[Arthryn]

Many of you may know about Ben's blog SevenWrite. I have just contributed an article to it that I think many of you could benefit from reading.

It would be nice to see some discussion.

Here goes:

Your Teenage Writing is Shitty – Part I

I believe we have a large teenage readership here. If you are indeed a teenager, please allow me to tell you how shitty your writing is. If you are no longer a teenager but still think your teenage writing is awesome, please allow me to tell you how shitty your writing still is.

Wow Allison, how incredibly mean of you. You’re a huge bitch.

Yes, thank you. However, you need to know that your current writing is shitty, no matter how amazing and fresh and original and poignant you think it is. This article is about how to stop being so goddamn arrogant about your shitty teenage writing, and offers methods for improvement. You’ll definitely need a thick skin and an open mind.

Then tell me, what makes my teenage writing so shitty?

There are many factors that cause shitty teenage writing. Your shitty teenage writing is typically caused by you putting your lack of experience and lack of full emotional and mental development into a story. Here are some probable facts about the aspiring teenage author:

- Lack of life experience
- Lack of ample writing experience
- Lack of individual voice
- Lack of maturity
- Underdeveloped understanding of people and how they work
- Poor understanding of how things like economics work
- Angst
- Has never experienced criticism before
- Unable to accept or process criticism
- Doesn’t know what real criticism is
- Underexposed to real literature
- Thinks life/parents suck way more than they actually do
- Thinks life is way more dramatic/difficult than it actually is
- Has entitlement problem
- Plays too many video games
- Daydreams about riding dragons and shit
- Likes anime
- Is a virgin

Additionally, here are some problems your writing will inevitably contain, due to the problems listed above:

- Characters full of angst
- Characters and/or plots full of melodrama
- Lots of melodrama
- Self-insertion
- Unrealistic character motives
- Unrealistic conflicts
- Unrealistic political/economic issues
- Generally unrealistic
- Generally unoriginal
- Failure to redefine borrowed races
- Failure to make things difficult for characters
- Too much ‘Awesome Factor’
- Wish fulfillment
- Horrible romance
- Arrogance, as you’re the next motherfucking Tolkien

When you write, regardless of genre, you put a lot of yourself and what you know into your writing. So when you are an angsty social train wreck and what you know is an unfinished high school education and limited life and people experience, it really, really shows in your writing, and not in a good way. Don’t forget that when you’re a teenager, you are not fully mature, so pulling good, mature writing out of your immature little teenage brain isn’t very easy.

If my shitty writing is so deeply ingrained in my precious identity as a teenager, then how the hell am I supposed to improve??

Well, that’s going to take a bit of work, but it’s doable. The first step, of course, is realizing that your teenage writing is shitty. You can do this by going forward with an open mind about your work and breaking down your long-standing opinion of it so that you can view it in a new light. Once you do this, we can get to work. Now I know you're thinking that this article must be talking about all those other shitty teenage writers and not you directly, but I'm still talking about you, so for a start, at least attempt to get over yourself. Over the next few days, I’m going to lay down a few methods to follow to not only help improve your work, but improve your process. Future sections will include: Observation and Research, Scorched Earth Revision, Originality, and Criticism.

[Spinner]

Thank you very, very much for posting this, Allison.

Ben

[Buddhist]

I'm bored, so I'm going to have to do a response to each of those bullets.
- Lack of life experience- Yes
- Lack of ample writing experience- More than likely
- Lack of individual voice- Some people have indicated otherwise
- Lack of maturity- Depends on what kind (psychological vs. physical)
- Underdeveloped understanding of people and how they work- Probably.
- Poor understanding of how things like economics work- Compared to other peers of mine, I have a pretty large understanding of economics.
- Angst- Nope.
- Has never experienced criticism before- I love criticism, as long as it's constructive.
- Unable to accept or process criticism- See above
- Doesn’t know what real criticism is- See above
- Underexposed to real literature- That's also fairly likely.
- Thinks life/parents suck way more than they actually do- No. I like living, and I have to rely on my parents to maintain a cushy existence.
- Thinks life is way more dramatic/difficult than it actually is- Hell no.
- Has entitlement problem- No.
- Plays too many video games- That's probably a definite yes. But even these can, have had, and are a great medium for excellent stories. I.E., KOTOR, KOTOR 2, Mass Effect, the Half Life series...
- Daydreams about riding dragons and pooop- Eww. No.
- Likes anime- Anybody who's talked to me in a chat knows otherwise.
- Is a virgin- Yeah.

- Characters full of angst No. Nearly all of my characters are in early to mid twenties. I don't write teen-fiction pooop.
- Characters and/or plots full of melodrama- I don't do melodrama.
- Lots of melodrama- See above.
- Self-insertion- ?

- Unrealistic character motives
- Unrealistic conflicts
- Unrealistic political/economic issues
- Generally unrealistic
Most likely no. I try to make my stuff as realistic as possible, with the exception of me including other sentient races and small amounts of magic.


- Generally unoriginal
I try not to be.
- Failure to redefine borrowed races
I guess so.
- Failure to make things difficult for characters
If I am understanding what you are saying correctly, do things always have to be insanely difficult? I can understand a snag every now and then, and if it's a cakewalk, it would be boring. But it shouldn't have to be difficult all the time.
- Too much ‘Awesome Factor’- In what way?
- Wish fulfillment- Nah. I don't think that dark and low fantasy, or dystopias/anti-utopias would be considered that.
- Horrible romance- Not something I try to put in my stories.
- Arrogance, as you’re the next motherfucking Tolkien- It's not like that's impossible. Just very, very unlikely.

Anyways, this post will probably get me the self-worshiping douche award or something.

[Arthryn]

Don't forget that you're fifteen years old. It's also very hard to assess your own teenage writing without either lots of honest external input, or putting distance between you and your writing, like 5 years of distance.

If I had read this article when I was fifteen or sixteen, when I first started working on my current story (it looked very different back then), I would have balked and gone through and excluded myself from the vast majority of the descriptions in those lists. Just like you did. I thought my writing was totally awesome back then, and all my friends gave me positive feedback, and I thought it was pretty sweet.

A few weeks ago I picked up my old manuscript (I kept printed chapters of my old draft in a binder), and read through it. And I can say, now being 22, it was pretty horrendous. Melodrama galore. Embarrassingly verbose. Character dialogues that just didn't make sense. Lots and lots of unnecessary complexity in the plot and methodology undertaken by the characters. I see lots and lots of writing by teens here that get trapped in many of the same pitfalls, and I just want to help you guys out of it.

However, the inherent problem with this article is, as exemplified by you, Caligrus, is getting people to apply the article to themselves. Telling a teenager their precious writing is really really bad is like telling Christians Jesus wasn't divine.

[Buddhist]

Don't forget that you're fifteen years old. It's also very hard to assess your own teenage writing without either lots of honest external input, or putting distance between you and your writing, like 5 years of distance.

If I had read this article when I was fifteen or sixteen, when I first started working on my current story (it looked very different back then), I would have balked and gone through and excluded myself from the vast majority of the descriptions in those lists. Just like you did. I thought my writing was totally awesome back then, and all my friends gave me positive feedback, and I thought it was pretty sweet.

A few weeks ago I picked up my old manuscript (I kept printed chapters of my old draft in a binder), and read through it. And I can say, now being 22, it was pretty horrendous. Melodrama galore. Embarrassingly verbose. Character dialogues that just didn't make sense. Lots and lots of unnecessary complexity in the plot and methodology undertaken by the characters. I see lots and lots of writing by teens here that get trapped in many of the same pitfalls, and I just want to help you guys out of it.

However, the inherent problem with this article is, as exemplified by you, Caligirl, is getting people to apply the article to themselves. Telling a teenager their precious writing is really really bad is like telling Christians Jesus wasn't divine.

Though, to be honest, I've really stopped doing any actual writing. For the past year or so, I've been doing mostly lore and background stuff.

[Charles]

I think, at the heart of things, it goes to criticism. How do you take criticism? How does anybody?

Well, most people say that they're big into criticism, but if it touches a nerve, they go off. This is a lot more common in poetry. I have often considered going through the poetry section in this forum and just giving a run down. The thing is, if I'm asking the question "What?" and "why?" really frequently, then you're probably not delivering the kind of message you want for other people. I understand if you're writing for yourself. Honestly, I'm down with that. If you're writing for other people to read though, you gotta wise up about writing for an audience.

At the heart of this, we see that it's important to take criticism, constructive or not and internalize it. I like even bad criticism because it makes me challenge my own stuff. Am I making the right decisions here? Sometimes a bad question is more challenging than a good one.

Arthryn has a few more along this line lined up for this week, so I'm going to be interested to see the reaction from you guys.

[bucket]

Wow Arthryn, how very unlike you. Usually you're all about being diplomatic, but here you're being brutally honest. Good. I like it. And I have to say I wholly agree. It's rather comical when my friends brag about books they're writing that are really quite horrendus.

And lest you accuse me of being hypocritical, yes, I admit my writing sucks. Though in my personal opinion it is better then some.

Wow Arthryn, how very unlike you. Usually you're all about being diplomatic, but here you're being brutally honest. Good. I like it. And I have to say I wholly agree. It's rather comical when my friends brag about books they're writing that are really quite horrendus.

And lest you accuse me of being hypocritical, yes, I admit my writing sucks. Though in my personal opinion it is better then some.

[Arthryn]

Even when I'm being diplomatic, I don't sugarcoat stuff. I do try to be nice or at least neutral in tone, but this is an area where you really can't be nice or cut your audience any slack, because everyone else around them cuts them enough slack to more than make up for it.

Like Charles said, a big part of the shitty teenage writing problem has to do with criticism. That's why I mentioned it several times in my list, and that's why I'm going to write a fat, mean article about it and what it's really about. Because most of you who say you like criticism don't know what it's about in this context. Criticism for you is like your teacher marking up your essay and saying you need to use different word choice or make one of your supporting paragraphs more convincing. And when it comes to your creative writing, it's not about superficial stuff like word choice and how to best organize a chapter, it's about violating the very core of your creative thinking and expression to tell you why it is bad and what you need to do to make it not bad. Just because it's your 'art' doesn't make it immune to people really truly criticizing it.

The other issue, which will be more extensively covered in the Scorched Earth Revision article, is about self-evaluation of your writing and how to really analyze it and turn on your own creation and really question it. This way, you can do really productive deep revisions and keep looking at your work with a critical, questioning eye and keep it in perspective and not avoid the topic and settle for superficial self-edits to a chapter you don't want to dissect and rebuild.

Dealing with criticism from other people is extremely important in good writing, as is being able to view and revise your work realistically.

[Shruikanisbeast]

Wait, So you are dooming the whole teenage population dumbasses???
thats not fair to most who actual teens who right good stories.
My 17 year old opinon,,,,

-Lack of life experience- Not always true
- Lack of ample writing experience- That goes for any new writter, old or young
- Lack of individual voice- The story is the individual's voice or ideas.
- Lack of maturity- A majority of teens, but not really
- Underdeveloped understanding of people and how they work- Applies to morons who dont pay attention
- Poor understanding of how things like economics work- Oh really??? I beg to differ GOVERNMENT.
- Angst- More Character
- Has never experienced criticism before-Not true all teens have to deal with alot of criticism, some take it harder.
- Unable to accept or process criticism. This is an individuals prob not the entire teen population
- Doesn’t know what real criticism is-See above
- Underexposed to real literature- See above x2
- Thinks life/parents suck way more than they actually do-True
- Thinks life is way more dramatic/difficult than it actually is- Untrue, some peoples lives really suck.
- Has entitlement problem
- Plays too many video games
- Daydreams about riding dragons and pooop- I am quilty of that, as we all are this is a dragon rider site about dragon rider stories
- Likes anime- Anime sucks.
- Is a virgin- My training wheels are off honey.

Additionally, here are some problems your writing will inevitably contain, due to the problems listed above:

- Characters full of angst- More fun
- Characters and/or plots full of melodrama- Reserved for Emo and goth kids.
- Lots of melodrama-See above
- Self-insertion- Who does not do this??? Even a little bit.
- Unrealistic character motives- Well in a fiction story things can get unrealistic.
- Unrealistic conflicts-see above
- Unrealistic political/economic issues-s
- Generally unrealistic-Not bad for fiction
- Generally unoriginal-Good
- Failure to redefine borrowed races- Ok sure
- Failure to make things difficult for characters-Wrong
- Too much ‘Awesome Factor’- Never too much epicness, ever
- Wish fulfillment
- Horrible romance-To some degree
- Arrogance, as you’re the next motherfucking Tolkien- A bit of Irony buddy???

[Charles]

If you don't think this list applies to you, I can pretty much guarantee that it does.

Also, it's "write." As in, "write good stories."

[Arthryn]

Wait, So you are dooming the whole teenage population dumbasses???
thats not fair to most who actual teens who right good stories.

Quoting you before you try to edit.

Reactions like yours, Shruikanisbeast, is why I've included this very special sentence in the concluding paragraph to close the loophole of self-righteous self-exclusion:

"Now I know you're thinking that this article must be talking about all those other shitty teenage writers and not you directly, but I'm still talking about you, so for a start, at least attempt to get over yourself."

Yes, you need to get over yourself. And your writing. Once you do this and achieve enlightenment, you will be able to really 'right' some good stories.

[Malus Rune]

Good article, Arthryn. Certainly when I read through stories I have written I see a huge amount of that stuff; a few problems I have in particular are poor understanding of government/economics and self-insertion. I'm looking forwards to the improvement sections.

This post has been edited by Malus Rune: 13 August 2009 - 05:52 AM

[Cielina]

Full of constructive criticism as always XD. Either way, I agree wholeheartedly. I'm one to say, that if you ever start writing, your first long-term story will be crap. It will be. I guarantee it. Mine was. It was very, very, very crap. And I wrote it about a year ago. Write it sooner or later, to get it out of your system. Even if it is crap, looking back on the experience and the crappy writing will let you realise a lot of things, and help you improve.

I don't really write much on this forum, to be honest. Mainly because I lack work ethic with writing - I write about a chapter or two, before I've get bored. I've got around 20 or so of these chapters saved on MS-Word, ranging from some of the DIRE faeces I wrote as an 11 year old, to some stuff I wrote a month ago or so. And to be honest, I don't really love the stuff I write now. It's reasonable, and has improved greatly, but not good.

I think beginning to realise the mechanics of writing, and being able to appreciate the what makes a good book good helps. I've only started to realise about the pitfalls of Mary-Sues (a biggie), authors pets (like mary-sues...meh, I fail at this one though XD), white vs. black, angst, whiny characters, making characters badass for the sake of them being badass, doing things happen for the sake of it looking cool, unrealistic happy-clappy endings, lack of general logic in plots, characters being only plot devices, etc. Being able to appreciate good writing, and being able to see the flaws in bad writing is a start.

I'd also say that becoming a perfectionist helps. This is something we've been doing increasingly in my art lessons at school, and it has helped there. Do not think your writing is okay. Consider different responses in dialogue, consider the sense in dialogue, consider whether x, y or z adjectives is necessary and whether a verb, or an adverb would be better. Learning to be merticulous about everything helps. I'm a perfectionist about work myself, though I've always considered it to be an annoying habit as I've grown up (when I could of just put in the same piece of work less refined and still get a high grade and as much praise), but it comes in useful when writing. Being a perfectionist is useless if you're blind to flaws within writing however.

- Characters full of angst -- Solved that one
- Characters and/or plots full of melodrama -- Still working on it
- Lots of melodrama -- Still working on it
- Self-insertion -- Solved that one (last years writing had dire cases of this)
- Unrealistic character motives -- I'm working on this one.
- Unrealistic conflicts -- True. Reasearch probably needed.
- Generally unrealistic -- I fail at this one on a hundred levels XD
- Generally unoriginal -- True.
- Failure to redefine borrowed races -- I ignore races. They just irritate me in general. In one of my one-chapter books, I made elves a slave race, who had lost their magic, and spent time fighting among themselves like animals for scraps of food because I hated elves so much.
- Failure to make things difficult for characters -- Oh, I'm working on this bigtime. This is one which irritates me a lot.
- Too much ‘Awesome Factor’ -- Oh god, I see this all the time. I'm not that bad at this one, to be honest.
- Wish fulfillment -- Solved it. I realised this year, that life simply isn't fair.
- Horrible romance -- Yeah, I have this problem.
- Arrogance, as you’re the next motherfucking Tolkien - Yeah, but in my (crappy) defense, it used to be worse (I thought I was able to write something better than Tolkien...)

A lot of it, is just growing up: "Life ain't fair. Get over it. Tell your problems to the african kid dying of Malaria, won't you? You're lucky, kiddos. You are able to get yourself out of your own problems. Move your arse, and solve them."

Realise this truly and properly, and you're halfway there. And also realise that your emotions shouldn't control you (seriously, woe is me? -__-), because frankly, that just leads to trouble.

I'm also looking forward to the future improvement sections.

This post has been edited by Cielina: 13 August 2009 - 06:13 AM

[eragon nerd]

Wait, So you are dooming the whole teenage population dumbasses???
thats not fair to most who actual teens who right good stories.

Quoting you before you try to edit.

Reactions like yours, Shruikanisbeast, is why I've included this very special sentence in the concluding paragraph to close the loophole of self-righteous self-exclusion:

"Now I know you're thinking that this article must be talking about all those other poooooopy teenage writers and not you directly, but I'm still talking about you, so for a start, at least attempt to get over yourself."

Yes, you need to get over yourself. And your writing. Once you do this and achieve enlightenment, you will be able to really 'right' some good stories.

Told you it would happen. ^^

Anyways, one thing that stood out on your list of reasons is "Doesn’t know what real criticism is". This really needs to be covered in your criticism article. So many people get the standard one paragraph "I like it. Keep writing" and think that counts as constructive criticism. Also, too many people give that kind of criticism and think it really helps. It may be good if the person is unsure about writing and need encouragement but besides that, it isn't doing favors.

I don't know, I fall prey to giving superficial critiques focusing mainly on word choice and grammar, but I hope I critique from the "what" and "why" side of things through commentary.

This post has been edited by eragon nerd: 13 August 2009 - 12:44 PM

[Buddhist]

I'm still curious as to what Arthryn means by self-insertion. Does it mean putting parts of your personality in other characters or what? Or including yourself as some kind of weird cameo?