Thursday, October 13, 2011

Wednesdays Witterings.

Today I thought I would give all your writers out there the benefit of some
writerly advice from the sage herself Anne Enright

This was previously published somewhere else and I just thought it was very
good. I thought I would put that disclaimer in there before anyone decided
to sue.


It's not like Anne and I go to have coffee and a cake and she said let me
give you some writerly tips.


1 The first 12 years are the worst.


2 The way to write a book is to actually write a book. A pen is useful,
typing is also good. Keep putting words on the page.


3 Only bad writers think that their work is really good.


4 Description is hard. Remember that all description is an opinion about
the world. Find a place to stand.


5 Write whatever way you like. Fiction is made of words on a page; reality
is made of something else. It doesn't matter how "real" your story is, or
how "made up": what matters is its necessity.


6 Try to be accurate about stuff.


7 Imagine that you are dying. If you had a terminal disease would you ­
finish this book? Why not? The thing that annoys this 10-weeks-to-live self
is the thing that is wrong with the book. So change it. Stop arguing with
yourself. Change it. See? Easy. And no one had to die.


8 You can also do all that with whiskey.


9 Have fun.


10 Remember, if you sit at your desk for 15 or 20 years, every day, not ­
counting weekends, it changes you. It just does. It may not improve your
temper, but it fixes something else. It makes you more free.

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