Author Archives: knlistman

Originally posted on Write about what?:
Consider the possible basic conflicts in fiction:  man against environment, man against man, man against society, and man against self.  In most plots the conflicts are between people.  Even in Robinson Caruso and Castaway,…

Originally posted on Write about what?:
When a person refers to classic art, you automatically assume it is the style derived from classic Greek art. This style is associated with city-states on a small Greek peninsula beginning about 500 B.C. and…

Originally posted on Write about what?:
As a young child I assumed poetry must rhyme.  Meter was beyond my comprehension. It was only that constant repetition of ending sounds that mattered. In fifth grade, the teacher encouraged us all to…

Originally posted on Write about what?:
The social psychologist Solomon Asch  is famous for his experiments on  how peer pressure affects our perceptions in 1950s.  According to Asch if all those answering before the research participant selected the same incorrect…

Originally posted on Write about what?:
When Edgar Allen Poe published “Murders in the Rue Morgue” in 1841 the murder mystery was a relatively new genre. He wrote a few more of these increasingly popular detective stories before leaving behind…

Originally posted on Write about what?:
When reading a professional author’s discussion thread, I noted that more than one person assumed the trick to creating a unique writer’s voice was “writing like you talk.”  There is some truth to this…

Originally posted on Write about what?:
Imagery is one of the harder to pinpoint concepts in poetry. What exactly is the difference between describing something in poetry and creating imagery?  This concept is not always easy to explain.  So I…

Originally posted on Write about what?:
Recently I was following a thread of writers discussing how to find names that make characters memorable.  Honestly I believe that writers should be looking at the reverse situation.  It is the skillful creation…