by Gordon Hamilton

Created on: July 20, 2009   Last Updated: February 14, 2011

Developing your own writing style is about learning which genre of writing is best suited to your abilities, writing to it and allowing your style to develop chiefly naturally but with careful nurturing. Writing style is something which is inherent in each individual writer and has to be developed from within.

The first step which a writer has to take when looking to develop their own writing style is to find which genre of writing they are most comfortable with. There may be several types of writing with which the writer aspires to success but it does not necessarily follow that they are naturally skilled in writing to each particular genre. It is a case very often of trial and error in order to find the one in which they feel the words best flow and in which they are most likely to know success.

When a writer has chosen their genre, they have to begin the serious process of writing to it. They have to experiment with different types of sentence structure, descriptive techniques and perhaps narrative styles to find the one with which they are most comfortable. While this is a time for taking in to account such as perhaps teachings given in creative writing, or admired techniques used by favourite writers, it is more a time for self-expression, finding a comfort zone and simply getting the words out and down on paper in precisely the way in which they appear in the writer's head.

When each piece of writing has been completed, the writer has to scour carefully through it to find out how easy it is to read. Does it seem disjointed in any way? Does it flow in the way a piece of quality writing should? If the writer feels there is a problem with the overall feel of the piece, they have to analyse why this is so. They have to ask what they were trying to achieve at each break in the flow of the work. Were they trying too hard to be overly descriptive? Were they trying to incorporate the style of another writer in to their work, or teachings which they do not feel comfortable with?

As the writer practises writing in this way, they will gradually become more confident in their own abilities and particularly their ability to express themselves naturally. It is this freedom of expression which will develop the writer's own individual style and allow them to write confidently and well in the manner best suited to their capabilities.

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