[Overall, I think I'm weak on craft and need to improve. But I also think part of the problem is that I'm a natural long-form writer rather than a short-form writer, and it's interesting to think about how that might affect my overall pacing and style, even when I'm trying to work in a shorter medium.]
One of the things that I always recommend to people wanting to get better at writing short stories is the study a lot of poetry. Because damn, but poets understand economy of language. I think that in some ways it's even better than studying short stories, because it really yanks your attention down to how to tell a story in a hypercomressed space.
(...this seems like a perfect excuse for shameless poem quoting and linking! Let's look at some first sentences in poems I really enjoy! Looking specifically at ones which seem to tell a story.)
The moon is backing away from us an inch and a half each year.
I have to tell you this, whoever you are: that on one summer morning here, the ocean pounded in on tumbledown breakers, a south wind, bustling along the shore, whipped the froth into little rainbows, and a reckless gull swept down the beach as if to fly were everything it needed.
Wandering around the Albuquerque Airport Terminal, after learning my flight had been delayed for four hours, I heard an announcement: "If anyone in the vicinity of Gate A-4 understands any Arabic, please come to the gate immediately."
...that's probably enough. Seems like a good mix of scene-setting and question-raising, though; Time Capsule's "I have to tell you this" adds an urgency to what would otherwise be a pastoral scene; "The moon is backing away from us" is an odd little fact whose relevance isn't obvious; Airport Terminal starts with an imperative; "the boy whose name and face I don't remember" jars that particular opening out of its straightforward, expected form; "After every war someone has to clean up" starts you off in a pretty generic, we've-heard-this-one-before setting (war) and then moves it crisply into a part that we don't see all the time. There's not a lot of space wasted in any of them.
[... btw, I really appreciated the heads-up about the Strange Horizons gig but I never did do anything with it. I just didn't feel that I would be able to put in the time (and as busy as I am right now with school, I think it was a good choice). But thank you!]
No problem! If you ever do think you'd have the time, we're almost always open to having more first readers, so even if there's not something listed you can ping me and I can check with the other editors. (Often, we take down the listing because we don't want competing signals with something like our ongoing fund drive, or we don't have the time to deal with the rush of an open listing. But really, we can almost always use more hands on deck.)
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chiming
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Date: 2013-10-06 05:27 am (UTC)From:One of the things that I always recommend to people wanting to get better at writing short stories is the study a lot of poetry. Because damn, but poets understand economy of language. I think that in some ways it's even better than studying short stories, because it really yanks your attention down to how to tell a story in a hypercomressed space.
(...this seems like a perfect excuse for shameless poem quoting and linking! Let's look at some first sentences in poems I really enjoy! Looking specifically at ones which seem to tell a story.)
an inch and a half each year.
– ("Facts About the Moon", Dorianne Laux)
someone has to clean up.
– ("The End and the Beginning", Wisława Szymborska)
that on one summer morning here, the ocean
pounded in on tumbledown breakers,
a south wind, bustling along the shore,
whipped the froth into little rainbows,
and a reckless gull swept down the beach
as if to fly were everything it needed.
– (Last-Minute Message For a Time Capsule)
– ("Wandering Around an Albuquerque Airport Terminal ", Naomi Shihab Nye)
– ("After the Movie", Marie Howe)
earned the right to make any possible mistake
for the rest of his life.
– ("Ginsberg", Julia Vinograd)
into the school yard together, me and the boy
whose name and face
I don't remember.
– ("The Shout", Simon Armitage)
...that's probably enough. Seems like a good mix of scene-setting and question-raising, though; Time Capsule's "I have to tell you this" adds an urgency to what would otherwise be a pastoral scene; "The moon is backing away from us" is an odd little fact whose relevance isn't obvious; Airport Terminal starts with an imperative; "the boy whose name and face I don't remember" jars that particular opening out of its straightforward, expected form; "After every war someone has to clean up" starts you off in a pretty generic, we've-heard-this-one-before setting (war) and then moves it crisply into a part that we don't see all the time. There's not a lot of space wasted in any of them.
[... btw, I really appreciated the heads-up about the Strange Horizons gig but I never did do anything with it. I just didn't feel that I would be able to put in the time (and as busy as I am right now with school, I think it was a good choice). But thank you!]
No problem! If you ever do think you'd have the time, we're almost always open to having more first readers, so even if there's not something listed you can ping me and I can check with the other editors. (Often, we take down the listing because we don't want competing signals with something like our ongoing fund drive, or we don't have the time to deal with the rush of an open listing. But really, we can almost always use more hands on deck.)