(Neil Gaiman)Drawn from Gaiman's trove of published speeches, poems and creative manifestos, 'ART MATTERS' is an embodiment of this remarkable multimedia artist's vision - an exploration of how reading, imagining, and creating can transform the world and our lives. 'ART MATTERS' brings together four of Gaiman's most beloved writings on creativity and artistry:❖1❖"CREDO", his remarkably concise and relevant manifesto on free expression, first delivered in the wake of the Charlie Hebdo shootings❖2❖"MAKE GOOD ART", his famous 2012 commencement address delivered at the Philadelphia University of the Arts❖3❖"MAKING A CHAIR", a poem about the joys of creating something, even when the words won't come❖4❖"ON LIBRARIES", an impassioned argument for libraries that illuminates their importance to our future and celebrates how they foster readers and daydreamers.'ART MATTERS' is a stirring testament to the freedom of ideas that inspire us to make art in the face of adversity and dares us to choose to be bold.RUNNING TIME ⇰ 49mins.©2018 Neil Gaiman (P)2018 HarperCollins Publishers

    . . just haven't gotten around to it. No Plot? No Problem! is the kick in the pants you've been waiting for.Let Chris Baty, founder of the rockin' literary marathon National Novel Writing Month (a.k.a. NaNoWriMo), guide you through four exciting weeks of hard-core noveling. Baty's pep talks and essential survival strategies cover the initial momentum and energy of Week One, the critical "plot flashes" of Week Two, the "Can I quit now?" impulses of Week Three, and the champagne and roar of the crowd during Week Four. Whether you're a first-time novelist who just can't seem to get pen to paper or a results-oriented writer seeking a creative on-ramp into the world of publishing, this is the adventure for you.So what are you waiting for? The No Plot? approach worked for the thousands of people who've signed up for NaNoWriMo, and it can work for you! Let No Plot? No Problem! help you get fired up and on the right track.

    In his novels and stories, in letters to editors, friends, fellow artists, and critics, in interviews and in commissioned articles on the subject, Hemingway wrote often about writing. And he wrote as well and as incisively about the subject as any writer who ever lived…This book contains Hemingway’s reflections on the nature of the writer and on elements of the writer’s life, including specific and helpful advice to writers on the craft of writing, work habits, and discipline. The Hemingway personality comes through in general wisdom, wit, humor, and insight, and in his insistence on the integrity of the writer and of the profession itself.—From the Preface by Larry W. Phillips

    The prose feels off. The scene isn’t gelling. The dialogue sounds stilted or clunky. But they don’t know why or how to fix it. This book lays it all out 5 Editors Tackle the Twelve Fatal Flaws of Fiction Writing demonstrates the deadly dozen pitfalls on the road to a strong story, along with revisions that show writers exactly how to avoid novel failure.No other writing craft book offers such detailed instruction in how to spot and remedy the major flaws of fiction writing. What makes this book an important addition to a writer’s bookshelf? More than 60 Before and After passages showcase each of the twelve fatal flaws, which are then picked apart and examined to help writers spot these flaws in their own writing and fix them. Five editors with extensive background in both editing fiction and writing novels bring a wealth of insights, examples, and solutions to these flaws, using various genre styles and POVs. Each chapter ends with a checklist to help writers seek and destroy these fatal flaws in their manuscript, followed by bonus Before and After passages to help them test what they’ve learned. This in-depth guide to self-editing is an invaluable resource for any writer of any genre. It shows, not just tells, how to write better fiction. Using it, you’ll be armed with the tools and skills you need to conquer the twelve fatal flaws of fiction writing. Here are some of the 12 fatal flaws: Overwriting—the most egregious and common flaw in fiction writing. Nothin’ Happenin’—Too many stories take too long to get going. Learn what it means to start in medias res. Weak Construction—It sneaks in at the level of words and sentences, and rears up in up in the form of passive voice, ing verbs, and misplaced modifiers. Too Much Backstory—the bane of many manuscripts. Backstory has its place, but too often it serves as an info dump and bogs down pacing. POV Violations—Head hopping, characters knowing things they can’t know, and foreshadowing are just some of the many POV violations explored. Telling instead of Showing—Writers have heard this admonition, but there’s a lot to understanding how and when to show instead of tell. Lack of Pacing and Tension—Many factors affect pacing and tension: clunky passages, mundane dialogue, unimportant information, and so much more. Flawed Dialogue Construction—Writers need to learn to balance speech and narrative tags and avoid “on the nose” speech. “Underwriting”—just as fatal as overwriting.

    Using a wealth of examples, from ancient myths and folk tales via the plays and novels of great literature to the popular movies and TV soap operas of today, it shows that there are seven archetypal themes which recur throughout every kind of storytelling. But this is only the prelude to an investigation into how and why we are 'programmed' to imagine stories in these ways, and how they relate to the inmost patterns of human psychology. Drawing on a vast array of examples, from Proust to detective stories, from the Marquis de Sade to E.T., Christopher Booker then leads us through the extraordinary changes in the nature of storytelling over the past 200 years, and why so many stories have 'lost the plot' by losing touch with their underlying archetypal purpose. Booker analyses why evolution has given us the need to tell stories and illustrates how storytelling has provided a uniquely revealing mirror to mankind's psychological development over the past 5000 years.This seminal book opens up in an entirely new way our understanding of the real purpose storytelling plays in our lives, and will be a talking point for years to come.

    It covers everything from questions of truth and ethics to questions of craft and the crucial retrospective voice. An appendix provides information on legal issues.Judith Barrington, an award-winning memoir writer and acclaimed writing teacher, is attuned to the forces, both external and internal, that work to stop a writer; her tone is respectful of the difficulties and encouraging of taking risks. Her nimble prose, her deep belief in the importance of this genre, and her delight in the rich array of memoirists writing today make this book more than the typical "how-to" creative writing book. In this second edition the author has added new material and reflects on issues raised since Writing the Memoir was written, early in the memoir boom."No student of memoir writing could fail to learn from this wise, pragmatic, and confiding book. One hears on every page the voice of an intelligent and responsive teacher, with years of thinking about memoir behind her."--Vivian GornickJudith Barrington is the author of Lifesaving: A Memoir and numerous individual memoirs which have been published in literary magazines and anthologies. She is the author of three volumes of poetry: Trying to Be an Honest Woman, History and Geography, and Horses and the Human Soul (forthcoming in 2002). She has taught creative writing for the past twenty years.

    Provides new insights and observations from Vogler's pioneering work in mythic structure for writers.

    A story's use of time, plot, character, and other elements of fiction are analyzed, and readers are challenged to see each story's flaws and strengths. Careful endnotes bring attention to the ways in which various writers use language. Bell urges writers to develop the habit of thinking about form and finding the form that best suits their subject matter and style. His direct and practical advice allows writers to find their own voice and imagination.

    The theory itself may be simple — "Purpose opposed by Obstacle yields Conflict" — but Cook takes his "Plottoist" through hundreds of situations and scenarios, guiding the reader’s hand as a dizzying array of purposes and obstacles come to a head. Cook’s method is broken down into three stages: First, the master plot. This four-page chart distills the most basic plot points into a three-line sentence. Next, the conflict situation. Each master plot leads the reader to a list of circumstances, distributed among 20 different conflict groups (these range from “Love’s Beginning” to “Personal Limitations” to “Transgression”). There are over 2,000 unique conflict situations in the book, and each is cross-referenced with designs for how the situation might have started, or where it might go. Finally, there are character combinations — Cook offers an extensive index of protagonists, each cross-referenced with various supporting players — themselves tied to various conflict situations, for what appears to be an inexhaustible reservoir of suggestions and inspiration.

    Many of us love to tell them, and even dream of making a living from it too. But what is a story? Hundreds of books about screenwriting and storytelling have been written, but none of them ask 'Why?' Why do we tell stories? And why do all stories function in an eerily similar way? John Yorke has been telling stories almost his entire adult life, and the more he has done it, the more he has asked himself why? Every great thinker or writer has their theories: Aristotle, David Hare, Lajos Egri, Robert McKee, Gustav Freytag, David Mamet, Christopher Booker, Charlie Kaufman, William Goldman and Aaron Sorkin - all have offered insightful and illuminating answers. Here, John Yorke draws on these figures and more as he takes us on a historical, philosophical, scientific and psychological journey to the heart of all storytelling.What he reveals is that there truly is a unifying shape to narrative - one that echoes the great fairytale journey into the woods, and one, like any great art, that comes from deep within. Much more than a 'how to write' book, Into the Woods is an exploration of this fundamental structure underneath all narrative forms, from film and television to theatre and novel-writing. With astonishing detail and wisdom, John Yorke explains to us a phenomenon that, whether it is as a simple fable, or a big-budget 3D blockbuster, most of us experience almost every day of our lives.

    In this unique guide for writers of all levels, Gail Sher—a poet who is also a widely respected teacher of creative writing—combines the inspirational value of Julia Cameron's The Artist's Way with the spiritual focus of Zen Mind, Beginner's Mind. Here she introduces a method of discipline that applies specific Zen practices to enhance and clarify creative work. She also discusses bodily postures that support writing, how to set up the appropriate writing regimen, and how to discover one's own "learning personality." In the tradition of such classics as Writing Down the Bones and If You Want to Write, One Continuous Mistake will help beginning writers gain access to their creative capabilities while serving as a perennial reference that working writers can turn to again and again for inspiration and direction.

    S. Lewis's adult religious books, a repackaged edition of the revered author’s treasury of essays and stories which examine the value of creative writing and imaginative exploration.C. S. Lewis—the great British writer, scholar, lay theologian, broadcaster, Christian apologist, and bestselling author of Mere Christianity, The Screwtape Letters, The Great Divorce, The Chronicles of Narnia, and many other beloved classics—presents a well-reasoned case for the importance of story and wonder, elements often ignored by critics of his time. He also discusses his favorite kinds of stories—children’s stories and fantasies—and offers insights into his most famous works, The Chronicles of Narnia and the Space Trilogy.

    Our favorite writers often entertain, move, and inspire us less by what they say than by how they say it. In The Sound on the Page, acclaimed author, teacher, and critic Ben Yagoda offers practical and incisive help for writers on developing and discovering their own style and voice. This wonderfully rich and readable book features interviews with more than 40 of our most important authors discussing their literary style, including:Dave BarryHarold BloomSupreme Court Justice Stephen BreyerBill BrysonMichael ChabonAndrei CodrescuJunot DíazAdam GopnikJamaica KincaidMichael KinsleyElmore LeonardElizabeth McCracken Susan OrleanCynthia OzickAnna QuindlenJonathan RabanDavid ThomsonTobias Wolff

    How to Read Literature is the book of choice for students new to the study of literature and for all other readers interested in deepening their understanding and enriching their reading experience. In a series of brilliant analyses, Eagleton shows how to read with due attention to tone, rhythm, texture, syntax, allusion, ambiguity, and other formal aspects of literary works. He also examines broader questions of character, plot, narrative, the creative imagination, the meaning of fictionality, and the tension between what works of literature say and what they show. Unfailingly authoritative and cheerfully opinionated, the author provides useful commentaries on classicism, Romanticism, modernism and postmodernism along with spellbinding insights into a huge range of authors, from Shakespeare and Jane Austen to Samuel Beckett and J. K. Rowling.

    She’ll show you how to develop a foolproof character arc and plot, how to pace any book for a can’t-put-down reading experience, and how to ensure that your stories are complete and satisfying without wasting time or words.Hawker’s outlining technique works no matter what genre you write, and no matter the age of your audience. If you want to improve your writing speed, increase your backlist, and ensure a quality book before you even write the first word, this is the how-to book for you.Take off your pants! It’s time to start outlining.