An insight into creative writing

WHENEVER you write, you have to dream up words and put them into sentences. All writing requires you to be creative. Creative writing perhaps requires a little more of your imagination than some other types of writing, but the best imaginative writing is based on the possibilities of real life and experience; people and places, situations and stories, descriptions and narratives.

Take note of the distinctions between descriptive and narrative writing. In descriptive writing, you focus on a place or a person. When you write about a place, you naturally write about the people in a description of the scene. When you write about a person, you naturally write about a place or places associated with the person. Focus is the keyword.

In narrative writing, you build an account of events that are linked together. When you write a narrative, you control the selection and order of events. Control is the keyword. What makes a good piece of descriptive writing? The content will engage and interest the reader. A word of caution: Some students try too hard with descriptive writing. Relax and start by writing some clear sentences that set you up.

Students ask if they can use paragraphs in descriptive writing. Of course you can and it is a good thing to do so. There are some natural breaks even within a short piece of writing, so take the opportunity to show that you know how and when to use them. You need detail in a description, and you need a thoughtful vocabulary to make the meaning of the description more precise.

Using well-selected nouns and verbs can help to add detail. Do not feel that you need to add an adjective to every noun and an adverb to every verb in order to make your writing detailed. Also, avoid dropping impossibly long words into the description just to impress.

How not to write a narrative. Narrative is about clear and meaningful communication with the reader. Remember the key word is control, with maturity not far behind. You should avoid creating a piece of genre writing or unoriginal stories of horror, fantasy and war heroics. Writers of this kind of narrative are often re-living a film –badly –and forgetting that a good writer writes for the reader. Bad writers write to a formula –in other words, “let’s be predictable, let’s feed off as many clichés’ as we can! No, let’s not!’ What makes a good piece of narrative writing? The plot and the characters will be well-constructed and sustained. Keep the plot manageable and keep the number of characters down to three or four only. You have plenty of time to think about the opening sentences, Opening sentences can set up expectations for a story but above all, clear sentences set up expectations of quality and control.

Think about the ending before you start. Do not spoil a good story with a hopeless ending. The narrative is purposeful and well-placed. In a narrative of two or three pages, you have to be selective. Narratives that travel along a motorway stopping at every service station never reach the end of the journey. Selected snapshots, well signposted are very important.

Paragraphs will be varied in length, with links and connectives keeping the story progressing. Before you develop the confidence for variation, begin with paragraphs of roughly equal length. Connectives can be associated words, they can be the grammatical words and phrases that signal a change, for example, “One hour later . . . in the next village . . .’ or simply, “However . . .’

Overall, the reader’s interest is held, perhaps by means of interesting devices, words, phrases and sentences. Examples of narrative devices are flashbacks and cliff-hangers, among others; but the best devices of all are well-chosen words and phrases and crisp sentences that are properly punctuated.

First-person and third-person writing: A first-person piece of writing, often a narrative, is written from the perspective of “I” or “we” (grammatical first person). The narrator is therefore firmly in the story. A third-person piece of writing is written from a more detached point of view. The writer is generally outside the immediate action, looking in. It is written from the perspective of he, she or they (grammatical third person).

As with narrative writing, descriptive writing can also be written from a first-person or a third-person perspective, but it is not so easy to keep focus when writing a first-person description. What makes a good, accurate piece of English writing? The sentences are varied and controlled. Short sentences can be used to add impact, Make sure that longer sentences end before they run away loosely.

Accurate punctuation is used to vary pace, clarify meaning and create deliberate effects. Get your full stops or periods right first and remember, commas are not substitutes for full stops. Grammar is used confidently and purposefully. Use standard written English. You do not have to be posh, just proper.

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