[网聚牛]和菜头：恐怖大师斯蒂芬.金的7条Blog写作秘笈

这篇文章来自《positivityblog》，他的依据是斯蒂芬.金的《OnWriting》写的读后感，他把这些经验作为自己写博客的借鉴。之所以选择这篇文章，一是想测试抓虾需要多长时间抓取文章。二是满足抓虾用户的需求，他们非常喜欢这种标题。三是豆瓣九点已经成为我Blog的主要流量来源，这篇文章应该更符合豆瓣网友的口味。最后，原文是英文，我翻译为中文。考虑到我的英文水准有限，所以把原文和翻译都附上，希望能有人指正其中的谬误。

1. Get to the point.抓住重点

Don’t waste your reader’s time with too much back-story, longintros or longer anecdotes about your life. Reduce the noise.Reduce the babbling. In On Writing King gets to his points quickly.Get to your point quickly too before your reader loses patience andmoves on.
不要用过多的背景故事、冗长引子和作者个人传奇浪费读者的时间。要减少不必要的旁枝末节，要减少无意义的胡说八道。在《OnWriting》中斯蒂芬.金很快能抓住重点，你也得那么做，否则你的读者将会失去耐心掉头而去。

2. Write a draft. Then let itrest.写好草稿，然后冷处理。

King recommends that you crank out a first draft and then put itin your drawer to let it rest. Now, how long you let your text restmay vary. King puts his manuscripts away for several months beforerereading and start the editing process.
金建议，当你打好了第一个草稿之后，就把它锁在你的抽屉里，由它去好了。需要冷处理多长时间没有一定之限，金一般要把草稿放在抽屉里数月之久，然后才去再次通读并开始完善。

I often let a post rest for a day or two before I start editing(as I´m sure many other bloggers do from timeto time too).
我本人经常写好一篇帖子后等待一到两天，然后再开始编辑修订。（我相信很多博客时不时也会这么做）

This enables you to get out of the mindset you had when youwrote the draft and get a more detached and clear perspective onthe text. It then becomes easier to edit, add and cut in asometimes kinda ruthless way. The result is most often a bettertext.
使用这种方法，能够让你拜托写草稿时的情绪，而换用不偏不倚和更清醒透彻的视角对待文本。可以让你更容易地修改文章，使得增删的行为变得“冷酷无情”。这么做的结果是你往往能得到一篇更好的文章。

3. Cut down your text.勇于删削

When you revisit your text it´s time to killyou darlings and remove all the superfluous words and sentences.Removing will declutter your text and often get your messagethrough with more clarity and a bigger emotional punch.
虽然是文章是你的亲儿子，但是当你重新审阅它的时候，你要勇于删除所有冗余的字词和句子。删改能规整你的文章，还能以更为清晰和更富于冲击力的形式表达你的想法。

Don´t remove too much text though or you mayachieve the opposite effects instead. King got the advice to cutdown his texts by 10 percent from an old rejection-letter and hasabided by this advice for decades. While editing my blogI´ve found that 10 percent seems to be a prettygood figure not just for mammoth-sized books.
但也别删削太多，或是达到过犹不及的程度。金曾经在一封退稿信中得到过个建议：减少10%的篇幅。此后的几十年时间中，他一直遵从这个建议。当我修改我的博客文章时，我发现10%这个比例非常恰当，看来它并非只适用于鸿篇巨著。

4. Be relatable and honest.保持可信和诚实

King has an honest voice in his fiction and in his memoir. Hetells it like it is and makes us relate to him and his characters.Since King´s fiction often is of an odd kindwith strange plots that seldom happen to normal people I think oneof his strengths as a writer is being able to write relatablecontent anyway.
（relatable是不是想当然的生造词？）金在他的小说和角色里都始终用一种诚实的声音说话。他恰如其分地如实描述，因而使我们对他和他塑造的角色信服。虽然金小说中内容对于我们普通人来说非常另类罕见，我想他使人信服的力量源自于总是描述令人信服的内容。

One of the keys to doing that is to have an honest voice andhonest characters with both bad and good sides to them. People wecan relate to with all of their faults, passions, fears, weaknessesand good moments. King´s characters seem human.That creates a strong connection to the reader who starts caringabout the characters.
能做到这一点的秘诀之一是诚实的写作和真实的角色，无论作者是描写好的一面还是坏的一面。我们之所以会觉得一个人可信，是因为他所有的错误、激情、恐惧、脆弱和美好的瞬间。金塑造的角色有血有肉，这就让读者和小说人物血肉相联，开始关心人物本身。

Another key to being honest and relatable is keeping aconversational style. Keeping it simple and using language thatisn’t unnecessarily complicated. Using the words that first cometo mind.
另一个保持城市和可信的秘诀在于始终使用对话风格。保持对话内容简单，没有必要使用复杂的语言，而是要用你脑海里最初浮现的字句。

5. Don´t care too much what othersmay think.不要太过在意别人的看法。

King admits to being needy about the emotional feedback he getswhen he lets his wife read a new story for the first time. He getsa kick out of hearing her laugh so she cries or just cry becausesomething in manuscript really touched her. But he has also gottentons of mail over the years from people who confuse his sometimesnasty characters with the writer. Or just thinks he should wind upin hell. And King hasn´t always been afavourite among literary critics either.
金承认，当他让妻子做为他新故事的第一读者时，对于情绪化的反馈他很不适。听到她大笑的时候，他也会因此而抱怨，弄得妻子哭了起来。或者是她为草稿中的内容所打动而哭泣的时候，他同样会大发牢骚。而他每年也接到数以吨计的读者来信咒骂他，他们把作者和作者塑造的邪恶角色混为一谈，或者认为金应该下地狱。此外，金在文学评论界也同样很不得宠。

But from what I gather he just sits down at his desk and keepswriting every morning anyway. If you listen too much to yourcritics you won´t get much done. Your writingwill probably become worse and less fun. And criticism is often noteven about you anyway.
但是从我搜集到的资料显示，他只是回到桌子边坐下，在每个早晨继续挥笔*。如果你听了太多关于你的批评，那么你也将一事无成。你的写作过程将变得更为不畅，减少了其中的乐趣，而那些批评通常根本和你没有任何关系。

6. Read a lot.广泛阅读

When you read you always pick up things. Sometimes it might bereminders about what you know you should be doing while you write.Sometimes it’s some cool idea or just the world and atmosphere thewriter is painting. Sometimes it’s something totally new thatmakes your jaw drop. That one is my favourite. And sometimes youlearn what you should avoid doing. There are almost always lessonsyou can learn.
当你阅读的时候，总能有所收获。有些时候，当你在写作，这些在阅读中的积累会告诉你应该写什么。有些时候，它们则变成了某个绝妙的主意或者你笔下需要描绘的氛围。有的时候它们的效果是如此惊人，也许你会下巴掉到了地上。有的时候，你也能从中学到一些应该避免的事情。在阅读过程中，你总有可以学习的东西。

If you want to be a better writer you need to read a lot to getfresh input, broaden your horizons and deepen your knowledge. Andto evolve you need to mix yourself up with new influences and seewhat happens.
如果你想写得更好，那么你需要大量阅读，构思新的表现方法，扩大你的视野，深化你的知识，然后把它们带来的新意融汇到你想表达的事物上，看看会有什么事情发生。

How do you find time to read more? You can cut down on otherevening activities like watching TV-shows youdon´t care for that much anyway. Or, as Kingsuggests, you can bring a book to waiting rooms, treadmills ortoilets. I like to plug in an audiobook whileI´m on the bus or walking somewhere.
那如何找到时间阅读呢？你可以压缩晚上的休闲娱乐项目，比如说看电视，反正你其实并不需要随时盯着它。或者按照金的建议，你可以带着书去候诊室、健身房或者厕所去看。我个人比较喜欢在乘巴士或者散步的时候听声讯电子书。

7. Write a lot.勤奋写作

I’ve saved the most important tip for last. To become a betterwriter you probably – and not so surprisingly - need to writemore.
我把最重要的一条秘笈留到了最后。不要惊奇，如果你想写得更好，那么方法是写得更多。

Many of the best in different fields – Bruce Springsteen,Michael Jordan and Tiger Woods

- have gone beyondnormal limits of practise. And so they reap extraordinaryresults.
布鲁斯·斯普林斯汀、飞人乔丹、老虎伍兹，许许多多这样在不同领域内的高手，都曾痛下苦功，超越常人。所以，他们因为吃得苦中苦，终成人上人。

But what do you do when you don´t feel likewriting?

可是，当你不想写的时候你是怎么做的？

One good way to get around this is to find an effective solutionto reduce procrastination. You may have to try a few before youfind one that works for you. Another way is well, just to do it.And if you just get going your emotions changes a lot of the timeand any initial resistance becomes fun and enthusiasminstead.、
摆脱这种状态的好办法是找到一个减少拖延的法子。在找到一个奏效的方法之前，你也许得多尝试几个。另一种方法也不错：只管去做。当你能经常改变自己情绪的时候，最初的抵触情绪将代之以趣味和狂热。

*注“斯蒂芬.金多年来一直保持固定的写作习惯，每天早晨固定时间开始写作，写够定额，如同服药。
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翻译完了才发觉，满篇都是屁话，一文不值。除了打草稿之外，老子早就是那么做的，而且做得更狠。无论中文还是英文Blog世界，总有这种傻鸟写这种垃圾，什么什么的几条。这世上偏有那么多人喜欢这种垃圾，什么都可以归纳为几条，几个要点，每天要饿死多少老师傅？