Write What You Know
Apr. 28th, 2006 02:17 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
ellyssianFunny thing, whether it's writing or music or nearly anything else, there's a tendency to categorize and divide and label. To those with an interest in a genre, there are a multitude of subgenres that are quite obviously so specific and unique as to be deserving of their own little cubby hole with their own label tacked on. To those with only a passing interest, those subgenres blur - they may know of some, but the definitions of the set and members thereof are indistinct. From a further vantage, they are all the genre, and, likely, they are a conglomeration of the worst of the genre, and are hideously icky and owners of other such technically descriptive adjectives.
For example, the pioneering NWOBHM band Iron Maiden is, from a vast distance, either noise, or slightly more kindly, rock. However, the garden variety fan of mainstream rock looks with as much distaste upon a band that is clearly unlike Don Henley or Sting - that's not rock, they'd rightly say, that's heavy metal. Of course, Poison and Winger might also be considered metal bands by that same person, and yet the vast majority of the fans of those particular bands - maybe they call themselves pop metal, or hair metal - think Maiden is much too heavy and/or complex for their tastes. Some might consider them thrash, or maybe pre-thrash, as they certainly provided the influence for what would become the thrash metal scene, but they really don't play it. Some - myself once included - might label them as prog metal, or, again, a predecessor of prog metal. Their concepts and song lyrics and original style certainly were a progression from a baser form of metal, however, they haven't continually evolved from that point, and reuse a lot of similar musical structures, which is rather the antithesis of progressive. I've since settled on the term power metal, which describes that kind of pre-prog metal that bridges the gap between straight forward metal and something more progressive. Powerful, but not speed or thrash. Of course, they are also a NWOBHM band, as I labeled them at the outset - New Wave of British Heavy Metal - a label that, along with power metal, is one frequently applied to them.
I'm not big on fan fiction itself, not as it stands these days, with all that it seems to imply that it's solely a vehicle for a reader to get a character in some poor writer's work in bed with another character from either that same work or from another work by the same author in the same slice of reality, or from somewhere completely different. I'm sure it's a subgenre, really, but it's such a large portion of sub, that it seems to overshadow anything else and become synonymous with the broader term. On a sartain writing site I frequented once upon a time, I accidentally categorized some of my work as "fan fiction," and boy, were those who searched in desperation for some steamy stuff frustrated when they read In Quest of Knowledge, which was purposefully designed as a Lovecraftian tale. The forthcoming piece from The Dreaming - forth and fourth, and last of what has been written for that world - makes nods in the direction of both Lovecraft and Neil Gaiman, and also received a note or two regarding how it wasn't really fan fiction, as absolutely not one of the cats of Ulthar slept with my lead character, nor did he or they get it on with the lady cat who spoke of the power of change of dreams.
That only has peripheral application to my point here. One *other* generalization about fan fiction, is that it's full of readers inserting themselves into the tale. The reader-as-writer (and I use this terminology to differentiate them from the writer of the work they are admiring) can be discovered through the perfection of the character in question - they want to immerse themselves in this created world, and they naturally want the best for themselves, so they happen to be exceptionally good looking, talented at whatever obscure skill is needed, and able to jump into bed with any member of the gender(s) of their choice, and so forth.
Why do I ponder on this, you may wonder? Well, in Red, that is my fear of stroke showing up (sadly, a pre-existing condition to my diagnosis as one with an increased risk of just such a thing.) And many pieces started off as a dream in which I was originally the central character, but I altered it upon writing it down, replacing me, as it were. Purge, An Inheritance of Steel, and The Photographer were all like this. Sometimes my dreams can get cinematic and I am not physically in the dream, although sometimes I briefly bounce from character to character in regards to viewpoint - I experience it as them, even if only for a scene. Of the Leaves and of the Waves was a particularly intense example of this - every single bit of it, if not every word, was in the dream; all I did was transcribe it and hope I managed to collect at least a portion of the experience I had watching it in my sleep. Pieces of Peace will seem like even more of a Mary Sue - it was a dream that was wishful thinking regarding a certain young lady and a certain tension anticipated with her father - neither a relationship nor a duel to the death resulted from that situation in real life, though.
Continuing on, I can recall reading the advice for authors to "write what you know" about three and a quarter brazillion times. I'm some that some literal-minded (regardless of how literary they may be) will look at that and wonder how they can follow that advice and still come up with the next best seller without actually murdering someone or create an instant cult classic sci fi piece without ever having been off-planet even once (unless you count jumping really high...) or create the epic fantasy despite never having succeeded to slay a dragon, or even save a damsel in distress.
Being writers, it'd be a real shame if anyone actually took such advice literally - we all know better than to believe everything we read, but we certainly want to try not to let that happen to our readers.
One way to do this is to write what we know - to insert ourselves into the story, in a sense. Whenever a character quotes some obscure bit of trivia or discusses some other random factoid that was dropped in to give life to the character, chances are it's something the author is familiar with. Maybe a piece of specific knowledge that isn't common, or a snippet of a conversation overheard; a favorite turn of phrase, or some other minutia from the author's life - parts of their own self slip into each and every character, even if they've never done half the things the character has done; even if they'd never want to do anything or be like the character in any way, shape, or form.
I suppose if one wrote what they didn't know, it would be an awfully short and/or awful story. How can you explain or describe that which you haven't seen, even if it was only a glimmer in your imagination? And when you insert yourself, perhaps too deeply, into the story, how do you keep that creation from following your every whim, when it is that very whim that is all that the creation is? Does knowing of count as knowing as far as that advice is concerned?
When a beloved character of yours begins doing very stupid - most likely fatal things - and you're getting frustrated because they keep refusing every out your offering them, how does that reflect on your own sense of being?
And when you write something Great and Terrible, how do you explain to the concerned voices asking if that really happened that it's just a work of fiction?
That's what's great about writing - you can write about stuff that never happened, and still have it filled with truth; you can write what you know without ever having walked that particular path; and you can Mary Sue the hell out of your characters without the readers knowing, although they may call you on the ones you had or want nothing to do with. Powerful stuff, don't take it while operating heavy machinery.
I'm a bit doubtful that any Pen can stand up to a Sword with a decent edge, but I'm fairly sure that when a bit of Story rumbles through like a steamroller, the sword will be broken, and the pen will be bleeding ink out of its flattened corpse.
For example, the pioneering NWOBHM band Iron Maiden is, from a vast distance, either noise, or slightly more kindly, rock. However, the garden variety fan of mainstream rock looks with as much distaste upon a band that is clearly unlike Don Henley or Sting - that's not rock, they'd rightly say, that's heavy metal. Of course, Poison and Winger might also be considered metal bands by that same person, and yet the vast majority of the fans of those particular bands - maybe they call themselves pop metal, or hair metal - think Maiden is much too heavy and/or complex for their tastes. Some might consider them thrash, or maybe pre-thrash, as they certainly provided the influence for what would become the thrash metal scene, but they really don't play it. Some - myself once included - might label them as prog metal, or, again, a predecessor of prog metal. Their concepts and song lyrics and original style certainly were a progression from a baser form of metal, however, they haven't continually evolved from that point, and reuse a lot of similar musical structures, which is rather the antithesis of progressive. I've since settled on the term power metal, which describes that kind of pre-prog metal that bridges the gap between straight forward metal and something more progressive. Powerful, but not speed or thrash. Of course, they are also a NWOBHM band, as I labeled them at the outset - New Wave of British Heavy Metal - a label that, along with power metal, is one frequently applied to them.
I'm not big on fan fiction itself, not as it stands these days, with all that it seems to imply that it's solely a vehicle for a reader to get a character in some poor writer's work in bed with another character from either that same work or from another work by the same author in the same slice of reality, or from somewhere completely different. I'm sure it's a subgenre, really, but it's such a large portion of sub, that it seems to overshadow anything else and become synonymous with the broader term. On a sartain writing site I frequented once upon a time, I accidentally categorized some of my work as "fan fiction," and boy, were those who searched in desperation for some steamy stuff frustrated when they read In Quest of Knowledge, which was purposefully designed as a Lovecraftian tale. The forthcoming piece from The Dreaming - forth and fourth, and last of what has been written for that world - makes nods in the direction of both Lovecraft and Neil Gaiman, and also received a note or two regarding how it wasn't really fan fiction, as absolutely not one of the cats of Ulthar slept with my lead character, nor did he or they get it on with the lady cat who spoke of the power of change of dreams.
That only has peripheral application to my point here. One *other* generalization about fan fiction, is that it's full of readers inserting themselves into the tale. The reader-as-writer (and I use this terminology to differentiate them from the writer of the work they are admiring) can be discovered through the perfection of the character in question - they want to immerse themselves in this created world, and they naturally want the best for themselves, so they happen to be exceptionally good looking, talented at whatever obscure skill is needed, and able to jump into bed with any member of the gender(s) of their choice, and so forth.
Why do I ponder on this, you may wonder? Well, in Red, that is my fear of stroke showing up (sadly, a pre-existing condition to my diagnosis as one with an increased risk of just such a thing.) And many pieces started off as a dream in which I was originally the central character, but I altered it upon writing it down, replacing me, as it were. Purge, An Inheritance of Steel, and The Photographer were all like this. Sometimes my dreams can get cinematic and I am not physically in the dream, although sometimes I briefly bounce from character to character in regards to viewpoint - I experience it as them, even if only for a scene. Of the Leaves and of the Waves was a particularly intense example of this - every single bit of it, if not every word, was in the dream; all I did was transcribe it and hope I managed to collect at least a portion of the experience I had watching it in my sleep. Pieces of Peace will seem like even more of a Mary Sue - it was a dream that was wishful thinking regarding a certain young lady and a certain tension anticipated with her father - neither a relationship nor a duel to the death resulted from that situation in real life, though.
Continuing on, I can recall reading the advice for authors to "write what you know" about three and a quarter brazillion times. I'm some that some literal-minded (regardless of how literary they may be) will look at that and wonder how they can follow that advice and still come up with the next best seller without actually murdering someone or create an instant cult classic sci fi piece without ever having been off-planet even once (unless you count jumping really high...) or create the epic fantasy despite never having succeeded to slay a dragon, or even save a damsel in distress.
Being writers, it'd be a real shame if anyone actually took such advice literally - we all know better than to believe everything we read, but we certainly want to try not to let that happen to our readers.
One way to do this is to write what we know - to insert ourselves into the story, in a sense. Whenever a character quotes some obscure bit of trivia or discusses some other random factoid that was dropped in to give life to the character, chances are it's something the author is familiar with. Maybe a piece of specific knowledge that isn't common, or a snippet of a conversation overheard; a favorite turn of phrase, or some other minutia from the author's life - parts of their own self slip into each and every character, even if they've never done half the things the character has done; even if they'd never want to do anything or be like the character in any way, shape, or form.
I suppose if one wrote what they didn't know, it would be an awfully short and/or awful story. How can you explain or describe that which you haven't seen, even if it was only a glimmer in your imagination? And when you insert yourself, perhaps too deeply, into the story, how do you keep that creation from following your every whim, when it is that very whim that is all that the creation is? Does knowing of count as knowing as far as that advice is concerned?
When a beloved character of yours begins doing very stupid - most likely fatal things - and you're getting frustrated because they keep refusing every out your offering them, how does that reflect on your own sense of being?
And when you write something Great and Terrible, how do you explain to the concerned voices asking if that really happened that it's just a work of fiction?
That's what's great about writing - you can write about stuff that never happened, and still have it filled with truth; you can write what you know without ever having walked that particular path; and you can Mary Sue the hell out of your characters without the readers knowing, although they may call you on the ones you had or want nothing to do with. Powerful stuff, don't take it while operating heavy machinery.
I'm a bit doubtful that any Pen can stand up to a Sword with a decent edge, but I'm fairly sure that when a bit of Story rumbles through like a steamroller, the sword will be broken, and the pen will be bleeding ink out of its flattened corpse.
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Date: 2006-04-30 01:48 pm (UTC)Two different uses of labels, really - one to organize, the other to restrict.
I can remember the guys at the local Strawberries store loved when Derek came in the store - while we would talk with them, Derek would just start going through the shelves, putting everything into that most-difficult of ordering systems (alphabetical; which seems beyond the grasp of most consumers.) He just couldn't help himself.
I have my own library - currently, only a portion of which (DVDs and CDs) are shelved - organized very specifically. Once we build the library itself, the books will also be organized and filed, and, if I can find a labelling system I like, labelled.