Reviewing the footnotes in the story about the HMS St. Lawrence that I just added to the Solid Gold Box took me back twenty years. I remember spending all day poring through the primary source documents (usually in maddeningly-pale photocopies), and then “relaxing†in the evening with the secondary sources that rounded out my understanding of the subject.
To write, you must read. You must read nonfiction and fiction, across all genres and styles, always learning. It is an oft-quoted axiom. I read for hours every day. What is never mentioned in this is that a writer seldom has the opportunity to read for simple enjoyment.
I suppose that one would expect this to be true of writing nonfiction. If I am writing a piece about the Haida canoe, you can be assured that I am reading not just about canoe-making but in fact every scrap I can find about the culture and geography of the Haida people. What is frequently overlooked is that writing fiction has the same requirement.
If a story were set on the Cornwall coast, I would read everything I could find even if I had wholly invented the exact setting. I would be looking for authentic colour. If the same story involved Arthurian legend I would be re-reading Thomas Malory and already branching out as far as Geoffrey Ashe. And if the story were young adult—as most of my writing is, these days—I would be finding every YA story set in Cornwall that I could find.
Every once in awhile (often between projects) I indulge myself with a story that has nothing to do with anything I’m working on. On airplanes, possibly because I am unlikely to write anything beyond musings in my writing notebooks, I usually allow myself to select books with complete freedom. On my last flight home from New York I read The Lair of the White Worm, by Bram Stoker.
This isn’t to say that I don’t thoroughly enjoy any good story—no matter why I’m reading it. Right now I’m writing a young adult fantasy story, and I’m devouring A Wrinkle in Time, by Madeline L’Engle. It speaks to me no less powerfully than it did when I first discovered it as a child. But I sometimes wish I could read what I want, when I want to read it. Whenever I think of this I grow determined to carve out more library time for myself—though I never do.
Finding time to read
Reviewing the footnotes in the story about the HMS St. Lawrence that I just added to the Solid Gold Box took me back twenty years. I remember spending all day poring through the primary source documents (usually in maddeningly-pale photocopies), and then “relaxing†in the evening with the secondary sources that rounded out my understanding of the subject.
To write, you must read. You must read nonfiction and fiction, across all genres and styles, always learning. It is an oft-quoted axiom. I read for hours every day. What is never mentioned in this is that a writer seldom has the opportunity to read for simple enjoyment.
I suppose that one would expect this to be true of writing nonfiction. If I am writing a piece about the Haida canoe, you can be assured that I am reading not just about canoe-making but in fact every scrap I can find about the culture and geography of the Haida people. What is frequently overlooked is that writing fiction has the same requirement.
If a story were set on the Cornwall coast, I would read everything I could find even if I had wholly invented the exact setting. I would be looking for authentic colour. If the same story involved Arthurian legend I would be re-reading Thomas Malory and already branching out as far as Geoffrey Ashe. And if the story were young adult—as most of my writing is, these days—I would be finding every YA story set in Cornwall that I could find.
Every once in awhile (often between projects) I indulge myself with a story that has nothing to do with anything I’m working on. On airplanes, possibly because I am unlikely to write anything beyond musings in my writing notebooks, I usually allow myself to select books with complete freedom. On my last flight home from New York I read The Lair of the White Worm, by Bram Stoker.
This isn’t to say that I don’t thoroughly enjoy any good story—no matter why I’m reading it. Right now I’m writing a young adult fantasy story, and I’m devouring A Wrinkle in Time, by Madeline L’Engle. It speaks to me no less powerfully than it did when I first discovered it as a child. But I sometimes wish I could read what I want, when I want to read it. Whenever I think of this I grow determined to carve out more library time for myself—though I never do.