How Does it Start For You?

As a fellow writer, I'm curious to see how our readers (and writers) find inspiration for their writings. How do you being a story? Does it come with just an idea of a thought, or are you really well planned out about it?

Relate to us your writing style, and with the sharing, we'll learn more about each other and how to write creatively...

StudentNewsDaily.com

Here is a link to another great place to visit on the web!

Ever heard of WORLD magazine? They are a Christian-worldview version of TIME and U.S. News & World Report; and they are an excellent place (ont he web or in magainze form) to find news with an unbiased, Christian-Judeo based reporting.

As it just so happens, they have another sister website devoted jsut to 'teens' or young adults interested in following the news and learning mroe about journalism. It's called Student News Daily.com and I highly reccommend it. Here is what they define themselves as:

StudentNewsDaily.com is a non-profit current events website for high school students. Our goal is to build students' knowledge of current events and strengthen their critical thinking skills. This is done by providing comprehension and critical thinking questions along with published news articles and other current events items from established news organizations. We provide resources that will enable students to become informed viewers and readers of the news.


Check it out!

Getting to Know You

By Titmoss

Quite a few smart men have studied the matter down through the ages and most have come to the unanimous conclusion that while studying men like books has its place (in psychology, perhaps), it cannot tell you everything, nor get you a friendship.

For example, there once was a man named Clive Staples Lewis, who had one of the people in one of his novels say this:

"I happen to believe that you can't study men,

you can only get to know them, which is quite a different thing."₁

I agree with (what I would suspect to be) Jack's own sentiments. Studying men as we would, say, science, is pretty base—or at least dehumanizing in that it reduces them to a subject or object to be studied, tested, and have results drawn up from. Humans are each unique and therefore often unsuitable for the bestowing upon of 'blanket statements', as which we find the many studies of man by men seem to generate . Humans are changing and therefore, often the same person acts and thinks differently throughout their day, week, years, and life. Minute by minute we are forming new opinions, and abolishing old ones, acquiring new information, and losing other information. Today, you may be a charming as a bird, but tomorrow we may find you an absolute grouch.

Also, humans are made with an immortal soul, and a personality characteristic to only themselves. All this makes studying men (if you are going to attempt it) faceted with even more issues, problems, and hang-ups. Frankly, I believe that to study men in the sense of this dictionary definition of "to study"

"to discover facts about something by doing research or experiments"₂

...is pretty ridiculous. How many of us, if we want to understand a certain person, run down to the library and look up books on that specific person's habit, time, place, character, gender, etc? Hopefully, not many of us. Why? Simply because it is much simpler to get to know that individual as you interact with them on a daily basis. So in the sense of studying a person in order to understand them in order to know them, we might find this next definition of “study” more suitably satisfying towards illuminating us as to the proper way of ‘studying’ people:

Study: [verb] “to look at…something and think about it carefully”

Better, better. To look at—observe—someone and think about them carefully. It’s closer to our ‘getting to know you’ idea; but still, to just look at someone and think about them doesn’t quite encompass all that really should happen when we “get to know” people. I’m sure you don’t just look at and study your friend when you meet them. Usually, you want to know more of them (their habits, dreams, thoughts, etc.) rather than about them (their favorite color, the shape of their nose, how they sit, etc.)

So, what definition (if any) fits this idea of studying to learn of someone instead of just learning about them? Well, how about this next definition:

“the process of learning about a [person] by reading, thought, intuition, or research [

This could fit. For our purposes, it seems to include a more personal, and certainly more verbal kind of studying. In learning about a person by reading, you may think of them perhaps sharing their journals and letters with you; often that is a very intimate, and deep look into the person. In getting to know them by thought, you may think of conversing with them; hearing their opinions on subjects and understanding their person through the verbalizing of their problems, hopes, or plans. By intuition, we can feel or sense what the person we are learning of is feeling. Through intuition we learn their habits, emotional patterns, and ways.

If we employ research to get to know someone, we are learning of their past (which usually effects how they will respond and interact with us now) and we are discovering their feelings on subjects, and how they came to where they are; intellectually, spiritually, and socially. All these facets of studying (a person): observation, reading, thought, intuition and research are merely supplements to the first and foremost thing that they are require—talking. To sit down and talk, debate, talk, laugh, discuss with someone is still the best and fastest way to get to know them.

That last definition describes the process of actively getting to know a person (the concept Lewis alluded to as being better than plain ‘studying’ them) quite well, but not perfectly. "Getting to know" someone also implies that the person being known playing a part also. Friendship—the essence of ‘getting to know someone’--is not just about me passively studying them. It's about us knowing each other, together.

“Getting to know you is much different than studying you. If I wanted a quiet thing to study, I’d go to the library. But since I want something more—a friend--- let’s have lunch sometime, just you and me. Okay?”

₁ A Most Reluctant Convert: C. S. Lewis

₂ www.merriam-webster.com Merriam-Webster Online Dictionary, Encyclopedia, & Thesaurus"

ATTENTION W.A. STAFF: You now have free reign to edit this and/ or suggest improvements.

Grammar Bytes

Hey everyone!

It's been a long time since anybody posted on here. I realized that even if the magazine isn't going, we can still use this spot for discussions and sharing of resources. I have found more than a couple great resources related to writing and I'll be posting them , with some reviews, here over the next couple weeks. Keep coming back.

The first is....

A great website for teaching kids grammar usage in a fun way, or for brushing up on your grammar. This is the first website I've seen that actually looks pretty cool, being it's interactive and isn't littered with advertisements all over the pages.

By going to the Exercises page, you can take part in interactive lessons that test you on everything from fragments, to periods, to writing style. Neat stuff!

Go check it out.... www.chompchomp.com

"Tips For Young Writers"

1. Read, read, and read some more. The more you read, the better you write. Reading in bed with a bowl of popcorn is the best way to go about this.

2. Keep a journal, something private, where you can let out your inner most thoughts. This is good if like me, you have a very bad memory. I do remember keeping a locked diary when I was a girl. I only wish I could remember what I had written in it! Another good hint, don't ever throw your journals or diaries away!

3. Look for inspiration right in your own back yard. You don't have to travel across an ocean to find great ideas for stories. You can find them in your classroom, your lunchroom, your bathtub! Your family and friends can turn out to be your best characters. My two sons, Noah and Jess inspired me to write Awfully Short For The Fourth Grade, Back In Action, and George Washington's Socks. Many of my family and friends are sprinkled throughout my books.

4. Learn from the pros. When you do read, choose the best writers you can find. They can often be your best teachers. [...]

5. Don't expect perfect, ever. Expect mistakes, and lot of them! Most writers rewrite over and over, I know I do. And don't write in stone - meaning don't think you can't change or improve what you've written, even if you've worked on it for a very long time. Sometimes you have to write through lots of trash before you get to the treasure.

6. Don't try and correct each and every word as you go. Write your story out and then go back and make your corrections. Worrying about spelling, grammar, and punctuation while you're writing can bog you down. I check all those boring things over after I've finished for the day.

7. Read what you've written out loud. I do this all the time so that I can hear how the words flow.

8. Become a people watcher. Where ever you are take notice of people and their reactions to events. This will help you when you develop your characters.

9. When you travel keep an eye out for a story and take a notebook along with you. You never know where inspiration will turn up!

10. Write from your heart. Write about things that matter most to you and your words will soar!

This Is It!

We are beginning

to put together

the very first

online issue of

Write Away! Webzine.

And so...

In order for there to actually be issues in this coming year, we need you all to send in your work.

Be sure to send your writing in before the deadline if you’d like to have it in a particular issue. But other than that it’s very simple: just email your finished story, poem or piece of writing to this email address and we'll take care of the rest.

If you can't remember the guidelines, just look at the sidebar text box to the right of the screen and at the chart in this post; both of those will tell you all you need to you to begin.

Okay, ready? Send it on in!

–The Editors.

From the soon-to-be-former editor :)

Hi everyone! Welcome to the Write Away webzine. As you can see, Hannah has done a great job setting it up. She and her sister, Liz (their work has appeared in Write Away under the names H. E. and E. J.) are going to take charge of Write Away beginning with the January/February 2009 issue, which will be the very first online issue.

I look forward to seeing Write Away grow and change under the editorship of the girls, and I hope you do too. For now, if you have any comments or questions, you can e-mail them at writeawaynow@gmail.com. And read over the information Hannah has posted here; you’ll get a feel for the format and submission guidelines.

Thanks so much to Hannah and Liz for enjoying Write Away enough to continue it!

~Tabitha O’Connell, Editor-in-Chief (until January) ;)