Where Bad Writers Turn Good
Being a writer is hard. Nobody denies that. It is one of the toughest, most unforgiving career paths one can choose, and at the end of the day, only the strong (and lucky) survive. But then, why do people still do it? This collection of creative, nonfiction essays written by a diverse range of published... Continue Reading →
It didn’t take long for me to realize that my first draft sucked with a capital “S.” Halfway through chapter one, I wanted to take it out back and beat it with a hockey stick for wasting my time. I’d like to say that this feeling dissipated as I got further into my first draft, that my confidence grew word by word, sentence by sentence. But I’d hate to lie to you. The truth is that I became more sure of the inevitable failure looming ahead of me, blocking my path to success.
If you expect everyone to see colors the way you envision them while you're writing, then you may be disappointed. I may refer to blood as crimson while you think of it more as a ruby red. You may think the sky a soft Carolina blue, while I would paint the sky with a tint of periwinkle. While this may not seem a huge issue, it can complicate how your reader perceives your work.
When it comes to grammar, writers tend to divide into two separate groups: the grammar police, known to frantically run down those guilty of petty grammatical crimes, and the grammar hippies, who believe that creativity shouldn’t be stifled by the archaic rules of English professors long dead. Personally, I fall somewhere in between. I have been known to obsessively scour my writing for grammatical errors and to proudly pinpoint mistakes discovered in novels or on corporate websites, and other times, I recklessly break all the rules. Writing is an art, and with any art, there are times to scribble within the lines and then there are times to push the boundaries. So, how does a writer know which rules to break and when to break them?
Writing Bad - Official Site 