I've always been told that it's as important to read other writers and observe their technique as it is to develop your own method of writing, and I've always believed that. I did, however, have enormous problems with a creative writing tutor at university who took to underlining images and phrases and writing things like "Not original" in the margins. When I talked to her she said that, consciously or unconsciously, if you start to sound like another writer it verges on plagerism, and that it's better to write badly but to come from somewhere original than to write well from another author's perspective.

I started questioning everything I wrote after that with a kind of paranoia, but recently discussions with other members of this group have brought me back to the point of asking how right she was.

Becca sent the following quote from Ramsey Campbell as a point for discussion (thanks for this one Becca):

"I think it's a good idea to learn your craft by imitation while you discover your own themes and style. There are of course many imitators who never progress beyond imitation, but if you have anything valid of your own to say, you'll progress."

Does anyone have an opinion on this? All input welcome

Thanks

Ralph

There's an analogy to painting here - one way to learn (the old way) was to copy the work of a master. This teaches so many things - good choice of subject, composition, technique, use of colour etc. This becomes absorbed through years of practice until the student becomes competent enough to create original works. I suppose the nearest you can get to this with writing is by avid reading of those writers you admire, after all you can't really copy out their works like copying a painting. But in the end if you try to write in the style of someone else it rarely works - back again to that article by Squwark that Richard posted in one of the forums. We each have our own unique voice, and trying to write in someone else's is not only almost impossible but pointless.

And anyway, how can one be totally original unless one creates a new language? After all I daresay most words within reason have been used at one time or another in juxtaposition with most other words - it's only a series of different arrangements, and there must be a limit to how many there are before one uses the same ones again or descends into incomprehensibility or nonsense. Originality is the new god, both in writing and painting, but surely whilst seeking it we don't have to throw tradition and all we've learned out of the window? Stop ranting Nell.

Does anyone here not read as much as they should for fear of unconcious plagerism?

I think what your tutor said was just damaging. We are looking to find our voices in our writings and this is very important, but as Nell said,this does not mean we have to ignore everything that's ever been written in case we might be influenced by it (God forbid!). Originality shouldn't be about trying to find a brand new thing but about looking at the world in as fresh a way as possible. It is true that not everyone can get beyond imitation but this isn't necesarily an argument not to read. There is an argument that there are only 12 original narratives in existence in the world. What would your tutor say about that?

Oooh, I'd love to hear her response to that one... Thanks Fevvers.
It's not so much a case of not reading, as of not writing the things that spring to your fingertips sometimes because they sound so right in your head you're sure they've been somewhere else, if you see what I mean...
I've never consciously tried to immitate, but unconscious absorbtion continues to frighten me now.
I find it really interesting, because very often the best things critics can find to say about somebody's work is that they're the next "*****", and that's said with a positivity and enthusiasm, not, as my tutor expressed it, with a kind of invalidation of the things you've written.
I'm probably excessively anxious over this because I started a creative writing course as a way of discovering whether I could ever be a writer or not, and the tutor basically said not... but this was her reason, and I'm not sure I agree with it entirely.
Then again, maybe I'm just determined to write whether I can or not... in which case I should get on with it and stop worrying too much I suppose
Thanks for your input here everyone
Huggs
Ralph

seesm to me that what ever you write somebody else has already written in that style or on a similar subject.

What amazes me about music is how many different combinations of the same 8 basic notes there are so with thousands of words at our disposal other than out right plagarism I cant see realy why anybody should have a problem.

although I do worry myself about unconscious copying

many compared my chubby's burger bar with the style of rupert bear, it wasn't until somebody pointed it out to me that I bothered to read rupert a literary ofering I had never read before and realise dthat the style was similar but then again so what the content was different.

Oh Ralph, Ralph, you write like like a dream - I believe your tutor was jealous. It does happen. Please, never stop writing.

And Tweed, I went thorough a phase of reading Iris Murdoch, whose work I absolutely love, and as I came to each one of her works that I hadn't read before I'd have to go to my own work and cross something out. It got to be a little scary in the end. But I'd never stop reading in case I accidentally plaglarised something - I love it too much for that.

Oh Nell, thanks for the encouragement. No, I don't think I will ever be able to stop writing now - it's too addictive - but I'd like to be less terrified of it all, and you've been a real help with that. Thank you.
It's actually a real relief to know I'm not the only one who reads other people's work and then thinks "oh -erm, better not write that then..." The scariest for me was most a novel that started being exceeded by newspaper reports - creepy.
I actually started reading at least two books in any given time period so that I wasn't so open to one major influence (more of a disguise than a solution huh?) But then I started having strange dreams like the rats from "1984" turning into thousands of Harry Potter's enemies and invading Hogwarts to re-instate Big Brother.... Perhaps I should be seeking medical advice at this point

Ralph, your dream sounds like good inspiration; I do write down my more extraordinary ones - if I haven't forgotten them by the time I wake up, that is - usually the case.

Ralph - I would re-iterate other comments - your voice is yours, and is made up of echoes of all the voices that you've ever heard... ANd apart from anything else, I think you have an entirely striking style of your own (OK, I confess, I quite often don't have a good grasp of some of the things you write, becaue I find it a little too obscure sometimes) which is certainly unique in my experience.