Dark Matters
Writing Blog
What writing means to me
For years I couldn’t call myself a writer. It didn’t matter if I woke up during the night, plot and character ideas banging against the inside of my skull. A bin full of rubbished ideas, a folder on my computer full of partial written scenes and false starts. No, I wasn’t a writer. I didn’t feel like a writer, and I felt like a fraud.
‘Anyone can be an author,’ someone once said to me. ‘They copy the formula of some “Big Name” author, and throw it up on Amazon. I’d do it myself if I had the time.’
I imagine many, who’ve spent a fair amount of their time writing, will have experienced guilt. A nasty affliction, which struck me down often enough. Life with all its niggling, and sometimes major, problems, well, it gets in the way. Maybe I’ve been avoiding my work, unwilling to face how rubbish my work is. It might be my idea-generator has backed up. Banging my head on the kitchen table isn’t working. The guilt strikes and along with it, the doubt. Why am I doing this to myself?
Does the act of writing make me a writer, or is it something deeper? In other words, am I a writer, even if I don’t write? In theory, anyone who can read and write, who has the time and an idea, can write a book. It may not be a good book. They may not write another one. They might end up hating the process. Is such a person, still a writer?
I’m not saying I know the answer. However, after years of learning my craft, collecting rejections, feeling guilt, frustration and those rare moments of euphoria, I’ve learned writing isn’t just something I do.
I know I’ll never stop, because I love it. I need it. The guilt and the pain, those moments when I find some success, tell me I’m a writer. Ultimately, I will rage and cry over how horrible a writer I am. I’ll grin like an idiot on those few occasions I get it right. I’ll never quit though, because writing isn’t just something I do.
It’s who I am.
Welcome to my Dark Matters blog
Writing is often a lonely occupation, leaving plenty of room for self-doubt to creep in. I hope this blog will be of some inspiration to new writers, especially to anyone starting out.
Since I stole my first copy of the Hobbit – I was twelve, and it wasn’t so much stealing it, from school, as never getting around to bringing it back – well, ever since, I’ve loved fantasy. I still have the book, a map of Spain for geography class scrawled on the title page. It’s in tatters, dog-eared with chocolate stains, but I’ve kept it all these years. It represents my introduction to fantasy.
Before Tolkien, I’d been on a bland diet of . . . ahem, the “Hardy Boys”, and one “Nancy Drew” that slipped through by accident. Honest.
With that one little book, a universe of fantasy opened, (the Hardy’s and Nancy went in the bin, or a charity shop, don’t remember, don’t care), and there began my fumbling attempt to become a writer. I didn’t just want to read about dragons and magic. I wanted to write, but I didn’t know how. I didn’t let it stop me, but it was a tough road. My dreams, my life goals were laid out before me like golden path. All I had to do was walk it, right?
If only life was like that.
Well, that road is now more like cracked tarmac with potholes, but I’m still walking it. The real world has knocked me down a few times, but that universe of magic has been, and always will be, my safe place.
I hope you will enjoy reading my posts as I continue to figure out what it means to be a writer, never mind an author. Don’t get me started. Maybe someday soon, I’ll again catch a glimpse of gold on the path ahead.
