Emotional Writing
I realize I'm not very good at writing emotional scenes, and plan to do something about it.
I’ve been busy writing-wise. I’m still rewriting/editing my noir and deep into planning my space opera. During my rewrite, I realized I don’t enjoy writing emotional scenes. I’m not good at it. Oh, I can describe emotions and relate them in my writing, but I don’t think I’ve actually written an emotional scene–that is, one that the reader feels viscerally. No one has told me this–it’s just something I feel.
The issue is, I’m not an emotional person. I grew up in an environment where I was forced into what I call feel-and-release as a survival tactic. I’ve learned to be balanced and objective. It’s not that I don’t feel, it’s that I’ve channeled my emotions into analyzing and doing the best I can in the situation. I feel that behavior has stifled my writing.
My characters are emotional and feel emotions, and that comes across. However, my writing itself doesn’t feel emotional.
So what to do?
Coincidentally, my space opera is developing into being “emotion-centric”. Emotions are a central theme. I need to work out how I can use this to teach myself how to write emotional scenes, not just scenes with emotions.
How do I write an emotional scene? What is a scene that is “emotional”? Writing is a way to touch the reader, and I’ve been keeping mine at a distance. Writing has to make the reader feel something–not necessarily what the characters feel. In fact, I’d say that good writing makes you feel something beyond what the characters feel. Good writing makes the reader transcend empathy for the characters to feeling something personal.
For me, the series that stands out as a prime example of this is Stephen R. Donaldson’s “The Chronicles of Thomas Covenant”. (NOTE: This series may not be to everyone’s liking, but it is a prime example of excellent prose.) I’ve reread the series several times and each time it’s an emotional ride. But for all the times I’ve read the books, I still can’t put my finger on what about the writing style is so impactful.
So how does Mr. Donaldson do it? My guess is his writing touches the reader through the words he uses. I wish I knew how he chooses his words. That’s the secret. It’s not even that the words are specific or special. It’s how he puts them together that forces you to feel things that aren’t necessarily on the page. I wish I knew how he does it.
I need to do that. I want to do that. I plan on using my space opera to push my personal limits on how I write emotional scenes and the word choices I make. I'm going to be cognizant of the emotional impact every sentence has on the reader, not just the plot. This feels like it’s going to be a lot of hard, grueling, yet rewarding work.
I don’t know if I’ll succeed. That’s not the point. I know I’ll improve. That’s the point. It will make me happy as a result.
Word up!