I have an unbroken record of missing the deeper meaning in any story, play or movie, and as for dance and mime, I have never had any idea of what is being conveyed. "Do you put symbolism in your writing?" a student asked me.
I said that professional writers are solitary drudges who seldom see other writers. Brock said he was greatly enjoying his new life as a man of letters, and he told several stories of being taken to lunch by his publisher and his agent at Manhattan restaurants where writers and editors gather.
If your job is to write every day, you learn to do it like any other job.Ī student asked if we found it useful to circulate in the literary world. "What if you're feeling depressed or unhappy?" a student asked. I said that writing is a craft, not an art, and that the man who runs away from his craft because he lacks inspiration is fooling himself. I then said that the professional writer must establish a daily schedule and stick to it. He said he just stopped writing and put the work aside for a day when it would go better. "What do you do on days when it isn't going well?" Dr. I pointed out that professional writers rewrite their sentences over and over and then rewrite what they have rewritten.
I then said that rewriting is the essence of writing. "Let it all hang out," he told us, and whatever form the sentences take will reflect the writer at his most natural. Brock was asked if it was important to rewrite. It was hard and lonely, and the words seldom just flowed. I then said that writing wasn't easy and wasn't fun. Coming home from an arduous day at the hospital, he would go straight to his yellow pad and write his tensions away. Brock was dressed in a bright red jacket, looking vaguely bohemian, as authors are supposed to look, and the first question went to him. That made us a panel, and we sat down to face a crowd of students and teachers and parents, all eager to learn the secrets of our glamorous work.ĭr. He was going to talk about writing as an avocation. Brock (as I'll call him), a surgeon who had recently begun to write and had sold some stories to magazines. When I arrived I found that a second speaker had been invited - Dr. ISBN: 0060891548 Chapter One The TransactionĪ school in Connecticut once held "a day devoted to the arts," and I was asked if I would come and talk about writing as a vocation. Copyright ©2006 William Zinsser All right reserved. On Writing Well, 30th Anniversary Edition The Classic Guide to Writing Nonfiction By William Zinsser HarperCollins Publishers, Inc.
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