by Elton Gahr

Created on: October 29, 2009

No matter if you are a student writing your first real term paper or an author writing your fifth novel there is always room to improve your writing and the desire to do so is one of the signs of a good writer. Without that drive to improve writing stops being art and becomes a craft, but how do you improve your writing?

The first and most important thing to do if you want to become a better writer is to read. It is sometimes easy for a person who spends his or her time putting words to paper to forgo reading but you can't afford to do this if you want to improve as a writer. And more than just reading you have to read widely. There is nothing wrong with picking up the newest novel of your favorite author, but you also need to read things outside of the genres you normally do. Reading the classics and the best sellers with a critical eye will teach you everything you need to know.

Just as you need to stretch yourself as a reader you also need to stretch yourself as a writer if you want to grow. We all have things that we enjoy writing and come easier to use than anything else, but if you want to improve you need to try new things. This is where the short story becomes important. The short story allows you to experiment with point of view, narration, genre and style in ways that are simply too overwhelming for a longer work. Of course the most important basic element of all of this is to write as often as you can.

One of the most basic things that many beginning writers don't understand is that good writing is about rewriting. There are a few authors who can type out a story in a finished form, but very few, for those of us who are mere mortals you need to learn to edit your work effectively. This including understanding how to cut out work that you truly like which isn't part of the story as well as anything that would distract the reader from the story. Good writing isn't about proving that you are smarter than the reader or making them stop and think how great of a writer you are but about conveying an idea or story in a way that impacts them.

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