Ask the Author: David Charnick
Answered Questions (4)
David Charnick
You keep asking questions. Like a knotted thread, you don't keep worrying at it until it's too tangled. You take time to see how the knot works and start picking gently at it, stopping whenever you get frustrated. In the same way, don't get uptight when you can't get beyond your last sentence. Stop and allow the emotion to pass, and then start asking questions. What would happen next if x happened? What would he say if someone could see him right now? Is this the only way she could react? When you get some answers, things will start flowing again.
David Charnick
Shakespeare said that thought is free; the writer's mind is the freest thing. You're observing, analysing, and condensing the most abstract concepts into words. In the process you're breaking free of the constraints which tell us to think and behave like everybody else.
David Charnick
Read a lot - reading exercises the imagination and expands your means of expression. Writing is hard - not just in terms of finding your voice, but also in terms of getting taken seriously - so you've got a lot of disappointment coming. Don't feel crushed: keep going and show them why they're wrong. If you want it badly enough, you'll stay with it.
David Charnick
I'm a tour guide with Footprints of London, and the idea for 'The Dark Side of East London' came from one of my local tours, 'The Dark Side of the Green'. The tour looks at criminal moments in Bethnal Green from the C18, C19 and C20.
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