Donald L. Vasicek

Category: writing

  • How to Write Visually

    by
    Donald L. Vasicek

    Award-Winning Writer/Filmmaker Donald L. Vasicek

    Fiction writing is a visual medium. Thus, writing must reflect visual images.
    The more detailed these images are, the more visual what you are writing is,
    and in any writing, detail is everything. Remember show and tell in
    elementary school? When writing fiction, showing tells. Telling
    doesn’t show. It is vital to show. How does the writer do that?

    One way to improve one’s writing is to focus on verb usage. The use of
    action verbs always sparks up the writing, gives the writer the opportunity
    to be more detailed, and makes fiction writing more visual. Verb
    usage “forces” the writer to write visually. The use of action verbs “forces”
    the writer to be more creative and more visual.

    For example, “John is blind.” This is telling. The key here is the verb.
    The verb, “is,” is passive. It tells what John is, which is fine, depending
    upon the kind of writing you are doing. Passive verbs, however, usually
    make sentences boring when the writer’s goal is to be entertaining.
    When writing fiction, the writer cannot afford to be boring. “John’s blank eyes
    reflect a zombie-like look.” The verb here, “reflect”, is more visual. It shows
    the reader how John’s eyes are, and then, leaves it up to the reader to
    wonder, “What is going on here?” The reader will then hungrily read on
    to find out what is going on.

    Another aspect of making writing more competitive is to keep the
    writing lean. It gives the reader a better opportunity to move through the read
    faster, something most all people want to do who read scripts and manuscripts
    as part of the way they make living. Editors, publishers,
    agents, producers, directors, actors, etc. usually have manuscripts or
    scripts stacked up on their reading table. They need to read, and they
    need to read as rapidly as they can. So, one of the goals for you, the writer,
    is to make sure you write in a way that makes your writing easy to read.

    So, what you might want to do is go back through what you have
    written. Focus on the verbs. Change those verbs to action verbs
    where you see that it makes your writing more detailed, and
    more visual. This will shorten what you are writing, but in the
    same stroke of the pen, make it more vivid, more graphic, and
    more visual. And the bonus here, is the reader will be more
    attracted to what you have written.

  • Donald L. Vasicek’s The Zen of Writing

    by
    Donald L. Vasicek
    http://michaelc.nextmp.net/wordpress
    dvasicek@earthlink.net

    Writing requires creative effort. Creative effort translated means that regardless of what you are writing, it must be put together in a fashion that grabs readers and keeps them reading. How is this accomplished?

    Writing articles, blogs, personal letters, web site pages, books, poems, e-books, screenplays, radio scripts, video scripts, etc. requires a beginning, a middle, and an end without regard to linear or non-linear writing. A defining or main theme must be utilized to hold these elements of writing together. Like roots of a tree, a defining theme causes all elements of what one is writing to grow and blend together to be partial to the trunk and branches of a tree, as you write.

    How is this accomplished?

    The first step, and this is vital, is to use a pen and a piece of paper. It is advisable to sit down. Write down who caused you to come up with the idea about writing what you are about to write, what your situation was at the time, where you were, when was it, and why this particular writing idea surfaced. By writing down these answers with a pen and a piece of paper, it will cause the information that you impart to register in your subconscious mind. This, in turn, will give you the information you need to identify the main or defining theme for what you are about to write.

    By following this approach to writing, creative effort will turn what one is writing into an effective piece of writing.

  • “Fantasy”

    I think I’m going to wait and see if you call me.

    Meanwhile,

    I’ll eat some plums and do the dishes,

    read Albert Camus’ “The Stranger”

    and fall into the mailbox to see if

    you’re hiding in there.

    -Donald L. Vasicek