Wattpad 101: Your guide to the world of Wattpad

The Weakest Form of Writing

Just by the title, this chapter seems pretty brutal. I don't intend it to offend people or make them feel bad. The reason I feel the need to write this chapter is to increase awareness. When most of you start out writing, you start out writing a certain way. After becoming comfortable writing that way, you may continue to write in this manner for no other reason than that it has become comfortable for you to do so. However, you may not know why you do it, and you may not realize the "negative connotations" you may receive for choosing your narrative.

To be clear, ignoring the title, these examples are not "weak" writing in and of themselves. They are simply one of many different forms of writing, and great authors can use them to great effect... so can you. However, you may not be aware that this kind of stuff is the stuff every new author chooses, or that by sticking to these methods, you're kind of choosing to stick to the lowest common denominator.

I also speak in generalities here. There are plenty of exceptions. You may not start out writing like this, and you may write like this and do it fabulously, subverting the very idea that it can be considered a weakness. However, more often than not, this is used as a crutch, and while I'm not saying you shouldn't use these examples, it'd be a good idea if you were aware that they're a crutch, so that you can work towards using them in other ways. What am I talking about here? I'm talking about things like:

Writing In First Person

The first two entries in this post are perhaps the least fair. Telling someone not to write in first person is absolutely ridiculous. They're only three points of view, two if you rule out the limitedly useful 2nd person. If we cut out 1st, then everything will be third! Obviously, that's not what I'm trying to get at here.

I use this example because it makes the point the best. When I call something weak writing, I'm not necessarily calling it "bad" writing. The majority of books written are written in first person, and to go so far as to call it "weak" undermines way too many works of fiction. Therefore, I want you to keep it in perspective here. When I call first person weak, I'm talking about the state of new authors who choose to use it.

If you just started writing and you're under 20, you're almost certainly starting by writing in first person. It's not difficult to wonder why. It's way easier to insert yourself into a character than to create a living, breathing person objectively through the camera lens of third person. You can give them personality, spirit, and history. Plus, let's face it, most young writers are more used to writing with I.

It is one of the first things you're taught, and there are no shortage of essays, cover letters, and opinion pieces where you put yourself in the first person to explain your opinion. When you tell stories to your friends, you always refer to yourself as I. It's rarer to describe someone else than it is to describe yourself.

Plus, this by no means leads to a bad story. Being in that first person view gives you a front row seat into someone's mind. You see the world through their eyes... or at least you see it through the eyes the narrator wants to show you.

However, writing in first person IS the go to for new writers... and thus it gets a bad wrap as being weaker writing. After all, first person limits you in the sense that you can't do multiple character's PoV at once easily. You either have to label them via chapter, or label them via headline... and that also looks weak when you do it. It tends to be received as the easy way out.

So am I telling you to not write in first person? No... I'm telling you the same thing I've said in every chapter up until this point. You should have a reason for the PoV you're telling the story in. First person only becomes weak writing when it's told in a story that would be better off third, or told by person who picked it because it was easier.