(Updated 4/17) The Craft of Writing: A Comprehensive Examination
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The craft of writing is infinitely flexible and yet predictably formulaic. Popular suggestion dictates every story that can be told already has been. Sitting at your computer contemplating you may find this to be disheartening, but I’m here to show you it is in fact the greatest mindset shift you can create for yourself to write incomparable stories.
I am confident that this article will take you though the craft in ways and with tools you’ve seldom if ever seen. It will include perspectives you’ve never considered and correlations across all the learning I’ve done in last five years of intensive studying, reading, and testing.
Beginners in the craft aren’t just welcome they are encouraged to engage with amateurs, and if we are lucky maybe even a few professionals will grace us with their insights.
I assure you, I do this for my own reference as much as for you all. This won’t be the last article you’ll ever need on writing, but if I hit my target anywhere close it will be the first one you’ll want to come back to anytime you’re stuck.
The 5 Disciplines of the Craft of Writing
In this article I’ll take you through the most critical factors that make a story “unputdownable”. These disciplines are things you’ll comprehend immediately, understand eventually, and sometimes perfect the execution of with persistence. No story can survive or drive a reader’s attention without them.
The 5 Compositions of the Craft of Writing
In this upcoming article I’ll take you through the main chunks of writing you’ll perform again and again throughout your story. These core compositions fill in chapter after chapter in varying orders but are always ultimately the same. Without these no story can feel complete nor convey the desired message you hope it might. <COMING SOON>
The 5 Substances of Writing Style
In this upcoming article I’ll take you through what makes your writing uniquely you. This will help you understand what the ever ethereal concept of the “voice” is. This will allow you to maintain your style across genres and stories if you desire, or to change it as you see fit for whatever projects appear. <COMING SOON>
The 5 Elements of a Story
In this upcoming article I’ll take you through the base elements that make a story complete. Regardless of what structures, strategies, or freewriting techniques you might use these elements will always be there and without them your story will feel as though something is missing in sections or even in the story as a whole. <COMING SOON>
The 5 Reader Experiences
In this upcoming article I’ll take you through the reader’s perspective of entering your story, gaining understanding, and ultimately becoming obsessed with it from front to back. The reader experience is often overlooked by the writer who has the advantage of living in the story day in and day out, a benefit a reader will never have on first reading. Without lending these hands you’ll find readers more often confused than amazed by your writing. <COMING SOON>
Advancing Your Craft
When you bring awareness to these factors that make up the craft of writing you will see your writing improve massively, even if your spelling and grammar never improves.
Because the truth is while a story can benefit from well executed written word. Emotional connection cares little for perfected academic execution. Insight is not stifled simply because a comma is in the wrong place. Lives and perspectives aren’t changed because of “i” before “e” except after “c”. The perenniality of a piece of work isn’t dictated by the modern pretense of language, but the resonance of the message you convey.
These factors will sharpen your message. They will impact your reader and allow your message to send the reader reeling from your insight, and enthralled by it’s composition as any truly powerful and complete story does.
