Jul 02 2008
Trouble Writing It? How Would You Say It?
The great filmmaker, Frederico Fellini, was quoted as having said, “… they will tell you there are a lot of rules. Of course these rules are important, but in reality the way to tell a story is the way you would tell it to your friends in a café. And if you have a talent as a narrator, you will tell this story well. Otherwise all the technique in the world will never help you.”
If you’re like everyone else on the planet, you regularly become frustrated when you try to turn what you want or need to say into written words. This frustration can come upon you in your office, at your home – wherever you put your fingertips on a keyboard or take up a pen. It can happen to you regardless of what you’re writing, whether it’s a personal letter, a sales brochure or a full-blown book.
So what do you do when you can’t make your words make sense – when what you are writing isn’t really what you want to say?
Take a cue from Fellini. First, take a few deep breaths. Relax. Imagine yourself sitting in a café with friends. Now tell them what you’re trying to write. Don’t use “write talk.” Just tell them. Remember, you’re among friends. Don’t worry about whether you’re using exactly the right words or whether your high school English teacher would approve of the structure of your sentences. Just spit it out.
Write down what you’ve just said. Finally, clean it up a bit. That’s okay. In fact, it’s important. Just don’t go at it with a wire brush and start changing it to the point that you’re back where you were before the exercise.
PS. Sign up for free weekly e-mail updates from The Writers Bag and I’ll e-mail you the previous week’s posts every Thursday morning. See the form near the top left of this page.
Loved, loved, loved this advice! For this is how I feel I write and now feel validated
Although, I do agree with “cleaning things up a bit”, as editing can make things so much clearer and concise -edit, edit, edit. Fellini’s quote is a keeper.