Thursday, January 15, 2015

Well Said: Pretend

I find it works best to suppose just one thing. Pretend you are a ghost, or Pretend your chemistry set works magic, or Pretend this dog is the Dog Star. Then I go on to explore the implications of this supposition. Quite often, I am totally surprised by the result.
Diana Wynne Jones, The Children in the Wood
This is a wonderful bit of advice for any fiction writers out there. It is also something I've begun keeping in mind when I'm reading. Quite often the books I don't like are Pretending about too many things or they have forgotten to explore the implications (and just sit around pretending without doing anything). One is chaotic and the other is dull.

1 comment:

  1. I'm embarrassed to admit as an adult I am STILL pretending: using my imagination for story ideas all the time! Some of them get written, a lot don't but I still must do it...it's like breathing air to me!

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