When it comes to writing there isn’t much that Roger Wolfson doesn’t know, a mastermind how has forged an incredible career in writing. Roger’s career spans the law sector, the television space and he has even got a regular column online. Roger is the ultimate story teller and he has been sharing some great tips via webinar recently about what exactly a story should look like and some tips on how people can write better stories.
More to the point Roger wanted to share some tips on how best to write stories and if you missed it, here is what he had to say.
Everything But The End
Whilst you should of course have a good idea as to what story you wish to tell, it is important that you realize that the end of the story doesn’t have to be decided when you first start. In fact very often you’ll find that if you have already decided the end, that by the time you actually get there you will have changed your mind or the story will have gone in a different direction.
Characters
The characters will always be more important than the story and this is absolutely crucial to remember. It is the characters which drive the story and they can only really go where their personalities and their decisions tell them to. This is why character development is so vital and why you should invest a great deal of time in the beginning to decide who they are, what they are motivated by and what their story and background is. The key to any great story is characters, and there are absolutely no exceptions to that rule, even if there is only one character in the story.
Stay Strong
When you are writing something like a story there are going to be days when you are absolutely on fire, where words coming flying out of you and where you will be filling up the page at an alarming speed with high quality penmanship. Unfortunately however there are also going to be days where you just can’t string two words together, where you become utterly lost and where you simply have no idea what on earth you are doing sat at the desk. It is during these days where you must stay strong, you must make sure that the next day you get back to it and try again, the words will come back, you just need to stay calm.
Finally you have to really envelope yourself in this project, it isn’t one which you can just pick up and put down as and when you feel. If you do this then your mind will be in different places every time you get to work, and that will come across in the story and the way in which it flows, or not in this case.
Go after this story, you have it in you, stay strong, stay creative and don’t forget about those characters.
