Tim Martin interviews the author in the Independent.
New word gleaned from the article:= fanarchists! (But has any other author ever needed the expression?)
I liked this:
I think writing is the coolest thing you can do and I think it's a craft. I think being a writer is magical, and it's like being someone who can make a table. I don't think those two things are contradictory, but I think you do people - especially people who want to be writers - no favours if you lead them to believe that what you do is unattainable. The writing that helped me become a writer was people like Harlan Ellison, Michael Moorcock occasionally: these guys who would write about the nuts and bolts of becoming a writer, and let me understand that I could do that: all I had to do was write a really good short story.
7 comments:
Saying and thinking that writing is a craft sounds just right. Not as, well, pretentious as saying that writing is an art yet also understanding and expressing that writing doesn't just involve mechanically churning out words.
By a similar token, I like the word "wordsmith" for writer, etc. Or is that too pretentious sounding? ;S
i like "wordsmith" too very much
help me. i need a job. i love writing but staying up all night doing brochures etc will be the death of me.
poor ms d, all my sympathies
me LOVES neil gaiman, LOVES i tell you.
I guess I'd be a fanarchist too. A nice one, no violence. Just sushi.
i love gaiman too; and i get what he says, because sometimes i get this feeling that writing is unattainable. some times i read books that make me think, i could never write like this, i could never be this great, and that is what actually stops me from sitting down and becoming a writer - and its so cool that neil gaiman can relate to this. thanks for the link for the interview. shall go read it.
shri - those nasty voices can stop you writing for sure, so gaiman's advice is important. just do it!
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