creative writing definition

creative writing definition

The Importance of Creative Writing

1. Introduction

The essay will be published in the Journal of Creative Behaviour and it attempts to explain the value of creative writing. Both the journal and the essay are directed toward an academic audience. The essay will contain four main points. The first point will define what creative writing is using a definition proposed by Selander. The second point will discuss the psychological benefits of creative writing. The third point concerns the educational benefits of creative writing with research to support this. The final point will support the contention that creative writing is currently undervalued and thus neglected. This point will be supported with research into the declining interest levels in creative writing. The overall argument of this essay is that creative writing is an undervalued activity useful to personal development and increasingly relevant to the wider educational and economic context. It is argued that an understanding of the value of creative writing has been hindered by a lack of research into its benefits. The essay acknowledges that creative writing is an inherently intuitive activity and as such difficult to research. However, it is proposed that greater general awareness of the potential benefits of creative writing would help to shift negative attitudes which are reflected in current trends. Suggestions for future research directions are made throughout the essay.

2. Benefits of Creative Writing

Creative writing also helps develop artistic expression, which can come in many forms. For students with an intense interest in writing poetry or fiction, this is the most obvious writing influence. And for students who long to write for the newspaper or who have a desire to blog, this can mean an improved sense of objectivity and an increased ability to present concisely to the audience. Finally, those interested in any career which relates to media or advertising can greatly benefit from learning creative writing. With the correct mix of creative writing experience and knowledge, it is possible to develop into an advertising copywriter or a media reporter.

Improved ability in creative writing is believed to facilitate the development of greatly needed communication skills as well. A Journal of Personality and Social Psychology 1996 study showed that children become more verbally expressive when parents are taught how to be more sensitive and responsive (Critical Links, 2002). This also translates into improved writing skills. Students are forced to expand their vocabulary and choose their words carefully to communicate their message to the reader. They are required to produce flexible, thoughtful, and precise writing, and the best way to achieve this is through practice.

3. Techniques for Effective Creative Writing

Using any of the following methods should help you to be more creative and to come up with more interesting ideas: Keep a diary. Write down even the briefest and dimmest ideas in your head. You will be inspired more and more over time and will find you have created your own store of stimuli. If you get into the habit of noting any ideas that come to you, you will gradually be able to ‘tune in’, as it were. Try free writing. Give yourself a set period of say 5-10 minutes. During this time you are not allowed to stop writing for more than a couple of seconds. Force yourself to keep going until your time is up. You will find that some very strange ideas turn up at the back door of your mind. This is very good exercise to break a writer’s block, or when you have to produce something out of next to nothing. Write any tiny little scraps of ideas that come your way and place them in a big envelope. Periodically have a big read through and see what connections you can make between the different ideas.

4. Overcoming Writer’s Block

What is writer’s block, and how does it affect the creative process? The page is random on this one. When one has writer’s block, a person feels as if they are stuck in a hole which they cannot get out of. They cannot think of what to write or the right words to use, and it is almost as if the paper is soaking up any creative thought that comes to mind. Writer’s block is not only frustrating for the writer but also has a direct effect on the quality of the work and the writing process. The easiest way to attempt to avoid writer’s block is to brainstorm. This may sound like an easy way out, but brainstorming has its effectiveness. Get a piece of paper and write anything that comes to mind. Try to draw something that is related to the topic; it does not have to be anything in particular. Any type of imagery can trigger a different train of thought. Coming up with an outline can be beneficial to some writers being that it could provide a little more structure to the assignment or paper. This method can use specific types of topics and subtopics and throw ideas in them and later on develop these topics into a rough draft. Using general topics and putting bubbles around them is an effective way to brainstorm an outline. One should put the topic in a bubble in the middle of the paper and put subtopics in circles surrounding the topic. Another means of overcoming writer’s block is changing the writing environment. The writer should go outside, get some fresh air, a change of atmosphere may help explain the change in thought process. Going outside of your house, away from a desk and actually writing with paper and pencil has shown to be effective. Use of the whiteboard can trigger some thought process, and it is used in a similar manner to brainstorming. Visualizing the process of what you want to write before you actually write is effective because you are essentially planning your work without getting frustrated writing the bad parts of it. Taking breaks throughout the writing process can prevent writer’s block too. Writing a paper in one shot without any breaks can cause mental fatigue. Mental fatigue can be very frustrating as well because you may want to continue writing but you cannot due to not being able to think or losing focus. If you start to feel as if you are on the verge of writer’s block, taking a break can prevent it. Do not take a long break, just do something different for a while until you feel like you want to write again and it is no longer a hassle to do so. Finally, the most effective way to prevent writer’s block is to sleep on your work. This does not mean that you should take a break and go to sleep when you start to feel like you have writer’s block. Writing a little bit each day and sleeping on the work you want to write about can be extremely effective being that the brain works in mysterious ways when you are sleeping and waking up you may have a completely different viewpoint on what you want to write. This is essentially thinking when you are not trying to think, making it easier to prevent mental frustration.

5. Conclusion

Creative writing is an important tool that can be used to improve a writer’s piece, as well as a means of providing a writer with experience in using a piece of work to bring a reader’s interest and the most important statement of the work. Creative writing improves the writer’s piece in a number of ways. An evident example of how a writer can improve their work through creative writing is simply giving the writing more thought. By doing this, the writer can formulate a clear idea of the work and can be certain that the reader will understand it. This falls into the category of planning and thinking which is a key fundamental in creative writing. With a clear idea and understanding on how to execute the work, the writer can then begin to construct the piece. By using correct language, sentence structure, detail and imagination, the work can be done seamlessly. All these writing skills fall into place, learning how to improve on them and the only way to actually see how they can be utilized is through practice. This can be done by doing drafts and re-writing the same piece but with different ideas and ways of writing. The most valuable skill learning how to write in different styles for different pieces of work. As said before, it is possible to decide the best way to write a piece on the given idea but writing it for the first time round is quite difficult. Over time and with the various practices on different writing styles, it will become easier for a writer to judge and be able to conduct the best writing for a given piece.