Monday, December 16, 2013

Why We Write

I had a conversation yesterday with a woman who just finished a novel and is doing the publisher search. I'm fascinated by why people write, and lately have been asking this of writer friends. The answer is generally something like this: It's what I do.

Seems it's as simple as that: it's what I do.

I said to her, You mean, like breathing? 
She said, Yes, that's it.

On one hand, I envy her a little. She's shopping a novel around, and there's always the (remote) promise of payment. Poets don't possess that illusion. But still we do it, day after day, hours at the keyboard or notepad, typing, scribbling.

And for what?

It allows me to breathe, this daily practice.

It's what I do.

Writer friends, any thoughts on this?

3 comments:

  1. Because I learn things about the world, our nation, and people that everybody should know.

    I persist in hosting these now considered preposterous notions that we need to understand the past to understand the present, and that just possibly knowing what happened the past may help us to not repeat the Grand Crimes and Sins -- at least through the errors of knowing no better.

    As said, in the face of the past and the present it is preposterous of me to think that.

    Love, C.

    Love, C.

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  2. writing is doing something with words, something that's more than what words mean, it's envisioning I would say and a silent dialogue with your self

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