by Liam Cross
My Unwritten Rules For Writing
Me, personally, I’ve always been a huge believer of two key things when it comes to writing, and those things are: writing every single day in some way, shape or form, and also, branching out in your writing and walking into any unexplored avenue you uncover.
My Philosophy behind it is simple, the idea behind writing every single day is because I like to think of our creativity levels and imaginations as another skill that has to be perfected. Like how a football player must train his feet, us writers must train our imaginations and keep those creative juices flowing, or else the flow will fizzle out.
The same simplicity is applied to my theory of branching out in your writing. The more genres and styles we write in, the more we try out and learn about, the more developed we become as writers.
And sticking with this theory, I believe there’s a very distinct benefit to be had from writing poetry, in terms of your capacity to construct a beautiful and gripping novel-length piece of writing.
Poetry and its Secrets
I find poetry to be one of the most expressive forms of writing out there. There are no set rules, no set boundaries; no set regulations, it’s just you, the paper and your pen. And what could be more beautiful than the thought of a blank page coming to life with nothing more than the trapped ingenious thoughts of a writer and a few shabby scrawls of black ink?
It’s why I enjoy writing poetry so much, it is the type of writing in which I feel I am at my most free creatively. The ability to create an entire story with nothing more than just a few lines excites me more than it probably should, but that is life as a writer. When we read words that are strung together beautifully, we get excited. But when we read words that are strung together beautifully and were written by us ourselves, we start acting like kids on Christmas Eve, jumping around frantically at the thought of Santa bringing us crosswords this year.
With this type of freedom, comes great responsibility. or at least, that’s usually the case in the majority of old and boring cliched things. But with poetry, no such responsibility exists, and that is a valuable asset I feel we should all carry over into our novel-writing. Nothing hurts my heart, causes my soul to scream more, than a set of rules for writing a novel. Whenever I see such titles, be it on the front of a book or at the top of an article, my skin begins to crawl, my heart begins to bleed.
But what about the rules?
Rules? What Rules?
There are no rules when it comes to creativity. Do you here me? There. Are. No. Goddamned. Rules. When. It. Comes. To. Creativity! Which in turn means there are no goddamned rules for writing a novel, because, newsflash, writing a novel is one of the most creative processes I’ve ever come across.
It’s essentially the act of creating an entirely new, alternate universe and existence, with nothing more than your brain and eighty-thousand words. Now if that isn’t creative, I don’t know what is.
I’ll say it again, just in case you missed it: there are no goddamned rules when it comes to writing a novel. And I feel poetry can really help to teach you this. So get out there, ingest the world, congest your thoughts, write some poetry, and discover your true creative freedom.
And discovering your true creative freedom, that certainly makes for some:
Happy writing!
Alternately titled Writing Tips/Insights #14: Writing Poetry Makes for Good Storytelling.
Guest post contributed by Liam Cross. Liam has loved writing ever since he can recall. Even as a small child in primary school, the craft of writing had always been an interest of his, and he now delegates his time to novel-writing – and of course, the occasional short-story or poem here and there. His ultimate goal is to be a published author, but he can also be found training in the local gym for upcoming bodybuilding shows.
Amen! No damned rules! Great post!
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Thank you
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I have written poetry and I write. The experience is completely different for me. I usually write sonnets or a poem with three verses of four lines each. Writing is liberating for me. I like skipping between my blog, novel and toying around with a 2nd idea.
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“Rules? What Rules?” Love it, so true! My writing mentor is always saying be creative, be individual, break the rules 🙂
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Can so relate to this. I started a story, but paused it in Dec 2016, and now I have been writing related poems, which are further into the story and mentions of the follow up stories, so yes poems create stories for certain. Brilliant
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Reblogged this on Cynthia Hilston – Author & Blogger.
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I agree – there are no rules when it comes to writing. But for the result to be good writing, there must be a good edit between what goes on the paper the first time and the end result. And there is no getting around the fact that for editing, there are rules…maybe fewer for poetry, but a great novel will never be great without undergoing meticulous editing first.
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Reblogged this on Where Genres Collide.
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This is such a great post! I think I need to get into reading or even writing some poetry. It’s so true that there are no rules to writing and creativity, something that’s really easy to forget. Thanks for the reminder. 😊
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Good post!! Let’s face it, any little trick that helps to unlock our self-induced blocks is terrific! Thanks for this, Liam!
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rules and talent find a way to blend in harmony, great post
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Yes, I started writing poetry first, and I think it made me a better writer.
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Reblogged this on SCAN and commented:
This is a writer after my own heart!
“There are no rules!” OH, YES!
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Reblogged this on .
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Poetry is indispensable to all good writing. It teaches writers to shed whatever isn’t necessary, to be that core of brightness that matters.
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Well said. I’ve very recently started to experiment with poetry.
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Great post and the first I clicked on when looking at writing poetry for the first time. Have been feeling the desire to express my writing further through poetry. Great inspiration to move forward. Thanks for sharing!
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