A Quote by Dennis Green

It's pretty easy to think of the idea of a story, and maybe even to write a scene or two, but understanding the ebb and flow of a narrative, where to leave the little clues your protagonist (and reader) need, while playing fair, takes a lot more skill and patience than you might think.
When you need an idea about how to do anything, get quiet and relaxed and think about what it is you need to know. Then the flow of ideas will come. Be patient and let it happen. Sometimes it takes a little while, but it always works.
I think the first thing is to recognize that there is an ebb and flow to your career. There are going to be moments that are really high, and then you're going to have moments where you step away for a little bit, and maybe that's just by choice or maybe you have a family.
In order for a narrative to work, the primary character should have a concrete desire - a need that drives her story - and the story's writer should make this goal known to the reader pretty early in the narrative.
With my students, I don't offer any simple tips like that, maybe because my own process is pretty messy, but when we workshop we talk a lot about the deeper subject, which is what the story or novel is about. I think defining a narrative's themes can lay bare a narrative's tensions.
I do think some games are works of art, although their medium is visual rather than verbal. Both games and novels allow the reader/player to become a protagonist in the theater of the imagination. Both build worlds. In my opinion, the big difference between game and novel is in narrative structure. Communal role-playing games are open-plan without an end. A novel - at least the kind I write - has a closed structure with a beginning, a middle, and an end. I like that closed structure, and I feel I can say more with it.
I think from a personal standpoint, maybe I appreciate a little more that there are two sides to every story, and the way that the U.S. is sometimes is viewed outside of the U.S. can be pretty tough, depending on what the U.S.'s actions are.
I think there has to be an empathic strike between the reader and the protagonist. There has to be something said or known that connects the reader to this person you're going to ride through the story with.
What did I do to make Mommy leave?” “You didn’t do anything. This isn’t your fault.” “Then why?” she’d wailed. “I don’t know,” her daddy had said, and he looked so sad. “It isn’t fair!” “No, it isn’t, baby. Not by a mile. The world’s only as fair as you can make it. Takes a lot of fight. A lot of fight. But if you stay in here, in your own little cave, that’s one less fighter on the side of fair.
I think the more you have a generalist perspective, I think sometimes the more you can kind of see through the forest and the trees. And when it gets a little bit cloudy, you know, have some sense of, "Well, maybe this might happen or maybe that might happen." So I really am a big believer in liberal arts education. I think it's better - particularly in these kind of uncertain times - to know a little bit about a lot of things as opposed to being expert in one thing.
All you really need to know for the moment is that the universe is a lot more complicated than you might think, even if you start from a position of thinking it's pretty damn complicated in the first place.
I don't write jokes first. I write down topics. I think of what I want to talk about, and then I write the jokes - they don't write me... And even if you don't think it's funny, you won't think it's boring. You might disagree, but you'll listen. And maybe even laugh as you disagree.
I've always been a little bit more of a novel reader than a short story reader. I think the first books that made me want to be a writer were novels.
When I'm writing, I try not to think things like, 'Gosh, I have to finish writing this book.' Books are very long and it's easy to get discouraged. Instead I think to myself, 'Wow, I have this great story idea, and today I'm going to write two pages of it. That's all - just two pages.'
That was the funniest thing I'd heard in days. You're kidding, right? PLEASE tell me you have a stronger motive for me than 'fair is fair.' Life isn't FAIR, Dean....Nothing is fair, EVER. That's the stupidest thing I've ever heard. I need to help you because FAIR IS FAIR? Try, 'I need you to help me so I won't rip out your spine and beat you with it.' I MIGHT respond to that. MAYBE.
Meditation takes discipline, just like learning how to play piano. If you want to learn how to play the piano, it takes more than a few minutes a day, once a while, here and there. If you really want to learn any important skill, whether it is playing piano or meditation, it grows with perseverance, patience, and systematic training.
[While voicing] you have to create a feeling for what happened before a scene, what's going to happen after a scene, and what you are doing in a scene. You need to use your imagination even more and once your emotions are up, then your voice and expressions will go accordingly.
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