Emerging Writers:
Crafting an appealing story becomes much easier for older writers emerging from the ‘hole of life’, especially those lucky enough to remember the rich material available. With more time to learn writing rules and techniques, explore ideas from a writer’s group, read books to provide examples of different styles, and access to a thesaurus, good writing will become easier and clearer to readers.
Among the many writing tools is the omniscient narrator. While telling your story, the narrator can be a character, a close companion to your other characters, and maintain objectivity and distance from the action. Even mock the characters and their society. Such a narrator usually adopts the first-person point of view, using pronouns like ‘I’, ‘me’, ‘we’, and ‘us’, and can be used to shape your story’s approach. The reflective comments of the omniscient narrator can span all time, offering a vast creative playground for writers. An all-knowing narrator (perhaps not quite as ‘all-knowing’ as the gentleman who seems present in every audience) could point out why the character missed the point, has always done so and will continue to do so unless listening more carefully. A writer hopes the reader will appreciate or be amused by such insightful details and easily connect with the narrator.
Workshops are another tool available to the emerging writer. While many workshops advocate the ‘show, not tell’ approach, using an omniscient narrator wisely can effectively show the character’s emotions and tell readers your hero’s feelings. Some writer workshops recommend challenging a reader, suggesting that a well-chosen word implies a character’s current predicament. This allows the reader to use their imagination to visualise the scene. But what if your reader doesn’t enjoy challenging innuendo or the well-chosen word from the thesaurus? You don’t want to lose a confused reader who didn’t understand your implication or carefully selected word.
Having the time and freedom to explore your writing ideas is a wonderful gift. The following plot incorporates selected ideas learned from the Bribie Island Emerging Writers Group. The story is told by an omniscient narrator, a potted Boab tree collected, propagated, and grown by the protagonist’s grandfather eighty years earlier. The protagonist is Jarrad, who, depressed by the feedback of his autobiography’s first seventeen pages, returns to growing plants. Tree, knowing the proposed characters quite well, takes over. The sometimes fictional biography chronicles Jarrad’s family and his grandfather’s influence, tracing Jarrad’s journey through evolving beliefs about humanity, democracy, inherited traits, meditation, and reincarnation. The story culminates in the reading of Jarrad’s will, which was meant to ensure his reincarnated self becomes the rightful heir to his estate. The complex nature of the will imparts a valuable lesson for all.Among the many writing tools is the omniscient narrator. While telling your story, the narrator can be a character, a close companion to your other characters, and maintain objectivity and distance from the action. Even mock the characters and their society. Such a narrator usually adopts the first-person point of view, using pronouns like ‘I’, ‘me’, ‘we’, and ‘us’, and can be used to shape your story’s approach. The reflective comments of the omniscient narrator can span all time, offering a vast creative playground for writers. An all-knowing narrator (perhaps not quite as ‘all-knowing’ as the gentleman who seems present in every audience) could point out why the character missed the point, has always done so and will continue to do so unless listening more carefully. A writer hopes the reader will appreciate or be amused by such insightful details and easily connect with the narrator.
Workshops are another tool available to the emerging writer. While many workshops advocate the ‘show, not tell’ approach, using an omniscient narrator wisely can effectively show the character’s emotions and tell readers your hero’s feelings. Some writer workshops recommend challenging a reader, suggesting that a well-chosen word implies a character’s current predicament. This allows the reader to use their imagination to visualise the scene. But what if your reader doesn’t enjoy challenging innuendo or the well-chosen word from the thesaurus? You don’t want to lose a confused reader who didn’t understand your implication or carefully selected word.
About Geoff Cayzer.
After two years in an office, then national service, and fifty years as a computer programmer and programming teacher, Geoff retired to set up Oasis Plant Nursery. He’s now working through a novel exploring the insides of ‘A Bubble of Illusion’. A bubble he suspects many of us enter at birth.
