Here are my replies to three commonly asked questions:
I have been asked where my ideas come from. I imagine every writer is asked this question at some time.
Story ideas come from observations, daydreams, yearnings, aspirations and sometimes they come as mere suggestions from an unexpected source. Trail Guard is the result of just such a suggestion - a story that may never have come into being, had I not been asked to write it.
I have also been asked if I draw from my own life experiences.
The answer to that is Yes. I believe all writers draw from their own lives, sometimes quite deeply and directly. The thing of it is, story elements the reader may perceive as having come from the writer's personal experiences are often the very elements of the story the writer invented or drew from another source.
For instance, in a mystery, you may not take the author to be a murderer, but you may assume his personal history most closely resembles the attorney in the story - when, in fact, the author may identify more closely with the guy in the bar watching the breaking news on TV, or the bum who tried to cadge a buck off the attorney on his way up the courthouse steps. In short, the writer's personal experiences, attitudes or attributes may be linked to elements of the story the reader least suspects!
Most often, I think, there are elements of the writer scattered all over the story: traces of him in various situations, various characters and, of course, in the voice with which he speaks. After all, we are not usually writing about ourselves but people we've invented. Characters who must navigate the landscapes we create for them. In combination, our experiences, research and imaginations all help them along.
Hopefully, the writer loves his characters and will imbue each one with some aspect of him or herself or, at the very least, something he or she personally aspires to be. Creating is an experience in itself and our characters great companions from whom we learn quite a lot.
Of course, at some point every aspiring writer is told: Write what you know. It's a lovely sentiment but, as soon as someone says this, the first gut response is: But I don't know anything.
Well, that may be the bald faced truth, but the fact is, in one way or another, a writer will inevitably write what he or she knows. What you don't know, you'll find out and you'll write about that because that is what you do. You write.
And that, my dears, is the answer to Question Number One:
How does one become a writer?
You write.
Don't Write Up, write down.
Don't Write Off, write on,
and on, and on.
And don't give it up unless you find you're just not liking it - in which case, you're probably not a writer at all.
You see, a writer can't help but write.
***
The questions are stimulating to ponder and the answers complex, but it's all just part of the mystique of the artist. No one has all the answers as to why a person writes or paints or sings. It's just part of the miracle. Revel in it! This is Life, after all.
***
I have been asked where my ideas come from. I imagine every writer is asked this question at some time.
Story ideas come from observations, daydreams, yearnings, aspirations and sometimes they come as mere suggestions from an unexpected source. Trail Guard is the result of just such a suggestion - a story that may never have come into being, had I not been asked to write it.
I have also been asked if I draw from my own life experiences.
The answer to that is Yes. I believe all writers draw from their own lives, sometimes quite deeply and directly. The thing of it is, story elements the reader may perceive as having come from the writer's personal experiences are often the very elements of the story the writer invented or drew from another source.
For instance, in a mystery, you may not take the author to be a murderer, but you may assume his personal history most closely resembles the attorney in the story - when, in fact, the author may identify more closely with the guy in the bar watching the breaking news on TV, or the bum who tried to cadge a buck off the attorney on his way up the courthouse steps. In short, the writer's personal experiences, attitudes or attributes may be linked to elements of the story the reader least suspects!
Most often, I think, there are elements of the writer scattered all over the story: traces of him in various situations, various characters and, of course, in the voice with which he speaks. After all, we are not usually writing about ourselves but people we've invented. Characters who must navigate the landscapes we create for them. In combination, our experiences, research and imaginations all help them along.
Hopefully, the writer loves his characters and will imbue each one with some aspect of him or herself or, at the very least, something he or she personally aspires to be. Creating is an experience in itself and our characters great companions from whom we learn quite a lot.
Of course, at some point every aspiring writer is told: Write what you know. It's a lovely sentiment but, as soon as someone says this, the first gut response is: But I don't know anything.
Well, that may be the bald faced truth, but the fact is, in one way or another, a writer will inevitably write what he or she knows. What you don't know, you'll find out and you'll write about that because that is what you do. You write.
And that, my dears, is the answer to Question Number One:
How does one become a writer?
You write.
Don't Write Up, write down.
Don't Write Off, write on,
and on, and on.
And don't give it up unless you find you're just not liking it - in which case, you're probably not a writer at all.
You see, a writer can't help but write.
***
The questions are stimulating to ponder and the answers complex, but it's all just part of the mystique of the artist. No one has all the answers as to why a person writes or paints or sings. It's just part of the miracle. Revel in it! This is Life, after all.
***
