In Conclusion...

So I have been learning to "read like a writer" via Francine Prose's not so much life changing but definitely helpful book for students studying "the art" of writing fiction. A wonderfully successful author herself, depending on how you define success...as I do by the fact that she has written, and published, several novels and that people actually read them,(oh yeah, she's won some awards as well) finishes the book with a chapter on courage. The courage it takes for someone to write.

Courage. Is writing a courageous act? People have often told me so. In fact when the subject of my blog, in one way or another, comes up in conversation the responses that follow are more often than not something along the lines of,"oh how brave it is to put your thoughts out there for everyone to read" or "wow, that takes guts, I could never do that.", etc.

I have never looked at writing as an act of courage. When I first started writing, it was just something I had to do. An act that was far from courageous or brave but that, if I am to be perfectly honest, was more for my own selfish benefit. It was therapeutic. Writing, sitting in solitude and putting pen to paper. Talking about the world and the way I see it, or creating lives and stories from thin air. This was what writing had always been for me.

However, in reading authors who manage to "write well", and there is most definitely a difference in writing well and just writing for mere pleasure, I see the act of courage in their sentences. I've often felt inspired by these writers and their courage to write for a purpose, an agenda. We all have something to say, but it's the way we say it that matters. There is a raw honesty in the admittance that most of the time, as writers, we only half way know what we're talking about. None of us have all the answers. Perhaps the best piece of advice Prose's book has to offer is this? She tells us to "forget about life...admit that you understand nothing of life, nothing of what you see. Then go out and look at the world."

Well, until next time...