#10: Writing Credo 2010

I had a professor (in the playwriting class I believe) who recommended creating a credo especially about your writing life and updating it every year. If you keep it up as a regular habit, you can use it to see your growth. I'm a few years behind and don't remember what I did with the last one I wrote. It's around somewhere; I never throw those things away.

So I'm going to start with five quotes that mean the most to me about writing and explain why they mean so much. Bear in mind if it sounds like I'm on a self-righteous kick, I apply these standards to my own writing first of all.

"The written word is all that stands between memory and oblivion. Without books as our anchors, we are cast adrift—neither teaching nor learning. They are windows on the past, mirrors on the present, and prisms reflecting all possible futures. Books are lighthouses erected in the dark sea of time." – "Gargoyles: A Lighthouse in the Sea of Time"

This quote lived on the front page of the BookWorm's Library for years until I moved it to my bio page. Just because I moved it doesn't make it less true. I had a friend argue about its validity because of oral tradition and how most people give storytelling a spiritual superiority because it was developed first. I don't believe it is an either/or position; there is still storytelling along with books. But our culture depends on books as the depository of knowledge and the metaphor works.

Robert Fulghum's Storyteller's Creed

I believe that imagination is stronger than knowledge.
That myth is more potent than history.That dreams are more powerful than facts.
That hope always triumphs over experience.
That laughter is the only cure for grief.
And I believe that love is stronger than death.

Isn't this why we all turn to fiction? This is what I hope my fiction does for readers.

"My job is to comfort the disturbed and to disturb the comfortable."

I found this saying on a bumper sticker during my commute to the paying job. No matter what genre you write, I believe it is a perfect bull's-eye target for what you should accomplish with every story.

"If one is really a writer, then one must write, and write now, while the hand still kept its cunning, while the technique was still in one's head, while one was still in touch with one's public." -- Throne, Dominations by Dorothy L. Sayers and Jill Paton Walsh

A subplot in the book is Harriet Vane Wimsey dealing with her insecurities as a writer. Before her marriage, it was how she earned a living and avoided the tribulations of her private life. The old ways of looking at writing no longer apply and Harriet has a crisis of doubt if she even is a writer. What I quoted is what she tells herself to buck up and get back to work. It works for me too.

A Reader's Bill of Rights

1. You have the right not to have to stop and guess at a writer's meaning.
2. You have the right to paragraphs for ease of reading.
3. You have the right to read about strong characters.
4. You have the right to correctly-spelt text.
5. You have the right to transitions between scenes and/or character's point of views.
6. You have the right to meaningful dialogue.
7. You have the right to warning on the material, either through a blurb or disclaimer or summary.
8. You have the right to description, depending on the style and format of the writing.
9. You have the right to a well developed and cohesive plot.
10. You have the right to entertainment.

It has been years since I wrote this (with the help of a group think tank). All writers need to keep them in mine while editing.

So there are my views on writing in a nutshell. I'm surprised it is that short actually.