remmers
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Writing: Lesson 1 -- Getting Started
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Dec 14 05:23 UTC 1995 |
Now that you have mastered the skill of reading, it is time for you
to take up writing. For there would be no readers if writers did
not write things for them to read. On the other hand, there can be
writers without readers. For example, much writing is spoken by
actors and listened to by listeners, rather than being read by
readers. This is called "television". In any case, to spend one's
entire life reading and listening, without contributing to the
body of that which can be read or listened to, is the height of
selfishness. Therefore, you must write.
First, be certain that you have the proper writing equipment.
There are two kinds of writers, those who write with pencil and
those who write with pen. As you are a beginning writer, you may
wish to use pencil. Modern pencils come with erasers that can be
used to correct mistakes, and even well-trained beginners make
mistakes. As you gain practice in writing, you will become an
advanced writer; then you may use a pen. Advanced writers do not
make mistakes.
I do not recommend the use of a typewriter or a computer for
writing. These devices are very good at printing, but we are
concerned with writing here. Printing is for small children.
Once you have acquired a good quality pencil, you are ready to
begin your writing career. And now I must caution you about one of
the worst mistakes a beginning writer can make, and that is to
write alone. If you do this, you will never master the art of
writing. Instead, you should write as part of a group and learn
writing skills from the experienced members of the group. Find a
good writing committee and join it.
Yes, the best way to learn writing is to be part of a writing
committee. Thanks to television, there are many writing committees
available. This is because every sitcom is written by a committee,
and there are many, many sitcoms. Vacancies open up on these
committees quite frequently, as writers leave one committee to join
another. Quite often a new sitcom will come into existence,
requiring a whole new committee. Thus there are many good
opportunities for the beginning writer to join a committee and
learn the art of writing. With luck, you can join a committee for
one of the better sitcoms, such as "Married with Children," "X
Files," or "Ann Arbor School Board."
Writing committees are organized in such a way as to guarantee the
finest quality writing. Generally, there will be a committee member
responsible for writing each part of speech. Thus, one member will
write the nouns, another the verbs, another the adjectives, and so
on and so forth. As a beginner, you will most likely start out as
the gerund person--you will be apprenticed to the verb writer, who
will give you verbs to turn into gerunds. You do this by adding
"ing" to the end of each verb. This is a simple yet important and
rewarding task. It may come to seem repetitive after a while, but
by then you should be ready for promotion to a higher position on
the committee, and in the meantime, writing gerunds provides
excellent penmanship practice. It is certainly preferable to what
is considered the lowliest position on the committee, which is to
do the punctuation. The punctuation job is usually given only to
people with spelling deficiencies and seldom leads to promotion.
The most important position on any writing committee is that of
Head Writer. This is a person who has achieved mastery in all
aspects of the art of writing, usually through years of experience
doing the other committee chores. It is the job of the Head Writer
to do the word order--to write the words and punctuation provided
by the other committee members into proper sequence, so as to form
sentences and paragraphs. Thus, the Head Writer assembles the final
writing product that the reader reads or the listener hears. Every
beginning writer aspires to be a Head Writer some day. With hard
work and perseverance, you too can become a Head Writer!
I will close by noting that there are a few exceptional individuals
who can do all the tasks of writing by themselves, without the need
of a committee. Such writers are called Bards. The greatest of
these was Shakespeare, the Bard of Avon, who wrote "Hamlet," which
contains the immortal phrase "To be or not to be." It is clear from
this that Shakespeare was a master of word order. A lesser writer
might, if lucky, have chosen the same words, but would have written
them in the wrong order, such as "Not or be be to to."
There are very few Bards. You are probably not one, for if you
were, you would be off somewhere writing classics instead of
reading this. Thus, you should go and join a writing committee as
soon as possible. Best of luck with your new writing career!
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