Writers on Writing

Writers on Writing

On Writing, and Writing Well

Writing is bliss. Writing is lonely, difficult work. There is much to know if one wants to learn this craft. However, the keenest of all writing’s challenges is the putting of oneself onto the page, re-vealing the pieces we des-perately want to keep hidden away because of their judgment, passion, aggression, blindness, admiration or whatever else we prefer not to reveal, certainly not to the faceless reader who we hope will pick up our work and see it all. But the efforts that go into putting words onto the page so they are delectable, so they en-rich people’s lives, tell an unforgettable story, intro-duce ideas, prove points and uncover truths become worth it when someone does read our work. Writing is, at its best, revealing. Several books on writing sit on my shelves. Each title represents one aspect of what I spend my professional life doing: editing, writing and coaching au-thors. There is John Gardner’s The Art of Fiction and Renni Browne and Dave.

King’s Self-Editing for Fiction Writers for novelists looking to learn their craft, Vivian Gornick’s The Situation and the Story for writing the per-sonal narrative, Michael Larsen’s How to Write a Book Proposal and Susan Rabiner’s Thinking Like Your Editor for developing nonfiction books and proposals to market them. There are books for inspiration: Anne Lamott’s Bird by Bird, Betsy Lerner’s The Forest for the Trees, Mario Vargas Llosa’s Letters to a Young Novelist and a slew of others, no less worthy but too numerous to list here, that I use on a regular basis to remind myself and to teach others. While books on the subject can be helpful, if you really want your literary efforts to be read, there is no substitute for the triumvirate of writing, rewriting and showing your work. It is not over after the writing part. Rewriting is next,

a la-borious process, one that forces you to exercise a dif-ferent set of muscles and do it over and over again. (I of-ten tell my clients the average number of revisions a novel goes through before serious publishing industry consideration is 10.) The next step – showing your work – is the kicker because it means possible rejection or more revisions. Either one can be painful to con-template. But getting back to the writing, Annie Dillard said it beautifully: “One of the few things I know about writing is this: Spend it all, shoot it, play it, lose it, all, right away, every time. Do not hoard what seems good for a later place in the book, or for another book, give it, give it all, give it now. … Some more will arise for later, something better. These things fill from behind, from beneath, like well water. Similarly, the impulse to keep to yourself what you have learned is not only shameful, it is de-structive. Anything you do not give freely and abun-dantly becomes lost to you. You open your safe and find ashes.” Reveal. It’s worth it.?

Writing Resources