Should you Create a Language?

Quon you Desira ta Forme lein Lingyuanet?
Translation: Do you want to create a language?

Many writers will want to create languages for their worlds. And I don't mean just making up where the language came from, where it's spoken, etc. I mean making long lists of nouns and pronouns, adjectives and adverbs, prepositions and interjections. Creating the sentence structure, grammar, syntax, and punctuation.

There's nothing wrong with this. Tolkien created many languages for Middle-earth, some more developed than others. He also wrote in detail about the languages–how to pronounce vowels and syllables, rolled r's and dotted i's.

But Tolkien was a language professor. Now, you don't need to be a language professor and have a degree from Oxford University to create a language.

But, for the sake of authenticity in your language, I would recommend to have studied language in some way. This could be studying a second language, or advanced study on your own language.

If you don't know the nine parts of speech in English, or how they are used, then your created language is likely to turn out a code copy of English–in which every word is simply translated to another word in your language. Real languages don't work this way. Each language has its own sentence structure and grammar.

And English is the worst language to base a realistic language off. English is such a conglomeration of Latin, Greek, Old Norse, French, Spanish, German and many more, that it is a very difficult language to learn and understand.

I have created a language, but I have studied Latin and Greek (and French and Spanish a little bit). When I first started writing Delvish (as I called it), I didn't understand the parts of speech, cases, tenses, etc. Delvish was, then, a code copy of English. I had each English word translating directly to one Delvish word. Delvish had English pronunciation rules–i.e. none.

Now, however, after doing four years of Latin, I have refined Delvish into a more realistic language. It has its own peculiarities and ways of doing things, and its own pronunciation rules and exceptions.

You can create a language without studying linguistics, but I would recommend at least some study in a language before attempting it. (And especially before putting any of that language in any published books.)

These are only my thoughts, and I could be mistaken. Thoughts?

--Jag Swiftstorm

Writing Extra Scenes

I had a thought.

It's quite a good thing to do; thoughts are generally quite useful, in theory. Some may be better thoughts than others; some may be rather pointless, others may be great thoughts, but you just don't carry them out.

Anyway, back to my thought.

(No, it's not the only thought I have, but it is one of them.)

I was reading Go Teen Writers: How to Turn Your First Draft into a Published Book by Stephanie Morrill and Jill Williamson, and it was talking about making your deeper characters.

(It's chapter 2, by the way, in case you have the book and want to go look it up. Just to make sure I'm not lying. And if you don't have it, get it.)

It wasn't the actual exercises that gave me the thought, although they did begin my train of thought that eventually thought up my thought, as you will see if you keep reading down.

(See how crazy my brain is?)

I answered the questions for my antagonist (and my main character, but the antagonist's questionnaire was more revealing). One of the questions asked about a secret desire that your character had. Anyway, to make a long story into a short one, I wrote a short 'story' about my antagonist, and some of the factors that caused him to become the villain he is.

(It wasn't a very good story… badly written… telling rather than showing… narrative summary... but it did the point, and I can always rewrite it.)

So, my thought was…

Drum roll…

Why don't writers write lots and lots and lots of stories about their characters, and their world?

(Or maybe they do, in which case the question should be 'Why don't I?')

Why don't writers/we write scenes that go in between the published scenes?

For example, if your characters are going on a overnight hike, write out all their conversation from the evening. Describe the trip in as much detail as you want. If there are two years in between two chapters, write as many scenes in those two years as you want. It will give you an idea of what your characters got up to during those two years, and will develop their character further.

I guess if writers don't, there has to be a reason for it. Either: a) they haven't thought of it or b) the 'con's are greater than the 'pro's. Or I'm just the only writer who doesn't do it.

Pro's
Character development–you often won't write long scenes with characters sitting around a fire talking, but some of those conversations might be very beneficial for character development.
World development–you can write descriptions as long as you want, because you're the only who'll need to read them.
Story development–sometimes those conversations will spark a new direction for the plot or subplot. And maybe those scenes will become crucial and be used in a later draft or sequel.
Writing practice.

Con's
You might get emotionally attached to those scenes (not likely for some writers, but some might) and want to put them in the novel.
Takes up time that you could spend writing other things.

I would personally say that the 'pro's overwhelm the 'con's, for me at least.

Now that I've written all of this, I can now remember that I have heard some writers say that they do this… maybe I'm just an non-backstorying anomaly.

Only way to settle this… I'll have to ask my loyal, devoted, (and possibly traitorous) (okay, hopefully not traitorous) readers.

The question is, then:

Do you write all the filler/backstory scenes to fit into your project?

For some reason, this post has been written with a much less formal tone than my other ones. (At least it seems like that to me.) Do you prefer my more formal tone, or this 'write-my-thoughts-down-as-they-come-to-me' mad rush post?

Jag Swiftstorm

How to Accidentally Create a Superhuman

A superhuman character, that is. (If you wanted to learn how to become Spiderman, you'll have to find another blog.)

Unlocking the door, Tim opened it, threw his leather jacket onto a rusty hook, grabbed a packet of chips from the cupboard, and slumped down in front of the TV.

What is the problem with this sentence? The problem is that Tim is doing all five actions (unlocking the door, opening the door, hanging up his jacket, getting food, and sitting down) at the same time. Simultaneously.

Unless he's Superman (and he isn't), this obviously won't work. He can't do all those actions at the same time; he does them one by one.

Starting your sentences with '-ing' verbs can cause these problems. (And yes, I know that their technical name is present participle, but we won't go into that now.) This is not to say that you shouldn't use '-ing' verbs, it just means that you need to be very careful when doing so, that you don't cause a simultaneousness problem. (And yes, that is a word.)

Related to this is action-reaction order. The action comes first, the reaction comes after that. Don't have your character reacting to an action before (or at the same time as) the action is occurring. Using '-ing' verbs can cause this, so even if the two actions can physically occur at the same time, be careful that one of them isn't actually a reaction to the other.

Just because these are funny, I'll post some more simultaneousness-problem examples:

Spinning round, Kate ran towards the school.
Slamming a hand over his mouth, Joe screamed a warning.
Switching on her computer, Tina opened Outlook.

And an action-reaction one:

Spinning round, Mary felt a presence behind her.

Note that because Mary should feel the presence behind her before spinning round, switching the two parts wouldn't change anything. '-ing' sentences happen simultaneously.

Feeling a presence behind her, Mary spun around.

Using sentences that start with '-ing' (or number 4's for any other IEW-ers) can vary the sentence structure, but it is important to be careful in using them, as problems can easily occur, as can be seen above.

Jag Swiftstorm

Speaker Tags

"How're ya doin'?" I inquired.
"Oh, I'm fine." she responded.
"I... thought I might ask you a question." I ventured.
"Go ahead," she encouraged.
"Well... you know that patch of land out back of the old house? I was wondering if I could buy it off your papa, and then fix it up and maybe build a little cabin there? Do you think he might sell?" I inquired.
"That old bit of land? That's covered in junk!" she shouted.
"I know, but I thought I could maybe sell it and make a bit of money." I retorted.

Now what is wrong with that? I don't think that there's anything wrong with it, but the speaker tags (I inquired, she responded, I ventured, she encouraged, etc.) are rather flowery and fancy. There is nothing wrong with this, but how about the following dialogue?

"How're ya doin'?" I asked.
"Oh, I'm fine," she replied.
"I... thought I might ask you a question," I said.
"Go ahead," she said.
"Well... you know that patch of land out back of the old house? I was wondering if I could buy it off your papa, and then fix it up and maybe build a little cabin there? Do you think he might sell?" I asked.
"That old bit of land? That's covered in junk!" she replied.
"I know, but I thought I could maybe sell it and make a bit of money," I said.

In the first example, what were you looking at? The speaker tags, or the dialogue itself? In the second example, though, were you looking at the dialogue? The speaker tags were invisible–said, replied, and asked. Using those for your writing means that readers can focus on the dialogue–as long as that is well-written.

Now, I know that you may have heard "Don't use 'said', use more powerful verbs." I think that this may be one exception to the rule of using strong verbs. Now, don't take me wrong here. I'm all for strong verbs. But I think that dialogue is one place where what the characters said is what the readers care about, more than how they said it. Good dialogue (and characterization) should show the reader how they said it, just by what they said.

'Said', 'Asked', and 'Replied' probably cover just about every piece of dialogue in most projects. But what about pieces of dialogue where none of those three words seem to fit? Can you use other words then?

Absolutely. A quote from somewhere–I have no idea where: "There are no rules in writing, there are only guidelines." (If any does know where it comes from, please say!) Other words can absolutely be used as speaker tags, as long as they aren't used too much. After telling your reader twenty times that your character 'demanded' something, how are you going to convey when he really demands something. If you've been using 'said' all the way through, that one 'demand' is going to have a real punch.

In my own writing - I did Command-Find to examine what speaker tags I've used, and these are some of my results:

Said: 426
Asked: 169
Replied: 78
Shouted: 24 (maybe a bit too many?)
Screamed: 5 (although three of them are literal screams, not speaker tags)

As you should be able to see, I try to keep with 'invisible' speaker tags as much as possible.

One final thing about speaker tags though–be careful to not use speaker tags which lead to facial gymnastics. He grinned–he grimaced–he scowled, for exaple. Try talking at the same time as doing one of those, and you'll see what I mean.

These are just my thoughts on the subject, and you may have totally different ideas. If you do, please leave a comment and say what you think–I'm open to hearing new ideas.

--Jag Swiftstorm

Writer's Block

Writers know that they come up against something called Writer's Block. When you just. Can't. Write. Words don't flow, sentences don't make sense, and the story (if you can manage to write) doesn't seem to have any meaning.

Many writers want to know how to solve this. I have read what writers have written about Writer's Block, and this is the answer that seems to be repeated, over and over again.

Write.

Just write.

Force yourself to write, to put fingers to keys, or pencil to paper, or even feather pen to papyrus.

Just write.

If you can't manage to work on your main project, go and write something else. Try something different. If you've never written contemporary fiction, try it. If you're an all-out science fiction/science fantasy junkie, try picking up a sword or bow and venturing into the dangerous realms of medieval fantasy. You don't have to stick with the same thing.

Just write.

Just write.

(This is not to say that you shouldn't do things other than write, but ultimately, the only way to write is to write.)