Today, my answer is "not much" since a truck rolled to a stop on my head and is now unloading elephants for the circus. Thankfully my nose is imitating the Boulder Dam so I don't have the olfactory element of the elephants to contend with.
The silver lining is this is the perfect excuse to not leave the house, and thus roam around the Internet.
Which brings me to one of my favorite blogs "You Don't Say." In a recent post John E. McIntyre offers up career advice for a student. One thing on the list is "be knowledgeable." I think that's very good advice.
Right now I know too much about elephants and noses. Tomorrow, I hope to know a lot more about something much more interesting.
What are you knowledgeable about and did it help your writing?
31 comments:
I'm told I know a lot about being a wiseass and I've also been told my dialogue is good.
There might be some sort of correlation there . . .
I learned some hard core revising in my earlier years of college that I've been using to revise my story. I won't know how knowledgeable I really am until I have other people pick it apart BUT I'd like to think I'm doing a good job with just my own eyes.
But hey, if I don't feel knowledgeable enough, I hit Google. Research makes a lot of difference--not just for your story, but how to write it and how to revise it (and how to query).
Beer, and no.
Brit rock and hell yes.
I'm still laughing about Generalissimo's answer...
I used to be knowledgeable but then I got a PhD in cryptography. Now I don't know nearly as much as I used to.
Angels. And yes, lots.
I collect simple truths. I suppose you could say I'm knowledgeable. For instance, I know for a fact every single person on the face of the planet has something s/he can teach me. Has this helped my writing? Hell, yeah.
I know more about neuroscience and psychology than the average person. It gives me some nonfiction credentials. For fiction, I guess it gives me something a different angle from which to look at characters, etc. Nothing radically different from other writers, but it's fun to kick ideas around with other writers on my blog.
I know a lot about not giving up. And yes, it has helped.
Hope you feel better soon!
I second Sarah W's response. In addition to sarcasm, I know loss. And yes, that's come into my writing. I didn't realize it at first...but lately, I've learned to work with those emotions on paper, to let my characters experience those emotions...to not hold back.
Computers - no.
History - yes.
Poetry - YES!
My encyclopedic knowledge of lightning protection and Monty Python has yet to bear fruit in my fiction. I don't quite know why this is.
But thanks to my writing I now know it's possible to die of hemorrhaging from a stab to the gut if the spleen is punctured. Ah, the things I'm learning....
I know where Atlantis was and where 38 metric tonnes of gold are buried. No, it didn't help me with my writing but I hope it will help me get into an exclusive psychiatric ward...
The original Trivial Pursuit.
U.S. Army.
Bourbon. Scotch is a woman's drink.
Poetry-forget it.
Less and less, compliments of Father Time. The jury's still out.
You are as entertaining in sickness as in health. Here's hoping the circus has a short engagement, so you can pivot from pachyderm to shark a.s.a.p.
I make high end furniture and have a love of history.
The history knowledge tells me how much my furniture pieces will be worth long after I'm gone... Not that I'm bitter :-)
Rock music, and the late 70s, and yes, since my current work is taking place there.
I've been told my dialogue is realistic, and I think it has to do with running my writing scenes like a movie in my head. Also, I am pretty observant, which I think helps too.
I hope you feel better soon.
I know many scattered and random things, like how to give an ornery post-surgical rottweiler an enema.
That specific tidbit has not had a postive impact on my writing thus far. It's hard to engineer that exact scene...since I'm not James Herriot.
I know too much about skin cancer right now.
Not sure how to use in my ficttion...
I know about horses, which I'm not sure is a real plus to my writing.
I know: how to be a midwive to a sheep, how to cook in a hangi, that tattoos hurt, how to change a nappy, that angels are real, that Oprah's coming to Australia, that it's possible to break 10 concrete rooftiles with a punch, but it serves no purpose because a roof tile has never attacked me. It's hard to tell if these things have helped my writing.
As a photographer and painter who has seen much of the world I find my writing is inclined to show, not tell.
I know the complete lyrics to the Flintstones theme song, including the line that follows: "Let's ride with the family down the street ..." Until the confounded Interwebs came along, with their searching and their Google and their fancy-dan Bing, I was the only living man who knew said lyric.
Not only do you have knowledge of elephants and noses, but you are a superb bird dog when it comes to pointing out intriguing blogs - 'You Don't Say' - thanks.
I know a lot about men, especially good looking younger men, and this has always helped when I'm writing a romance novel and drawing from personal experience.
(You asked; I'm honest)
I know a lot about horses. They provide some color to my setting, which hopefully lends some authenticity to my story.
BTW - Few things get under my skin more than BS fiction horse stories. They are not unicorns. They are horses. All of them weigh several hundred pounds, some of them are smart, some of them are stupid, some of them are kind, some of them are mean. They are (sometimes) beautiful, but they are not literally magic. Again, they are not unicorns.
Rant over.
Also - I know the menu at the town pub forward and backward. It's walking distance from my house, so, you know, I'm pretty expert on that.
Some days I know more than I'd care to. Other days I know very little. Today, I know that if I don't get my ass in gear & stop flitting around the internet, I won't get any writing done & I suspect that Suzie won't like that very much, although I don't know for absolute sure...
Speaking of unicorns.
My eye was caught recently by a headline from CNN about "French unicorns." I immediately clicked on the link (of course!) only to have my hopes crushed when I realized it was "French unions."
I know about physics, but I write fantasy. It gives my writing a weird spine. I'm more likely to poke at fantasy tropes and say, "That wouldn't work," or "That would work but not the way everyone thinks."
Regarding this line from the article:
Never, never, never heat fish in the office microwave.
That's Yoda-level wisdom, that. Possibly even Gandalf-level.
French unicorns would be an enticing link title!
French onions not so much. :D
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