On page 13 of The Operators, author Michael Hastings offers a pretty good piece of reporting advice that I'm surprised I had never heard put that way. Not revolutionary, maybe, but well-put certainly.
"I took out my notebook. I started making a numbered list. Memory was unreliable, as they said, and I'd learned that I never knew what material I was going to need for a story until later. I tried to discipline myself to write down ten details of any scene."
I usually had my photographs to refer to when I was looking to fill in the specific scene-setting details, but there were plenty of times when my memory was unreliable, or my handwriting unreadable, and I wish I had been more deliberate in keeping track of tiny details that I know I missed.
Also, a review of a review about The Operators:
I had the same reaction. I wrote in the margin, "I need to do this!"
I try to remember to write down random details, too, but never thought to number them, which I think will give me a good mental alarm clock to do it and be satisfied that I've done it.
My tiny bit of add-on advice: I try to listen for at least a few sounds, and one smell.
I can usually remember visuals, but sounds tend to blend in, and I have to stop to become aware of them at the time, or they are not recorded.
And good smells can be REALLY hard to come by--they need to feel natural to work--but they are infrequent enough in writing that one good one (even per chapter) goes a long way. And they are supposedly the most powerful sense-memories, in transporting readers back to a memory/place.
Posted by: Dave Cullen | 01/06/2012 at 10:46 AM
That's interesting you say that, because in two places in the book that this site promotes - "Can't Give This War Away" - I do use specific smells to make points, and hopefully relate a time/place to the reader.
And yes, they have to feel natural to work.
I am surprised that I never heard the "write 10 details" lesson in any class I ever took....or I never wrote it down.
Posted by: Rahfa | 01/06/2012 at 11:18 AM