Stuff I say during school visits…
Here are a few quotes and moments from my recent awesome week filled with school visits and writing workshops. Thank you to all the students and teachers at St. Anthony’s School (Bristol, CT), Talcott Mountain Academy (Avon, CT) and Memorial Middle School (Middlefield, CT)! Enjoy!
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90% of writing is paying attention to the world. The rest is just nouns and action verbs.
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Writers are people who write every day. Authors are people who finish things.
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If you don’t learn to write well, then all your thoughts and opinions and stories and ideas remain trapped in a box that looks like your head.
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You’ve got to keep a notebook. For me, cheap notebooks are best. The cheaper the better. They don’t demand good writing. If I had an expensive notebook, I’d feel compelled to try and write well and that would be a disaster. A leather bound notebook would kill me. Especially if the leather was made out of human skin. (I said this to a 6th grader who was reading Silence of the Lambs).
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Ideas come from everywhere. But the best ideas come from failure.
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I used to think that deer were like giant bunnies. After hitting a couple with my car, I learned that they are actually big bags of cement covered in brown fur. (This came up while discussing similes and metaphors and the long beautiful driveway that leads up to Talcott Mountain Academy):
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All stories require at least two characters. And shut up about Hatchet.
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Student: My name is Colin, and I would like it if you named a character after me.
Me: You need to be careful what you wish for. Every character has a flaw. So even if I described you as a great athlete who is handsome and kind and heroic and funny, I’d still have to show something about you that is not flattering. Then everybody would wonder if the real Colin was kind of crazy.
Student: How do you know my name is Colin?
Me: Because you’re going to be in my next novel.
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Harry Potter is the biggest failure ever. It took him 7 books & 8 movies to kill the bad guy. What does this tell us? It tells us that failure is the magic ingredient that makes stories go.
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Put that book down. It’s bad for you! Even the author says so! (See below)
.
90% of writing is paying attention to the world. The rest is just nouns and action verbs.
.
Writers are people who write every day. Authors are people who finish things.
.
If you don’t learn to write well, then all your thoughts and opinions and stories and ideas remain trapped in a box that looks like your head.
.
You’ve got to keep a notebook. For me, cheap notebooks are best. The cheaper the better. They don’t demand good writing. If I had an expensive notebook, I’d feel compelled to try and write well and that would be a disaster. A leather bound notebook would kill me. Especially if the leather was made out of human skin. (I said this to a 6th grader who was reading Silence of the Lambs).
.
Ideas come from everywhere. But the best ideas come from failure.
.
I used to think that deer were like giant bunnies. After hitting a couple with my car, I learned that they are actually big bags of cement covered in brown fur. (This came up while discussing similes and metaphors and the long beautiful driveway that leads up to Talcott Mountain Academy):
.
All stories require at least two characters. And shut up about Hatchet.
.
Student: My name is Colin, and I would like it if you named a character after me.
Me: You need to be careful what you wish for. Every character has a flaw. So even if I described you as a great athlete who is handsome and kind and heroic and funny, I’d still have to show something about you that is not flattering. Then everybody would wonder if the real Colin was kind of crazy.
Student: How do you know my name is Colin?
Me: Because you’re going to be in my next novel.
.
Harry Potter is the biggest failure ever. It took him 7 books & 8 movies to kill the bad guy. What does this tell us? It tells us that failure is the magic ingredient that makes stories go.
.
Put that book down. It’s bad for you! Even the author says so! (See below)
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