Best books on Writing and Creativity for 2013 - 1. Why we Write : 20 Acclaimed Authors on How and Why They Do What They Do - Edited by Meredith Maran
Why We Write: 20 Acclaimed Authors on How and Why They Do What They Do
Prolific novelist Isabel Allende, one of the prolific novelists, who is one of the writers of the above book, offers three pieces of advice to the aspiring writers -
It’s worth the work to find the precise word that will create a feeling or describe a situation. Use a thesaurus, use your imagination, scratch your head until it comes to you, but find the right word.
When you feel the story is beginning to pick up rhythm—the characters are shaping up, you can see them, you can hear their voices, and they do things that you haven’t planned, things you couldn’t have imagined—then you know the book is somewhere, and you just have to find it, and bring it, word by word, into this world.
When you tell a story in the kitchen to a friend, it’s full of mistakes and repetitions. It’s good to avoid that in literature, but still, a story should feel like a conversation. It’s not a lecture.
2. Manage your Day to Day - By Jocelyn K.Glei
This book features contributions from a twenty of today's most celebrated thinkers and doers, delves into the secrets of this holy grail of creativity.
Gretchen Rubin, one of the featured authors in this book, says -
"You’re much more likely to spot surprising relationships and to see fresh connections among ideas, if your mind is constantly humming with issues related to your work. When I’m deep in a project, everything I experience seems to relate to it in a way that’s absolutely exhilarating. The entire world becomes more interesting. That’s critical, because I have a voracious need for material, and as I become hyperaware of potential fodder, ideas pour in. By contrast, working sporadically makes it hard to keep your focus. It’s easy to become blocked, confused, or distracted, or to forget what you were aiming to accomplish. … Creativity arises from a constant churn of ideas, and one of the easiest ways to encourage that fertile froth is to keep your mind engaged with your project. When you work regularly, inspiration strikes regularly."
(Courtesy: Brain Pickings Weekly)
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