Nobody Wants to Read Your Sh*t: Why That Is And What You Can Do About It

by Steven Pressfield

In the real world, no one is waiting to read what you’ve written.

Streamline your message. Focus it and pare it down to its simplest, clearest, easiest-to-understand form. 2) Make its expression fun. Or sexy or interesting or scary or informative. Make it so compelling that a person would have to be crazy NOT to read it. 3) Apply that to all forms of writing or art or commerce.

writing/reading is, above all, a transaction. The reader donates his time and attention, which are supremely valuable commodities. In return, you the writer must give him something worthy of his gift to you.

1) Nobody wants to read your shit. 2) If you want to write and be recognized, you have to do it yourself.

If you imagine this is easy, try it sometime.

A concept takes a conventional claim and puts a spin on it. A concept establishes a frame of reference that is greater than the product itself.

“It’s okay to be the kind of person I am.” It’s okay to be anxious. It’s okay to be unable to sleep. It’s okay to lack self-esteem. It’s okay to be an introvert, to seek out the quiet corners at a cocktail party, to care about quality, to have your mood be affected by your surroundings.

“Kid, it ain’t stealing if you put a spin on it.”

When you try too hard, you have bad ideas. When you work mechanically, you have bad ideas. When you follow formula, you have bad ideas. When you’re desperate or panicky, you have bad ideas.

Problems seeking solutions. This is a very powerful way of thinking about the creative process. Implicit in this point of view is the idea that the answer already exists within the question, that the solution is embedded within the problem. If your job is to find that solution, the first step is to define the problem.

Define the problem and you’re halfway to the solution.

If you don’t ask for the sale, how are you gonna get it?

Art is artifice.

Either I would slay that dragon or it would slay me.

A real writer (or artist or entrepreneur) has something to give. She has lived enough and suffered enough and thought deeply enough about her experience to be able to process it into something that is of value to others, even if only as entertainment.

There seems to be no way to make the passage easier, nor any method to eliminate the pain. The lessons can’t be taught. The agony cannot be inoculated against. The process is about pain. The lessons come the hard way.

If your Climax is not embedded in your Inciting Incident, you don’t have an Inciting Incident.

THE SECOND ACT BELONGS TO THE VILLAIN

The scarier the monster, the deeper the jeopardy, and the deeper the jeopardy, the more emotion will be produced in the hearts of the audience.

Keep the villain up front throughout the Second Act.

To say, “Keep it primal,” is to say, “Tell the story in pictures.”

First figure out where you want to finish. Then work backward to set up everything you need to get you there.

This stuff sounds like formula, I know. But it is the marrow and sinew of storytelling, and if you don’t believe me, please check with Mr. W. Shakespeare.

Get your characters in danger as quickly as possible and keep ratcheting up that jeopardy throughout the story.

the Indian Dream is more American even than the American Dream.

The character must undergo a radical change from the start of the film to the finish. She has to have an arc. She must evolve.

We establish a theme that is worthy of a star.

Does our protagonist have a star arc? Have we given her star scenes? Does she suffer like a star? Evolve like a star? Is she one of kind? Is she unforgettable?

The story’s gotta play.

Your job as a writer is to give your hero the deepest, darkest, most hellacious All Is Lost Moment possible—and then find a way out for her.

A great epiphanal moment not only defines the stakes and the jeopardy for the protagonist and for the audience, but it restates the theme and answers the question, “What is this story about?”

But to make the villain a pure monster is a cheat.

You don’t really learn an art or a craft in school.

Then there’s the way you really learn: Alone at your keyboard.

Fuck my agent. I’m gonna write the book.

Every work must be about something. It must have a theme. 2) Every work must have a concept, that is, a unique twist or slant or framing device. 3) Every work must start with an Inciting Incident. 4) Every work must be divided into three acts (or seven or eight or nine David Lean sequences). 5) Every character must represent something greater than himself/herself. 6) The protagonist embodies the theme. 7) The antagonist personifies the counter-theme. 8) The protagonist and antagonist clash in the climax around the issue of the theme. 9) The climax resolves the clash between the theme and the counter-theme.

How to start a project. 2) How to keep going through the horrible middle. 3) How to finish. 4) How to handle rejection. 5) How to handle success. 6) How to receive editorial notes. 7) How to fail and keep going. 8) How to fail again and keep going. 9) How to self-motivate, self-validate, self-reinforce. 10) How to believe in yourself when no one else on the planet shares that belief.

Narrative device must work on-theme.

Can you do that?

A novel is like an acid trip. For the first forty-five minutes you’re thinking, “Hmm, this isn’t so intense. I can handle this.” Then you look down at your hands and flames are coming out of them.

You’re playing with dynamite when you type CHAPTER ONE.

The enemy is Resistance.

You can’t fix everything in one draft.

The great thing about writing (as opposed to climbing Mt. Everest or raising children or going to war) is the work sits still.

Writerly self-indulgence ends here. Now we must serve the reader.

We cannot give our readers ore. We must give them gold.

Does your novel have a concept?

Theme is what the story is about. Theme is not the same as concept.

It’s possible for you and me to write a 1,000-page novel and have no idea what its theme is. I’ve done it more than once.

Write for a star.