Write another guide for aspiring writers. Worth a try What are you writing?
Current page: 1 (book has 10 pages in total) [available reading passage: 2 pages]
Karen Behnke
Write more! A Guide for the Aspiring Writer
Translator Victor Genke
Editor Evgenia Vorobyova
Project Manager O. Ravdanis
Proofreaders S. Mozaleva, S. Chupakhina
Computer layout A. Abramov
Cover design Yu. Buga
Calligraphy on the cover Zakhar Yashchin / bangbangstudio.ru
© Karen Benke, 2010
Published under agreement with SHAMBALA PUBLICATOINS, INC. (4720 Walnut Street #106, Boulder, CO 80301, USA) with the assistance of Alexander Korzhenevsky Agency (Russia)
© Publication in Russian, translation, design. Alpina Publisher LLC, 2016
* * *
To all adherents of creative writing - both young and those who are young at heart. And also to Collin Prell, my bright-eyed muse.
- This won't help! - said Alice. – You cannot believe in the impossible!
“You just don’t have enough experience,” the Queen remarked. “When I was your age, I devoted half an hour to this every day!” On some days, I managed to believe in a dozen impossibilities before breakfast!
Lewis Carroll. Alice in the Wonderland
Introduction
Dear adventurer!
Relax. This is not a test, homework or a collection of exercises. This book is a combustible mixture of fairly simple ideas, designed to inspire and encourage your inner writer. This is a book you can take notes in, you can dig into, you can share, and you can even tear out pages! (But only if it's your book.)
On the following pages you will find “Word Lists” to help you when your work gets stuck; experiments in the “Worth a Try” section that will spark new ideas in you; texts entitled “This is the story”, which will teach you to look carefully at truth and lies; “Decipherers” to deepen your knowledge and “Notes” from real writers who will share with you their thoughts on what it's like to express yourself on paper.
You can, of course, use this book with all its sections as you please. Only you decide which page to open it on - somewhere at the end or in the very middle. If you don't like what's printed in the "Taming the Clichés" section, skip it. (I had trouble with this section too.) If you liked something, draw stars around it. If you don't like it, cross it out. It is your book. You can take her for a walk, cuddle her, have a snack with her, laugh, even kiss her. You decide what, when, how, where, why and why not. There is no right or wrong way to write creatively. Is it true. There is only your own approach. All this book requires is your imagination and a willingness to go on a journey. Write what only you and no one else in the world can write. Break the rules. Take risks. Argue. Make “mistakes.” Give yourself kilometers of time and as much space as you want. Let the scribbles come out from under your pen, don’t be timid and don’t be shy about tearing out the pages! This is what creative people do when they are not eavesdropping, spying, or daydreaming.
Once things get going, maybe you can share something with me. (And maybe I’ll write you back.) Remember: when you commit your words to a piece of paper, you are braver than you think.
...
Worth a try
What do you write with?
Let's forget about the obvious suspects: pencils, pens, paints, crayons, markers... What if today you could write with anything? What if you could hold, say, a memory in the fingers of your left or right hand? Your limitless imagination? The power of creativity? A spinning planet? Forgiveness? Tree trunk or ray of sun? Well, what can I say... In the world of creative writing, anything is possible. There are trillions of possibilities here, and they are multiplying, diverging in endless whirlwinds. What do you write with?
...What am I writing?
I write in the dim light of a ragamuffin's forgiveness
I write with the smallest stars of what is almost invisible
I write with long sticky threads of the sacred webs of spiders
I write with spinning planets of darkness and danger
I write with brilliant and elusive tricks from my sleeve
Your turn
..._______________________________________________________________
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List of words
Favorite words
The writer's imagination craves words. To fuel your creative energy, you need to throw something at your imagination 24 times a day (and night) or more. Here's a list of some of my favorite words to snack on. Help yourself. Feed. Use it. Open this page whenever your imagination starts growling and needs something to chew on. What words with 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6 syllables did you like today?
Worth a try
Ask yourself a question
What if the next question you ask yourself takes you to a part of your mind that you have never been to before? What if, simply by asking yourself a question or imagining what the answer would be, you could dream deeper, think wider, imagine higher, reach further? Here are 30 questions that you can answer however you want. These are not trick questions. These are questions that need to be looked at a little differently as you tailor your answers to them. Your answers can be true or false, long or short, fast or slow, soft or sticky. Walk through the near and far areas of your life. There is no wrong path. Everything that comes to mind is correct. See what interesting, sweet, kind, funny, nasty, honest, infectious and outrageous people you can be as you set out on a journey where every step is a word and where there is no map or compass.
Tips:
...Everything you write is correct.
Don't worry about spelling and beautiful handwriting.
Write clearly or unclearly. Experiment.
Why not answer a question with a question?
Your turn
Try different options and see where the answers take you. If words need more space, let them go down, across, up, and off the page.
...Unleash your wildest, wildest dreams. Where does she want to go?
Mine is already kicking and jumping and rushing straight towards the open gate, into the distance, across the field, straight towards...
_______________________________________________________________
What will grow if you plant your heart? What color are his shoes?
_______________________________________________________________
If you stand on your hands, where will you go? And how will you fall? Who will go with you?
_______________________________________________________________
If you look under the canopy of the tent of life, what will you hear? What will you see? Why are you sneezing?
_______________________________________________________________
What are the names of your fingers? What about the legs? Each arm and leg? By the nose?
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Where did your silliest song come from? What calms you down? Where was your talisman before you?
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Why do you never cease to be surprised? Who surprises you again and again?
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What do you love at the bottom? What are you afraid of at the very top?
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Where would you like to fly to? What do your wings look like today?
_______________________________________________________________
What trap did your favorite memory fall into? Where will it go next?
_______________________________________________________________
What kind of natural disaster would you be willing to experience if you knew in advance that you would not be harmed?
_______________________________________________________________
You invite someone to make a wish and promise to fulfill it. To whom? What is this desire?
_______________________________________________________________
If you could become any color for a day, what color would you like to become? And on what day?
_______________________________________________________________
Write 100 (or more) words as one long word with no spaces at all around the perimeter of this page... don't stop until you have a spiral in the very middle. Hypnotize your hamster, dog, sister, brother, mother, father with this text, slowly repeating: “You want to sleep... You really want to sleep.” Say the long, spiraling word you created 3 times. This is a good exercise for your mouth, jaws, tongue, cheeks and loose teeth if you have any. You can try to hypnotize the cat, but he is most likely asleep anyway.
This is the story
Yellow car
...Last week, a boy I know was driving in the car with his mother - to school, to the store, to the library, then back home - basically, wherever they usually go - and suddenly noticed that there were no yellow cars on the road.
“Where are all the yellow cars?” - he asked. Mom reminded him about the taxi and asked if he was feeling well.
And then he told her that he would count every scrap of yellow he could find. Almost immediately he began to see yellow everywhere: double lines of crosswalks; black cat eyes; a raincoat-clad man walking a yellow Labrador; fire hydrants; warning signs; rows of sunflowers peeking over the fence. And yellow cars are everywhere! And trucks, and buses, and bicycles. What if everything you put your attention on becomes real? Today yellow cars... and tomorrow world peace?
Is there anything that you barely notice? Anything you're thinking about? Anything you would like to find or see? An airplane from an aerobatics team going into a dive? Colony of caterpillars? Or an old friend from second grade? Sketch out a list of several (or several hundred) of these things, and inside the letter X, which traditionally denotes the exact location of the object on the map, write where it was found and what you will look for now.
Your turn
Worth a try
8 wishes
What if there are no desires too bold or too timid, and everything is possible under the moon and where the slanting rays of the sun do not reach? What if the more you pay attention to your desire, the stronger it becomes? What if all you have to do is close your eyes and fish out 8 desires from the depths of your soul... and then everything you really want will start to come closer? Why 8? The fact is that the number 8 is considered extremely lucky. For example, the opening ceremony of the Summer Olympics in Beijing began at 8 hours 8 minutes 8 seconds local time on August 8, 2008!
...8 rules for making wishes come true
1. Wait until the full moon.
2. Make sure you really want it.
3. To cancel a wish, simply wish the opposite.
4. At first, don’t tell anyone about your desire. This could break the spell!
5. Pay attention to your desire every 8 days. (Sing to him, write poetry to him...)
6. Act (and feel) as if the wish has already come true.
7. Rethink everything life gives you.
8. Smile and thank your desire for coming to you.
Window sill of desires
The package arrived. She has no return address.
Inside I find a note: “Make a wish.”
There are 8 paintings wrapped in red paper:
on the first there is winter and a tree, and on a branch there is a crow,
and in her eyes there seemed to be an important secret.
On the second there is a house by the river. Bridge across the river
and the young moon sleeps in a piece of the sky.
On the third there is nothing but a yellow circle,
and I decide that this is the gate of the sun.
In the corner of the fourth is a gold coin from 1929.
The fifth and sixth are a diptych of clouds and fog.
On the seventh, the cursive inscription reads: “Inspiration”
and silvery sparks from each letter.
The eighth picture is happiness. Reminds me of your smile.
Karen
Your turn
...The note by Annie Burrows
Dear writer!
Writing. There is good news and there is bad news. Here are the good ones:
1. If you write, you are a writer.
2. All troubles with adults can later be used as material for stories.
3. The same goes for bitter grievances.
4. Spelling has nothing to do with the ability to write good text.
5. Unlike reading.
Now the bad ones:
1. To be a writer, you must write.
When I was a child, I didn't think much about writers. In general, I didn’t believe in them. I thought that writers are, well, not superhuman (I wasn’t aware to that extent), but they don’t live on Earth exactly the same way as I do. The books were my own separate world, an unreal place that had nothing to do with my life. It seemed to me that my favorite books were written by people living in the same unreal world. Now that I am a writer myself, I no longer think that writers live in some other world. Unfortunately. I'd like to live in some magical place where I could write books without having to rewrite the same sentence over and over again dozens (or hundreds) of times. But I live here on Earth, like all the other writers, and we write and rewrite everything again, trying to make the sentence sound. This is both good news and bad news: it means that anyone who does the work of writing—the intense, tedious, often fruitless work of writing—is a creature from another world: a writer.
From Annie
Text by Annie Burrows
...From "The Magic Half"
The notebook fell from Miri's hands and she stared, eyes wide, at the white wall in front of her. It was all true. The magic was real. Today she traveled back in time and met an eleven-year-old girl named Molly. The last shadows of doubt disappeared from her consciousness like a bursting soap bubble, and in the free space the question arose: why? Why did this happen? Why did magic choose her?
Miri was sure: this did not happen because she was good. Here's Cinderella - yes, she was good: she sang when she cleaned the house, and enjoyed sewing dresses for her nasty stepsisters. That's why the fairy godmother gave her a carriage, a dress and a prince. Miri always thought Cinderella was boring, but she was certainly better than Miri. Miri complained even if she had to clean her room. Today? Yes, she almost killed Ray with a shovel. No, magic didn't choose her because she was good.
Growing up, Annie Burrows was always good, sweet, kind, and pure of heart. She never did anything wrong. Well, except for that lipstick thing. And yes, some may think that what she did to the cat was bad, but the cat didn’t mind. The cat liked it. To learn more about the books Annie writes for children, visit www.anniebarrows.com.
Worth a try
State of Gratitude
Admit it, you sometimes complain - or even whine - about what you don't have: the coolest fashion gizmo, the latest, greatest, expensive, super-fast latest generation super gadget with remote control and free upgrades. It happens to everyone. However, such desires (and whining) can make us sooooo unhappy. But there must be a way to take your desires in a different direction, put the whining on pause and find a lever that triggers a state of gratitude. At the very least, we can remember what wonderful things and undeservedly forgotten things we have There is. Very simple things, such as the fingers with which we hold a pen or fork and with which we can scratch our backs. What about our imagination, which we are born with and which continues to develop? What about mom and dad, sisters, brothers, aunts, uncles, cousins, and all our close friends? And don't forget about the beating heart, the changing seasons, maple trees and grilled cheese sandwiches. As soon as you step onto this slope, you will see an avalanche of large and small gifts that are given to you. Here’s the world’s best-kept secret: a state of gratitude is the only thing that can make us happy, content, and at peace.
...Gift of autumn
The maples dressed themselves in red and burgundy;
the tops of the poplars are all in gold.
The grass becomes woody from the cold; pine needles
falling from above, they cover the ground,
like matches in children's games. Roofs, fences, mountains
the edges are clearly visible. The air is cool.
The dog looks older, the children look taller.
We hide our necks deeper into our collars,
we put our hands in our sleeves and believe,
like Penelope, that such a wonderful world will not perish.
Katie Evans
Your turn
Feel a state of gratitude. What do you thank your lucky stars for?
This is the story
Things you never told anyone
...I never told anyone that I liked to sit in the backyard, in the corner, and watch the bees fly into their hive in the hollow of the leaning oak tree and watch the crows land on the roof of the house and scare the squirrels. I never told anyone that I have three false teeth, and that I was once bitten by a shark, leaving a wound that required 45 stitches... that I'm afraid of deep water, but I like to swim butterfly, so I jump in the sea anyway, I scream and laugh. I never told anyone that short stories made me afraid the longest, and that last winter I watched a boy feed crushed grain from his hand to a family of deer. I never told anyone that I once stuck a glass marble up my nose just to find out what it felt like, and yes, I rescued sidewalk snails and released them into the ivy. I never told anyone that I was sad to see the leaves fall and that I wanted to live in Japan when I was 93 and want to learn how to perform tea ceremonies. I never told anyone that last night I climbed out onto the roof through the dormer window to sit there and dream about what I would look like if I slept on the moon.
On this page, write mixed together 6 things that you have never told anyone and 6 things that have nothing to do with you at all. Merge together the true lies and the false truth. If you start to feel timid, think of the bravest person you know and complete the sentence you would most like to erase. Don't show anyone what you write (unless, of course, you want to).
Your turn
Definition decoder
When you deliberately use repetition in your text, the result is very interesting. “A rose is a rose is a rose is a rose is a rose.” The line belongs to Gertrude Stein, a famous poet of the last century. She also wrote: “Creating is creating – this is creating – this is creating – this is creating – this is creating – this is creating – this is creating.” Repeated words attract attention. Please! Oh please! Well please! Please! Is everything ready yet? All is ready? Is it ready yet? Try to continue it yourself! Use repetition in your daily requests and questions - feel how strong (or unbearable) they become. Pick a word and repeat it again and again (and again). Take one of your poems or stories and find 12 places where you could insert a repeat. Watch how Paul Hoover embeds the word "famous" 12 times in his poem. Okay, even 13 if you count the title.
Here are more examples of words that can be used for repetition:
...number - for example, 12; 105; 3.7 million...
color - for example, brown, gray, flying silver or shimmering orange...
a sign - for example, shining, or famous, or twisted, or encrypted...
two words - for example, in no way, or you must, or come in!
...Famous
The famous snow is falling,
covering the famous mountain with snow.
The wind shakes the famous cedars.The stone at the bottom of the river is famous.
The most ordinary river flowing
from here to there.The famous dust settles
in unremarkable and famous corners,
where I stood or where you stoodand someone will stand again soon.
For some reason, the cup is famous, again.
The bowl is famous for the spoon.Sunlight is famous - he is the most famous
when he climbs the garden fence.
Famous for the moon passing through the night,known for its darkness.
And the Earth with its sweet spirit of history
famous only for the Earth.Paul Hoover
Before you go
You must walk through the salt flats with pockets full of light. You must see your true radiance through the hazy haze. You must read the story of a past that is as slippery as a fish. You have to go very far before you begin your journey. You have to understand: when your heart is broken, the beating stops. In winter you should see the snow falling down and up. And then you have to see how it melts, even though the cold has not subsided.
Patrick
Also use repetition in chants and spells...
Karen Behnke
Write more! A Guide for the Aspiring Writer
Translator Victor Genke
Editor Evgenia Vorobyova
Project Manager O. Ravdanis
Proofreaders S. Mozaleva, S. Chupakhina
Computer layout A. Abramov
Cover design Yu. Buga
Calligraphy on the cover Zakhar Yashchin / bangbangstudio.ru
© Karen Benke, 2010
Published under agreement with SHAMBALA PUBLICATOINS, INC. (4720 Walnut Street #106, Boulder, CO 80301, USA) with the assistance of Alexander Korzhenevsky Agency (Russia)
© Publication in Russian, translation, design. Alpina Publisher LLC, 2016
To all adherents of creative writing - both young and those who are young at heart. And also to Collin Prell, my bright-eyed muse.
- This won't help! - said Alice. – You cannot believe in the impossible!
“You just don’t have enough experience,” the Queen remarked. “When I was your age, I devoted half an hour to this every day!” On some days, I managed to believe in a dozen impossibilities before breakfast!
Lewis Carroll. Alice in the Wonderland
Introduction
Dear adventurer!
Relax. This is not a test, homework or a collection of exercises. This book is a combustible mixture of fairly simple ideas, designed to inspire and encourage your inner writer. This is a book you can take notes in, you can dig into, you can share, and you can even tear out pages! (But only if it's your book.)
On the following pages you will find “Word Lists” to help you when your work gets stuck; experiments in the “Worth a Try” section that will spark new ideas in you; texts entitled “This is the story”, which will teach you to look carefully at truth and lies; “Decipherers” to deepen your knowledge and “Notes” from real writers who will share with you their thoughts on what it's like to express yourself on paper.
You can, of course, use this book with all its sections as you please. Only you decide which page to open it on - somewhere at the end or in the very middle. If you don't like what's printed in the "Taming the Clichés" section, skip it. (I had trouble with this section too.) If you liked something, draw stars around it. If you don't like it, cross it out. It is your book. You can take her for a walk, cuddle her, have a snack with her, laugh, even kiss her. You decide what, when, how, where, why and why not. There is no right or wrong way to write creatively. Is it true. There is only your own approach. All this book requires is your imagination and a willingness to go on a journey. Write what only you and no one else in the world can write. Break the rules. Take risks. Argue. Make “mistakes.” Give yourself kilometers of time and as much space as you want. Let the scribbles come out from under your pen, don’t be timid and don’t be shy about tearing out the pages! This is what creative people do when they are not eavesdropping, spying, or daydreaming.
Once things get going, maybe you can share something with me. (And maybe I’ll write you back.) Remember: when you commit your words to a piece of paper, you are braver than you think.
Worth a try
What do you write with?
Let's forget about the obvious suspects: pencils, pens, paints, crayons, markers... What if today you could write with anything? What if you could hold, say, a memory in the fingers of your left or right hand? Your limitless imagination? The power of creativity? A spinning planet? Forgiveness? Tree trunk or ray of sun? Well, what can I say... In the world of creative writing, anything is possible. There are trillions of possibilities here, and they are multiplying, diverging in endless whirlwinds. What do you write with?
What am I writing?
I write in the dim light of a ragamuffin's forgiveness
I write with the smallest stars of what is almost invisible
I write with long sticky threads of the sacred webs of spiders
I write with spinning planets of darkness and danger
I write with brilliant and elusive tricks from my sleeve
Your turn
_______________________________________________________________
_______________________________________________________________
Karen Behnke
Write more! A Guide for the Aspiring Writer
Translator Victor Genke
Editor Evgenia Vorobyova
Project Manager O. Ravdanis
Proofreaders S. Mozaleva, S. Chupakhina
Computer layout A. Abramov
Cover design Yu. Buga
Calligraphy on the cover Zakhar Yashchin / bangbangstudio.ru
© Karen Benke, 2010
Published under agreement with SHAMBALA PUBLICATOINS, INC. (4720 Walnut Street #106, Boulder, CO 80301, USA) with the assistance of Alexander Korzhenevsky Agency (Russia)
© Publication in Russian, translation, design. Alpina Publisher LLC, 2016
* * *To all adherents of creative writing - both young and those who are young at heart. And also to Collin Prell, my bright-eyed muse.
- This won't help! - said Alice. – You cannot believe in the impossible!
“You just don’t have enough experience,” the Queen remarked. “When I was your age, I devoted half an hour to this every day!” On some days, I managed to believe in a dozen impossibilities before breakfast!
Lewis Carroll. Alice in the Wonderland
Introduction
Dear adventurer!
Relax. This is not a test, homework or a collection of exercises. This book is a combustible mixture of fairly simple ideas, designed to inspire and encourage your inner writer. This is a book you can take notes in, you can dig into, you can share, and you can even tear out pages! (But only if it's your book.)
On the following pages you will find “Word Lists” to help you when your work gets stuck; experiments in the “Worth a Try” section that will spark new ideas in you; texts entitled “This is the story”, which will teach you to look carefully at truth and lies; “Decipherers” to deepen your knowledge and “Notes” from real writers who will share with you their thoughts on what it's like to express yourself on paper.
You can, of course, use this book with all its sections as you please. Only you decide which page to open it on - somewhere at the end or in the very middle. If you don't like what's printed in the "Taming the Clichés" section, skip it. (I had trouble with this section too.) If you liked something, draw stars around it. If you don't like it, cross it out. It is your book. You can take her for a walk, cuddle her, have a snack with her, laugh, even kiss her. You decide what, when, how, where, why and why not. There is no right or wrong way to write creatively. Is it true. There is only your own approach. All this book requires is your imagination and a willingness to go on a journey. Write what only you and no one else in the world can write. Break the rules. Take risks. Argue. Make “mistakes.” Give yourself kilometers of time and as much space as you want. Let the scribbles come out from under your pen, don’t be timid and don’t be shy about tearing out the pages! This is what creative people do when they are not eavesdropping, spying, or daydreaming.
Once things get going, maybe you can share something with me. (And maybe I’ll write you back.) Remember: when you commit your words to a piece of paper, you are braver than you think.
Karen
Worth a try
What do you write with?
Let's forget about the obvious suspects: pencils, pens, paints, crayons, markers... What if today you could write with anything? What if you could hold, say, a memory in the fingers of your left or right hand? Your limitless imagination? The power of creativity? A spinning planet? Forgiveness? Tree trunk or ray of sun? Well, what can I say... In the world of creative writing, anything is possible. There are trillions of possibilities here, and they are multiplying, diverging in endless whirlwinds. What do you write with?
Name: Write more! A Guide for the Aspiring Writer
Karen Behnke
Writing your own book is not as difficult as it seems. Especially if you know what techniques can help you with this. Of course, you can learn creative writing by spending several years and graduating from a literary institute. Or you can read Karen Behnke's book. Of course, it will not make Nabokov or Tolstoy out of you, but in it you will find everything you need to start your literary career.
The author suggests not getting hung up on boring academic rules, but giving free rein to your imagination, playing with words, thought forms, rhymes, meters and ideas. Small sections, each dedicated to a specific creative technique, consist of a brief theoretical part, an interesting task, a place to perform it and examples of how it can be done. The book also contains valuable advice from famous writers to beginners.
Why the book is worth reading
- Many of us are afraid to approach writing, believing it to be an extremely difficult task, accessible only to a select few. After reading “Write More!”, you will understand that there is nothing scary in this activity and, perhaps, you will finally decide to try your hand at writing.
- "Write more!" - not a boring textbook or monograph. This is an easy and interesting educational workshop in which important knowledge is presented in a playful way.
- The author has been teaching writing to both adults, schoolchildren and students for many years. Therefore, her book will be useful for beginning writers of all ages, from elementary school students to the most adults, but who have not lost the ability to openly look at the world like a child.
Some are destined to become a famous writer, some a copywriter or journalist, and some will write speeches for presidents.
However, the vast field of activity is more than compensated for by human laziness, excuses about lack of talent and tales of lack of time.
Writing coach and poet Karen Behnke wrote this book specifically to clear away your doubts and fears.
How to do it? More optimism, color fonts, tasks and space for their implementation right in the book itself.
The magic word in this book is “MORE.” When do we say it? When we really like something and want repetition, development, continuation.
It is on this principle that the motivation of the reader-writer in this book is built. Imagine that you wrote one of your first texts and bring it to your friend, mother or expert acquaintance, and he or she, after reading your still not very perfect lines and paragraphs, suddenly says: “Great, let’s go further!”
This is how inspiration and the desire to continue are born.
In a sense, Karen Behnke acts as a Muse for all those who today put their fingers to the keyboard with the desire to become a writer or simply a creator of inspired texts.
Translator Victor Genke
Editor Evgenia Vorobyova
Project Manager O. Ravdanis
Proofreaders S. Mozaleva, S. Chupakhina
Computer layout A. Abramov
Cover design Yu. Buga
Calligraphy on the cover Zakhar Yashchin / bangbangstudio.ru
© Karen Benke, 2010
Published under agreement with SHAMBALA PUBLICATOINS, INC. (4720 Walnut Street #106, Boulder, CO 80301, USA) with the assistance of Alexander Korzhenevsky Agency (Russia)
© Publication in Russian, translation, design. Alpina Publisher LLC, 2016
* * *
To all adherents of creative writing - both young and those who are young at heart. And also to Collin Prell, my bright-eyed muse.
- This won't help! - said Alice. – You cannot believe in the impossible!
“You just don’t have enough experience,” the Queen remarked. “When I was your age, I devoted half an hour to this every day!” On some days, I managed to believe in a dozen impossibilities before breakfast!
Lewis Carroll. Alice in the Wonderland
Introduction
Dear adventurer!
Relax. This is not a test, homework or a collection of exercises. This book is a combustible mixture of fairly simple ideas, designed to inspire and encourage your inner writer. This is a book you can take notes in, you can dig into, you can share, and you can even tear out pages! (But only if it's your book.)
On the following pages you will find “Word Lists” to help you when your work gets stuck; experiments in the “Worth a Try” section that will spark new ideas in you; texts entitled “This is the story”, which will teach you to look carefully at truth and lies; “Decipherers” to deepen your knowledge and “Notes” from real writers who will share with you their thoughts on what it's like to express yourself on paper.
You can, of course, use this book with all its sections as you please. Only you decide which page to open it on - somewhere at the end or in the very middle. If you don't like what's printed in the "Taming the Clichés" section, skip it. (I had trouble with this section too.) If you liked something, draw stars around it. If you don't like it, cross it out. It is your book. You can take her for a walk, cuddle her, have a snack with her, laugh, even kiss her. You decide what, when, how, where, why and why not. There is no right or wrong way to write creatively. Is it true. There is only your own approach. All this book requires is your imagination and a willingness to go on a journey. Write what only you and no one else in the world can write. Break the rules. Take risks. Argue. Make “mistakes.” Give yourself kilometers of time and as much space as you want. Let the scribbles come out from under your pen, don’t be timid and don’t be shy about tearing out the pages! This is what creative people do when they are not eavesdropping, spying, or daydreaming.
Once things get going, maybe you can share something with me. (And maybe I’ll write you back.) Remember: when you commit your words to a piece of paper, you are braver than you think.
Worth a try
What do you write with?
Let's forget about the obvious suspects: pencils, pens, paints, crayons, markers... What if today you could write with anything? What if you could hold, say, a memory in the fingers of your left or right hand? Your limitless imagination? The power of creativity? A spinning planet? Forgiveness? Tree trunk or ray of sun? Well, what can I say... In the world of creative writing, anything is possible. There are trillions of possibilities here, and they are multiplying, diverging in endless whirlwinds. What do you write with?
What am I writing?
I write in the dim light of a ragamuffin's forgiveness
I write with the smallest stars of what is almost invisible
I write with long sticky threads of the sacred webs of spiders
I write with spinning planets of darkness and danger
I write with brilliant and elusive tricks from my sleeve
Your turn
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List of words
Favorite words
The writer's imagination craves words. To fuel your creative energy, you need to throw something at your imagination 24 times a day (and night) or more. Here's a list of some of my favorite words to snack on. Help yourself. Feed. Use it. Open this page whenever your imagination starts growling and needs something to chew on. What words with 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6 syllables did you like today?
Worth a try
Ask yourself a question
What if the next question you ask yourself takes you to a part of your mind that you have never been to before? What if, simply by asking yourself a question or imagining what the answer would be, you could dream deeper, think wider, imagine higher, reach further? Here are 30 questions that you can answer however you want. These are not trick questions. These are questions that need to be looked at a little differently as you tailor your answers to them. Your answers can be true or false, long or short, fast or slow, soft or sticky. Walk through the near and far areas of your life. There is no wrong path. Everything that comes to mind is correct. See what interesting, sweet, kind, funny, nasty, honest, infectious and outrageous people you can be as you set out on a journey where every step is a word and where there is no map or compass.
Tips:
Everything you write is correct.
Don't worry about spelling and beautiful handwriting.
Write clearly or unclearly. Experiment.
Why not answer a question with a question?
Your turn
Try different options and see where the answers take you. If words need more space, let them go down, across, up, and off the page.
Unleash your wildest, wildest dreams. Where does she want to go?
Mine is already kicking and jumping and rushing straight towards the open gate, into the distance, across the field, straight towards...
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What will grow if you plant your heart? What color are his shoes?
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If you stand on your hands, where will you go? And how will you fall? Who will go with you?
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If you look under the canopy of the tent of life, what will you hear? What will you see? Why are you sneezing?
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What are the names of your fingers? What about the legs? Each arm and leg? By the nose?
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Where did your silliest song come from? What calms you down? Where was your talisman before you?
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Why do you never cease to be surprised? Who surprises you again and again?
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What do you love at the bottom? What are you afraid of at the very top?
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Where would you like to fly to? What do your wings look like today?
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What trap did your favorite memory fall into? Where will it go next?
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What kind of natural disaster would you be willing to experience if you knew in advance that you would not be harmed?
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You invite someone to make a wish and promise to fulfill it. To whom? What is this desire?
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If you could become any color for a day, what color would you like to become? And on what day?
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Write 100 (or more) words as one long word with no spaces at all around the perimeter of this page... don't stop until you have a spiral in the very middle. Hypnotize your hamster, dog, sister, brother, mother, father with this text, slowly repeating: “You want to sleep... You really want to sleep.” Say the long, spiraling word you created 3 times. This is a good exercise for your mouth, jaws, tongue, cheeks and loose teeth if you have any. You can try to hypnotize the cat, but he is most likely asleep anyway.
This is the story
Yellow car
Last week, a boy I know was driving in the car with his mother - to school, to the store, to the library, then back home - basically, wherever they usually go - and suddenly noticed that there were no yellow cars on the road.
“Where are all the yellow cars?” - he asked. Mom reminded him about the taxi and asked if he was feeling well.
And then he told her that he would count every scrap of yellow he could find. Almost immediately he began to see yellow everywhere: double lines of crosswalks; black cat eyes; a raincoat-clad man walking a yellow Labrador; fire hydrants; warning signs; rows of sunflowers peeking over the fence. And yellow cars are everywhere! And trucks, and buses, and bicycles. What if everything you put your attention on becomes real? Today yellow cars... and tomorrow world peace?
Is there anything that you barely notice? Anything you're thinking about? Anything you would like to find or see? An airplane from an aerobatics team going into a dive? Colony of caterpillars? Or an old friend from second grade? Sketch out a list of several (or several hundred) of these things, and inside the letter X, which traditionally denotes the exact location of the object on the map, write where it was found and what you will look for now.
Pony Express Russia track your parcel, cargo
What is the cheapest currency in the world against the dollar?
Shores of the Dead: How cutting up old ships turned into one of the most dangerous jobs in the world