Writing too demanding for simple storytelling?

[Privid]

Recently, I've been reading some manga and Realized how much easier they have it with storytelling. Unlike a novel, there is far less demand for stylistic perfection, incredibly deep, multi faceted characters... It seems like a more relaxed medium, with far less elitism going on, while telling a story more or less just as well.

Meanwhile, story writing seems to be plagued by elitism, demanding criterions. Not a bad thing by itself... But sometimes, no, often, usually, I find myself boggling over the stylistical structure and ornamentation of a sentence, or the build of a character, rather than the story and world itself. Sometimes, I just want to tell a tale, drive my readers on a journey, but the actual craft of writing seems to separate me from that plane of creativity and makes writing a chore.

Do you ever find that you're less able to tell a story because you keep worrying about the actual writing itself?

 

[Graham Irwin]

Multi faceted characters and stylistic perfection are in no way forms of elitism. They are refined art.

If you don't like writing, if you are more of an "idea" person, try a collaboration.

 

[Sparkie]

Do you ever find that you're less able to tell a story because you keep worrying about the actual writing itself?

No.

I just try to write in a clear, understandable manner. I don't write to please critics or elitists. I write to tell stories.

That's not to say a storyteller shouldn't try to work on and improve the quality of his writing. No one will pay attention to your stories if they cannot understand what you're trying to say.

Just communicate with the reader clearly. Prose need not be ornate. Rather, simple language is often the best choice.

Don't lose heart. Tell your stories. Practice. You'll do fine, I'm sure.

 

[Steerpike]

I don't agree re: manga and graphic novels. I like them, but they're a lot more flat than novels. They don't tell a story just as well. They can be interesting in their own right if done properly, but you'll never get the depth of story out of them that you can achieve with a well written novel.

 

[Codey Amprim]

I know what you mean, Privid. Honestly, just focus on your content rather than making it look fancy. Sure you want to throw a little spice in the mix, but making the thing is the main goal, right? Content is far more important than fancy prose and big, sophisticated wording. I know if I am to read a story, it better not have too much fluff to the point where I'm trying to figure out what I am reading, rather than enjoying a story.

The reason why manga might seem more flowing and whatnot is because it is essentially a graphic novel. They use pictures to convey the story and set the setting rather than words (words do account for moving the story along as well, but the pictures do a lot of the work for it). In book-style fantasy/fiction, the writer has to build the scene from words, not pictures, and this might make it seem tedious and difficult while you're trying to get a story across at the same time.

Also, because of different mediums, there is a different audience regarding manga and fantasy.

 

[Ghost]

Do you ever find that you're less able to tell a story because you keep worrying about the actual writing itself?

I don't agree about manga and graphic novels either. There's a certain economy needed to convey what you mean in pictures, and if you don't draw something well, you'll easily confuse readers. Manga artists have such similar styles to each other I find it difficult to imagine the mood until I'm well into the first chapter. I often see spirits coming out of characters mouths or those little exes on their foreheads to show emotional states and lightning or roses in the background to show their effect on others. If you take those sort of props away, they'd have to work harder.

I see my stories visually, playing in my head like a movie with a different angles, panning, and close ups. I feel like I have to write the book adaptation of what I'm seeing. What results is a mess. It's as if I explain my story to someone who's spoken English for a few months, and he turns around to dictate it to a five-year-old who transcribes it for me in crayon. The story looks nothing like I intended. It would help if I finished my first draft and revised it, but I think I psych myself out before it gets to that point.

I wouldn't say the writing is a chore, but trying to translate what I'm seeing into words and keeping motivated definitely are. I figure, the more I write the better I'll be at writing, so it always comes down to discipline for me.

 

[Queshire]

Seriously? Did you seriously just call making a manga easier then writing a story? Let me tell you, I'm only writing a story because I'm NOT GOOD enough to do it as a comic.

Comic writers have all the same problems found in conventional writing, pacing, coming up with a good plot, making characters your readers can relate to, establishing the scene and action, just because it's visual doesn't mean it's any easier.

Futher they have their own problems, drawing is NOT easy, you know when you feel like your writing is horrible? Imagine feeling that not only for your writing but your drawing as well. Then there's figuring out the panels, how big they are, what shape they are, at what pace you should put your story. And the time constraints! Your average Mangaka makes a chapter a week! Add to that the lack of respect you get for writing manga, people viewing your writing as simple and childish after all the effort you put in it.

No sir, making a manga is NOT easy.

 

[SlimShady]

Don't know a thing about magna, but I do know quite a bit about comic books.

I figured comic book writers would have it harder than writers actually. They have to come up with a good plot and tell it in so many issues. They have to specifically plan out every single scene with very good descriptions so the artist will know what to draw. Comic book writers usually don't even have the freedom we have. If you're a big name comic book writer I'm positive you are pretty well restricted. (Unless you own the character of course...) Comic book writers can't kill off certain characters because they are to well known. (Imagine if Spider-Man died? Or Wolverine?) Even if they can kill them off, the death won't stay permanent.

 

[Legendary Sidekick]

My brother writes and illustrates a comic. Here's the difference between him not liking a page and me not liking a page when writing a book:

• I edit the text and I'm happy.
• He has to redraw the entire page.

It's possible redraw a panel and use Photoshop, but I've seen all of his original pages, which are on paper that's something like 18" x 24". He only uses Photoshop for little things, like a "write-o" (a handwritten typo).

We both have the same problem with getting into a scene so much that our characters won't just shut up so we can move onto the next scene. And even there, I can just cut some text and fit everything in. If my brother decides he wants to ditch three panels after the whole issue is done, well... he needs to replace them or just leave them there.


Basically, I write stories because I have writing talent, but not the necessary skill sets to make a comic or a video game.

 

[ScipioSmith]

From Queshire down, I think you're being a bit harsh on Privid. It was clear to me that he was talking about the storytelling aspects of manga, not the actual process of drawing (though I, too would consider illustrating my story manga style if only I didn't suck at drawing).

Privid, I think a lot of what you're describing is a matter of genre convention: as a fan of anime/manga, I know that the characters aren't going to be incredibly deep, but as long as they are reasonably three dimensional (and I should note that the best manga does humanise its villains much better than a lot of fantasy literature out there) then I'm okay with it. As for writing, as others have said its only as important as you make it for yourself. I just this morning finished book 2 of the Dresden Files, and while the writing quality and characterisation depth isn't going to blow anybody away the plot zips along at a good clip, the characters are engaging and the action is cool (the same things I demand from a manga actually) so don't worry so much.

 

[grahamguitarman]

Perhaps you should team up with a willing artist and collaborate on a comic/manga together. But be aware, writing for a comic can be easier because there is no prose needed, but at the same time, more difficult because you need to convey your ideas to the artist.

And yes there is a lot of work that goes into making them good, so much work that it often requires a team to make one. A typical comic book team for example, has a writer, an illustrator (who makes the original pencil drawings) an inker (who refines the pencil drawings into cleaner ink lines) and a colourist (who adds all the colours to the line drawings).

Personally I Love reading a good graphic novel, though I prefer western graphic novels to Manga (My current favourite graphic novel/comic is Girl Genius Girl Genius Online Comics!).

Its probably unfair to make comparisons between manga and a novel, since writing for a manga/comic is closer to scriptwriting than actual prose. That doesn't make novel writing superior to manga writing, just different. Good graphic novel writing can be just as deep and with equally developed characters as any novel if done well (unfortunately there is a lot of lazy comic writing out there).

As it happens I have the talent and ability to make graphic novels if I wanted, and I was very tempted to write my steampunk Novel as a graphic novel. But another part of me actually enjoys painting a picture with words, so I'm kinda torn on this. and to be honest I find writing a description is often quicker and easier than producing a drawing too.

In the end I decided to compromise and write a novel, but with illustrations, such as the one below:

 

[Anders Ämting]

Recently, I've been reading some manga and Realized how much easier they have it with storytelling. Unlike a novel, there is far less demand for stylistic perfection, incredibly deep, multi faceted characters... It seems like a more relaxed medium, with far less elitism going on, while telling a story more or less just as well.

Meanwhile, story writing seems to be plagued by elitism, demanding criterions. Not a bad thing by itself... But sometimes, no, often, usually, I find myself boggling over the stylistical structure and ornamentation of a sentence, or the build of a character, rather than the story and world itself. Sometimes, I just want to tell a tale, drive my readers on a journey, but the actual craft of writing seems to separate me from that plane of creativity and makes writing a chore.

Do you ever find that you're less able to tell a story because you keep worrying about the actual writing itself?

Eh, manga isn't necessarily less artistically demanding then novels. To begin with, there are a lot of techniques in comic storytelling that aren't apparent to the casual reader. (Something my brother, a comic artist in training, made sure to teach me.)

Like, did you know that comic art has direction? A picture can actually be drawn to subtly point at the next picture, making the imagery easier to follow. Did you know that the space between the panels serve basically the same purpose as punctuation does in writing? It's a whole science in itself, and on top of all that, the actual storytelling is in no way less demanding then what we writers have to perform.

Also, manga is a vast and very varied market with its own elites and it's own high and low brows. It's just not something you'll notice if you tend to stick to a particular genre.

If you want to read an extremely high-class manga, check out Vagabond by Takehiko Inoue. It's one of the most expertly crafted comics I have ever read.

Perhaps you should team up with a willing artist and collaborate on a comic/manga together. But be aware, writing for a comic can be easier because there is no prose needed, but at the same time, more difficult because you need to convey your ideas to the artist.

I've discussed this with my brother, actually, and it's even more complicated then that: Even if you are just writing a script, you have to understand proper comic book layout or your artist partner won't be able to do a good job translating your script into pictures. In fact, your writing is likely to get in the way of the artist's ability to tell the story using pictures, resulting in entire pages where the characters just talk a lot and nothing happens on the visual front.

A lot of manga created by writer/artist pairs apparently suffer that problem - even relatively popular. high quality ones like for example Death Note. My brother finds it very annoying.

 

[grahamguitarman]

I've no doubt you are right Anders, my only experience in the field has been to write and illustrate manga singlehandedly. So for me there were no communication problems to worry about, if I wanted to zoom in on the eyes for effect I just drew it I didn't have to convey that.

 

[Philip Overby]

I actually have two manga under my belt as a writer and just finished my third which is now in the art phase. Since I live in Japan, I'm in the middle of the whole game. And as Anders note, there is definitely a skill to doing them.

If you want an informal way to learn a crap-load about manga, read "Bakuman." It's a really popular manga here that's serialized in Shonen Jump and is actually about a writer/artist team in their attempt to get their manga published. You learn a lot about how to write a manga, how the industry works, and much more.

One thing that has helped me in writing manga is not growing too attached to anything. An artist has to have room and ways to express your story. There's a certain way it has to be laid out. So tons of stuff that I wanted in the story have been cut. Since we've been using translators, a lot of jokes and words that we use have to be cut as well just because they don't make sense.

For manga I think the best thing is to be simple, easy to understand, and even ham-fisted in it's obviousness. Manga can be high art, but most of what people read here they read quickly and often on the train, bus, or some other place where their attention isn't really focused.

I've learned a lot since I started writing manga, but I'm also not a life-long manga fan. I was sort of pulled into it by a friend who had been drawing but didn't have any ideas. So I have more to learn than most. But I'm also realistic in that I know what sells by studying the market. I don't expect most of my better ideas to ever be published this early in the game.

Another thing that's great about Japan is that you can schedule meetings with editors and they'll read your stuff and give you instant feedback. That is of course unheard of in most other countries. But manga editors are always looking for new stuff because there is such a massive demand for manga here.

So before thinking about doing manga, realize that it is hard work. I have to draw about 10 "names" (outlines of the manga for the artist), edit all of them several times before getting a final copy, collab with the artist on sketches, and come up with 10 new ideas every week for new manga to work on. At the rate we're going we have to write about one manga every month. And that's still too slow. Most serialized manga-ka in Japan have to produce weekly. They also have loads of assistants that help them, but if their creativity runs dry, then they may lose serialization and that can be a death knell for some series.

OK, that's enough. Sorry, this is a subject dear to my heart.

 

[Kaellpae]

If you don't like writing, if you are more of an "idea" person, try a collaboration.

I would love to be an idea person and write just a little. It'd help me learn how others write and would get some ideas out of my head.