Friday, September 16, 2011

Become a Writing Outlaw

"What has been spoiled through human mistakes can be made good again through human work."
                                                                   - Richard Wilhelm

Become an outlaw and break writing rules as an exercise.

Make a list of the correct grammar, syntax, and style issues you wish to attack before your begin your destruction.

For example:

Omit a verb and see where the sentence action goes.
Dangle a participle.
Over-modify nouns with stacked adjectives.
Overwhelm verbs with adverbs.
Avoid subject and verb agreements and use a singular subject with a plural verb.
Add commas everywhere to splice sentences.
Use myriad exclamation points rather than have the sentence do the work.
Split infinitives.
Misspell.

Write for ten minutes making outrageous grammatical and syntactical mistakes.  Take detours into kooky. Create and dabble in your own language.  Make up words to suit your style.  Just go fliberative.

Notice what happens when you intentionally break the rules.  Does it help to shake up stale concepts?  Do you feel energized and on a hunt for surprises?  Take a risk you haven't before.

Share your experience as an outlandish outlaw of writing rules.

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