Writing’s Brilliant

Posted by Jacko | Filed under Jacko: Author

Writing’s brilliant. I mean that with every ounce of sincerity that I can muster. I love it. I love creating things, and with a notepad and a pen, I can do just that. I can create anything. I can be anything.

How powerful is that?  To really enjoy writing, you need to be the characters. You have to put yourself in the situation and act it out, imagining what would happen to you. This is how you make characters real, even when it is quite obvious that they could never exist in society. Adding that little bit of the real human element gives the ridiculous: substance. It’s fun too, like make-believe for grown-ups (downside is that last night I had a dream that the Predator smashed my head in with a blunt instrument - and that was a normal dream for me).

The technicalities of writing are something that you have to learn, or rather, “one has to learn.” I’m writing for enjoyment, right now. I don’t have to pander to technicalities. I am writing for my own pleasure whilst getting my opinion across in a, hopefully, friendly and amusing manner, and that gives me total and utter freedom. I can write what I want.

Necrophiliac homosexual ducks.

See.

I think the duck watching it all is the real sicko. This really happens, by the way. http://www.guardian.co.uk/education/2005/mar/08/highereducation.research  

Back to my topic. Writing is complete freedom and, with a little imagination, a writer can live the life of anything and anyone, blah-di-blah.

Now, here’s the thing, I wasn’t a writer, although I do have a GCSE in English language and English Literature. So what did the fifteen-year-old tit version of myself learn from English classes?

1)      Jane Eyre is really boring and really, really long.

2)      The bird on the Roman Polanski version of Romeo and Juliet had wazza jugs (a forbidden fruit for gentlemen over 16 years of age - she was only 15 when she appeared nude in the film!).

3)      Roman Polanksi is a diddler.

4)      Girls in my class didn’t find Dungeons and Dragons enthusiasts very sexy.

I picked up a pen and paper again, at twenty-four, for no other reason than to give writing a go. Why not? And, if I can do it, you can do it. 

Out of all the arts, writing is the most accessible. Even though I am a master at drawing an ejaculating penis, I wouldn’t consider myself an artist. I’m in a band, but I’d hardly call myself a musician. I can invent extravagant lies and hide the hideous truth behind a complex web of smoke and mirrors when lying to my missus about the reason I smell of horse urine, but I’d hardly call myself an actor.  You may argue that to write, you need to hone the skills of sentence construction, and so on; and so forf;.!  And, I guess that is true to a certain extent, but only to do it well. Consider the title of this piece “Writing’s Brilliant.” Many people would have considered using a witty pun or something to catch your eye, but that’s not what I’m trying to get at. You don’t need flashy crap to enjoy writing. In fact, you can write badly and still create wonder and amazement and ANYONE can do it.

I’ll show you. Here’s some of that writing stuff.

“Gary can smash planets.”

In four words I have created a shit sentence and a being of gargantuan and monstrous proportions. This…Gary…has the ability to break planets. What is this being? Can he break them with his bare hands? Has he invented a doomsday device that can end the world? Whatever it is, one thing is certain, and should be heeded at all costs: Do not mess with Gary.

It doesn’t matter that the sentence is shit. Who cares? What matters is that I have written four words and I have already started my adventure and I can take it anywhere. Gary’s mate, Neil, is a Lightning God, whilst his cousin, Denzel, sells insurance. What a story that would make.

Creative thinking is for anyone and everyone, and writing is the easiest way to exercise it. Someone once sat down and came up with this concept

 Things, honestly, don’t get much better than that. Admit it, before Dinoriders hit your television, you fantasised about sitting on top of a Tyrannosaurus Rex, which had laser cannons attached, blasting your enemies into a million pieces.  See, you can do it!

Now, authoring is a different game, altogether. I consider a fiction author to be someone who makes a living from writing (my definition is questionable). I’ve had one book published, with the two sequels of The Great Right Hope trilogy on the way, but, on a night out, when I am asked by curious, curvy, eighteen-year-old sex kittens what I do for a living I always say “I’m a scientist, but I also write.” Science is a cool profession, by the way. Ghostbusters is awesome!

If you write simply because you wish to become the next J.K Rowling or Dan Brown then you’re probably going to be disappointed. Say you get lucky and get a deal with a big publisher who decides to release your book as a hardcover; you get extra lucky and they print 5000 copies (first Harry Potter run for Philosopher’s Stone was 500 copies), and then you get extra, extra lucky and sell all the books in the first year. If the hardback retails at £15, you can expect a 10% royalty. Go Go Gadget-G.C.S.E-maths! 5000 x 1.50 = £7500. If that took a year to research, write, edit and proof then, based on a 35 hour week, four weeks holiday = £4.46 an hour.  Minimum wage is £5.80. Not saying it’s impossible, but you ain’t getting rich writing one book.

That’s authoring. That’s different. That’s bloody hard. Looking back through this little ditty, I realise that I have started the construction of a “shit sandwich.” It’s a non-corporate expression based on the ultimate in corporation man management. The shit sandwich is something for the yearly review: start with something good and positive, then hit the employee with the reason they are getting a paycut, but finish on a high, so they go out of the meeting happy. “You kept your desk very tidy this year. Keep it up.”

I’ve just done the same thing. I’ve told you how great writing is, but then the shit in the sandwich was the “Authoring Ain’t Easy, Baby” bit, and now I have to finish on a high.

You’ve kept your desk tidy this year.

I need to do better.

Here goes.

YOU HAVE THE POOOOOWWWEERRRR!

Or rather,

USTED TIENE EL PODER!  That’s even better in Spanish?

How ridiculous is the whole concept of He-Man? Someone created it. Someone let the mind run riot and their grey matter exploded in an orgy of homoerotic strangeness. You can do that to, and before you give me that rubbish about not being able to do anything creative, answer this: how do you know? Have you ever tried? Just let go and see where that brain of yours takes you?

Just try it. Your personality will come out and things will flow. It doesn’t matter if it’s any good. It doesn’t matter if you don’t use punctuation. You can stick that all in at the end. Actually, don’t just put all the full stops and commas at the end of the story, that’s not what I mean. I mean you can learn the art later, but first, you need to enjoy what it is to write and rediscover the imagination of your childhood and just give it a go. What’s the worst that can happen?

Oh yeah. 

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Permalink | December 4th, 2009

3 Responses to “Writing’s Brilliant”

  1. Coop Says:
    December 4th, 2009 at 3:27 pm

    Nice article mate. Haven’t been able to take a look at the videos since they’re blocked in work, but still nice reading.

    You’re absoloutely right though - writing is pretty kick ass (although at the moment I haven’t been able to get any done!)

    Will be ramping it up soon though - both the blogging and the writing…

    See you on the Hop!

  2. Jacko Says:
    December 4th, 2009 at 4:26 pm

    I can’t stop looking at that Dinoriders picture.

    Trainhop 11…who’d have thought it?

  3. The Blog of Mark Jackman, Author, Hunk, Sportsman, Musician, Scientist and Virgin » Blog Archive » Getting Published Says:
    December 10th, 2009 at 10:47 pm

    [...] is the follow-up to my article Writing’s Brilliant. The title of my last piece wasn’t devilishly clever or witty like this one, and that was the [...]

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