All right, you're a writer or want to be a writer. What is your vision of humankind? What? You don't have a vision of humankind? You need one. This vision of humankind will run through everything you write. A writer's vision colors what he or she writes about and how he or she writes about it. Knowing what your vision is will help focus your work. And if you are working within the tight confines of flash fiction (or any length of fiction) your work must be focused. Spend some time thinking through exactly what your vision is. This will help to make your work unique. What are you really saying about the human condition?
Your vision may be made up of very ordinary elements. That's okay just as long as you are aware of these elements and how they inform your work. Never state in a story what your vision is; it should be acted out by your characters in your story.
I think one of the reasons we still read the work of F. Scott Fitzgerald is because of how intimately his vision informed his subject matter. I would argue that his fiction was about the struggle to achieve paradise on earth and paradise on earth was made up of youth, wealth and beauty. Later, a more mature Fitzgerald (This Side of Paradise was published when he was 23 or 24 and it brought him money and national celebrity status) wrote about the moral corruption that was at the center of this paradise.
All my fiction is held together by the vision of an emotionally wounded humanity trying to survive and find meaning (love) in a hostile world.
Hello Guy,
Having a vision certainly helps. But as so often, way and goal can be equally demanding subjects. Like I state on my matahari sky page, photography is about objects in different light conditions, or equally true, about objects characterizing the nature of light. In analogy i would argue that some have a vision, before they write, whilst others chrystallize their vision through writing: both approaches are good!
Determined to confront the hazy memories of his troubled youth, Oliver Matthews, a retired detective and confirmed bachelor, returns to the picturesque town of Henley-on-Thames for the first time in years.
Soldier's Gap is a non-traditional mystery with literary elements. The high school principal is brutally murdered, but Deputy Sheriff Dave Jenkins's search for meaning and love is a much more significant theme.
"Murder isn't usually this fun
May I offer you a Round the World Cruise of a lifetime for the price of a novel?
Not only do the seas roll on but two romances,a death at sea, uncovered past lives, history uncovered in Brazil, caves in Australia, poetry in Senegal, the Lux Mundi
Having a vision certainly helps. But as so often, way and goal can be equally demanding subjects. Like I state on my matahari sky page, photography is about objects in different light conditions, or equally true, about objects characterizing the nature of light. In analogy i would argue that some have a vision, before they write, whilst others chrystallize their vision through writing: both approaches are good!