So, yesterday I got to sit in on a roundtable discussion in a high school Creative Writing class.
Those kids ask some really hard questions.
And I don't think that writers are necessarily being evasive or disingenuous when we say "I don't know" to some of them.
Because I really don't know how some things happen in writing. If you're doing it right, sometimes things just write themselves. So, I don't know.
The schedule at Newbury Park High is a block, so the classes run about an hour-and-a-half, I guess, which gave us a lot of time for discussion. I got to read, too, and the kids and teacher pretty much insisted I read at least one passage with f-bombs in it (I think I heard a kid gasp, though).
It was a great day, as always.
Here are a few of the questions I particularly liked (paraphrased), even if I had a hard time answering them.
1. How do you make your characters seem so genuine?
2. When you're writing something, do you ever stop yourself from saying something because you're afraid of offending people?
3. I'm interested in going into journalism in college, but I'm afraid that it's a dying profession. What do you think I should do?
4. When you write parts of a story and they're really depressing or filled with anger, how do you keep those negative feelings from affecting your personal life?
So... yeah... like I said, they ask some tough questions.
6 comments:
Wow! Kudos to those youngsters. Most adult writers have a hard time coming up with quality questions. And by most, I mean me.
I'm going to guess at your answers, and then give mine.
Yours:
1) Because they're real.
2) Fuck no.
3) Journalism will never die, it will only evolve. Just tell the truth, find great stories, and there will be a medium in which they're told.
4) Go running.
Mine:
1) By basing them on some part of me.
2) Creatively, no. When blogging, all the time.
3) Believe in yourself. Shock the world. Be what you speak, never speak on what you be.
4) I actually write because it's therapeutic. I purposely write about things in my own life that were really fucked up, just giving them a twist to protect the guilty (me).
And Andrew, I totally agree about sometimes the writing just coming through you, writing itself, if you will.
I wrote a FF piece the other day, and one of the commenters was asking how I built the tension so well. Tension? I was like "it's 350 words, there's tension?"
But people agreed, so I guess it was there, but I didn't do it on purpose.
Have a great weekend.
Wherever there's truth, there will be journalism.
Shit, Andrew. Looking back at my asinine comment I realize it could be considered totally disrespectful. I KNOW you, and I LOVE you, but I don't necessarily know you well enough to give you shit on that level.
You're one of the most honest cats I know, so when I inevitably do offend you, please be sure to tell me.
Not even close...
Thank god. I just worry sometimes that I'm TOO MUCH myself online, but I just can't help it.
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