Open Book
I began my love/hate relationship with writing at the tender age of nine. My whole life I have had a strong imagination, which would have me spend hours in solitude, dreaming of far away places, celebrities, and myself as their leader. I would have these intense and powerful dream sequences with amazing story lines, characters, and twist endings. It occurred to me one day that I should sell these ideas to big time Hollywood directors and have them made into movies. You know, just give them the idea and run with it. All this from a seven year old!
As I said, at the age of nine, I wrote the worst story of my life. I had a school assignment to write a seven page story. I don't remember any other details of the project, however I found myself writing and writing until I had over 18 pages. It was the beginnings of a harrowing tale of child abuse - from someone who had never experienced it nor seen it. The protagonist of my novella is able to divorce his greedy self-centered parents only to be adopted into and even more horrible family where abuse and neglect was ten-fold worse than he had experienced before! Oh the tag-lines, the movie offers, the millions in cash that I would be given on a silver plate for writing the most amazing story ever told! I could taste the fame!
Um, no. My teacher told me to slim it down and stop writing the story. I had to find an ending and fast! Well there goes my story line. Wait! I don't actually have one, I thought. How am I going to end this nobel prize winning work of literature?
Well basically the protagonist ends up going back to his birth parents who promise not to hurt him anymore and insists that they have reformed. Great Hollywood story, right?
As it turns out, the best part of my story was the cover. I had found in a magazine a collage of people's faces that I used as my cover art, with the title, "Why Me" emblazoned on it. Profound, but not all that interesting to be honest. So did I learn something from this experience? Yes: That experience taught me to have a plot in mind before you even start to write. Did I keep that new adage in mind the next time I wrote? Yes, but over the years I have come to learn something even more important. It is a good thing to have a plot and especially and ending in mind, however a story is a being, it may change over time. Plots evolve. They don't have to stay the same as you first imagined, but that makes them only better.
As I said, at the age of nine, I wrote the worst story of my life. I had a school assignment to write a seven page story. I don't remember any other details of the project, however I found myself writing and writing until I had over 18 pages. It was the beginnings of a harrowing tale of child abuse - from someone who had never experienced it nor seen it. The protagonist of my novella is able to divorce his greedy self-centered parents only to be adopted into and even more horrible family where abuse and neglect was ten-fold worse than he had experienced before! Oh the tag-lines, the movie offers, the millions in cash that I would be given on a silver plate for writing the most amazing story ever told! I could taste the fame!
Um, no. My teacher told me to slim it down and stop writing the story. I had to find an ending and fast! Well there goes my story line. Wait! I don't actually have one, I thought. How am I going to end this nobel prize winning work of literature?
Well basically the protagonist ends up going back to his birth parents who promise not to hurt him anymore and insists that they have reformed. Great Hollywood story, right?
As it turns out, the best part of my story was the cover. I had found in a magazine a collage of people's faces that I used as my cover art, with the title, "Why Me" emblazoned on it. Profound, but not all that interesting to be honest. So did I learn something from this experience? Yes: That experience taught me to have a plot in mind before you even start to write. Did I keep that new adage in mind the next time I wrote? Yes, but over the years I have come to learn something even more important. It is a good thing to have a plot and especially and ending in mind, however a story is a being, it may change over time. Plots evolve. They don't have to stay the same as you first imagined, but that makes them only better.
posted by Stuphalina at 5/11/2006 01:02:00 p.m.
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