/lit/ - Literature

You keep writing until the stuff that's decently good you produce eventually outnumbers the amount of shit you create. If you didn't know this, you don't actually want to become a writer.

>>4372205
pretty fucking hard when the standarts for the first chapter is suppouse to decide wheather your book gets published or not.

Read good writers. Do what they do.

>>4372208
dont write to get published, write for the love of writing and develop your craft before even thinking about getting published.

>>4372208
So write the first chapter last. Or rewrite it when you're done. What the fuck that's the dumbest problem ever.

>>4372208
You should have written quite a bit before you ever even thought of being published.

>>4372208
Practice motherfucker. Do you think professional athletes get where they're at without practicing? It's a similar concept. Find someone you trust with a literary interest and bounce ideas off of them.

>>4372196
I don't

>>4372221
This is actually a good piece of advice, thanks

>I have good ideas
>don't write
>wat do
I've been seeing this on lit a lot lately. What constitutes as a good idea? A man taking his pet lizard to the vet could be a good idea or a bad idea for a short story depending on how it's written. How do you know it's good?

Let's hear one or two of your ideas, OP. I don't believe you.

>>4372250
Baby shoes. For sale. Never worn.

>>4372250
>Let's hear one or two of your ideas, OP. I don't believe you.

So you can steal them and create your own? haha no

>>4372256
No one wants to steal your lame-ass ideas. You don't have to go into detail. Just prove that you're not some lazy chum who imagines flashy movie scenes when listening to upbeat orchestral music, and doesn't want to bother putting them on paper.

>>4372219
said no one who ever got published.

>>4372267
>lame-ass ideas

hoho, then please, i invite you to present your repertoir then, king faggotron

>>4372275
I didn't make this topic, faggot.

>>4372267
>some lazy chum who imagines flashy movie scenes when listening to upbeat orchestral music
holy shit, this is me.
fuck you

>>4372277
I didnt act with a "holier than thou" atitude, shitlord

>>4372278
we are all that feel

>>4372281
>"holier than thou" atitude, shitlord
Welcome to /lit/.

>You claim to have good ideas
>You want to know how to "get past the feel"
>Someone suggests you list some of your ideas
>You won't
I'm trying to alleviate the feeling you're feeling by suggesting that you don't have any good ideas. If you prove that you have good ideas, maybe /lit/ can help you with your problem. Otherwise, you don't have one.

>>4372250
Not the one you're replying to, but why does he have to prove anything? All he said is that he has ideas but sucks at writting

>tfw great author bot long sence realised theirs nothing two say

>>4372300
Fine..but dont let me catch you stealing the ideas or else ill track you faggot and murder you

In short its about how humanoid life form began sprawling in the lyran constelation, but due to stars dying they had to move to other planets

This one humanoid planet had some conflicts with another humanoid planet, and they decided to marry their royalties to establish an allience. After their star died out eventually, they moved to a planet called Maktun, to start all over. The royalty was considered to be pure, and not merge with the other plebian classes. Royalty had red-ish eyes while the plebs blue-ish. The core principle of rulling was let the plebs do whatever they want, royalty just guiding them and giving them tools to develop properly.

Fast forward, the plebs abused this, on the background of many betrayals and backstabing within the elites, and decided to take over.

The action revolves around the child Anu, which was the fruit between his future king father, and plebian mother that dated secretly. His parents died so they gave him to a native women to take care of him

His life starts to change once he gradually start to find out he's not the same as his other friends

well, what do you say now

>>4372353

>>4372368
lel so epig menes :DDD

>>4372373
well?

>>4372353
Thanks for posting your idea. This (>>4372368) isn't me, btw. Personally, I don't think it's that great, nor would I feel too bummed out about not being able to write it.

But, regardless, you have a premise in your head, and thus as good a jumping-off point as any.

Since you say you "suck" at writing, I'd start with an outline. This doesn't take much creativity or descriptions, and builds the basic skeleton of your whole story/book. You could spend anywhere between days or months perfecting an outline. When you're done, you have a map. (Duh.) If you get writer's block in one scene, you can immediately jump to another. It's just extremely useful.

While you're in the outline phase, also make a list of books and authors that are similar to the voice and style you want to convey with your own writing. Read these with the primary goal to learn how they form sentences and tell their story. If you try to mimic them, your own unique style will eventually jump from the page.

>>4372413
Thank you very much for your suggestions, ill let my wife handle the writting then, because i simply cant face all the requirements...

I mean..how exactly much do people read in order to publish good stuff? and where on earth do they find the time to read so much among other things

if it's any consolation your ideas are shit

I bet you're one of those morons who's afraid that someone is going to steal you dumb ideas and make bank with them.

>good writer
>no sense of narrative

pls halp

>>4372481
just let your wife handle it

>>4372488
is that a bad thing?

>>4372493
If she's better than you at writing, then it's not a bad thing

>>4372500
Yeah, she works as a screenwritter, i dunno how well that translates to books tho

>>4372453
>>4372488

>>4372503
did she ever try to write?

>>4372196
>write beautifully (or so have been told) but have absolutely nothing to write about.

This one is just as depressing op

>>4372511
Nothing besides scripts for theatre plays

>>4372512
No it isn't. If you write beautifully, then you should be able to translate any situation into writing. There is never "nothing to write about."

umm writing is something you can practice and improve at.

>>4372512
You have a common problem: you have no imagination. The solution is going outside and living, and learning about people's lives. Then you can write about it in your well developed style.

>have a great idea for a song but can't play the guitar

>have a great idea for a pie but can't bake

>have some really good muscles but can't lift weights

>Having lots of interesting ideas
>trying to write a short story
>it ends up being more difficult than expected
>people say my writing is not bad, but I should make it even longer
>can't handle critique and expectations, delete everything and stop writing forever
>tfw

>>4372519
If she's interested in the story, let her try. Does she like reading? If she knows general rules they had probably taught her if she's a screenwritter, and she likes to read, she'll do a better job than you for sure.

>>4372453
>giving up this fast
Holy crap, OP.

>>4372520
what I've written is exactly that: lucid and distant descriptions and narratives of meaningless events. I don't understand character development or plot devices. Think Beckett but without meaning or grandeur.

I like to write about everyday moments that are of no consequence yet still remain crystalline and perfect within themselves.

The trouble with this is that nobody cares for ornate wallpaper and it will never be commended as 'serious' or intellectual prose.

>>4372538
Well my current job doesnt allow me to be extensivly creative simulteniously in 2 directions, plus i dont have the time to read

>>4372555
Just be Tao Lin.

>>4372570

>don't have the time to read
>posting in /lit/

>>4372603
i meant i dont have the time to read as much as people expect before writting a book

>>4372601
that's a tall order.
I write more evocatively than him, which is probably my downfall.

I get the feeling that my writing always feels like it's leading somewhere, but it never ends up that way. I get depressed that i don't have any social criticism, commentary or satire in me that will get me remembered.

>>4372627
don't you have a story in you?

Have you ever tried writing an outline at least, for a story?

>>4372632
no. I just write.

I write about experiences and situations. About skimming stones and scaring birds. About walking through fields and brushing your hands on the wheat. The knowing and harrowed look a homeless man will give you when you meet his gaze.

But when I try to write an actual story I clam up and get scared of writing a waste of time soap opera.
I hate the fact that so many books are judged solely on the relatability of their characters. Or how fucking 'quirky' and individual the protagonist's viewpoint is. It just seems masturbatory to me.

>>4372654
Maybe if you actually try writing an outline you could fabricate a decent story.

Limiting yourself to "just writing" is missing out on a lot of what a novel is.

>>4372664
that's what sucks.
How do you suggest putting a story to paper. I am ten pages into my novel and there is only one brief social interaction to speak of. The theme I have is Disillusioned in the face of beauty.

If that doesn't make sense imagine a kid on his own rowing down a river that he appreciates to be a beautiful thing, yet doesn't understand the importance of this beauty and doesn't understand how his trajectory towards comfort and social conformity (in the footsteps of his father) will serve to heighten this distilled pleasure.

It's a bit scatterbrained at the moment

>>4372683
I would suggest staying away from the actual prose for awhile, make a word document called "outline," and then just imagine the events in your story, writing them down clearly and concisely. Imagine how these events lead to one another, and what they might mean.


>If that doesn't make sense imagine a kid on his own rowing down a river that he appreciates to be a beautiful thing, yet doesn't understand the importance of this beauty and doesn't understand how his trajectory towards comfort and social conformity (in the footsteps of his father) will serve to heighten this distilled pleasure.

This could make a great story. But make it a story. Don't just tell the theme to the reader. Create you main character and plan the events he will go through, maybe taking from events or experiences in your own life that you can relate to, or not. Just use your imagination. One event leads to another, etc etc etc. And just keep going like that. It's not that hard if you try, to create something interesting.

>>4372683
Post excerpt pls.

>>4372709
i guess I'll do that.

Thanks for the advice

>>4372710
"my teeth rattled from the vibrations of a window even though that's not the proper word to use"

>>4372714
Not you.

>>4372714
I posted an image of a dictionary definition proving you wrong.

>>4372196
I can assure you the opposite is a far worse feel

>>4372724
Yeah well noone sympathizes with conceited cunts like you teehee.

>>4372722
one thing you should figure out if you ever want to be a writer of any accomplishment is that your dictionary cannot pick the most appropriate word to use in a sentence for you

>>4372710
don't laugh too much

>>4372196
How do you know your ideas are good?

>>4372734
Thankyou for your input

>>4372709
>If that doesn't make sense imagine a kid on his own rowing down a river that he appreciates to be a beautiful thing, yet doesn't understand the importance of this beauty and doesn't understand how his trajectory towards comfort and social conformity (in the footsteps of his father) will serve to heighten this distilled pleasure.

Sounds like it could be about a kid living in the suburbs. Somehow an event happens, that causes him to understand the importance of the beauty. Or maybe it is obvious to the reader but not obvious to him, and that creates dramatic irony. And his father figure is obviously someone he admires. He copies whatever he does. Maybe the father dies and he realizes stuff. I don't know

There has to be movement

>>4372749
I guess I may as well call him Holden too.

>>4372738
don't underconfidence too much. Your stuff is more readable than 90% of the stuff I see here. My only complaint is the male-gazy part.

>>4372738
I see what you mean.

You're writing isn't really going anywhere.

Remember Kurt Vonnegut's rule for writing: Every sentence must do one of two things — reveal character or advance the action.

>>4372757
>>4372758

I try to stick by this rule, but the male gazey part is the only part that reveals any character in that particular excerpt

>>4372770
Really because I felt that was the part with the least characterization.

>>4372709
here is an outline oif my shit story, for example.

Only events and info. No flowery stuff. That comes later and is what brings the story to life, but is not the story itself.

>>4372782
I'll have a think.
I want to create an obsessive and love drunk protagonist who slowly falls into despair and ruin and loses his value for beauty and forgets why he is living.

The point was he sees her again later in the story and hates her as he would a whore.

>tfw no ideas and bad at writing

>>4372738
A couple of neat turns of phrase here and there, but it mostly comes off as something written by somebody who doesn't read much. Am I wrong?

>>4372808
why would you say that?
What led you to this conclusion?
I would consider myself well read.

This is the first page btw (with the rattling that deep&edgy was moaning about)

>>4372821
Hehe

you're that guy who wrote on the piece of paper in the train.

>>4372825
hehe you are a funny guy

>>4372792
>value for beauty
>hates her as he would a whore

I hope you're working on linking these ideas.

>>4372839
yes.
That was my intention.

>>4372839
the cost of beauty is something I had scribbled down somewhere at least

>>4372196
>>4372196
I guarantee you your ideas are just as terrible as your writing.

>>4372851
Less of a cost and more of a logical conclusion imo.

>>4372860
that's a nice thought.

>>4372738
>>4372821
Not to come off as rude, but honestly your writing suggests to me that you might be autistic. There's a weird focus on landscapes and details while heavily lacking in characters and relationships. I know it's only a couple pages, but something tells me that you could dedicate an entire book to describing a series of Bob Ross paintings while struggling to write a few thousand pages on the interactions between a few characters.

Every character in your writing thus far feels more like a prop rather than a person, and that feels weird to me.

>>4372873
I wonder if there is a genre dedicated to just describing landscapes.

>>4372864
Your ideas not mine. Your character "falls in love" with her after checking her out once. Seems logical that ideals change with people.

>>4372880
High Fantasy.

>>4372353
I seriously hope Anu has purple eyes. If he doesn't, I'm gonna be extremely disappointed, anon.

>>4372873
>bob ross

Subtle par right there

>>4372873
>your writing suggests to me that you might be autistic

Yeah, I definitely got a "STEMfag trying his hand at writing" vibe.

>>4372882
I get the jab. But seriously. 350 pages of just describing imaginary scenery with no characters, dialogue or story. It would be the /lit/ equivalent of listening to the sound of the ocean.

>>4372905
>field recordings

/mu/ loves them.

>>4372905
i like doing that

>>4372909
/mu/tant for a couple of years

I love that shit. I love ambient and minimal techno and drone and micro house and field recordings.

I feel I'm writing what I like but get conscious that it wont be received well

>>4372909
Nobody on /mu/ would like field recordings of the ocean aka music old people put on to go to sleep.

>>4372683
well maybe stop being a fucking hipster with you 2deep4u moments and be creative in a plotline

big problem i have is i inevitably turn everything i write into a sad story.

like there was a competition on here a while back where the prompt was 'a comic-book mail-in novelty prize,'--like glasses that make you see through people's clothing etc. that should by all means be a fun idea.

well i started off happy, ok, so a little boy writes into the magazine to order a super hero for a friend. the super hero comes and spends a day having fun with the kid. so i start writing it and then i think, hmm what if the super hero comes late at night and rapes the boy. so i started writing that,and then i thought hmm what if i get rid of the rape but the super hero comes 50 years too late and the boy's now an old man, that'll be quirky and less offensive. cool. so i started writing that, and by the end i'd somehow made the whole thing a metaphor for an old man having a heart attack.

>>4372944
i guess I'll write a book about a young boy who lives under the stairs and gets a letter from a wizard school telling him he's the chosen one or some shot like that then

>>4372950
Your first thought is a man raping a boy......dude

>Ideas I really like
>write and edit professionally
>bursts of motivation only come once a month
>spend most of my free time either watching anime or taking aimless drives to places I pick on a map at random


I think my novel will be done when I am forty.

>>4372955
there was a bit of logic behind it. i'm not completely schizoid.

>i'd just read salinger's a perfect day for a bananafish, and i liked the discomfort in seeing a grown man playing with a kid
>competition seemed a good opportunity to replicate that feel by having a stranger in a superhero costume take a kid to a park for a day. but i want it to end positively for once.
>realise competition has a word limit of 2000. i can't both build the tension and alleviate it in so few words
>guess i'll make it more obvious and have the stranger break into the kid's bedroom and try persuade him to come play (therefore absolutely no ambiguity about what's going to happen).

etc etc

>>4372954
yes, people would enjoy it and take something from it rather than ramblings about the environment that go nowhere

>>4372962
>Ideas I really like
>write and edit professionally
>bursts of motivation only come once a month

You me?

As a kinda-writer, ideas matter for maybe 15% of the process.

It is entirely execution. You might have a CLEVER idea, but not necessarily a good one. It really entirely depends on how you write it.

>>4372962
Fall in love or enter a place of crisis. You must write every day, or you'll be shit.

>>4372962
>spend most of my free time either watching anime or taking aimless drives to places I pick on a map at random

I know this makes me a judgmental asshole but I cannot imagine both of those traits in the same person

>>4372256
>being this vain
kek

>>4372353
>anu
Anal fixation detected.
also
>being this beholden to worn sci-fi tropes
go fuck yourself, please. If you have nothing new to say, why are you still talking? Write a story that has never been written before.

>>4372413
>If you try to mimic them, your own unique style will eventually jump from the page.

Actually, the opposite will happen, and your writing will just become a shoddy knock off.

>good ideas

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=I3JlBLG7xOI

>>4373070
>Write a story that has never been written before.
There's nothing new under the sun. Everything news is a copy of a copy. Every copy is a copy of a copy.

Look at Hunger Games; already been done before with Battle Royale. Harry Potter; magic has been done multiple times before. Twilight; vampires. Most of our movies are remakes of old movies or are based off of other media like books, video games, anime, or comic books.

It's not about the ideas, it's about the plot and the adventures it gives us. The feelings given, and the escape from reality that we can take.

>>4372256
what am I, Jack London?

>>4372267
>What if I imagine simple, uneventful scenes when listening to solemn chamber music (i.e. camera pointed at the face of a man walking 8 blocks down a road)

How do you even learn to write well?

>In short its about how humanoid life form began sprawling in the lyran constelation...

oh boy

>>4373231
>It's not about the ideas, it's about the plot and the adventures it gives us. The feelings given, and the escape from reality that we can take.

Stop being a lazy asshole and write. Great writers weren't born great writers. They worked hard and weren't degenerate assholes like you.

>>4372275
>I have all these good ideas but can't write!
>What's your good idea anyway? Let's hear it
>No, YOU give YOUR good idea!
super kekfest '95

>>4373446
All media is meant to be an escape from reality. Unless that's not your point?

>>4372255
I laughed.

>>4373618
>All media is meant to be an escape from reality.

Media is meant to *mediate* ideas and philosophies which reveal aspects of reality.

>>4372250
>>4372196
This is the /lit/ equivalent of /v/'s Idea Guy
Which is funny because the Idea Guy with regards to writing has been around for centuries before vidya

>>4373665

wouldn't it be smarter to put a collective effort into making a software that is incredibly easy to build games with so that everybody could be creative and shit

>>4373664
And yet, we often find ourselves using it as a form of escape. Some just read more into it than others. Really, you could have a 5-page paper per argument over which is how media is meant to be taken.

For example, when I have a rough day at work, I put on a comedy. Not for ideas or philosophy, but to take my mind off of the previous 8 hours.

Sure, some of the comedy is an aspect of reality (e.g. using an over-protective mother-in-law), but it's still being used as an escape.

>>4373265
>tfw 4chan stahpped meh frum writin liek dis

Seriously, this site basically forced me into getting good grammar and spelling skills.

>>4373279
>oh boy

what wrong?

>>4372196
That's everybody in the world. Everybody has ideas. You get past this feel by realising your ideas aren't any better than anybody else's.

The difference that makes a writer is the desire and willingness to put the work into converting these ideas into something.

>>4372269
Beckett did.
I am actually convinced that most good authors would agree.