» There’s No Such Thing as a Fake Reader Three people walk into a bar: the first is carrying a book of experimental poetry, the second holds a YA vampire novel, and the last sits down and opens up a Victorian classic. Who is the “real reader”? Writers, understandably, are always seeking advice for how to better connect to readers. An appreciation of readers as diverse individuals with different tastes should be a basic tenet of criticism. Take, for example, this painfully un-self-aware NPR review of Mark Doten’s experimental Iraq war novel, The Infernal: [The Infernal is] a novel written not for readers but for those who love to argue about the novel-as-object more than they love the words. I don’t want to debate the merits of The Infernal here—it’s gotten mostly very positive reviews, and I, full disclosure, know Mark Doten personally—but this is the perfect example of a flaw common in today’s literary and cultural criticism. I want to make it clear here that I think intelligent arts criticism is important and valuable.
MUJERES QUE ESCRIBEN; TODA UNA AVENTURA EXISTENCIAL Por Mónica Maristainmarzo 8, 2015- 00:00h Mujeres que escriben, toda una aventura existencial. Foto: Francisco Cañedo, SinEmbargo “Del libro y del hijo no se dudan”, dijo la fantástica Marguerite Duras, ejemplo de una vida dedicada a la escritura, la gran aventura que para muchos seres humanos ha constituido una posibilidad de trascender la futilidad existencial, aunque sea por un segundo, probablemente de manera ilusoria y tan abstracta como inasible. En el Día de la Mujer, un festejo que destaca el lugar que el género ocupa en un sistema social que ofrece todavía muchas desigualdades, quisimos celebrar la presencia de las escritoras con una pregunta: ¿Qué es la escritura para ti: qué te ha dado, qué te ha quitado? No era nuestro interés acudir al cliché de explicar la condición de género, porque pensamos que ese cliché ahonda precisamente las desigualdades. Como toda selección se construye también por las ausencias. CLAUDIA MARCUCETTI. LAURA MARTÍNEZ-BELLI. SANDRA LORENZANO. Esperanza.
8 Tips For Creating Great Stories From George R.R. Martin, Junot Diaz, And Other Top Storytellers What the hell is a Story Lizard? In Wonderbook: The Guide to Creating Imaginative Fiction (Abrams Books, October 15), Story Lizards join Prologue Fish and other infographic helpmates designed to banish dry textual analysis in favor of a kicking, screaming, slithering approach to storytelling creativity. Author Jeff Vandermeer, a three-time Fantasy World Award-winning novelist who co-directs the Shared Worlds teen writing camp, says "The way we're taught to analyze fiction is to break down and do a kind of autopsy. But I think writers need to be more like naturalists or zoologists when they study story because then you're looking at how all the elements fit together." Enter the Story Lizard, above, illustrated by Jeremy Zerfoss. As Vandermeer tells Co.Create, "A recurring thing in Wonderbook is to think of stories as being more like living creatures than machines." Neil Gaiman. Read on for a sampling of Wonderbook tips about how to craft mind-blowing stories. Tell, don't show Name Wisely
Building the World of Your Screenplay: Your First 10 Pages Click to tweet this article to your friends and followers! As religious lore has it, God took 6 days to build the world… You have 10 pages. You’ve all heard the horror stories of producers who only read the first 10 or 20 pages, and if they’re not hooked, intrigued and impressed, they toss the script. And unfortunately, those stories are true. So you need to make sure your first pages accomplish all the things necessary to keep a reader’s interests. You need to paint a picture in your first few pages that make it clear your story is visual and your writing is interesting. You are the God of your script’s world. These details are not only what’s going to suck us in and make us believe that this world actually exists, but it’s also what’s going to show off your voice, creativity and originality. Always set up the most implausible and outlandish part of your world first. No matter what genre or type of story you’re writing, every world has rules that must be set up. At a Glance Related Posts:
The Basics – Better Storytelling The BasicsIndex of Articles The Basics of Storytelling by William F. Nolan As a storyteller, you must begin by creating a protagonist who is real, three dimensional, with genuine emotions that play out over the course of your narrative. Your range is … The Blank Page – Where To Begin? Start At The End Have you ever read a story with an intriguing plot, compelling characters and great action, but when it came down to the end of the story, the author dropped the ball? What Makes A Great Hero? How Setting Affects Your Story Some writers make the mistake of ignoring where their stories take place. Lead With The Theme Stories with a well developed theme are rare. Desire: The Spine Of Your Story Some stories lack zest, gusto… oomph! Need: The Heart Of Your Story Many writers fail to notice the emotional undercurrent in their stories. Identification Have you ever read a story or seen a movie where you couldn’t “get into” the main character. Writer’s Block – Feed Your Muse!
Reel Story: Most Common Reasons Why Scripts Are Rejected Whenever a script is submitted to the industry, it is passed off to a reader for analysis. The reader will give the script a “recommend,” a “consider” or a “pass.” And unless it gets a recommend, probably no one else is going to look at it. So how many scripts get a recommend? About two percent. Which means roughly ninety-eight percent of spec scripts are dead on arrival. Why do so many writers make these kinds of errors, often over and over? 1. I have found that roughly five percent of writers naturally write in professional-level conflict, by which I mean the kind of conflict that hooks a reader and makes them want to keep reading. The good news is that professional-level conflict is a learnable skill based on techniques that can be practiced and mastered. If you don’t naturally write this way, as most writers don’t, I can’t emphasize enough how important it is that you make the investment to train yourself in these skills. 2. 3. 4. 5. 6. 7. 8. 9. 10. The Key to Success Step one.
The Neuroscience Of "Harry Potter" Let's do a casual experiment. Here's a brief passage from the first book in some obscure fiction series called Harry Potter: A bush on the edge of the clearing quivered. … Then, out of the shadows, a hooded figure came crawling across the ground like some stalking beast. Harry, Malfoy, and Fang stood transfixed. And here's another passage from the final book of the series: He got up off the floor, stretched and moved across to his desk. Which passage did you find more engaging? The results of our experiment, that action is more engrossing than scene-setting, may be unsurprising. Hsu and collaborators recruited test participants to enter a brain scanner and read passages of Harry Potter (translated into German) about four lines long. As expected, the fearful passages received significantly higher ratings for immersion than the neutral ones—more likely to get readers lost in the book. The results support what the researchers call the "fiction feeling hypothesis" of reading immersion.
The Taming of the Shrew: Writing Female Characters & Archetypes One of the biggest topics discussed in entertainment this year, especially the last few months, is the decrease in the number of women in the industry and especially the lack of female directors and female protagonists in cinema. Despite there being a number of films with female leads that have become massive hits, there are still far fewer produced than those with male leads. Studios are still passing on female protagonist projects and it’s our job to figure out why instead of just bemoaning that it happens. Recently, at the Final Draft Screenwriting Awards, the infamous Nancy Meyers labeled 2013 as the Year of the Shrew. That with few exceptions, most of the lead female characters in films last year were basically shrew-like bitches that no one could like and advised that writers “should write women you want to know, instead of run away from.” The more I thought about it, the more I realized – she’s not wrong. Cate Blanchett in ‘Blue Jasmine’ Were some of them complex characters? 1. 2.