#it is perfectly possible to write successfully without ever having a formal teacher but IF YOU HAVE A FORMAL TEACHER. UH. | Explore Tumblr posts and blogs

essektheylyss · 10 months ago

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I am obsessed with how narratively convenient Lark's divinatory abilities are. She's the only one of the protagonists who is both pragmatic and has a working sense of self-preservation, so having some internal impulse that is actually the guiding hand of the cosmos pushing her into doing the REALLY stupid shit is both necessary and really useful.

Like, I am the type of writer who kind of scoffs at the idea that characters are beyond the writer's control and will completely screw over your outline, because on one hand, a sensible outline will follow the characters' personalities and tendencies anyway. Obviously in an ensemble cast you will need to do some wrangling, but in theory your characters are responding to varying degrees of stimuli in order to maneuver them into the places you need them to be for things to all come together in the end.

But more importantly, "curse from god" is the funniest and easiest way to push any character to do things beyond the realm of reason when necessary, and frankly, what the fuck is the point of playing god if you don't embrace that?

#midst podcast #midst spoilers #cr meta #anyway at all times I am advocating for taking full responsibility for your characters and overall story #this is also why I laugh at those posts like 'um if you're not going to treat your characters right then you shouldn't get custody of them'#sorry babe there is no CPS in my head. I am the cruel custodian and these are my poor darwinian orphans.#that's a joke but really like. look. yeah sometimes you gotta fabricate scenarios to make characters do what you want #but like... you do that by going 'who is this character and what would it take to push them to x'???#and especially in an ensemble cast sometimes that thing is 'curse from god' or 'divine insight'#fun fact: I LOATHE that post about 'my writing teacher made a joke that the characters are driving and the writer is locked in the trunk'#absolutely fucking hate it.#because THE WHOLE POINT OF FORMALLY LEARNING WRITING IS LEARNING HOW TO BE INTENTIONAL.#it is perfectly possible to write successfully without ever having a formal teacher but IF YOU HAVE A FORMAL TEACHER. UH.#like yeah yeah 'workshopping' but like. okay go build your own workshop group don't pay somebody jfc #(cuz it's not like most creative writing teachers know how to teach you to workshop. let's be fucking real.)#if you wanna learn how to workshop take a script class for the love of god.#ANYWAY rant over but I'm correct. the highest purpose of a writer is to be a control freak and to play god.

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