My new phone is here! I've been busy playing on it all evening, but did want to blog these thoughts before I forget them.
I watched The Electric Horseman last night via Netflix streaming. There was once a time when I loved this movie. However, last night, as I was watching it, I couldn't help but thinking how silly the entire premise was. I mean, here's this horse that was the premier Thoroughbred racehorse in America. Supposedly worth $13 million. Some company has bought him and has him stoned, on steroids, and hawking breakfast cereal.
In real life, a horse that valuable would never have been sold in the first place. He would have retired from racing and would be living the rest of his days in comfort, siring many offspring. He'd never have become what amounts to a circus clown.
I mean, seriously could you imagine Secretariat prancing across a stage in Las Vegas with Christmas lights all over him? Nope. Never would have happened. I mean, it's a pretty good story, if you can get past how unrealistic --how unbelievable-- it is.
Which kind of made me think about Tolkien's works. Hobbits, Elves, Wizards, Goblins, magic rings, Middle Earth...purely fantasy, yet fantastic. Every bit of it is totally believable. When you are reading it, it's not fiction. It's reality.
It's history.
That's what makes the difference between a good story, and a great one.
Which brings me to my point. I've kind of been wanting to take some creative writing classes. The local CC doesn't offer any at their campus, and I don't know if I'd want to drive all the way to Oxford. I'm thinking of looking online for some, but have been known to be terrible about keeping up with such things on my own.
Like the Latin and Italian lessons I was going to learn. Yeah.
But anyway, I can't afford classes right now. Not for something that would just add to my own personal enjoyment. Maybe one day.
Just not today.
2 comments:
Fiction is always better than reality - well maybe not. Sometimes those Hollywood writers are just plain silly, but they are able to evoke emotions from their audience - who do not seem to know the reality anyway. It's kind of like war movies. Those of us who are not soldiers do not know the difference in what is real and what is silly. But real soldiers probably scoff at most war movies. I think it's best to only write about what you really know.
You don't need classes Becky to do creative writing, you just have to DO IT. You've already got your blog for nonfiction/journal genre
Writer's block is not necessarily an issue either, just put the work aside until you get some inspiration, at which time you already have your notebooks to jot in.
You don't even have to worry about "where do I start" or "this sucks" because no one has to see your work but you. Just start somewhere, one paragraph or just one sentence at a time. Write what you know and build from there. How does one eat an elephant?
Writing fiction is almost easier because you can base it loosely on real life, but edit details or plot based on where you want the story to go, not on how it may have actually happened IRL. The only limits are in the writer's imagination
Later on, after you have something written, you can find a professional editor or class to learn the "official" skills and polish up what you've already done
And now that e-books are more popular than traditional books, it has never before been easier to get published. All one needs these days to sell their own work is a PDF of it, a Paypal acct, and a blog or website to advertise their book...all for minimal or even zero cost to the writer.
I know what I'm talking about. I've got almost 400 pages that I wrote from scratch saved on MS Word; started it back around 2002ish, and pick on it every once in awhile, adding a little here, editing a little there, etc. I've also got quite a nice collection of original haiku too. Both writings are just for my eyes only though (or after I'm dead), so sorry ;)
There ya go, you just had your first lesson in Creative Writing 101. No more excuses. :)
Post a Comment