What do Favorite Authors May Say About You

Many beginner writers will run into the old advice of “Write what you know.”  The value of this advice and its literal interpretation has been embroiled in debate by academic, commercially published, and underground authors.   There has been a new piece of advice that has been touted, “What what attracts you, interests you, and then get to know it well as you prepare to write about it.”  While this advice may find its way on to more fertile ground, it still leaves a beginning author with an inferior understanding of what attracts them.  As readers and writers we can all identify books we love, genres we crave, and authors we would love to have coffee with and discuss the art of writing.  But, what does this list say about us as a writer and how does it influence what we should write about?

Your favorite author may be Sinclair Lewis, Anne Rice, or Earnest Hemmingway and walk away thinking that you should sit down and write in their style to learn your craft.  That is far from the goal.  The goal is to take all writers: poets, fiction authors, tv script writers and playwrights and examine your favorites.  Go beyond how they may turn a phrase, or use description.  Get out of the art side of writing for a moment and analyze the writer and their works.  Go back in your mind and think about how you discovered your authors in the first place.  It may have been an assignment in school, it may have been an advertisement you saw, or you may have been wandering a bookstore in your favorite genre or surfing the television for something to watch and had the experience of “I want this.”  Hold your mind in that moment.  Why did you pick that over the millions of other choices—what was it that the author was giving you?

How do you discover what you should be writing about and what your choice in literature says about what you should write?

1.       Take a few days and list every writer whose writing you love and moves you deeply.  Weed out the writers that struck you in a fad or brought something one time to your life.  This list is a list of writers who have been a continuous force in your reading or entertainment and that touch you deeply with their writing.

2.       After you have a list, research the author.  Look up the themes and topics they write about.

3.       What are your favorite books by these authors?

4.       Is there a common thread of themes or topics all these authors write about?

5.       Take the common threads.  Are these something that you feel compelled to write about?

If you answer yes to this question, then you have found what your true subject matter that should guide you on your trail as a writer is.  This is not a set in stone path to your writing career, but only the trail signs that mark the beginning of your journey.   Use them to help find your path when you start and when you may lose the fire that sparks your imagination—losing the desire to write because you have somehow been pulled away from your favorite subjects.

Thank you for reading and please visit www.davidalanlucas.com for information on the stories and blogs I write.