In writing (and anything else in life), people want to know techniques and tricks. As I think about it, I find myself asking, what's the difference? If they're the same thing, then we don't need to ask for techniques and tricks; we can just ask for one. But I have a suspicion that since we say both, they are different things.
So what is a technique? A technique is an action that has a certain result. For example, using short sentences to increase the speed and power of the narrative is a technique. Every time you use short sentences, they feel more important. If you are writing and want to know how to increase the speed of the flow (or if you don't know why your somber piece sounds too excited), you know what technique to use.
And what is a trick? A trick is an action that has an inexplicable result. Telling somebody to write about the Holocaust is a trick. There is a general pattern that stories about World War II are extremely popular (Maus, Schindler's List, Night), so if you write one, you should be successful. The problem is that it is not guaranteed (and also pretty offensive). There is no reason why it will work, which is also why you can't guarantee that it will work. There is a pattern of it working, but that's just a trend at best.
Ultimately, the difference between techniques and tricks is knowledge. A technique is something that has been tested and comes with its own users manual. A trick is unexplored territory. Some people may have tried it out enough time to write it down, but there is still a great deal more to be learned. Both of them are useful, but for very different reasons. If you want all the help you can get, ask for both. But if you want something specific, ask for what you're looking for.
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This post reminds me of a code snippet I saw from John Carmack (even though it isn't actually himwho wrote it, was just attributed to be) to calculate the inverse square root. An explanation can be found here
ReplyDeletehttp://www.beyond3d.com/content/articles/8/
No, I don't understand it either. The code is pretty compact, I think.
Anyway, the point is, the constant (1,597,463,007 in base 10) is slightly different than what you arrive through derivation, or so I read. So its kind of a trick because its not a constant you'd expect to use in that context, but it works faster than the one you expect. So I've read anyway.