Writing what you know

[icemink]

So until recently I kind of always held to the idea to be a really good writer you should “write what you know.” I guess I always figured if I wrote a novel to be published it would be about actors or something, or maybe take place in my home town.

Why I thought this I don't know, because I approach writing much as I approach acting. I am not a method actor. It’s kind of hard to explain how I do act, except to say I go on the general theory that human beings have pretty much the same emotions. Now they react to different situations in very different ways, and for all sorts of different reasons, but basically, being happy is being happy, and being sad is being sad, and if can remember what that feels like, I know how to mimic that.

I know lots of people are big on the whole idea of really being in the moment, and feeling what your character really feels, but you know what, my acting teachers always said that if you actually managed that, you’d probably drive yourself insane, or at least do emotional damage to yourself. And you know what, after hearing JM, talk about what the end of Season 6 did to him because of his acting method, I think my teachers were very wise.

Anyway, my point is, when I write, I don’t try to become Buffy, or Spike, or whomever. In fact one of the reasons I don’t read or write any Willow pairings is that she’s a little too close to home for me. I’m not exactly like her, but we have several of the same flaws.

And clearly I don’t write what I know, because I’ve never seen or met a vampire, or slain a demon or you know any of that sort of stuff. And yet still I always kind of believed in that “write what you know stuff.”

A couple days ago I realized that must be something that only non-writers believe (okay probably not but I disagree). Why the sudden change of heart? I‘ve been working on the next chapter of The Guardian for about a week now. It’s a pretty hefty and major chapter, so I’d written a lot of it, but hadn’t finished it. So the other day I go back to reread what I’d written so far, especially because there was a conversation which hadn’t gone quite as I had planned, those pesky characters ran off with it and didn’t say all the really clever things I had thought they would say, but much simpler, more realistic things.

Anyway, as I was rereading it, I came to a section that I felt was absolute trash. I don’t think I have ever disliked something I’ve written quite as much as I disliked that one bit. And you know what, that was the one bit “that I knew”. In other words there’s one tiny moment of the next chapter where a character experiences something I’ve experienced. All the reasons are different, and so is the reaction, but I wrote one “true” thing. One thing that I really know, and have been through. And yes I thought the writing was horrible.

Now maybe it was just a case of bad grammar, because I made a few corrections, and then came back to it tonight, and it was fine. Not great, but fine. Now maybe the problem is that I’m writing not just fiction, but escapist fiction. Obviously if I was writing my memoir, I better have experienced everything in it.

So I’ve kind of lost my point, but I was wondering what other people think of the idea of “Writing what you know”. Cause it seems to me, at least in fiction, that it’s not the best idea, except going on the theory that you need to know people, and how they behave.

Comments

[rebcake.livejournal.com]

Hmmm. I think you're on the right track with the "know people and how they behave" thing. I also think that research is nifty, but I tend to write historicals, and since I hardly ever get the keys to the Tardis, I could never claim it to be "what I know". More like, "what I found out". Tom Wolfe always scoffed at young writers who pounded out boring coming of age stories about people just like them. "There's a whole world out there," he said (in my brain). "Go out there and look around!"

I think the "write what you know" came from desperate English teachers who were sick of reading sixteen-year-olds' fantasies, and wanted their students to find something "true" in the story they were telling. It's just a theory, but the Mary Sueism has got to wear on a person.

Fanfic has a bad rap for being derived from other peoples' creations. I've always loved fiction that has references to other stories, mythologies, and storytelling traditions. Too me, fanfic is the new folklore, the digital tradition (rather than the oral). I think you know plenty about vampires and slayers, even if you've never been one, 'cos you've done the research, yo. But, yeah, let's make it about real human emotion, while we're at it.

[icemink.livejournal.com]

I like your theory on the English teachers. And you're right about fanfic being a new kind of folklore. The idea of the original story is actually pretty new, only a few hundred years old. Before that when someone did make up a story, they always pretended it had some sort of source, like they'd found a bunch of letters or something.

And of course the good thing about fanfic, is no one ever wonders if character X is really your brother, or the guy you work with or whatever, because most of the characters were not created by you.