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To become a better writer, read as much as you can

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Re: To become a better writer, read as much as you can

#201

Post by hrnnnnnn »

mega_dean wrote: post #157
hrnnnnnn wrote: post #107

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Imagine instead the post was about people who want to make music but don't listen to it. I literally cannot imagine being a musician who doesn't listen to music.

This isn't a real counterexample, but an interesting case is Bobby McFerrin, who wrote "Don't Worry, Be Happy". He avoided listening to singers for 1-2 years in order to develop his own voice/sound: "First was the vision, then the technique of working it out. I wanted to find my own way of singing by knowing myself. I knew that if I started listening to other singers, it would take me years to develop. So I shut myse…

That makes sense to me. If I was about to write a doom metal record I'd probably avoid listening to doom metal for a while.

The difference here, as you point out, is that Bobby already had a lifetime of listening to music and appreciating other singers.

Re: To become a better writer, read as much as you can

#203

Post by presbyterian »

psadri wrote: post #194

In my experience, the thing that makes your better at something is actually _doing_ it, badly at first and then gradually improving by iteration. But for writing, I usually see the advice that says you should read a lot instead of write a lot. What gives?

You shouldn't read a lot instead of writing a lot, you should be doing both, in the same way a musician should practice their instrument and listen to a lot of music. Or, for a more HN-appropriate context, imagine trying to contribute to a FOSS project without reading any of the existing code or knowing the style guides. Your contributions could be fine, but they'll never be good.

Re: To become a better writer, read as much as you can

#204

Post by cyberpunk »

Robin_Message wrote: post #195
Guestmodinfo wrote: post #68

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Please please suggest me some books where language and style of speaking sentences takes the crown rather than the story being the selling point. I'm tired of hearing about the usual greats and also booker prize ones because they have good characters and good story content or shocking emotionally but are quite bland on the language front because they assume their readers have grade 5 level capacity so the sentences a…

Neal Stephenson - Anathem is great and not an easy reader. I enjoyed most of his other books but that one was the complexity sweet spot for me. Umberto Eco and Ursula Le Guin I agree on.

His latest one, polostan, may be the worst book I’ve ever read on the other hand.. No idea what happened.

Re: To become a better writer, read as much as you can

#205

Post by [deleted] »

nottorp wrote: post #89
zmgsabst wrote: post #78

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I’m working on a whitepaper on a layover. > I know good sentences. I know the style of prose I like to read. I know how things can veer between florid and poetic and where the line is. I know how a sentence can be completely different if you read it as though it was spoken, instead of to yourself (some of mine are written to be read.) Your perspective doesn’t really speak to me at all — because I’m writing as the way…

The parent post wasn't talking about technical writing. There is reading and writing for fun, remember?

[deleted]

Re: To become a better writer, read as much as you can

#206

Post by buxwash__5 »

philipov wrote: post #190
shnock wrote: post #185

Earlier quoted context omitted.

How so? The masses are composed of individuals... who can commit to continuing to read. Are you talking about incentives?

The mass is more than the sum of its parts, and if only a small minority exercise critical thinking they will be overwhelmed by the whole. As the great comic wrote - those who don't learn from history are doomed to repeat it, but those who learn from history are doomed to stand by helplessly as everyone else repeats it. And furthermore, a democracy can not survive if the majority of the voter base is incapable of cri…

For someone literate you should probably know better.

First of all the Patriots were not even a simple majority. Turns out you don't need a majority to win what is basically a war of insurgency. There are several modern analogs that reflect this reality.

Second of all the country was founded by elites. It wasn't that farmers could do critical thinking (whatever that really means) it was that the punitive British response aligned economic incentives across class, and across North and South. So a large enough slice of the populace was ready to be sufficiently bought in on the propaganda of a few outstanding men.

Thirdly, your conception of history is wrong. Small elites always rule societies. America was not a democracy at its founding, that is if you take democracy to be the 21st century standard of universal suffrage. Societies are less about some arbitrary standard of critical thinking and more a contingent set of circumstances and incentives.

It's a bit ironic in your rather tired critique of modern culture you reveal another truth - those who complain about the contemporary intelligence of the masses often leave much to be desired in their own supposed superiority.

You should read more.

Re: To become a better writer, read as much as you can

#209

Post by tmoertel »

Guestmodinfo wrote: post #68
vintagedave wrote: post #63

> Why be a writer if you don’t love reading? Why devote your intellectual and emotional energy to creating a book, when it’s a form you’re not invested in? Why write, when you aren’t steeped in wonder of storytelling? This is the key point, I think. I've seen the same as the author: people who want to be writers but rarely read books. And I don't get it. I recently finished a novel (now shopping around for agents, wh…

Please please suggest me some books where language and style of speaking sentences takes the crown rather than the story being the selling point. I'm tired of hearing about the usual greats and also booker prize ones because they have good characters and good story content or shocking emotionally but are quite bland on the language front because they assume their readers have grade 5 level capacity so the sentences a…

> Please please suggest me some books where language and style of speaking sentences takes the crown rather than the story being the selling point.

I will give you approximately twenty delightful novels where the prose and the stories are both excellent: Patrick O’Brian’s Aubrey–Maturin series.

I avoided these books for the longest time because I didn't believe I was the kind of person who would read “books about tall ships.” But so many people recommend these particular books because of the masterly writing that I tried the first, Master and Commander. Immediately, I was taken by O’Brian’s writing: vivid, lively, and engaging, while also utterly precise.

Give that first novel a try. It’s not easy, but it is oh so rewarding.

Edited to add some examples from the first novel:

“I have never yet known a man admit that he was either rich or asleep: perhaps the poor man and the wakeful man have some great moral advantage.”

“Where there was no equality there was no companionship: when a man was obliged to say ‘Yes, sir,’ his agreement was of no worth even if it happened to be true.”

“He held up two fingers, in case a landman might not fully comprehend so great a number.”

“But you know as well as I, patriotism is a word; and one that generally comes to mean either my country, right or wrong, which is infamous, or my country is always right, which is imbecile.”

Re: To become a better writer, read as much as you can

#210

Post by orthoxerox »

shnock wrote: post #187
vintagedave wrote: post #63

> Why be a writer if you don’t love reading? Why devote your intellectual and emotional energy to creating a book, when it’s a form you’re not invested in? Why write, when you aren’t steeped in wonder of storytelling? This is the key point, I think. I've seen the same as the author: people who want to be writers but rarely read books. And I don't get it. I recently finished a novel (now shopping around for agents, wh…

You could always post it on a web-serial site like: https://www.royalroad.com I have seen that to be a viable path to publishing many times now, as well as other benefits like building a community of readers.

The first problem with web serials is that you write your weakest chapters first and release them into the wild.

The second problem is writing too much. I am reading a popular web serial right now to see what's all the fuss is about and all I want is to edit, edit, edit it into something more concise and refined.

Don't write YA novels that are five times longer than War and Peace, please.

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