The great Stephen King offered some simple advice for writers who want to improve their imagery: “see everything before you write it.”

It sounds simple, but his thoughtful essay at Wordplayer shows how deeply King imagines a scene before he writes it. Test yourself right now–can you picture the last scene you wrote? Here’s more from King:

take two pledges: First, not to insult your reader’s interior vision; and second, to see everything before you write it. The latter may mean you’ll find yourself writing more slowly than you’ve been accustomed to doing if you’ve been passing ideas (“It was a spooky old house”) off as imagery. The former may mean more careful rewriting if you’ve been hedging your bets by over-description; you’re going to have to pick up those old pruning shears, like it or not, and start cutting back to the essentials.

This is our eleventh NaNoWriMo Tip of the Day. As writers around the country join the writing marathon this month, we will share one piece of advice or writing tool to help you cope with this daunting project. (Link via)