I guess writing is like many forms of art or craft or whatever one may call writing. It comes from deep within a person, it’s very personal and it can also be therapeutic for many. It gives those who are introverted a path to quietly express themselves. It also gives those who are out there a chance to do it with structure and thought.
Writing can help to put past life experiences into perspective; it can help one accept matters that perhaps have been troubling for years. Writing down those experiences means thinking about them, rationalising them, putting them on paper in a physical form to look at and think about.
Much of it is not for anybody else to read, just for the writer. It is private but, hopefully, settling and calming once done. We cannot change the past but we can learn to live with it in several ways: writing being one of them.
Many writers start out that way and then find that they enjoy using their minds and their words. They find that written memories of past events give them the strength, confidence and vision to write about other matters that interest them - good stuff, happy stuff, funny stuff.
I guess over time most writers settle into a style, a genre. I admire writers because I know how they are sometimes putting it all out there for everyone to read; perhaps leaving their hearts on the page so to speak.
I enjoy those writers who stick to the small, funny things of life, the things that happen to us all every day. Their ability to write in a funny, even sad, way about those events, the relationships we all enjoy and the funny things we do to make those relationships work.
Now and again I’ll indulge myself by reading a serious writer, well, serious in my terms of looking at the world. I wonder at the way they can use their words to paint a picture so clearly in the reader’s mind. I wonder about what made them think like that. If you are a reader, you will know what I mean - a book you start and just cannot put down, fiction or non-fiction.
People who know about such stuff call it the “writer’s voice”: the voice of the person writing the words coming through, the ancient art of the storyteller. Not all of us are natural storytellers. Those who are and also write are fascinating to read.
If I were to mention certain authors, some would agree and some would not. I guess it is personal to the reader what sparks that entrancing relationship with the storyteller.
Despite all the wonderful advances in technology we are experiencing, there will always be writers and readers. The storyteller and the listener. An art that is as old as Man.
Since becoming addicted, I have come to know quite a few writers of all different styles and genres.
Without exception, they are all supportive of novices in their world. They are all, also without exception, very interesting people who happily indulge their personal addiction to the written word every day of their lives. Some are very well-known. Some are New Zealanders who are more well-known and successful overseas than in their native land.
They all started writing for a reason. Those reasons are probably as numerous as the writers I know. Some to make money, others to try to sort some stuff in their heads, some to scratch a creative itch, others because, well, it’s their job - they write the stuff we all read every day in our newspapers.
Apart from the very few highly successful writers and those who do it for the weekly paycheque, writers in our country don’t do it for the money, believe me. Paying gigs can be few and far between so most need a day job as well or some other form of income.
That does not even figure in the minds of us writing addicts. We just do it. Every day we will write something - even a humble grocery list.
