Tuesday, February 12, 2013

Tuesday's Inspiration ala Stephen King on Imagery


Third time's the charm. The essay by M. King really gave me a lot to think about and a lot of inspiration. I tend to be a tight writer and imagery isn't one of my greatest strengths as a writer of fiction. The quotetime is "Don't be totally transported with imagery."

We've all read stories where the writer is so hyped on imagery the story gets lost in the number of images they're pushing at us. While we may finish the book we can then wonder what the book was about. Words, phrases and the use of every writing trick to bring the scense to life and we do see the scene but we don't remember it all.

An interesting thing I saw on TV was about people looking at a scene and then trying to remember what they had seen. Few of any could remember every detail. Most people only remembered a few things. This is something we should consider when writing. What images do you want the reader to carry from the scene.

For someone like me, I have to consider this very much since I may not create images for the reader to expand on in their own imagination. I'm trying to do better.

How about you? Do you bury your reader in images hoping to overwhelm them into seeing what you have envisioned? Do you forget the images to get the story down? A happy medium is the best way to go. So one more quote from Stephen King. "If you're writing fiction, you don't want to drown your reader in textures."

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