the art of writing

Removing excess words is good advice, but it ends up driving people to cut all the life from their writing until it becomes overly minimalistic. Don’t suck the life out of your writing in the name of grammar.

Singing the counter-melody My advice and opinions may sound strange on their own. Do you know what musical counterpoint is? Underneath the main melody, you have a countermelody that goes against it, and together they make harmony. This is different from harmonizing, where someone sings along with the melody at an interval. The counter-melody is a s

In employing prescriptions, he will approach the non-mechanical in a mechanical way. He will replace the power of his instincts, with manufactured notions of correctness and incorrectness. He will replace his inner voice with the voices of others. And when the prescriptions begin to fail, he will need new ones.

Concrete writing resonates. Abstract writing puts people to sleep. Bring your words to life by making them vivid and tangible. Use specific examples. Talk about things people can see, touch, taste, smell, and hear.

You don’t have writer’s block. You’re just scared to say what you actually think. As my friend Jeremy Giffon says: “The best writing prompt for when I'm stuck is simply ‘be more honest.”

If you update the language and some references, books written thousands of years ago sound like they could have been written today. The human condition remains the same. Your book has all the wisdom you need. Read metaphorically, and apply it to your modern life.

I write so I don't sound like an idiot when I speak." —Charlie Bleecker