6 Writing Tips from Ernest Hemingway

[@andyontheinternet5777]

Number 1 tip for writing success: Write the book. No really, just sit down and write it.

[@chloee59]

100%

[@stratocruising]

Hemingway was sitting at a table with friends at Sloppy Joes. Someone came to the table and wanted to talk to his friend Sully, the machinist. They went to another table. Sully listened, started making "Go away." motions with his hands, then came back to the table. Hemingway asked what that was all about. Sully told him. "He wants me to help him rob the bank. He needs a cutting torch to cut through the bars on the vault, and I have the only cutting torch on the island. The cops know that. Hell, they borrow mine sometimes." That was how "To have and have Not" started. Story ideas are all around.

[@FrankPhillips1952]

The most encouraging thing (for me) was to hear I am in the 1 percent who actually write a novel. And Mow I am revising my second one. BTW I am a retired newspaperman. If a person refuses to learn to write for a newspaper they won’t be successful writing anything else.

[@chloee59]

Well done on finishing a manuscript. Big accomplishment in itself.

[@TahoeRealm]

Wonderful - thank you

[@ninecatsmagee8384]

I've always despised Hemingway's writing style, and yet, mine's so opposite it's worthwhile to hear what he says and take note.

[@chloee59]

Honestly…I’m not always a fan of it either but his writing helped me to get out of the “significance” of style and get down to the brass tacks of story.

[@VictorSeremet]

Great tips and very well explained

[@chloee59]

Thanks! Glad you liked it.

[@hafeez3103]

Appreciate this a whole lot. Excellent, highly practical tips.

[@chloee59]

Thank you so much!!!!

[@coachtaewherbalife8817]

I haven't watched this video try, but let me guess. 1. Write everyday. Write a lot. 2. Read everyday. Read a lot. 3. Put your writing aside for a week and then look at it again. 4. Keep at it for years. How am I doing so far?

[@jasonleech1254]

I hope you do audiobooks for your own work mate. Great video and perfect music too

[@chloee59]

Maybe one day!

[@46metube]

These rules are for Hemingway alone. He found them most useful. And, I'll assume, he believed everyone should copy him - because he was so 'great.' When in fact the rules are much simpler, because the rules don't adhere to having to be 'great.' The rules are yours not his: Write everything down - everything. That includes typos grammar mistakes incorrect punctuation - the overuse of adjectives - everything! Write it all down in the manner that best suits you. Whether it's by hand or on a keyboard or both. Don't labour over the right word or phrase - because you are creating barriers that belong to Hemingway not you. Your brain is a tap, listen to it and let it flow. Follow along as fast as you can. If your characters are TRUE they will guide you: trust them. Not these 6 rules. Trust yourself ultimately. And things will begin to move - sometimes at speeds you can barely keep up with. And I believe, that if you are struggling - something is wrong with your story. Open your 'own' mind to what's there. Let it flow. And don't question it. You will then have the opportunity to 'revise & correct' afterwards. Put everything in. Then at least you can take it out again. You are not Hemingway. You are yourself. Read Hemingway for sure - read widely, books magazines, road signs, cereal boxes. All have their place. Just don't shackle yourself. One last thought: write as often as you can: notes, poems, ideas, thoughts. Keep the tap open. And you'll begin to fill buckets.

[@Fantumh]

Hemingway thought of these as tips, not rules. Not sure of the negativity or why you think Hemingway thought everyone should write like him.

[@robinsprung207]

Great content. Just discovered your channel and really like what you are doing! Subscribed!

[@chloee59]

Thanks!!

[@SzazaM077]

Loved all the tips! Thank you. Subscribed.

[@chloee59]

Thank you!

[@crazylessons1076]

Your video is valuable

[@chloee59]

Thanks!

[@DanielleAlexandriaAlchemy]

Excellent video, thank you 🤓.

[@chloee59]

Thanks for watching!

[@spacecatboy2962]

and my tip for videos is do not put noise over the video that makes it hard to hear you

[@chloee59]

Thanks for the tip!

[@mytherstar]

Thanks.

[@chloee59]

Of course

[@philipswain4122]

My writing changed after I read Hemingway.

[@chloee59]

So did mine :)

[@debcullen9578]

Great ideas and tips but the music is very distracting and too dominant.

[@chloee59]

Thanks for the feedback! I’ll tone the music way down for the next one

[@acornsucks2111]

Number 7, stop looking at the NY Times.

[@chloee59]

😆

[@ballybunion9]

"One true sentence"? What's a "true sentence"?

[@KeenBulldozer]

This is a true sentence.

[@saltwellhill]

I would like to use a short clip from this as audio on a podcast I and working on. It is the quote "write 1 true sentence..." I will give you credit in the show notes. If it is agreeable to you please let me know. thank you!

[@chloee59]

Of course. Go for it.

[@hansruedi982]

The background music should be louder

[@chloee59]

Funny you say that. I had a viewer earlier comment that the music was too soft.

[@davidwaldheim1147]

Nice job--but please PLEASE know (though almost no one else does any more) that "literature" is a four-syllable word not three. I think Hem would want you to.

[@chloee59]

Good point! Thanks

[@marcomoreno6748]

I remember when literature was a five-syllable word.

[@InceyWincey]

Shakespeare would like to inform you that language is fluid and changeable.

[@aesth4u525]

Background music name??

[@chloee59]

Pulled it somewhere off epidemicsound.com

[@kevgh3869]

It makes me laugh when people say, "ya, I'm gonna write a book one day". It's the same as saying "ya, I'm gonna play in the World Series one day."

[@chloee59]

It is an incredible amount of work!

[@thomasj9561]

“if it doesn't come bursting out of you in spite of everything, don't do it.” Charles Bukowski

[@ercm2393]

But how do you know if your idea is good if you don't talk about it?🧐

[@chloee59]

Great question…….. Well personally I talk to my wife and maybe 2 close friends that I trust about ideas or stories I’m working on. I try to keep it within that circle before publishing or sharing with other people. I really try not to let stories get out until publishing ready. Keeps me excited to release it. And that excitement helps fuel the writing.

[@ercm2393]

Ok awesome! That’s what I’m doing. So it’s good to know.

[@markkennedy5479]

Thanks for reminding us why nineteenth century novels are generally far more substantive and intellectually challenging than twentieth century novels. I think even Hemingway would have recommended that you enlarge your experience of twentieth century literature to include Joyce, Proust, Mann, Huxley, Woolf, Faulkner, Camus, Waugh, Wilder, Bellow, Forster, Kafka, etc., etc. Hemingway was undeniably influential, but he's construable as the twentieth century's greatest novelist only if we take 'greatest' to mean 'most easily parodied.'

[@chloee59]

Thanks for the comment! You seem widely read. I’m curious, what modern authors writing today do you think are the best?

[@markkennedy5479]

@@chloee59 You're welcome. Thanks for your reply. Among the authors listed (the ones Hemingway presumably would have known) my personal favourites are Huxley and Camus, but all repay attentive reading. Among those in the same category who made their contributions after Hemingway passed from the scene are John Banville, Nicole Krauss, Rachel Cusk, Jenny Erpenbeck, Margaret Laurence, Karl Ove Knausgaard, Michel Houellebecq and Emmanuel Carrere, off the top of my head. I don't subscribe to the 'tyranny of the present' that regards 'contemporary' as a suitable criterion for assessing aesthetic worth, however. I'd just as soon read Huysmans, Gide or Peacock (to say nothing of the heavyweights it was once assumed every educated person had read, from Plato to Shakespeare, Tolstoy, Dostoyevsky...) as any twentieth century notable. Whether my personal reading background qualifies as extensive of course depends on which set of comparators one is considering. I'm a retired reference librarian with a lifelong interest in philosophy, literature and intellectual history... so you're safe in inferring I've at least read something. I would unhesitatingly recommend Karl Jaspers' Way to Wisdom; Margaret Archer's Being Human: the Problem of Agency; Randall Collins' The Sociology of Philosophies; and Jonathan Israel's Radical Enlightenment to anyone seeking substantive reads outside the bounds of literature. P.S. The virtues you've ascribed to short sentences and paragraphs have more to do with attention capture than literary merit. Keeping in mind that there's a difference between writing literature and writing advertising, you may find the following discussion of interest: kzbin.info/www/bejne/q3jUoYmLg5idms0

[@dylanharkin8198]

for I have seen lions on the beach...

[@amk2224]

Please turnd down or turn off interfering music.

[@chloee59]

Will do for future videos

[@chriscollins3531]

That's a Russian typewriter.

[@chloee59]

Oh nice. Didn’t know that.

[@kalekain3521]

The problem with the stripped down approach is that at the end of the day you’re left with a newspaper article, not a story. If i wanted to read a newspaper article, I’d pick up a newspaper, not a book.

[@chloee59]

Yes I agree it doesn’t work in all situations…..