Friday, March 15, 2013

Write your book to please yourself

By Dennis Mellersh

One of the themes running through the thinking of successful book authors, ranging  from diverse writers as Ray Bradbury to Eudora Welty, is that you should focus on writing to satisfy yourself, and in your own voice, not in a way you think will please any particular segment of the reading market.

To try to please others with your writing can result in your book lacking truth, conviction, life, and passion.

Granted, if you are focussed on a particular segment of the book market such as novels for the young adult market, fantasy novels, or historical fiction, you do need to keep the broad parameters of your book’s structure focussed on that market’s requirements.

But in what you have to say as writer, in the message you are trying to get across, in the ideas you are trying to convey, you need to be true to yourself, rather than writing what you think “the market wants to hear.”

Eudora Welty during an interview conducted by The Paris Review commented, “I believe if I stopped to wonder what So-and-so would think, or what I’d feel like if this were read by a stranger, I would be paralyzed.”

Even in a non-fiction book, you need to make sure that your own unique voice and point of view comes through to the reader.

If your book it is not your own voice, than someone else may as well write your book, because you are depriving your audience of your unique perspective.

Being true to yourself in your writing also includes trying to avoid emulating the style of your favourite writers. Many writers start out their writing life imitating their literary heroes, but as they gain confidence in their own abilities; their own voice starts to come through more forcefully.

Overall, if you try to write to please anyone or anything other than yourself, you won’t be happy with what you write, and you probably won’t enjoy doing the writing.

And, as Ray Bradbury has said in many interviews, you need to “Do what you love, and love what you do.”

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