If at First You Don't Succeed

For most writers, writing a first draft of an article, short story, or book is still a lot better than going to the dentist. For some, cleaning the bathroom or folding the laundry is a lot less stressful. With a first draft you'll start from nothing and creating something, but not the finished product.

Before writing the first draft of any piece of writing, it pays to block out your idea. It makes writing an article or short story a lot simpler. But just because you block out the structure of your piece of writing, that doesn’t mean you have to stick to it religiously. Blocking helps you to think through some questions before you begin writing. If you’re writing fiction, the story, itself, can take an unexpected turn. That can change everything. Sometimes, it’s a dead end, and you’ll have your blocking to fall back on.

Think of your first draft as the clay, not the sculpture. You start out with a hunk of clay that you mold over and over. Much of it will be messy and unrefined. But don’t worry about that now. Your job is simply to get from the beginning to the end. Put down everything that comes into your head. Don’t worry about grammar. You’ll be able to correct any problems later. For now, get everything out.

Remember, no one but you should read your first draft.  Don’t show your first draft to anyone. Asking someone else to read it would be pointless and embarrassing. If you don’t know what your first draft needs, then by all means, ask for help. But just because you don’t show your first draft to anyone else doesn’t mean you can’t discuss your idea with a close friend or colleague if need be. Doing so might give you a different take on your subject.

Don’t stop to do research.  Depending on the type of writing you do, completing all your research before you start may be necessary, such as in writing an article. But if you’re writing a piece of fiction or even a book, it may be better to do some basic research—just enough to get you started—rather than doing all of it. Instead, you can insert words in uppercase letters in your first drafts to indicate where details need to be filled in later.

Set a deadline. It pays to set a deadline for your first draft. Otherwise you may be writing it for much longer than you planned. You really can't move on until you complete your first draft. And without anyone to prod you, you may not even get your first draft finished. Don’t start your next draft as soon as you finish your first one. Give it some time to rest. In the meantime, do some work on another project. When you come back to it, you’ll see the problems immediately.

The All-Important First Draft

First drafts are the all-important backbone of any article, short-story, or book. But many writers produce them as if they’re the final draft. There’s a great difference between the two.  And there’s a difference between a first draft in non-fiction and one in fiction.

In non-fiction, you begin with a mass of facts and have to compile them into a cohesive article or book that documents reality. But in fiction, you start out with nothing and have to create an illusion of reality. In both cases, a first draft gives you something to work with.

But even before you get to the first draft stage in your writing, you need to think about what you’re going to write. You’d be surprised just how many beginning writers don’t do this. This comes from bad practices they learned in school. Much of the writing they did was spontaneous writing in class. The teacher would give them an exercise, and they had to start it or even complete it in class. Too many carried this method over to their own writing.

In fact, you should begin by thoroughly thinking out your idea and how you plan to craft it. Then you need to block out what you plan to write. This isn’t an outline but a plan—and a loose one at that. You shouldn’t include too many details in your blocking but, instead, focus on the main and some of the subpoints. The main thing is to keep it flexible. Your blocked plan will help you to stay on course. In non-fiction, it will help you line up the facts in a logical order. In fiction, it will keep you from going down too many side paths and thus drifting away from your plot.

Think of your first draft as the clay, not the sculpture. A potter starts with a hunk of wet clay and kneads it into a pliable mass. At that point, he or she only has a vague idea of what the final piece will look like. And just like this mass of clay, your first draft will be messy and unrefined. But refining comes later. Your job now is just to get started.

So the first thing to do is to empty your head of everything on the subject at hand. In non-fiction, you most likely will have notes to refer to but in fiction, you may just create as you go. In both cases, you have your blocked plan to follow. Don worry about how your writing looks or sounds at this point. This is just between you and your  keyboard.

You shouldn’t show your first draft to anyone. You know it needs lots of work. In fact, you probably know exactly what that work should be. So showing your first draft to someone at this stage is pointless. It’s not called a “rough” draft for nothing.  And while you shouldn’t show your first draft to anyone, that doesn’t mean that you can’t discuss your idea with a close friend or family member. Doing so might help to free up the cobwebs in your brain. Talking about an idea  often helps a person think it out.

Today, both non-fiction and fiction writers do lots of research. But that can bog you down.  You may get so involved in your research that you never get to your first draft. Also, know when you’ve done enough general research on your idea. If you start writing and then continue your research, you’ll constantly be changing what you’ve written. It’s okay to look up details.

If you’re writing fiction, you can always flub the details and make them up to keep the story going. To make sure you know which details to look up later,  put them in bold type. This will make them stand out. If you’re writing an historical article or fictional story, put the year dates in bold type. Then you’ll be able to see at a glance if they’re out of chronological order. The only time they may not be is if you’re using a flashback.

Finally, set a deadline for your first draft. Be reasonable. Give yourself plenty of time to write it, but know when it should be finished so that you can get on with revising in future drafts. If you stop for any reason for a bit of time, insert “START HERE” in your notes or if you’re in a revision draft, wherever you stop within it.

The key to writing a successful first draft is not to revise as you go. Keep revising until after you have the whole story laid out, and you’ve gained some perspective on it. When you’ve finished your first draft, let it rest. Work or another project or do something else for a bit. That way, when you do get back to it, you’ll be able to see just what needs to be done.

Developing a Voice of Authority

Why is some writing believable and other writing isn’t? What makes the reader believe in some pieces and know that the material is made up in others? The answer to both questions is voice of authority, that sense the reader gets when reading that the writer really knows what he or she is talking about.

Most writers don’t even think of this when writing. A voice of authority enables the writer to create a depth to a piece of writing in non-fiction and to characters in fiction. This comes from research. To write with depth takes lots of research. The more research you do, the better you’ll be able to draw your reader into your article or story.

The effect of a good voice of authority makes the writer seem like an expert in the subject. What captures readers is a sense that the voice of the writer has authority.

So how do you become an authority on a subject without years of study? There are several ways you can become an authority on the subject. Obviously, you can prove you’re an authority if you’ve already amassed this knowledge through earning an undergraduate or graduate degree, or if you’re a professional writing about a subject in your field. But you can also rely on experts through interviews and research. Lastly, your own personal experiences might give you all the authority you need about a particular subject. After all, the cardinal rule in writing is to write what you know.

But knowing your subject well isn’t the only secret. To truly draw your reader in, you need to write using active voice. That means you’ll have to forget what you learned in school because there you learned to write in the academic style where writers hide in the shadows and have to credit their sources.

Writing in the active voice is in-your-face writing. In it the subject of your sentences controls the action through active verbs that offer precise images to the reader. Combine that with knowledge and you’ve got a winner. Using adjectives that describe scenes and people precisely also helps to improve the authority of your voice. Authority not only involves what you know but your values and your vision. In some cases, this may involve your personal beliefs.

What person you choose to use to write your story also affects your voice of authority. If you write in the third person, the reader views it as a report on what’s happening. If you write in the second person, the reader becomes personally involved—like in this blog. And if you write in the first person, whether your story is true or not, the reader believes every word because it’s coming straight from the horse’s (your) mouth.

But even if you choose to write in the third person, you can still demonstrate your authority on the subject by the details you choose to include. Using lots of details make it seem to the reader that you really know your subject, even if it’s the one and only piece you’ve written on it.

In creating convincing fictional characters, many writers research the lives of real people to gain insight into how they think and communicate about their chosen lifestyle and locality. This isn’t any different than method film actors who take the time to follow along with a real person who’s in the same occupation and lives in the same region as the character they’ll be playing on the screen. That’s what makes their performance so believable. That’s what draws viewers into a film and makes them empathize with the character.

Narrative authority signifies believability. It’s a series of deliberate yet subtle cues that you’ll use to convince the reader that what he or she sees on the page amounts to a genuine human experience. In order for this to work, the reader must accept that the you, as the article writer or storyteller, are the best person to deliver the information. Ultimately, authority convinces readers to take a leap of faith. It instills trust and makes the reader believe that the illusion of the story in fiction is as real as anything else. In non-fiction, especially historical writing, it propels the reader back to another time and place.

However, you must not use tricks and gimmicks to work authority into your writing. You’ve got to be honest with your reader and show that you truly know your subject. That’s the only way it will work.