Creative writing classes

flogen · 18-09-2003 12:41am #1

Ok, i think this is a good place to ask this.
How do you people, as writers, feel about creative writing classes.
I personally cringe at the idea, but perhaps I mis-understand them. I am an aspiring novelist, and I feel that a good imagination and ability to create a scene or mood cannot be thought. I know good gramer and other basics can, and must be, but i see creativness as a personal thing, and find it a contradiction to be thought how to be creative... surely it would just create a group of people who write in similar styles, without real thought or emotion, just memories of formalities and thoughts like 'what would Mr. Johnson have put there'

As I said though, maybe Im wrong, and they simply encourage an aspiring writer to find his or her imagination and talent... but if thats the case, they'd be useless to me, not to be cocky, but Im happy with my style and imagination, i just need to get myself into a routine of writing if i ever want to finish the books i have planned.

Id love to hear from someone who has attended classes, or others who feel the same to me, and certainly those who disagree

Flogen

Thanx 4 The Fish · 18-09-2003 11:25am

I have not been to any officially (I did not pay for it) but they used to be run in a room I studied in college and it was quite interesting. They do not really teach you how to think; rather they go on about word usage, grammar, and some techniques for setting a scene, plotting a tale and eventually finishing a book. They also go through how to write as you write rather than writing as you talk, while some people get away with a conversational style in a book, it is a tough one to crack.

These are things that can be "taught" and when applied can prove helpful to an aspiring writer.

And a quick one for anybody deciding to write a book, hire a good proof reader, there is nothing that annoys me more than spelling mistakes in a book I have paid up to twenty quid for. When I say spelling mistakes, I don't mean spelling words wrong, as this will not happen anymore with word processors etc but putting in the wrong word, i.e. thought rather than taught and there rather than their. I am halfway through book 10 of WOT and there are no fewer than 12 of these types of mistakes already.

You'll have to forgive the rant, but I have needed to say it for ages and here, while probably not the best place, it will probably be the most forgiving.

blondie83 · 22-09-2003 11:12pm

flogen learn some grammar!:D

MarcusGarvey · 22-09-2003 11:20pm

While inspiration cannot be taught the process of becoming inspired can be helped along and what to do with this inspiration can also be taught.

Creative writing classes

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