Writing

A common critique of any new movie, book, tv show or anything, a common criqitue of any new story in the written medium, (whether script writing or otherwise) is the lack of originality. Originality is defined as 1) existing from the beginning, 2) created personally by someone or 3) not dependent on other ideas. But is anything at all independent of ideas, or 'original?' One can now start to argue that everything's been done before, from new world with strange creatures, to magical schools, to a climactic battle between good and evil. I pose three question: Does originality exist any longer? Does originality need to be redefined? Or do we need to change the way we criticize storytelling?

The Internet has wielded unprecedented impacts on writing: from methodology, to modality, to publication, to dissemination, to memory. In all of these cases, the Internet has (seemingly) offered expansion. New, inventive methodologies; an ever-changing landscape of modalities; an explosion of publication avenues; a global, instantaneous system of distribution; and endless memory and storage.

However, with the absolute profusion of writing (from documents, to webpages, to web-text, to user-generated content like Facebook and Instagram, etc.), it feels as though writing is getting lost. Search Engine Optimization (SEO) has become crucial, and writers and companies struggle to craft their content to be relevant and, most importantly, to be seen.

The writing is certainly stored online, but does storage equate to permanence? Does storage equate to memory? Do permanence and memory even matter, if the writing cannot be found?

The contemporary popularity of the present tense in narrative storytelling has been critiqued by authors such as Philip Pullman, who have argued a preference for the tone associated with the past tense. Popularised by figures such as Jane Austen, the past tense can be used to achieve a 'classic' tone in narrative writing; today, however, authors are freely experimenting with tense.

This article will address how, in today's world, the aspiring author make sense of tense. Is it a matter of personal preference, or do choices of tense play into more complex sociocultural aesthetics? If tense matters, how important is it to take a stance on the subject? Is tense a purely relativist construct, its validity being subject predominantly to the whims of the author?

Books and magazines have been outlets for creative expression since printing presses made them viable options for creative production. Today, though, the magazine industry seems straddled over digital and print options—and after the editions are printed, they are slowly extinguished in a swirl of ephemeral media (print letters, circulars, magazines), while books re-circulate in libraries, used bookstores, and personal collections.

Is it fair and accurate to say that books hold more enduring value than magazines? If so, why do books hold their value more so than magazines? If a book held the exact same content as a magazine, would its life cycle be different? Is the fate of these publications dictated by their binding and paper type, or are there cultural undertones that determine if these media flourish?

Analyse the importance of travelling to experience other cultures on the creative writing process (either your own experience or an author you are familiar with).

An analysis of how disney characters have changed over time. Describing the differences in the characters and plotlines of the old disney as it started to how it is today. Figuring out why these changes have happened or how they benefited disney.

Countless famous writers– Maya Angelou, Kerouac, Victor Hugo– have been documented as having strange writing rituals that jumpstarted their creativity. Angelou only wrote in motels, Victor Hugo wrote naked… the list goes on. What were the strangest rituals in the history of the greats? What are some rituals proven to work? How should writers looking for structure embrace the practice of rituals before writing?

Provide an overview of what's wacky, what's working, and what's downright weird.

Artists in various disciplines sometimes comment on the process of working from an initial idea toward published versions of their works. For those learning in the arts, one powerful message within such commentary is the general commonality and value of leaning into a practice of improvement over time through successive revisions of a work. This could be contrasted against the notion some students have that great works emerge relatively whole and complete most of the time.

The author of this article could review the revision practices of various established artists, comparing their similarities and differences. The article could restrict itself to a single discipline (e.g. a certain type of writing), or could take a multi-disciplinary view.