Creative Writing Tips from Authors for Beginners

Creative writing (C.W.) is a perpetual thing, but, at the same time, it is the thing that teaches us to develop together with the world and people who inhabit this world. It is a parallel universe filled with wonders, dreams, and hopes. Imagination defines creative writing, imagination can take us anywhere, and we can be anyone: we can be merry dwellers of Victorian London, or dangerous assassins stalking their victims. Another word for creative writing is talent, talent for writing is as essential as any other talent, like drawing, dancing, singing, designing, etc.

You may hear here and there that writing is easy: you just sit down, begin writing, go on until you are done, and then you finish writing. That’s how many non-writing people see this process. To tell you the truth, it is hard, difficult, and mind-blowing. Especially if you force yourself into writing when you don’t feel like writing at all. We’d like to cover this topic for several reasons: first, this is a task that you may be required to complete during your studies to train your imagination and become more skillful at C.W., and second reason is that one day, you may seriously consider shifting from general C.W. to writing a book. That’s where your creative writing talent will be of a great help.

Let us start with the first reason. When you are just a student, you may have a talent for writing, but you may be absolutely unaware of it. C.W. assignments are given to students in order to test their writing abilities, to understand whether they are capable of writing, and to enlarge already available writing talent. And it’s not that simple as it may seem at the first sight. Students who attend departments of journalism and practice such thing on a daily basis learnt to write creatively through the flow of thoughts. They were supposed to close their eyes, turn off all unnecessary thoughts and write down their feelings. As they become more skillful at this, these thoughts transform into large and colorful images with the specific plot. Here, we are going to discuss what creative writing is, and how we should apply it properly, and what beginners should do with this form of writing.

Tips and Ideas for Creative Writing

There is no strict scientific definition of a creative writing essay, since it is something that you cannot measure. It shows your ability to come up with a certain idea, and transform it into the whole story. When you need to complete this kind of assignment and you feel lack of inspiration, you can try to find inspiration among things and people who surround you. Look at things that you see.

Ideas for C.W. may differ depending on a topic and a purpose of C.W. For example, if you write a home assignment for a college or university, or you write it for yourself. In the first case, you are given a specific topic, and an idea for the assignment depends on this topic. In the second scenario, you are free to experiment.

If your mind is empty, go out of your home, take a walk in the park, and visit the kingdom of the Mother Nature. Nature has always been a source of inspiration for many famous writers and poets. The way tree leaves move disturbed by the wind, colors of the sunset, songs of birds, and cries of seagulls. Every little being of the Mother Nature can be a source of inspiration.

Another great creative writing tip for beginners is to draw inspiration from his or her own affections. For example, you are a dreamer, so dream in words and sentences. Trust your dreams a piece of paper and make a piece of art out of it.

Do you want to read a few creative writing tips from famous authors? Here you have it! George Wier, the author of such books as “The Last Call”, “The Capitol Offense” and many others, says about the necessity of being a story-teller. Every  type of C.W. needs a story which you are going to tell to your readers. Readers want to read stories, different kind of stories. He also points out that a writer, no matter whether he is an experienced one, or just a beginner, should be interested or even compelled with what he writes. He says that “if it doesn’t compel you, it won’t compel others”. Adapted from this video:

[embed]https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kL6mW1lXcGg[/embed]

He recommends imagining a story-writing process as a process of communication. Imagine it as if you are talking to someone and you are telling him or her a story. He says that writing is a process of communication, and you communicate with readers through writing.

I bet all of you know who Ernest Hemingway is! He is a famous American author and journalist, and he is more than any other writer has some valuable advices on writing. Hemingway states that it is essential for every writer to write about living people rather than ordinary characters. He says that readers can feel when a writer creates fake, so ordinary characters are fake. If you want to become a successful writer, create living people with emotions, affections, hate, love, etc. However, he also adds that a writer should write himself or herself out of the story. A writer should be a mere story-teller and not a participant of the story. Finally, he says that a good writer should know everything, but at the same time, he or she cannot know everything. That is why it is so essential to learn new things constantly. A great writer is always open to learn something new and contribute this knowledge to his/her writing.

Looking for creative writing tips from experienced authors, you can often come across advices by Neil Gaiman, an English author of novels and graphic novels, short fiction stories, comic books, and audiobooks and films. He seems to know a lot to share his writing experience with beginners. He is a winner of numerous awards, such as the Bram Stoker Award, Nebula, and many others. He is known for “The Graveyard Book” (2008), “The Ocean at the End of the Lane” (2013), etc. He says that you have to read stories that are written by you as if you have never seen them. You should pretend that you read the story for the first time ever. Neil also says that “perfection is like chasing the horizon. Keep moving”. And this is absolutely true since you may be unable to make your C.W. perfect before you actually will have to present your work in public. You should learn to move on because we learn by our own mistakes. He also says that it is necessary to be confident in what you are doing, but this rule can be applied to writing as well.

Finally, it is worth mentioning one more time that aspiring writers learn to write by reading works of acknowledged and famous ones. That is why reading is so essential for every writer. You simply cannot be a writer, if you do not read books.

No matter what you decide, we hope that this creative writing tips and tricks will be really helpful to you. Besides, you can even use these creative writing tips when creating your blog! So have fun writing! And don`t forget to buy creative writing esaays on Pro Papers ;)