To have a beautiful written style is always nice.
But to have a damn good story is essential.
– Joanne Harris
Month: January 2019
haiku 422
food worker
shows us her burn
from making the rice
Quotable 304
I revise toward clarity and away from difficulty,
wanting the poem to appear to be written with ease.
– Ted
Kooser
haiku 421
dentist –
people with perfect teeth
smile from the walls
Quotable 303
Men love women. It’s not an original idea. But
if you somehow write a terrific novel about it, then by a literary
sleight of hand it becomes absolutely original.
– Umberto Eco
haiku 420
ice storm –
power outage map
lights up
Quotable 302
Finish the damn book. Nothing else matters. Stop
second-guessing yourself and write it through to the end. You don’t
know what you have until you’ve finished it. You don’t know how
to fix it until it’s all down on the page.
– Lauren Beukes
haiku 419
late evening drive –
red traffic lights
line my path
Pen to Paper: The Business of Writing Fiction
Most people, when they start writing, don’t think of it as a business. They’re focused on their art and their craft, which makes perfect sense. It may be a stereotype, but I’ve found a lot of truth in the observation that creative people are stymied by numbers and the more mundane, practical activities in life. We do better when we’re in our own heads, creating our own worlds and our own visions.
But as Kameron Hurley shows us, if you want to be a professional or semi-pro or even part-time writer for money, you’ve got to think of yourself as a business owner. If you want to share your writing for free, as I’ve done here at Catsignal, then you can skip this. Otherwise, take good note of what Hurley has learned from hard experience so you won’t also have to learn the business end of writing the hard way.
Quotable 301
Craft is what enables you to be successful when you’re not inspired.
– Brian Eno