type of mistake you can find. Concentrating on a single issue can be of more use than shotgunning for everything, to make you more aware of it. Awareness is the key. You need to change your habits of writing, and a habit is something that we do without being aware of it.

Repeat as needed for each item on your hit-list (and a list is a good thing if you have more than a few bad habits!).

Telstar · Oct 2, 2009

I'll never stop suggesting The Elements of Style by Strunk and White for English grammar issues. It covers basically all.
For the rest, it may takes YEARS not months to write good, and some mistakes you'll tend to always make, because they weren't corrected during your school years.

Ruv Draba · Oct 2, 2009

jinkang said:
I'm thinking of 'typing' a good book. Think this aligns with your suggestions?

If you mean transcribing a good book -- copying it word for word, that's a method some writers use when they want to study voice. Like copying the Mona Lisa stroke by stroke it will teach you what strokes the artist made, but not how the he saw the subject or why he did it that way. Copying a book will teach you the vocabulary and syntax of the writer, but not how to design good characters, write tight dialogue or build a tense scene.

If you want to write well, there's no alternative to reading widely, reading deeply and thinking about what you've read. If you read thousands of books that's an investment of hundreds of thousands of hours of your time. That plus thousands of hours more of experimentation is what it takes to write well.

Here's how you need to read to study writing craft:

Identify the main characters. What defines them? What makes them unusual? What are their internal conflicts? What are their external conflicts? Why might the author choose these particular characters? Which are the characters that are most interesting? Why? Which are the boring ones? Why?

Break the story into scenes -- events in which characters set goals. For each scene identify the goals, any opposition to those goals, any disasters the character may risk, the choices the character faces, how the scene resolves. Find the crisis. Identify the scenes that work well; the ones that don't. Venture opinion as to why they work well or don't.
Each time a character changes its goal or beliefs, stop and read carefully. Look for where the author foreshadows the change, justifies it. See whether you understand the change and believe it.

For each exchange of dialogue, see how the author crafts the different voices of the characters. See what things are included in dialogue and what is left out. See whether each line of dialogue contains conflict. Identify the lines you like. Think about why you like them. Identify the lines you don't. Think about why you don't.

Each time a character is introduced, stop and study how the author does it. What descriptions are physical? What are psychological? What impressions or impact does it make on you?

Each time the author introduces setting, see what emotions are being constructed. See whether setting has an impact on the psychology of its characters, or the mood of the story. Try to guess why the author draws our attention to some things in the setting but not others.

Look at how the writer constructs sentences -- how long are the sentences? What sorts of words are used? Are any words unusual? How do these sentences create mood? Reveal ironies? Foreshadow events?

At the end of the story stop and reflect on how each of the characters change, why they change. Ask what would happen to each of them a year later. Ask if there is anything still left unresolved?

If you do all that thinking on a badly-written book then you're just wasting your time. So don't just go to the bestsellers and don't just hit one genre shelf. Read across genres, read across the mainstream, and keep a look out for old books (30 years or older) that are still selling -- there'll be a reason that they are. Some of these books may be called classics, some may not. But writing that can keep a book through decades of reprints will have something to teach you.

Once you've done all that on a dozen great books, do it for fellow writers. See where you think they're going well, where you think they're going badly. Rather than just saying whether you liked the story and picking on spelling and grammar, try to see how the story is constructed and revealed and talk about what's working and what's not.

And keep reading.

Best of luck.

Q: Where to get a new brain & how to learn from mistakes

jinkang

Learning

RJK

Sheriff Bullwinkle the Poet says:

jinkang

Learning

DeleyanLee

Writing Anarchist

Elonna

I'm a dork

jinkang

Learning

jinkang

Learning

stephenf

Danthia

sunandshadow

Impractical Fantasy Animal

DeleyanLee

Writing Anarchist

Mara

Clever User Title

Ruv Draba

Libbie

Worst song played on ugliest guitar

jinkang

Learning

jinkang

Learning

jinkang

Learning

Bufty

Where have the last ten years gone?

Matera the Mad

Bartender, gimme a Linux Mint

Telstar

I create people

Ruv Draba