C
Chessie
Guest
Hi, my fellow Scribes. So given certain discussions on this site and some other articles/books I've read recently have me thinking about author or creative voice. We hear this a lot: you just have to find your voice.
So what the heck does that exactly mean?
When I first started writing, I just wrote. I was young and didn't understand crap about anything. I didn't understand grammar, story structure, plot, setting, character development, etc. I just wrote whatever came from my heart and the sentences just flowed. Over the years I learned more and improved my craft. There came a point where I didn't know exactly how to construct a story but I tried my best to copy what I saw in fiction books.
I've been writing for a wicked long time, and can just now say that I finally recognize my "voice".
So what is it? How can we recognize our creative voice?
First off, it takes practice. Years of practice. Sorry. A lot of beginning writers don't like to hear this crap. I can't tell you how many wannabe writers have told me that they just write when they're inspired. They don't try to improve. They don't make writing a habit. Well, all of our writing goals are different, right? Some of us want to sell big time. Some of us just care that a few people read our work. Others of us want big publishing contracts and thousands of fans. It doesn't matter what your goals in the writing business or not are─what matters is that we improve with every manuscript we finish. And how do we do that? Practice.
Write daily or write often. There's no way around that.
So back to author voice. A realization came to me just recently thanks to this article by Kristine Kathryn Rusch. She got me really thinking! Voice is how we talk. We don't recognize our own voice because we hear it all the time when we speak. She's so right! (at least I think so lol)
The concept of author voice has escaped me all of these years but I think that I finally understand. It's always there through the way we construct words, through the way we tell our story, through the type of stories we tell. Author voice is YOU telling a story! Simple. Listen to yourself talk. That's it. We are storytellers using paper to entertain others. Our voice is there from the beginning but it's only through practice (writing daily or often) and by learning HOW to construct a story and use language to our advantage that we begin to recognize it within our work some time later.
My voice is straight to the point with pieces of layered description. I have always preferred to focus on character emotion vs heavy description. I like stories laced with sadness, broken human spirits that find hope, sex, passion, and love that is very, very bad for us. My voice conforms to that. It's how I tell those stories.
Your voice is different than mine. And different from other writers. So yes, language and grammar and spelling are all tools we use to tell our stories but HOW we tell those stories, our choice of words and how we construct the sentences and paragraphs is our voice.
Sorry for the super duper long post, but what do you guys think?
So what the heck does that exactly mean?
When I first started writing, I just wrote. I was young and didn't understand crap about anything. I didn't understand grammar, story structure, plot, setting, character development, etc. I just wrote whatever came from my heart and the sentences just flowed. Over the years I learned more and improved my craft. There came a point where I didn't know exactly how to construct a story but I tried my best to copy what I saw in fiction books.
I've been writing for a wicked long time, and can just now say that I finally recognize my "voice".
So what is it? How can we recognize our creative voice?
First off, it takes practice. Years of practice. Sorry. A lot of beginning writers don't like to hear this crap. I can't tell you how many wannabe writers have told me that they just write when they're inspired. They don't try to improve. They don't make writing a habit. Well, all of our writing goals are different, right? Some of us want to sell big time. Some of us just care that a few people read our work. Others of us want big publishing contracts and thousands of fans. It doesn't matter what your goals in the writing business or not are─what matters is that we improve with every manuscript we finish. And how do we do that? Practice.
Write daily or write often. There's no way around that.
So back to author voice. A realization came to me just recently thanks to this article by Kristine Kathryn Rusch. She got me really thinking! Voice is how we talk. We don't recognize our own voice because we hear it all the time when we speak. She's so right! (at least I think so lol)
The concept of author voice has escaped me all of these years but I think that I finally understand. It's always there through the way we construct words, through the way we tell our story, through the type of stories we tell. Author voice is YOU telling a story! Simple. Listen to yourself talk. That's it. We are storytellers using paper to entertain others. Our voice is there from the beginning but it's only through practice (writing daily or often) and by learning HOW to construct a story and use language to our advantage that we begin to recognize it within our work some time later.
My voice is straight to the point with pieces of layered description. I have always preferred to focus on character emotion vs heavy description. I like stories laced with sadness, broken human spirits that find hope, sex, passion, and love that is very, very bad for us. My voice conforms to that. It's how I tell those stories.
Your voice is different than mine. And different from other writers. So yes, language and grammar and spelling are all tools we use to tell our stories but HOW we tell those stories, our choice of words and how we construct the sentences and paragraphs is our voice.
Sorry for the super duper long post, but what do you guys think?