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Originally Posted by mammamaia
it may have for you, but i don't see how, since as i noted above, screenwriting is the most specialized of all the writing arts and the spare style required to write spec scripts successfully doesn't really relate to writing good prose...
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Writing in a spare style forces the writer to pick and choose his or her words. As I'm sure you well know, screenwriters are forever stressing over which verb to use so as to avoid having to use an adverb, or how to say in eleven words what they've been saying in fifteen to shave precious lines off a twelfth draft so that it finally runs in under 95 pages!
I think learning that style of writing, and learning to stress over those individual words and thinking about what they mean, helps cut some of the fat when writing in other formats. You probably don't want to write a novel in the same style you'd write a screenplay, and you may, probably will, choose to use more words, nicer language; but, at least you'll know that you could have written
War and Peace 582 pages shorter! And you'll be able to identify that fat, and decide where and when you want to use it.
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Originally Posted by mammamaia
plus, i doubt learning 'some screenwriting' makes any sense ...if you don't learn it all, you're not actually screenwriting... i've mentored probably thousands of aspiring screenwriters over the years and can testify to the fact that just 'some' learning of the craft is much worse than none! ;-(
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It doesn't make any sense if you want to pursue screenwriting (if you do, you'll learn
all eventually), but, if you decide to pursue screenwriting, learn
some things about it, and then decide to stop pursuing screenwriting, what you've learned will, most likely, not go to waste:
Learning 3-Act structure will, for example, help you with plotting (at the very least it will make you
aware of structure, which is something!); learning to write in the spare style you mentioned will help you with writing leaner and meaner in general, and might do wonders for poetry, lyrics; learning narrative economy (packing as much information into each action, description ,and line of dialogue as possible) will, again, help with, most forms of writing, be they fiction or non-fiction; etc.
However, the most important skill that screenwriting teaches is how to edit -- and especially how to edit one's own writing. To steal some Douglas Adams ideas: If writing is rewriting, screenwriting is doubly so!
IMO, precisely
because screenwriting's such a specialized field, it'll help a writer. Maybe in the same way that learning to race in F1 might help one's general day-to-day driving... Sure, you won't use or need all the skills you learn, but, on the whole, it will make you better-equipped to handle the drive to grocery store.
I can't write a script without extensive pre-planning, but I can write lengthy prose without becoming tangled in it.
