Beginners only - please

BEGINNERS ONLY - PLEASE
notes from a tutor in creative writing

YOUR tutor will want to know if you have already had some success and whether you want to write:

• with a view to making it a full-time career
• or to produce a second income
• for therapeutic reasons
• or for the sheer joy of studying.

All are good and sufficient reasons.

Anybody can write if they have a mind to do it, and the proof is quite simple. Writers include people with little in the way of formal education who are successful and others with double firsts from Oxbridge.

There are housewives, doctors, vets, artists, TV weather girls, shop assistants, hookers, bank managers, policemen, teachers, businessmen, journalists and lawyers.

We all know the famous names: Maeve Binchy, Barbara Taylor Bradford, Jilly Cooper, Ian Fleming, Freddie Forsyth, Tom Clancy, Harold Robbins, Dick Francis, Dean Koontz, John Grisham, Helen Dunmore, etc...But there are thousands of people merrily scribbling away - some earning a considerable sum of money as a second income, from £5,000 to £50,000 - of whom you have never heard.

There are thousands more writing personal memoirs, autobiographies, short stories, poems and the occasional novel, getting a great deal of enjoyment from their hobby.

It's not all about getting published. There are competitions, the best of which offer publication.

Sometimes a magazine - usually a woman's magazine like The Lady or Cosmopolitan, will run a short story competition. The first prize may be something like £1,000.

They get up to 8,000 entries for these competitions and most of the entrants send their entry off to the magazine and never hear of it again.

Let me tell you a trade secret: 80 per cent of entries arrive in the final few days before the closing date.

MANY of you will have recently taken the plunge into a course in creative writing or may be thinking of taking one as a New Year resolution when classes resume at adult education centres in January. Or it may be that you are thinking of a home study course, signing on for an MA in creative writing at one of our progressive universities or perhaps booking a writing holiday. Let's offer some tips that will make you feel less like a new boy or girl on the first day at college

It is physically impossible for a panel of three judges to read 5,000 stories in two weeks.

If you are entering then make sure you get your entry in early. Don't forget that there must be at least 20 markets for that story. Send it to at least 10.

As soon as somebody accepts it or awards it a prize you can always withdraw it from the other nine.

In fact, in the United States and Britain there must be at least 1,000 competitions every year with prizes ranging from £25 up to £50,000.

There are prizes for the best:

There are thousands of them.

If you get the latest edition of the Writers & Artists Year Book from the library you will find the better known ones listed. Similar publications exist in the United States.

If you are determined to make a start what should you do?

If you can write a letter you can write a story. If you want to write - you can.

All you need is a clear mind: a pencil and paper, or pen and notepad, or a typewriter, or a word processor a dictionary and a good public library

Despite what critics may say, all early novels and short stories are in part biographical. Why not begin with a biography? At least you know the facts.

You know what happened to you and you will get some satisfaction perhaps doing it for your grandchildren or their children.

If you like, start with a memoir - you do not have to do a full biography. The easiest way is to begin with something dramatic. It might be the first occasion you had a best friend killed - or a father coming home from the war.

Write a dozen pages on this and then flashback to the start of events or your earliest memory. It's an easy technique. You have captured the reader's imagination. Away you go. You want to tell the reader what has happened and to describe it as vividly as possible.

Begin with a pad of paper and make notes. You need to answer a number of questions. The basic ones are:

Kipling's honest serving men: WHO WHAT WHEN WHERE WHY AND HOW.

They cover every story from a main newspaper article describing the death of a world leader or Middle East war to a win on the lottery for a hard-up family to a family saga and crime novel.

Try to answer most of the questions before you begin.

Stage two is to add in the five senses: SMELL - TOUCH - SIGHT - HEARING - TASTE and don't forget that sixth sense: the crime writer's favourite.

We all know how certain smells evoke memories both pleasant and unpleasant. Think of how you remember an event linked to a certain perfume - the smell of new mown grass, a bonfire - the acrid smell after a bombing raid in the blitz - the smell of opening a brand new book - a father's pipe tobacco.

Touch: can be equally evocative. The feel of the first silk dress you owned - oil on a new cricket bat - dubbin (no longer used) on football and rugby boots - the stubble on your chin the morning of a hangover - holding a newly-bathed baby against you for the first time, the feel of your skin after a luxury bath, a soft mohair jumper or a cuddly toy. Descriptions like this help to fill in the detail.

Sight: Here you must guard against clichÚs but all great writers describe in detail what they see. Give as much detail as possible on clothes. Give the length of the skirts, whether straight, pleated or flared. And the waistcoats and blouses. Hairstyle, stockings. . .shoes. Remember weather and lighting. Women writers are particularly good at this.

Go well over the top with your descriptions. You can always cut back on it if necessary later.

Sounds: help a story enormously. Is the voice Janet Street Porter or Cilla Black, Posh Spice or Posh Kate Adie? Accents may help you to delineate character.

Certain songs and tunes remind me of events that happened 10, 20 or 30 years ago. Popular music can often set the period in which certain events happened - just as certain performances of classical works by great artists such as Casals, Menuhin or Francescati evoke other memories.

It was Noel Coward who remarked in one of his plays the stunning effect made by the recall of a popular tune.

Other sounds help to paint a complete picture: perhaps some of them no longer exist - like the sound of a steam train. That great popular songwriter Johnny Mercer wrote Chattanooga Choo Choo. You couldn't do it today as modern diesels make a very unmusical err errr sound.

Sounds of the sea, of farmyards, of traffic, a whistling kettle, a chiming clock - all evoke other scenes.

Taste: It's no good writing we always sat down to breakfast at 7am because we had an hour's journey to school. What did we have for breakfast. . .what did it taste like . . .was there always time. . .was there always food? How did weekends vary?

Taste, just like the other senses, does not have always to evoke pleasant memories. Who can forget the first time they tasted burnt custard -or when the salt was left out of the boiled potatoes - or the smell from the kitchen of burnt toast being scraped? Read Annie Proulx.

What you are doing by answering: How, what, when, why, how and when and filling in the descriptions of the senses - smell, touch, sight, hearing and taste - is painting a picture.

That is what you will be doing, no matter what you write. You will be painting pictures so clearly that an artists could pick up a pen and draw the scene you have described. A film director should be able to begin work on your story without talking to you.

Now to the mechanics of writing. Many beginners are worried about plot. Don't be. Many of today's successful writers do not bother at all with working out a plot.

Much more important is to invent characters and place them in interesting situations.

Frequently the invented characters will take over the author and race away inventing their own adventures.

Catherine Cookson, Mary Wesley, Ken Follett, Danielle Steel and Ian Fleming are people who invent strong characters, place them in tough situations and then really say. . .get out of that.

What they all have in common is conflict. Each hero or main character has a number of obstacles to overcome - real, imaginary, mental or physical and it is how they overcome the obstacles that sustains reader interest and makes the story flow.

A few questions that would-be writers ask?

How important is dialogue and how do I write it?: Good dialogue is vital. It helps to delineate character. It moves the story along and adds pace to the narrative. Well done, it makes the story more believable.

The test of good dialogue is: can you leave out the he said. . . she said. the inspector agreed. If you can, and it is obvious who is speaking then your dialogue is OK.

Writer's block: Warm up by copying out in pen or pencil a couple of pages of your favorite author. This is really like a warm-up exercise before aerobics. It doesn't matter if your favorite author is George Eliot or Zadie Smith, Kathy Lette or Jane Austen, Graham Greene or Dickens. You will be warming up and learning by osmosis.

How much should I write?: Set yourself a daily target. Either an hour or two hours a day at a set time - or a number of words - as low as 500 or as much as 2,000. Try to do it every day. After a while you will become like an exercise freak. If you don't do your two hours or your 1,000 words you will feel there is something missing in your life.

Betty Smith decided to write a minimum of 500 words a day in her rundown New York flat. At the end of a year she called it A Tree Grows In Brooklyn and she had a best-seller.

I have trouble beginning: A famous American writer said writing is easy - you just sit down at a typewriter and open a vein. A less drastic solution is to try one of the following standard introductions:

The man who introduction - Don Quixote

The superlative introduction - It was the best of times. . .the worst of times. Tale of Two Cities

The arresting introduction - Earthly Powers by Anthony Burgess or that superb mood and scene setter from The French Lieutenant's Woman by John Fowles.

Look them up. All memorable.

Research and when to stop it

Do NOT make the mistake of getting bogged down in research. If you cannot remember whether the Jungfrau is to the left or the right, the east or the west as you drive south into Interlaken check it later. Do not stop writing.

Do the minimum of research before you start writing.

Markets and marketing: Now to the nitty gritty. If you scan the writing magazines you will find markets and you can send off to 10 or 20. You do not need at this stage an agent.

If you are writing a novel do NOT wait until you have finished the whole book. Just send off a covering letter, a synopsis and two or three chapters to several publishers or agents.

If you have written a short story send it off to as many competitions and magazines as you can.

How do I know if it is any good?: Read it aloud. If it flows easily it is OK. If your best friend or partner can read it aloud to you without stumbling that too is good.

If there is any section that you feel is awkward then rewrite it. Trust your ear.

You have to learn to take rejection well and use it to redouble your efforts. That wonderful writer A J Cronin had his first novel rejected 11 times and in disgust threw the ms on to a bonfire.

Unknown to him his wife rushed out, rescued it, retyped the first scorched pages and sent it off to be accepted and a bestseller.

Seventy years on people are still reading A J Cronin and Dr Finlay's Casebook became a great TV series.

Editing: Verbs are the engines of good writing. Don't write he ran quickly down the street. Make it he dashed or he sped. Don't write James thought about the proposition. Make it James sat down, flicked out a cigarette and went over the deal. If he played along he could go to jail. If he refused he would lose his boat. The cigarette stayed unlit in his lips. .

Nouns: are next in importance. Hemingway has suffered from all the awful parodies done on his style, but he does make good writing simple.

Clear out all adverbs: If you have to qualify a verb or an adjective it is probably weak and the wrong one. Search for the right one. English is a rich language and you should spend it happily. Take them all out and put back only those which are essential. That keeps your writing crisp.

If you have difficulty with descriptive writing try reading poetry. Something by Dylan Thomas, Wilfrid Owen, Keats, Shelley or Wordsworth, W H Davies, Walter de la Mare or Blake.

Avoid clichs like the plague

Too many cooks spoil the broth. Twist it: too many chefs spoil the soufflÚ. Jilly Cooper is an expert at this.

Avoid short stories where the twist in the ending is a dream sequence.

We have all read this kind of story. The first 500 times this was tried were fine - but enough is enough.

Avoid talking dogs or animals with human characteristics. Handled by Paul Gallico or Roald Dahl it is tremendously effective but it is hard to do.

Be ruthless as an editor but don't knock the guts out of a story. Don't throw away pages of work because you are dissatisfied. There is always something which you can save for another story and another day. It might be an original phrase - a name for a character. Be careful before you screw up a few pages that don't work and hurl them into the bin.

Which brings me to another point.

Always keep a notebook. Make it small enough to go in your pocket or handbag. Keep it by your bedside, put down ideas - fresh phrases - snatches of dialogue - titles - books you should read.

Write as if you had had two large scotches or two large gins but don't have them. Just be uninhibited.

Keep everything simple: The best writer in the English language is old Will himself. Shakespeare was a remarkably simple writer

To be or not to be. . .That is the question?

The man is practically monosyllabic

Shall I compare thee to a summer's day?

Once more into the breach dear friends. . .

He is not complicated. At a normal, literate, readable level he is simple.

Academics and analysts make him difficult. Schools have to use him for exams. The good thing is that the educational system has kept his stories alive. . .the bad thing is that so many people have been turned off by treating his great plays as examination tasks.

Four letter words: Sooner or later people ask about four-letter words. Should you use them or shouldn't you? In direct speech - if it is in keeping with the character - YES. But do it sparingly.

One four-letter word on a page has 100 per cent impact. Each successive four-letter word devalues the currency.

If you hear one correctly used it might make you smile. If you hear a string of obscenities you want to turn off.

Tautology: There are many deadly sins in writing - puerile verbs, redundant adverbs and weary adjectives. Beware of writing. . .That bright morning around 7am Jim looked out of his window. . .

Caroline always had a sweet smile on her face (where else would she have it?)

Fiction: If you want to dive straight into fiction then beware of starting on a novel. Sometimes it is better to write 50 short stories rather than one novel. I am sure that you will learn more that way. I am sure Chippendale made a few book ends and pot stands before he started on a chair.

Publishers will not accept handwritten entries but there is nothing to stop you working long hand and getting somebody else to keyboard the material.

Colin Dexter, who invented Morse, writes everything out by longhand twice. Dexter was a schoolmaster who taught classics and then became an examiner, setting and marking papers for one of the university boards.

He went on holiday to North Wales when it rained every day. There were three detective stories which he read. There was nothing else after he had finished those so he thought I could do better than that and sat down and wrote one.

He sent it off to one publisher, waited for nine months and then got it back. He sent it off to another publisher who accepted it within 48 hours.

He still writes everything in long hand. Hemingway always wrote standing up. No champ ever won a title sitting on his ass, he once said. A view shared by Gunter Grass but expressed somewhat differently.

All authors go to work each day to sweat for a number of hours or to produce a number of words. Writing - good writing is going to work.

Lonely business: Don't forget that writing is a lonely business. Join a writers' group near you. Get some support. Give some support.

Sex scenes: Sooner or later somebody always says they cannot write good sex scenes. It is said all writers put something of themselves into their stories. All short stories and novels are in part autobiographical - especially in the early days.

If you have trouble writing about sex then think of the time when you enjoyed the biggest turn-on in your life and sit down and describe it. Then ask some questions.

What happened? Why did it happen? Where did it happen? When did it happen? How did it happen? And with whom? Then check the senses: have you described Touch, Smell, Feel, Sound, and Taste.

The test is just the same for any piece of writing.

Do not run away with the idea that good sex scenes will sell a bad novel. They will not. Publishers are inundated with mss from authors who think that an unbroken series of bonking will make a book.

Not so.

There is no such thing as the obligatory sex scene. Millions and millions of books and thousands of authors are published without one.

Do not imagine for one minute that you can sell a bad book by inserting chapters of explicit sex.

Ray Bradbury was once a star speaker at a writers' conference and paused as he gazed over an expectant audience or more than 400 souls.

Who wants to be a writer?

Every hand shot up.

Well, why aren't you at home writing?

Well, why aren't you? It's not that difficult.

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