Writing

I’ve signed up for a writing class. It only meets 4 times for 2 hours and it’s a 101 class. There’s no critiqueing (thankfully! and by the way, how do you spell that? Apparently I didn’t spell it correctly because it has red dots under it, but you’re just going to have to deal with it for now. I’m not looking it up.) and there’s no reading your work to the class (hallelujah! And I can spell reading!). The class is designed to give you guidance as to whether or not you really WANT to write, what your strengths are, what kind of writing you might be interested in and good at, and then some suggestions as to what your next steps should be.

I’m really looking forward to it. I have no idea if I’ll pursue anything past this particular class, but I’ve always been interested in writing and thought I would see what I find out about myself.

In preparation for the class, I took a friend’s advice and bought Stephen King’s book about writing. I have never read a Stephen King book and as far as I know I’ve only watched one of his movies (Carrie). I’m a pretty big scaredy cat and Carrie and the few clips I’ve seen of some of his other movies have let me know that is not a genre I need to get involved in . . . because I tend to need to sleep on a regular basis and sometimes I actually find it necessary to go outside after the sun has gone down.

But I have to say that I have really enjoyed Stephen’s book on writing. It’s been very interesting to learn what was going on in his life while he was writing certain books. And it was fascinating to read about when he received his first really big check.  I recommend the book if you’re a Stephen King fan or if you’re interested in writing or if you’re just looking for an interesting read.

His book is not a textbook but he has given one assignment (so far, but I’m almost at the end) and it is proving to be very fascinating. The few things I have written in my life have been non-fiction. I have never even thought I would be interested in writing fiction . . . and I’m still not convinced. But the exercise he has me working on right now is fiction and I’m having fun with it!

He compares writing a story (fiction) with unearthing a dinosaur skeleton (or something like that). So for the exercise, he gave us a particular situation and asked us to ‘uncover’ the story. I know VERY LITTLE about writing . . . so I’m sure there are other ways people write . . . but this particular process has been very good to Stephen King so I’m not going to question it.

I still can’t imagine me spending my time writing fiction, but I guess I’ll see what I learn from the 101 class.

Can’t wait! I’ll keep the two of you posted.