Next month I will embark on a series of workshops entitled 'Novel in a Year'. I feel chuffed to have gained a place in this workshop, as numbers are limited to just five people. There will be workshops over twelve months, and we will be able to have up to 20,000 words of our work critiqued during that time.
I currently have about 20,000 words in my novel already, but there are several things that I can learn about that will change and improve my work. I'm looking forward to getting stuck into the novel and the workshops.
Another area of writing that I would also like to study is screenwriting. I have previously reported that I am reading a lot of scripts to learn how to write screen/radio plays. I may be on my own in learning this, but I know who to get hold of for any advice I need.
For scriptwriting, I'm currently reading through the scripts for the BBC series, Spooks. I have already picked up a few terms, and I'm getting used to how the writing scripts appear on the page. Interestingly, in the first episode of Spooks, the script describes the characters that we will come to know over the episodes. One of the main characters portrayed in writing differs from how the character is depicted on the screen. I thought this was strange, only to be told that in the pilot episode of the American series Fame, there is a character that is a central part of the story, only for that part to be written out of the remaining episodes and subsequent success of the show. It must be brutal in the world of screenwriting!
After watching a Channel Four program interview on Sunday morning with a writer/screenwriter, I sat down to catch a couple of episodes of Lockwood & Co. The Netflix series has a bit of Ghost Busters about it. The exciting thing was that whilst I was watching it, I thought about how the scene would appear in the script. I was almost writing a script in my head. I am starting to pick something up from the screenwriting books and blogs I'm reading.
Those two projects will require a bit of writing over the next year. I intend to keep writing for this blog and migrate it to another platform. The migration may have started by the time this piece is published.
I will be continuing with my short stories. I'm on the lookout for more competitions to enter. The results of the last one that I entered should be out in the next couple of weeks. There are £49,949 writing prizes in this month's Writing Magazine for starters.
My letter to the Rugby Paper was not used in the following week's paper, and neither were any others, as they didn't publish a letters page that week. I expect they were overwhelmed with reader's letters that week and after the RFU's latest missive. I will check if it gets used in the coming weeks.
Just a thought; is there going to be anytime for work?
No comments:
Post a Comment