A Writer’s Journey (Part Two): Tests, Allies and Enemies
In my last post I had managed to cross the threshold and get some words on paper. I’d taken that first important step in my writer’s journey.
I felt happy and productive.
Until the next day when I read what I’d written and realised, I sucked.
The inmost cave
Like that scene in the Empire Strikes Back — where Luke comes face to face with his dark mirror image – I had encountered my first, worst enemy: myself.
You thought you could write something good? my inner voice scolded. What were you thinking!
I read my words back and each one bit like a bullwhip. And, what seemed like a masterpiece only the day before transformed into a steaming pile of turgid tropes and stinking clichés, with an over abundance of adverbs and alliteration. Wink to camera.
I was tempted to give up.
Because at that point I didn’t know that every writer — probably even the greats — face this same inner struggle with self doubt. It can destroy you before you even make it out of the starting gate.
But then I learnt one simple idiom:
Every. First. Draft. Sucks.
Seriously, even the best authors have to write countless drafts before they have something that’s worth putting their name to.
So, to avoid this inner battle I found the best thing to do was to not read what I had written.
Or at least not to edit it.
Not at the beginning anyway. Through the course of writing I discovered that everything was in a constant state of flux: Characters developed minds of their own and guided the story in directions I didn’t expect; New plot ideas had reverberations on preceding chapters; Various twists required adding things, changing things removing things.
I found I had to throw away or drastically re-write vast sections of the plot and realized that all that time I had spent perfecting my prose had been largely wasted.
The Devil is in the detail
And so, as I continued to write, and more and more details emerged, I encountered a seemingly never ending cascade of Russian doll like conundrums to solve. I would solve one only to discover another in its place. It was tough — gruelling — and I found that the only way to get through it was with sheer determination and perseverance. I had to force myself to write every day, even though sometimes it was painful. Because I was beginning to understand that it is only through the process of writing that you force yourself to figure out ways to overcome those obstacles.
But as I solved each puzzle I found that my writing was beginning to improve. They say that practice makes perfect and with writing I believe that’s a large part of becoming a good writer, along with reading often and widely.
Anyway back to the plot.
After managing to overcome my own inner doubts, and having thwarted countless obstacles, I finally had a detailed plan of characters and locations with reference images borrowed from the net (if only I’d had Plotist back then it would have been a lot easier). I’d also written sixty thousand words of the manuscript itself – about two thirds of the projected final word count. Everything was going swimmingly, until I found an advert online for the Festival of Writing.
Meeting the mentor
Held at York University, the Festival of Writing is a fantastic opportunity to meet other writers, attend workshops on everything from creative writing to self editing, and even have a couple of one to one’s with agents, book doctors and publishers. For me it was inspiring – I learnt so much – but also, paradoxically, it was crippling. Trouble was you see, it highlighted everything I was doing wrong.
For example, my story started with a dream, and, in one of the first workshops I attended, several agents reflected on how they hated it when manuscripts started with a dream – or waking up in the morning – which is apparently how the vast majority of manuscripts submitted begin. Ok, I thought, I’ll have to change that.
Then I attended another workshop on story structure, learnt about writing in sequences; the three act structure; the hero’s journey – all incredibly useful plot structuring techniques that I had been unaware of up until that point. Then I learnt about character development, themes, foreshadowing.
I felt like Bruce Wayne returning to the batcave — a cascade of lightbulbs flickering to life, illuminating the way forward. If I follow these rules, I thought, I can be assured a good novel.
So, on returning home I went to work applying everything I had learnt to my manuscript. I removed the dream sequence, inserted a more satisfying internal arc, added characters, deleted characters, firmed up antagonists, developed themes. The list goes on.
The Fall
Unfortunately it was all too much.
After several failed attempts I finally came to the conclusion that I could not reconcile the original manuscript with the changes needed to make the story any good. And, as I gazed up at the mountainous peaks of the work I had yet to do, the ground rumbled underfoot and a world splitting crack erupted as an avalanche of my writing flaws came crashing down on top of me.
Buried beneath apparently insurmountable odds, I gave up.
But fortunately that’s not where this story ends. Join me in my next post where I’ll tell you how I dug myself out of this plotastrophe.
Experienced anything similar? Or maybe entirely different? Tell us about your Writer’s Journey in the comments below.
