Are You a Writer: Take Two
By Lazette Gifford
© 2007, Lazette
Gifford
It's far too easy for people to worry
about the philosophical question of what makes a writer -- or any other
kind of artist -- and let it fester in their minds. It's the kind of
question that sows doubt and allows others to dictate some outside focus
or goal, often artificial, that the person has to achieve before he can
allow himself the lofty title of writer.
In the real world of writing, it
doesn't work that way: The answer is in the action, not in how the
action is accepted by others.
A writer writes, yes -- but he or she
also finishes projects, which an include editing and submitting if
publication is the goal. All the worldbuilding, note-taking and talk
about writing does not make a person a writer. Neither does having file
folders full of unfinished projects. Blogging, chatting on line and
letter writing does not make a writer, except sometimes in the form of a
journal writer.
For some writers, publication is not
the goal. Some people will tell you that you're only a writer if you've
made a sale. There are two problems with this definition. The first is
that there is no sudden, overwhelming difference in the writing between
the moment the person reads an acceptance of a story and the moment
before. Publication is an external verification of ability only. It
may be the goal, but it is not the definition of a writer. The second
problem is that anyone who died before their material was published
could not have been a writer during their lifetime... which is logically
impossible.
Another problem with the question of
'Are you a writer' is that it assumes there is a single answer that will
work for all writers. Obviously, writers are not all the same, and the
break point most writers consider is often the before and after of
publication acceptance. There is an easier way to think about this:
You are a writer, and then you are a published writer. Both do
the same level of work, and there is no huge change that takes place
from one moment to the next just because an envelope held an acceptance
rather than a rejection. The change has all come in the steps the
writer took to learn the craft.
Writers improve their craft throughout
their careers, both before and after publication. One does not achieve
'writer status' and then suddenly have everything learned and laid out
for the rest of their work. Every book, story, poem and article is a
learning process and an adventure.
There are people enough who will tell
you why you're not a real writer: you don't write the proper genre, you
don't take it seriously enough, you write too quickly, you don't write
enough, you don't suffer enough for your art, or a dozen other reasons
that have nothing to do with what you do as a writer. Don't add to the
negative, outside voices.
Worrying about whether or not you are a
writer is a waste of precious writing time and energy better put to
creating a new story. Don't analyze being a writer -- become one. Go
write something. |
