A writer writes!
Well that is what makes one a writer - actual writing! It's not publication after all, that is just validation for one's work. Selling something just makes one...well... a salesman I guess :-) Actually it makes one an "author" in my book.
How do you verify that you are a writer?
Do you go by number of pages completed?
Words?
By month, year, day, week?
Or is it more of a feeling inside?
Does working on stories in your head count?
What about researching and exploring?
What makes you a writer? Answering this question will go a long way toward helping you feel successful! It doesn't matter what others think, it only matters what you think. Writing has always been a very subjective venture.
How can you help yourself feel like a real writer? Take the answer to this question and design a monthly writing goal around it!
Please share your thoughts!
How do you verify that you are a writer?
Do you go by number of pages completed?
Words?
By month, year, day, week?
Or is it more of a feeling inside?
Does working on stories in your head count?
What about researching and exploring?
What makes you a writer? Answering this question will go a long way toward helping you feel successful! It doesn't matter what others think, it only matters what you think. Writing has always been a very subjective venture.
How can you help yourself feel like a real writer? Take the answer to this question and design a monthly writing goal around it!
Please share your thoughts!
posted by Victoria at 11:20 AM
8 Comments:
This is a great question. I think I'm a writer because I'm always writing something, and when I'm not writing, I'm often thinking as if I were writing. However, I'm not always writing what is supposed to make me a writer. I love the concept of a goal this month. That goal is to rewrite as much of my novel in progress as possible. Perhaps it's the neverending editing and rewriting that makes one a writer...
I think part of it depends on how you see yourself. Another part depends on how it serves the convenience of 3rd parties known and unknown to see you.
For 7 or 8 years (1996 to 2003 more or less, while stuck in Nebraska without access to substantive legal work) I wrote tons of freelance articles. I discovered I'm less of a "reporter" and more of a covert essayist. Cranking out articles got old -- and too easy -- so I let it all fade while I tried to make a transition into writing fiction.
I've had "45 Characters" for a couple of years and just bought "Story Structure Architect." I think Victoria is my winning ticket to a prolific burst of fiction sometime soon. Time will tell.
Meanwhile, the question of "What I am" is tougher since I am a a "gluttonous," over-diversified Enneagram 7. I am a writer, poet, jazz musician, teacher, paralegal, salesman -- all at once in varying proportions depending on which direction leads to money and/or friends right now.
For now, having recently turned 50, I feel as though there is this huge volume of stored up "special information" ("wisdom" sounds too conceited)waiting to bust out in various forms.
Meanwhile, 3rd parties have an easier time categorizing me as a writer than as a jazz musician, although, ironically, my quarter century of jazz piano gives me more authority to use the "big words" I prefer to the "morse code" frequently imposed by Hemmingway and the Associated Press.
I'm a writer because I get worried if I'm not writing, LOL. I feel guilty and get quiet anxious that I'm not ploughing into the latest wip.
And being a Writer is a much easier life than being an Author.
I became one of those officially yesterday and I'm already panicking, LOL
We've recently been discussing what makes a 'proper' writer on my blog so it was interesting to come across this post. Thanks.
Jazz-Law Bear: You write, "my quarter century of jazz piano gives me more authority to use the "big words" I prefer to the "morse code"...." *GRIN* I'd like to talk about the relationship of music to writing, but we'd need to do it over on my weblog (shalanna.livejournal.com) if you're interested. I think that Beethoven and other classical masters just plain had the guts to do it THEIR way. Mozart was told, "Too many notes." They were wrong, of course!
There is so much controversy about what makes one person "a writer" and another "an author." I don't believe you can allow the anointing of New York (publication) to dictate whether you are a writer or not. Other people may cast the fish-eye of doubt, but . . . you ARE a writer if you write.
Everyone seems to come to the conclusion that they are a writer because they write. That's great. I love to write. I feel that my story needs to be told. I am passionate about writing. However, if you can't get published, does that imply you are a bad writer. Using the same definition, I could say that I am a baseball player because I always play baseball. I am passionate about it. But if no one picks me for their team, do others consider me a baseball player?
I guage my writing by the number of words I have added to my novel.
Sure, it's shallow and doesn't really prove anything but it pushes me onward and like Kim Rees, I feel guilty if the word count hasn't changed in a week.
I find the Zokutou Word Meter (http://www.zokutou.co.uk/wordmeter/ )is the perfect tool to visualise my progress (or lack of). Add it to the side panel of your blog and see if it helps you.
From Jazz Law Bear of California (system keeps shutting me out!)
John Marske raises a valid point. Somewhere along the line, with every role we play, there is that X factor of validation through outside recognition. It's funny -- at least to me -- that he would choose baseball as a comparison, since no other American sport has a more fully developed minor league system. Is a New York Yankee more of a baseball player than a Toledo Mudhen? And whatever a person's recognized profession -- when s/he tires of it and ceases to pursue it passionately, how does that person's status compare with the up and coming talent deserving wideer recognition. In my paralegal work, I know so many lawyers who hate lawyering and have delved into things like writing and playing music.
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