Topic: On Writing
Last night, I attended a Book Club meeting at Earshot. They were covering Colin Cheong's book titled "Stolen Child".
His first book was published at the tender age of twenty-four, eight years after he started. Imagine. He began writing at sweet sixteen. Gee, the feeling this piece of information evoked is similar to that when I first stepped into a cyber-games joint, totally intrigued with this new fangled world and wanting to play but wishing I could unwind my own internal clock twenty years.
Before I wallow in regret and drag anyone under in the process, let it be said also that many start much later. The writers' site I haunt has many writers who are in their sixties. Wouldn't they be even more desolate in the knowledge that they have started so late? No. Definitely not. They will tell you this. There is a time and place for everything. Life's experiences do count for quite a lot and these senior folks have the luxury of time on their hands to pen down their own legacy.
Anyway, back to the tips from the guru, Colin Cheong, who has twenty books, both fiction and non-fiction, to his name:
1) Deep emotions, be it anger, despair, lust, love, regret, are the best drivers for writing, its outpour onto paper rendered more powerful and arresting even as it is cathartic to the soul.
2) When to stop writing the next page of the novel? When you know what is ahead. Strange though it sounded, the rationale is that it actually builds up that burning desire to go back and write and hence, fuel the drive and passion.
3) To help build characters in the story, use real people to act in the movie in your mind. That way, you only transcribe what you see and the characters are more believable and alive because of it.
Su Yin
