Rational Insanity
The creation of fiction
In my twenty plus years as a writer, I have always dedicated myself to creative literature. The main reason for this is that creative literature is more of a challenge than the other forms of literature; scientific writing and research, to name a couple. With my training in the field of research and development communication I discovered that other forms of literature other than creative literature have their own fixed criteria and set of features making them quite technical. This is what sets them apart from creative literature. While creative literature has to follow certain standards based on form and structure, creative literature is like creating something out of nothing; the 'nothing' being the writer's active imagination.
In creative writing I have written more poetry than prose. Most of my mentors would tell me that poetry is more difficult to write than prose because poetry demands that ideas be contained in as few words as possible while prose has an abundance of words at its disposal. Personally, I believe that both prose and poetry are equally challenging because while prose does not demand brevity, it also has a set of 'musts' that a writer must take into consideration for it to be called quality prose.
There are different kinds of prose and one of the most common is creative fiction, or what most of us would call short stories, novelettes, or novels.
I am as much a reader as I am a writer and in my reading years I have come to point out certain qualities of creative fiction that make them good reads. Perhaps other fiction writers would also consider these qualities when writing creative fiction.
Realism is a must for most Filipino fictionists. The reader has to be led into believing what he reads. The believability of a story is vital in fiction. The more believable fiction is, the more effective it is as a written piece; quite ironic, I must say. This is so because the reader's involvement and participation in a story is an important element in making the reader want to read any story for that matter. 'What's in it for me?' is always the question that a reader will ask when reading a story.
Intense attention to detail is also one quality that every story needs. As writers we must remember that we do not have television screens or pictures to show our reader and so we must paint a very clear image with our words and use the imagination of the reader as our canvass. The more detail we put into the story, the more mentally stimulating it become for the reader. This is the equal of the imagery that is demanded in writing poetry. Characterization is another element that should be worked out well. The characters in our story should be presented in such a way that they almost jump out of the page. Without our knowing it, the readers interest in reading also comes from the fact that most readers sympathize with the characters they read about in a story, and so, the more flesh we put into our characters, the more that they acquire a life of their own.
Reading through, we might say that writing fiction is very easy, but also consider that realism, detail, and characterization are just a few of the elements that we find in a good story. There are many other elements that have to be considered when writing fiction. Creating fiction demands that the writer become a god and have his/her feet planted firmly on the ground at the same time. We cannot just yap about anything just because we want to write a story. Creating fiction demands extreme literary engineering as much as poetry demands the same degree of attention. Being a wordsmith is not as easy as pie; it is a job meant only for those who are patient enough to create beauty from anything, even those things that don't seem to have a saving spark of grace in them. Perhaps we would all want to write a story about something, so before we even set our pens on a piece of paper and begin to write our first word, let us be prepared for a universe of challenges before us; challenges that could only be overcome with a writer's inherent gift of creation.
Be rational; be insane... every once in a while!!!TTFN! Hello to my dearest readers, to Jenny, Am-am, Dot, Verona, James, Sheen, Hellpen, Anne, Mary Dale, Chan,Michelle, Zarthus, Jonald, Mr. Bobot, Vic, Vincent, and Rex, Alex, Arvin, Corz, Jim, Kiara, Malikh, Audrae, Franz, Hendrick, Janice, Jay, Jim, Jonathan, Mark, Marz, Mel, Pres, Nhonoy, Niel, Piper, Rheavil, Joey, Alma, Rodolfo, Ecker, Ryan, Roni, Ian, Narle, Sunny and to Anuj of CMC, I love you all! Byers! Salamat gid sa mga walang-hintong text and reactions nyo! Catch Rational Insanity in TNT's online edition, check us out at www.thenewstoday.info, text me at (0920)9254269, or email me at prague@eudoramail.com. Byers! Mmmmmmmwah!