One of the many things I do in my writing classes is refer to writers who have been vocal not only about their work, but also about the process of writing. Ray Bradbury was one of these writers.
"To sum it all up, if you want to write, if you want to create, you must be the most sublime fool that God ever turned out and sent rambling.
You must write every single day of your life.
You must read dreadful dumb books and glorious books, and let them wrestle in beautiful fights inside your head, vulgar one moment, brilliant the next.
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You must lurk in libraries and climb the stacks like ladders to sniff books like perfumes and wear books like hats upon your crazy heads.
I wish for you a wrestling match with your Creative Muse that will last a lifetime.
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I wish craziness and foolishness and madness upon you.
May you live with hysteria, and out of it make fine stories—science fiction or otherwise.
Which finally means, may you be in love every day for the next 20,000 days. And out of that love, remake a world.
--Ray Bradbury
Bradbury makes some truly insightful points in the few lines gathered here, and they’re points that are worth noting:
1. You must write every day.
2. You must read voraciously.
3. You must love words.
Okay, allow me a bit of interpretive license when it come to number three there, but I believe that’s what Bradbury was saying…that in order to be a good writer you have to love words. You have to love reading them. You have to love writing them. You must learn to live and breathe them in a variety of ways.
Challenge yourself when it comes to reading in the new year. If you read novels then try a short story collection. Or a play. As I’ve said more than once, beginning writers can learn a multitude from reading plays. Plays work within the limitations of the genre, forcing the writer to use a bare minimum when it comes to characters, dialogue, location and number of scenes. These are some limitations that that help make better writers, no matter what format you’re writing. The two best playwrights that I’ve most enjoyed have been Ira Levin and Martin McDonagh. Levin wrote a variety of smaller thrillers (such as VERONICA’S ROOM) before writing what would become his classic stage thriller DEATHTRAP. And Martin McDonagh, an Irish playwright, wrote the captivating BEAUTY QUEEN OF LEENANE.
Now, I know what you’re thinking right now: There’s NO WAY I CAN SIT AND READ A PLAY. That’s where you’re wrong. Challenge yourself, right now, to go to the library or the bookstore and find a play. Try Levin or McDonagh. Get beyond the fact that you’re reading a play and you’ll suddenly find that the story will carry you away. That is, after all, what this is all about: finding the best, most succinct ways to tell a story.
Be well. Stay well. Write well.
--Tony Gangi
