One may wonder why team writing endeavors are undertaken. It seems contrary to the benefit of being an independent author and presenting a unique book without suffering the influence of others. However, there are various benefits that can be found in collaboration fiction. Sharing creative control almost harks back to oral tradition where individuals all contributed to stories.
Collaborative works are produced for a number of different reasons. They can be attempted as an educational exercise thus helping all the participants to develop their writing skills. Writing groups often produce such stories. It is also done for commercial purposes where experienced authors decide to work together for various reasons.
Writing together has a number of benefits but it also creates various challenges. One of the main benefits is that each author can benefit from the talents of the others. They can also challenge one another and thus stimulate increased creativity. The synergism can be very motivating.
A major difficulty when collaborating is to integrate all the efforts in such a way as to produce a consistent style. In order to do this there must be a level of mutual respect and egos have to be put to one side. One author may have stronger skills in one area than another and it makes sense when collaborating to use the particular talents of each author. One author may be better at driving a story along whereas another may be better at working on finer details like fine tuning dialogue and settings.
The way the work is divided between the authors should be done as evenly as possible. Problems can result if one author ends up doing most of the work or another feels that his work is not appreciated. Sometimes a plot is created at the beginning but other authors may work individually on chapters, characters or sub plots and only then decide how to put them together.
When this type of work is attempted, problems can easily arise as is the case with any act of collaboration. One author may be too domineering and another may not contribute enough. One may feel as though he is doing too much of the work and another may feel he is not doing enough. This is where communication becomes vital for success of the project.
The world of gaming has resulted in some collaborative writing. This is probably due to the role-playing nature of many of these games where characters constantly interact with one another. Other attempts in collaborative storytelling have been done at online websites where a story is begun and then driven forward by visitors to the site.
When people co-operate with another to produce books, the efforts can be disappointing but they can also be rich and complex. This type of work definitely has a place, especially when accomplished authors succeed in working together. They can produce books that reach greater heights than they could possibly have accomplished on their own.
Collaborative works are produced for a number of different reasons. They can be attempted as an educational exercise thus helping all the participants to develop their writing skills. Writing groups often produce such stories. It is also done for commercial purposes where experienced authors decide to work together for various reasons.
Writing together has a number of benefits but it also creates various challenges. One of the main benefits is that each author can benefit from the talents of the others. They can also challenge one another and thus stimulate increased creativity. The synergism can be very motivating.
A major difficulty when collaborating is to integrate all the efforts in such a way as to produce a consistent style. In order to do this there must be a level of mutual respect and egos have to be put to one side. One author may have stronger skills in one area than another and it makes sense when collaborating to use the particular talents of each author. One author may be better at driving a story along whereas another may be better at working on finer details like fine tuning dialogue and settings.
The way the work is divided between the authors should be done as evenly as possible. Problems can result if one author ends up doing most of the work or another feels that his work is not appreciated. Sometimes a plot is created at the beginning but other authors may work individually on chapters, characters or sub plots and only then decide how to put them together.
When this type of work is attempted, problems can easily arise as is the case with any act of collaboration. One author may be too domineering and another may not contribute enough. One may feel as though he is doing too much of the work and another may feel he is not doing enough. This is where communication becomes vital for success of the project.
The world of gaming has resulted in some collaborative writing. This is probably due to the role-playing nature of many of these games where characters constantly interact with one another. Other attempts in collaborative storytelling have been done at online websites where a story is begun and then driven forward by visitors to the site.
When people co-operate with another to produce books, the efforts can be disappointing but they can also be rich and complex. This type of work definitely has a place, especially when accomplished authors succeed in working together. They can produce books that reach greater heights than they could possibly have accomplished on their own.
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