Oh, for the love of humanity!

[L'Oiseau Noir]

Yup, I'm back again with yet another of my rants.

This time, however, it's about wannabe writers. You know who I'm talking about, right? Those angsty kids who write really bad stories with cliche plots, paper-thin characters, awkward sentences, spelling and grammatical errors galore, and a myriad of other mistakes because they're too lazy to actually study grammar? Yeah, them.

Now, don't get me wrong--I don't hold myself on a pedestal of any kind. Like anyone I still need to work at it. I'm just sick and tired of all these fools who gallivant about waving the writer's flag above their heads, simply because their literacy teachers may have told them that they were good. But hell, we all know teachers--for the most part anyway--just say that stuff to slide you along, and get you out of their class so they can get on with their lives.

I understand we all need to start somewhere, and that's true. This rant, however, is aimed at those individuals who swear they're Neil Gaiman, but never even cracked open a grammar book. As I've said before in another thread, you need the basic tools before you can weave a story together. It's like a carpenter who tries to build a house without basic structural knowledge--it'll all come crashing down, no matter how good the carpenter thinks it looks.

It's individuals like that who make people take teenage writers about as seriously as a prick on the finger. And frankly, I'm tired of being labeled as a "piss-poor writer" because of my age, especially since I took the time (and am still taking time) to brush up on my grammar and storytelling skills. I want to be in the utmost shape, dammit! I want to write!

Anyway, I just wanted to get that off my chest, as it's been bothering me for quite awhile.

[Godslayer Jillian]

I love you!
That's the reason I don't frequent the literature section much.
I wish there was a reason for me to, but there isn't.
There are the occasional jewels in it, but most of it is plain rubbish, and yet there keeps being more rubbish because people don't want to be 'mean'.
They encourage people filled with suck to keep posting either because they don't want to hurt their feelings or because they themselves are delusional about what consists on good writing and what doesn't.

[Tha Duckman]

Like R.L. Stine...

[L'Oiseau Noir]

Originally Posted by Godslayer Jillian

I love you!
That's the reason I don't frequent the literature section much.
I wish there was a reason for me to, but there isn't.
There are the occasional jewels in it, but most of it is plain rubbish, and yet there keeps being more rubbish because people don't want to be 'mean'.
They encourage people filled with suck to keep posting either because they don't want to hurt their feelings or because they themselves are delusional about what consists on good writing and what doesn't.

That's why I have to play the role as the "bitchy critic" to pound some sense into their skulls. Check out my posts in the threads The Blood, A Quick Story Called, Never Forget to Visit, and Unholy Union to see what I mean

I mean, hell, if someone's going to berate them, it might as well be a literature geek like myself. Plus, no one else has seemed to take the job up.

[L'Oiseau Noir]

Originally Posted by Tha Duckman

Like R.L. Stine...

The only reason R.L Stine has been able to stay afloat so long is because of half-assed marketing, and the elementary schools that stock his books for young, deluded children to read. Oh yeah, and let's not forget the chain of made-for-television movies, along with the TV series, based off his atrocious stories.

If it weren't for the little bastards, we'd have been rid of his ass by now.

[Green.Lady]

This rings a few bells - namely a close friend whose sad excuses for stories I edited a few years back. She deemed herself a 'writer' and planned to get published when she didn't know basic rules like:
- New person speaking equals new paragraph.
- And that this is wrong - "text." said Joe. And this is right - "text," said Joe.

The same wannabe complaint applies to painting, anime art, poetry, and pretty much any other art form you can shake a stick at. Over-praising kids is most definitely a problem - from both parents and teachers.

[L'Oiseau Noir]

Originally Posted by Green.Lady

This rings a few bells - namely a close friend whose sad excuses for stories I edited a few years back. She deemed herself a 'writer' and planned to get published when she didn't know basic rules like:
- New person speaking equals new paragraph.
- And that this is wrong - "text." said Joe. And this is right - "text," said Joe.

The same wannabe complaint applies to painting, anime art, poetry, and pretty much any other art form you can shake a stick at. Over-praising kids is most definitely a problem - from both parents and teachers.

That's precisely what I despise! Every time I comb through a newbie writer's work, I have to explain to them what pronouns and nouns are, or what appositives and conjunctions are. They swore they could write, but didn't even know things as basic as that. This is how bad our school system is now.

I'd rather have a teacher that tells me I need work than a teacher who swears I'm the greatest writer in the world. Unfortunately, I've yet to have a teacher like that, which is partially why I had to do studies on my own. One reason being they weren't even teaching grammar in the classes--they just threw a crappy book at us and told us to read it--and also because I wanted, for myself, to become better. Now, I'm happy to say I'm on an above average writing level, and yes, I have the audacity to say over the heads of most of my peers.

For God's sake, I've been writing for almost ten years. I started when I was seven, and just built myself up from there. I worked at it, and so should they.

[HumanePain]

I am glad I cut my teeth on fanfiction dot net and fictionpress dot com first before putting anything here, good practice, and those sites are more likely to offer constructive criticism.

[Duane]

This thread could use some examples on bad writing, and good writing, IMO. I'll see if I can find one of my terrible poems to post up as an example as bad writing.

[Noumi]

I write since I'm 9. what do you think about this poem of mines?
I warn you, it wasn't originally in english, it's a translation, but I did my best...

https://www.gothic.net/boards/showthread.php?t=9412

[Stormtrooper of Death]

My writing style is heavily based off Dan Abbnet. He has written over a dozen books of Warhammer 40,000 fiction. I write a lot like him, and I have good grammer. I'm not posting though, I think I suck. But back to the subject, I agree with you guys completely.

[magickaykay]

Yes! I so feel where your comming from, I am also a teen writer, and many "adult writers" who claim to be highly experienced won't even glance at my work. Haha...the little bit that I do have, I have the bad habit of burning/throwing away old stories that I wish not to continue on.
Of course, I see myself as a fairly good writer, but not as good as many people, or as good as I would like to be. Currently, I'm learning how to write more darker, morbid type stories. I don't have much practice with that area, so I'm reading various dark or morbid-like novels so I can see how to set up my theme and such.

[L'Oiseau Noir]

Originally Posted by magickaykay

Yes! I so feel where your comming from, I am also a teen writer, and many "adult writers" who claim to be highly experienced won't even glance at my work. Haha...the little bit that I do have, I have the bad habit of burning/throwing away old stories that I wish not to continue on.
Of course, I see myself as a fairly good writer, but not as good as many people, or as good as I would like to be. Currently, I'm learning how to write more darker, morbid type stories. I don't have much practice with that area, so I'm reading various dark or morbid-like novels so I can see how to set up my theme and such.

I know how that is, but I'm proud to say they're shocked when they actually read a sample of my work, which I trimmed, edited, and revised the shit out of.

I'm actually aiming to get published at present. It's irritating though, as many published adult authors who I've spoken to feel it'll never happen because of my age. They're pleasantly surprised, however, when I present to them an excerpt of my work.

I'm not going to be another teen/young author who only weaseled their way into the publishing world because of connections they all seemed to have. I'm going to do it the old fashioned way by sending query after query out, reading over and taking the advice of every rejection letter I'll get, and trimming and editing my work until it's damn pretty. I'm sure somewhere out there a literary agent will be willing to take my work to the market. It'll take time, yes, but I can do it, as can any other serious teen writer.

[Corpsey]

Good for you. Work at the sucker and I sure as hell hope you manage to pump out some decent literature. Just don't give up on your dream! Persist, I say!

[LaBelleDameSansMerci]

The only thing I'm good at when it comes to writing is grammar, I think. My strength lies in Visual Art.
One thing that irritates me about Modern art is that one doesn't really have to actually have much skill to be famous (such as abstract art). I can appreciate that it takes time to think of the composition and shapes and colour combinations (I'm thinking of colour field painting here, like Voices of Fire) and other elements of the work, but it just doesn't reach out and grab my soul with a scream of "HARD WORK AND DEDICATION AND HOURS AND HOURS IN THE STUDIO" and "CULMINATION OF YEARS OF STUDY AND OBSERVATION AND SKETCHING AND AGONIZING" like a realistic piece does.
*takes deep breath* I'm not denying that modern art has a right to exist, or that other people aren't allowed to like it (one of those things that's above that threshold that was talked about in the "That's Your Opinion" thread...), it's just that I don't. I feel like any idiot with a few cans/tubes of paint could do something like that... Especially Pollock-esque stuff.

Ok, I'll stop hijacking the thread now...

I think the state of poetry has gone downhill over the last century or so. I get the impression that a lot of it (not all, though) is just strings of vaguely-related, nearly formless phrases and words that have pauses between them. :\

Edit: I almost forgot: Good luck with the publishingness, L'Oiseau Noir!

[Sir Canvas Corpsey]

I would like to think of myself a "good" writer, at least compared to some of the people in year level, but I'm by no means the best, and I've had my fair share of failures and as much as i'd love my fiction and poetry to be published it probably won't because I refuse to edit my work, it's blasphemy against the art and it feels like i'm disrespecting part of myself.

Though I do aim for a job in writing, possibly art or runway reviews =D

[L'Oiseau Noir]

Originally Posted by LaBelleDameSansMerci

Edit: I almost forgot: Good luck with the publishingness, L'Oiseau Noir!

Thank you very much, LaBelle.

And I agree with you on the modern art statement/rant. It, too, fails to captivate me much as opposed to works by Renoir or Edvard Munch. I'd much rather stare at Renoir's The Theater Box, or Vampyre by Munch than Random, Angry Splotches by some unknown painter.

[tickingstitch]

I actually do a far share of writing myself but I would never post anything on this site because I don’t write anything that is even remotely of gothic. I think I might have posted two or three silly poems in the last three years to see what people say. How stereotypical can one group of people really be and that’s not an insult just a challenge. Honestly. The point of me posting on this thread is that we do not have to be dicks. I ALWAYS encourage people to find their own hum and ink vibrations. The poetry I wrote when I was 14 is completely different then what is filled my folders here at work. However, if mean elitist continuously rejected my failed attempts to write a masterpiece (on demand and snuffed at my attempts to be expressive in a controlled world) that in which takes years of development, I probably wouldn’t write now. Actually, I would because I write for myself but not everyone is like me. It’s not just writing… It’s far more then the outcome, for authors are not musicians, performance is not a prerequisite but a choice, secret distrubution is possible. However, pens are instruments in their own right, it takes practice. It is a gathering art of observation, intention, explosion, retraction and researching.

It is daring to breathe your insides open with a pen…
People are new and need encouragement to take their efforts further.
I’m published, who gives a fuck. I was an editor for sitrep as a side project. Who gives a fuck? Does that make me anything other then mediocre? Other published San Diego writers ask me when I am going to read agin because they want to hear my work. WHO GIVES A FUCK!!! Is my opinion more creditable because somebody other then me, appreciated that which I expressed. No. I am attracted to egoless poetry. I don’t care if the repetition is not quite correct or the theme could be developed more. Show yourself and dare to fall onto paper, regardless of what elitist say. Besides… editing and writing are mates but they are not the same thing. Hardly.

If this thread bummed you out go read the Poem

How To Be A Great Writer by Bukowski and fuck off everyone’s opinion of your work. Write to write
Write because you can and will
Write because you have to

[Godslayer Jillian]

Originally Posted by LaBelleDameSansMerci

One thing that irritates me about Modern art is that one doesn't really have to actually have much skill to be famous (such as abstract art)

That's what postmodernist art is: The soul without talent. Equally, I feel much of the old stuff was plain talent with no soul, like much of the Baroque period.

[Mir]

tickticktickstich: Well said. I agree completely.

[Xombie]

I couldn't write a decent essay to save my life, let alone poetry or a short story. What I write goes directly to my teachers, and comes directly back to me. I would never even consider embarrassing myself here.

[Mir]

Doesn't matter one bit if you don't post here. As long as you keep writing, you will improve.

[Xombie]

Nah. I have no desire to write well. I'd rather ~express myself~ through other mediums.

[tickingstitch]

Originally Posted by Mir

Doesn't matter one bit if you don't post here. As long as you keep writing, you will improve.

Very True!

No offense, L'Oiseau Noir but I posted a counter thread to this to encourage people to keep writing and posted something I normally would not post for the point of it. Its a post your not so "perfect" ungothic poetry if you like... Mir you should post something :~)

"Don't wait for newly arrived talents" said by the best

[blackwater1110]

re: L'Oiseau Noir's post:

I most definitely get aggravated when I read something shitty. I can't sit through it. I read the first few sentences, realize it's a bad train wreck waiting to happen, and bail before I spontaneously combust.

That said, I don't hold shitty writing against their authors unless:
a) they think they are God's gift to writing. If shitty writers are honest with themselves, I can forgive them; but nothing is worse than a talentless narcissist.
b) they go around calling themselves a writer. Until you are published, you aren't a writer. I play the guitar, but I am by no means a guitarist. You have to reach a certain level of artistic perfection and commitment before you can call yourself by the trade name of the field in which you are endeavoring to succeed. Public notoriety seems to me to make a fine benchmark.

*edit* The public notoriety thing only works, really, if you pursue art as a career; if you do it for personal reasons, you would have to establish a much more intangible goal. But for the purposes of this particular thread, I think the other definition suffices.