Learning to Write: Creative Writing for Beginners
By Mary Kole
Mary Kole is a former literary agent, freelance editor, writing teacher, author of Writing Irresistible Kidlit, and IP developer for major publishers, with over a decade in the publishing industry.
If you’ve ever wanted to learn to write creatively, you’ve come to the right place. Creative writing can be a fun and rewarding experience, and an exciting way to express yourself and your ideas. Whether you’re looking to write poems, plays, novels, or short stories, there are many tools and techniques available to help as you’re learning to write and get your creative juices flowing. Here, I’ll discuss some bullet points for beginners who are learning to write. Let’s dive in!
Learning to Write: Ingredients of Creative Writing
At its core, creative writing is about telling stories in an entertaining and stylish way. To do so, you need to think about certain book writing elements—namely characters, setting, plot, and dialogue.
Characters are generally the main focus of your story—they drive the action forward and give readers someone to relate to. Setting is where your story takes place, whether it’s in our contemporary world, a historical setting, or a fantasy world. Plot is how you express what happens in your story through a series of events. Your plot points should move along naturally in a cause and effect progression. Finally, dialogue is the art of how characters speak to one another and pursue their goals in scene. This helps to make your story more active.
If this is all making your head spin, don’t worry. You can take your time and practice as much as you want when you’re learning to write. Nobody’s looking over your shoulder, and the only goals are your own. Don’t hesitate to experiment, learn, and play around.
Learning to Write: Types and Styles of Writing
When learning to write, you can start by exploring different types and styles of writing, especially if you’re not yet sure about the type of writing that you want to do. One popular type of creative writing poetry—this requires writing sentences and using word choice as artfully as possible to convey a specific meaning.
You can also try screenwriting if you feel your ideas would translate well to film or screen. Playwriting is the art of writing for the stage. Last but certainly not least is fiction writing, either short-form or long-form, which involves creating entire characters, relationships, plots, and even worlds from scratch to tell a short story or a long one, respectively.
The great thing about learning to write is that you don’t have to commit to one thing now, or ever. Many writers practice multiple writing crafts, while some writers specialize in one or another.
Learning to Write: Coming Up With Ideas
Now that you’ve had an overview of learning to write creatively, it’s time to explore how writers come up with their story or book ideas. The answer here varies depending on who you ask, of course. There are many types of creative minds, and many ways to arrive at an idea. Some writers prefer freewriting exercises like brainstorming or mind mapping, while others rely more heavily on research-based approaches to really ground their creative writing in facts that give it the ring of truth. Ultimately, though, everyone learning to write will come up with their own unique process. One thing you can do immediately, though, is start keeping a journal of your ideas.
As you start to play around while learning to write, remember some opportunities and techniques to help level up your work. Sensory words that invoke smell, taste, touch, sight, and sound really bring your words to life and will invite readers into your characters’ experiences. You can use figurative language and writing imagery in your descriptions as well. You can use plot techniques like foreshadowing to keep readers engaged. There are so many options available to you when you’re learning to write, and you don’t have to learn or use them all at once. Take your time and see what feels right to you.
Creative writing is a great way for beginners and experienced writers alike to express themselves. Keep in mind that learning to write is a lifelong endeavor, and if you’re at the beginning of your journey, I’m so excited to see where you go.
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