Rudyard

"I keep six honest serving men

(They taught me all I knew);

Their names are What and Why and When

And How and Where and Who."

-Rudyard Kipling

Orwell's Six Rules of Writing

1. Never use a metaphor, simile, or other figure of speech which you are used to seeing in print.

2. Never use a long word where a short one will do.

3. If it is possible to cut a word out, always cut it out.

4. Never use the passive where you can use the active.

5. Never use a foreign phrase, a scientific word or a jargon word if you can think of an everyday English equivalent.

6. Break any of these rules sooner than say anything outright barbarous.

-George Orwell

(I know the photo doesn't really have anything to do with the content of this post, but it's cool, no?)

Capote

“Writing has laws of perspective, of light and shade just as painting does, or music. If you are born knowing them, fine. If not, learn them. Then rearrange the rules to suit yourself”

Truman Capote is my favourite writer.

On Writing Well

"Writing is hard work. A clear sentence is no accident. Very few sentences come out right the first time, or even the third time. Remember that as a consolation in times of despair: if you find that writing is hard, it's because it is hard. It's one of the toughest things people can do."

- William Zinsser: On Writing Well

The Spooky Art

Part of the reason why I started this blog was to become more comfortable with my writing and try to figure out what my 'style' is. I am constantly questioning if what I'm writing is reflective of my personality, or someone else's. 

My style of writing for this blog is different to how I write for publication. Here I am no good at being objective and tend to go overboard on the love, especially when I'm posting photos from a gig, but when I'm reviewing something for a magazine or whatever, that's when I push my preconceived notions about the subject aside and truly pay attention to what it is trying to achieve and I can be fair with what I write about it. 

In the first version of In Ghost Colours, I was emulating what I liked in other blogs and wasn't really being myself. So I deleted it shortly after. Now I am becoming more comfortable with what I am posting, though I often wonder if my sarcasm comes out in written word as I hear it in my head. Maybe it doesn't and you just think I'm a dick.

Will I ever find my own voice I am truly comfortable with? Do I already have it and I just need to refine it a little (or a lot)? Last year, I voiced my concerns about this to my uncle Pat who is a journalist in Perth and he told me that I shouldn't sit around and wait for my voice to suddenly appear, instead I should be reading lots of books and writing as often as I can. Not long after we had this discussion, he sent me a copy of Norman Mailer's The Spooky Art - Thoughts on Writing and I have read it numerous times since. Every writer should own a copy of this book. Mailer has so much good advice and little anecdotes that any writer can relate to. Here are two I particularly enjoy:

"Writing is spooky. There is no routine of an office to keep you going, only the blank page each morning, and you never know where your words are coming from, those divine words."

"A good skier rarely worries about a route. He just goes, confident that he'll react to changes in the trail as they come upon him. It's the same thing in writing: You have to have confidence in your technique. That is the beauty of mustering the right tone at the right time - it enables you to feel like a good skier, nice and relaxed for the next unexpected turn."

Which Dreamed It?

'The time has come,' the Walrus said,

'To talk of many things:

Of shoes - and  ships - and sealing-wax -

Of cabbages - and kings -

And why the sea is boiling hot - 

And whether pigs have wings.'

Lewis Carroll's Alice's Adventures in Wonderland and Through the Looking Glass are constant sources of inspiration for me. If I ever get writer's block, I like to open a page and giggle at its nonsense.