Why Do you write?

[greenmountaineer]

The following brief article is food for thought. (Pardon the cliché.)

https://www.brainpickings.org/2016/02/08/james-baldwin-advice-on-writing/

What makes you want to write? I can think of many reasons, but I also think there is a lot of overlap and the reasons can be sifted down to a few core reasons. What are yours?

 

[UnderYourSpell]

Because I can?

 

[Angeline]

Good article, GM. Thank you for sharing it. Of course I agreed with everything Baldwin and Didion said. And now I want that book!

I love words. They amuse and fascinate me. I can't remember a time when I didn't feel that way. I've always had a big imagination and can happily be alone imagining and reading or vice versa. Reading was a very big deal in my family. We read newspapers every day, we always had books in the house, we went to the library once a week. When I was old enough I was put in charge of picking out books for my (frail) grandmother. My family sat in the living room with our respective books and read for a while most nights. Books were (are) always treasured gifts for me.

That's just some background. I think I have to write. Like Didion said, it puts me more in touch with myself, with whatever is happening with me under the surface. I wouldn't say that I'm happy when I write, but when I've gone through long periods of not writing I feel like I've lost part of myself.

Also my ability to write paid the bills for many years. That's a big motivator.

 

[sexnovella]

Why?

To get paid.

 

[Lyricalli]

Literally, the first thing that popped into my head when I read the subject question was, "Fuck if I know." I suppose that's a good reason to think about it, eh?

 

[EmpressJosephine]

Why Do you write?

Because I must!

 

[Trixareforkids]

Good article, GM. Thank you for sharing it. Of course I agreed with everything Baldwin and Didion said. And now I want that book!

I love words. They amuse and fascinate me. I can't remember a time when I didn't feel that way. I've always had a big imagination and can happily be alone imagining and reading or vice versa. Reading was a very big deal in my family. We read newspapers every day, we always had books in the house, we went to the library once a week. When I was old enough I was put in charge of picking out books for my (frail) grandmother. My family sat in the living room with our respective books and read for a while most nights. Books were (are) always treasured gifts for me.

That's just some background. I think I have to write. Like Didion said, it puts me more in touch with myself, with whatever is happening with me under the surface. I wouldn't say that I'm happy when I write, but when I've gone through long periods of not writing I feel like I've lost part of myself.

Also my ability to write paid the bills for many years. That's a big motivator.

LOL, I never agree with everything anyone says, just call me Mary Mary

My mother was a reader when she was young but by the time I came along, 3rd kid, she didn't read much any more except for whatever stories we were into and her Encyclopedic Dictionary. She loved words and would pick up one half of that monstrous dictionary, that had all kinds of wonderful drawings and maps and things besides words, and pick a word at random and then follow it to the next word and the next and the next until she tired of it or ran out of words to follow and I was always just as fascinated as she was even when I didn't understand the majority of what was being said.

That was my introduction to words/reading and I think some part of me always knew that someday I was going to play with language in some form. I didn't write on a regular basis until a couple of years ago but I can't imagine not writing at this point. It took a long time for my writer's "voice" to emerge but now that it has, I don't think there's any shutting it up

 

[Magnetron]

Bear with me, because this is obnoxiously long.

I can't say why.

I began drawing around age 4 and writing fiction around age 10. While these hobbies just naturally emerged - I was not disciplined in either, meaning the end results usually fell short of my expectations.

People said I had God given talent, which seriously bothered me. I recognized that I could do better work. I was the one who struggled and could not do better. God gets credit for bringing me so far, but failure to advance is on me? Didn't seem fair at all.

At some point I took a stab at writing song lyrics when I was 17. I'm not sure what prompted this, but my attempts were atrocious.

No one ever taught me how to go about improving any of these hobbies. Public schooling in the 70s and 80s was a joke. So I ended up teaching myself how over the course of time.

At age 25, I began a dream journal. Symbolism intrigued me, as well as other aspects dreaming such as precognition.

However, it took an enormous amount of time to recall and write down what I dreamt each night. I had conditioned myself to be so conscious while I was dreaming that I remembered every freaking detail in as many as 6 dreams per night.

Then one night, I dreamt of an author's name. On a whim, I inquired at a bookstore if there was such an author in existence. There was and he wrote a book titled Writing With Precision. It was about getting to the point of what you wanted to communicate using the fewest words possible. I didn't even read the entire book because I immediately got the message.

Applying this concept helped me develop my own shorthand that made my dream journal effortless. I reduced each dream into a handful of key words. I was now consciously constructing symbolism to catalogue unconscious symbolism. The irony.

Then at age 35 or so I began writing poetry and lyrics as a means of honing my long fiction skills. I've since lost interest in writing anything else. I realized that these condensed versions of storytelling suited me just fine.

Long fiction now appears to me as extremely laborious and filled with unnecessary information. Stephen King is one of my favorite authors and some of his books make me want to slam my head in a car door with how slow they progress.

So, my best guess as to why I continue to write is for the exercise. It keeps me in touch with how to stay focused and get to the point in other creative pursuits like drawing.

 

[Sinseria]

I would literally fall over dead if I couldn't write ...everyone is sharing so I will share to ...part of my life ...my practice write of my past ...lol someone please cover Tazras eyes though hehehehehe



Yet, hope did come for her bout the middle of the year in the form of a new teacher transferred from another school. An English teacher that adorned such words of passion that would make the world sing in joy or cry in pain. Her name was Mrs. C. and was the only person that pushed her to achieve something, to believe in something outside of the stain left by school and the other children. A teacher that had a pulse and said more then what the recordings played of the other teachers she had known in her youthful life. The first teacher she would know to be so kind and caring with a heart of gold that believed in what she was doing. She was tall with long blonde hair beautiful blue eyes that reminded her of the lake she had left behind. The only class and the only teacher that would ever affect her so as it became the reason for her to go to school and the only homework she would ever truly care to do.

An assignment Mrs. C. gave one day set her mind busy to work. It was to write a paper about your past about a family member that affected you. She thought maybe of her grandmother, or perhaps her real father. But she never knew him. She had wondered at times about her real father. If he would have known what was going on in her head, if he could have fixed the broken inside of her that she didn’t understand. So this would be her paper. It would be the best paper she would ever write for Mrs. C. to appease her, make her proud. As she would devour and yearn for Mrs. C.s praises. So she went home that day to ask her mother about her real father.

When her mother arrived home she asked. Her mother’s response came quickly and short like a crack of a whip to her mind as she simply said “he is either dead or in jail for drugs,” and then turned and walked away. How she was torn by this utterly devastated. She would never know his name, where he was from, who he was. That is all she would ever know. So she set out in tears to write a paper of the unknown. With her prized pencil in hand she wrote in short:

“I know one day words of anger shall come and shatter the jar that surrounds me and the words of my past I’ve hidden so carefully will emerge. To arouse the words of my past would be a game to some, a nightmare to others, but for me it would be to walk upon the boundaries of death.”

She knew nothing of writing or how to write and this paper would be the only “A” grade she would ever keep in her mind. This paper, this teacher and assignment would bring forth into her a love for the written word that would never end. In times of her life it would be her addiction that kept her alive. Every word she wrote that day scribed from her heart as she cried. She felt every letter, every word and every sentence as it was the truth of her tiny shamed little soul. She told herself that day that she would never read a book for she knew she wanted to write more then she wanted to draw. When she learned her words she wanted them to be her own and not cast from someone else’s work. Though eventually latter in life she would read and she would never stop writing once she found her own words as it would become her obsession.

 

[GuiltyPleasure]

Like Ange, I want Plimpton's book, so, off to the library because it's a costly tome.

As for my reasons for writing, this will be old news to most of you - to the point of ho-hum - but since gm posed the question here goes.

Drawing and watercolours were my primary hobbies until about 15 years ago when progressive MS made it impossible. I found that poetry is an alternative outlet for that drive. I can no longer manipulate a pen, pencil or brush to my satisfaction but one finger can pick out words on my keyboard.

 

[legerdemer]

I had to think about it so as not to give a glib answer - it's a question that has puzzled me for some time, and more so since coming to Lit.

I communicate better in writing - I organize my thoughts better, extract the meaningfulness of events better, prioritize their import. I don't know why, but paper and pen, and to a lesser extent the computer and keyboard, demand more discipline. There is too much Brownian motion in my brain. Writing helps me crystallize what I want to say into something that is (or I hope may be) worth saying to someone else, or out loud.

So ultimately, I write to communicate and connect with others, but strangely, also with myself.

 

[Magnetron]

Aside from what I said earlier .....

..... STFU already Magnetron .....

..... Now that I can write decent enough poetry and lyrics, I see it as a worthwhile pursuit to continue on with for four other reasons.

2) I see it as giving back. Where would I be without all the books, movies and music I absorbed over the course of my lifetime? It's a bit selfish to want to be entertained and not lift a finger to entertain others.

3) I see a need to set the bar a little higher, because there is a lot of CRAP entertainment out there.

4) I see a need to teach by example. If a high school dropout with no extensive writing education can do it, so can Suzy and Tommy and Jill and .....

And I think I would make a better teacher than many of the sociopathic Nazi a-hoool moderators over at PFFA.

5) It's fucking fun, especially when you have such good sports as Butters and Harry.

 

[greenmountaineer]

Literally, the first thing that popped into my head when I read the subject question was, "Fuck if I know." I suppose that's a good reason to think about it, eh?

I'm a bit like you are on this, Lyricalli. Like Angie, I've always loved words. I wrote my first poem in the third grade and I don't know why at that particular moment.

Unlike Angie and Trix, there wasn't much encouragement to write in my family. That's not a slam on my parents. It just wasn't on their radar. What was was the need to get a good job. Times were tough for 3 kids, a stay at home mother, and a father who delivered mail.

After college until I retired 40 years later, I dabbled, writing about 2 dozen horrible poems as I look at it. Just before my retirement, I started to write more seriously.

I suppose I write first and foremost for the joy of it.

 

[butters]

Aside from what I said earlier .....

..... STFU already Magnetron .....

..... Now that I can write decent enough poetry and lyrics, I see it as a worthwhile pursuit to continue on with for four other reasons.

2) I see it as giving back. Where would I be without all the books, movies and music I absorbed over the course of my lifetime? It's a bit selfish to want to be entertained and not lift a finger to entertain others.

3) I see a need to set the bar a little higher, because there is a lot of CRAP entertainment out there.

4) I see a need to teach by example. If a high school dropout with no extensive writing education can do it, so can Suzy and Tommy and Jill and .....

And I think I would make a better teacher than many of the sociopathic Nazi a-hoool moderators over at PFFA.

5 It's fucking fun, especially when you have such good sports as Butters and Harry.

 

[butters]

I write when something's burrowing up from inside to the surface of consciousness, or when there's a tunneling down where i'm consciously trying to reach that something inside. Either route can fail, leading to frustration, but i feel my stronger writes are of the first nature.

I also believe the act of expressing oneself through art of any kind acts as a sanity safety-valve. There have been dark days, such as any of you may be familiar with, when writing allowed a release of pent up anger, pain and dreadful sorrow that could have otherwise eaten me away from the inside. Nowadays light fills my writing, along with some shadows for greater definition

And i write for the simple pleasure of doing so, the happiness it brings to communicate with H, and anyone else who enjoys reading my stuff.

 

[butters]

I had to think about it so as not to give a glib answer - it's a question that has puzzled me for some time, and more so since coming to Lit.

I communicate better in writing - I organize my thoughts better, extract the meaningfulness of events better, prioritize their import. I don't know why, but paper and pen, and to a lesser extent the computer and keyboard, demand more discipline. There is too much Brownian motion in my brain. Writing helps me crystallize what I want to say into something that is (or I hope may be) worth saying to someone else, or out loud.

So ultimately, I write to communicate and connect with others, but strangely, also with myself.

yes yes!

 

[Angeline]

LOL, I never agree with everything anyone says, just call me Mary Mary

My mother was a reader when she was young but by the time I came along, 3rd kid, she didn't read much any more except for whatever stories we were into and her Encyclopedic Dictionary. She loved words and would pick up one half of that monstrous dictionary, that had all kinds of wonderful drawings and maps and things besides words, and pick a word at random and then follow it to the next word and the next and the next until she tired of it or ran out of words to follow and I was always just as fascinated as she was even when I didn't understand the majority of what was being said.

That was my introduction to words/reading and I think some part of me always knew that someday I was going to play with language in some form. I didn't write on a regular basis until a couple of years ago but I can't imagine not writing at this point. It took a long time for my writer's "voice" to emerge but now that it has, I don't think there's any shutting it up

I'm like a three-year-old. I either LOVE or HATE something at first...and then I start backpedaling. Ok, maybe not a three-year-old. Maybe I'm just passionate! (See?)

 

[legerdemer]

I'm a bit like you are on this, Lyricalli. Like Angie, I've always loved words. I wrote my first poem in the third grade and I don't know why at that particular moment.

Unlike Angie and Trix, there wasn't much encouragement to write in my family. That's not a slam on my parents. It just wasn't on their radar. What was was the need to get a good job. Times were tough for 3 kids, a stay at home mother, and a father who delivered mail.

After college until I retired 40 years later, I dabbled, writing about 2 dozen horrible poems as I look at it. Just before my retirement, I started to write more seriously.

I suppose I write first and foremost for the joy of it.

There are two things that resonate with me as well in your motivations: my parents were readers, as were their parents, and lovers of culture, but we had moved to the US without much of a safety net and they were always very insistent that I had to be independent - of them and of anyone. I had to stand on my own two feet. When I considered being an art or history major in college, my father nearly had a shit fit.

And the joy, it is the ultimate motivator. But that joy is mixed in with communicating - it helps to know at least one other person out there likes or at least understands what I'm trying to communicate.

 

[Magnetron]

6) It's the best revenge against Internets trolls, immortalizing their idiocy for the entertainment of future generations

 

[AlwaysHungry]

I have always liked to build things. Not bookshelves or low riders or other tangible things consistent with my gender stereotype, but pretty things made of ideas. If I were a religious person, I would say that this is the meaning of the book of Genesis, where it says God made man in his image. Man, in turn, creates other things in his own image. For me that is poetry, string quartets, R&B songs, novels, symphonies, etc.

 

[UnderYourSpell]

When I was a little girl I was born way behind my sisters (probably an unfortunate mistake!) so they didn't want me hanging around them as they were already into boys. I was clever and more than a little odd if truth be told. I didn't know how to make friends and on top of that I was abused. So I lived in my own world, often make believe. I could read before I went to school though goodness knows who taught me, certainly not my Mother, and I lived in books. As soon as I learned how to write I was away making up my own stories where I was always saved. Then I found poetry and the floodgates opened, even more than writing prose. I poured out my heart, my hurt but never loneliness, I was the proverbial cat that walked alone. Nothing much has changed apart from the fact that I survived. I still wear my heart on my sleeve, who you see is who you get and I still pour it out in my poetry.

 

[Piscator]

First an observation, the last place I'd expect to see a discussion of why I write is in the back boards of Literotica. You are truly one of the most interesting groups I've come across. With world events as they are, I am continually grateful for the freedom, luxury and opportunity these forums afford.

Like many of you, reading and writing were important to my family and I was a voracious reader. As an undergrad, I majored in the sciences but also worked on the campus paper and even published a poem in the campus poetry thingy. But with Grad studies and then career, the focus of my writing was scientific and technical in which precision and detail were paramount with a minimum of jargon, particularly in writing directed to audiences outside my discipline. The worldwide web opened things up a bit and many of my 'erotic 'stories and poems were developed in Bianca's and similar forums. With semi-retirement, my writing has opened up again, I contribute to our Township's monthly newsletter and try things out here and elsewhere.

My reasons for writing are similar to those better expressed by Baldwin and the contributors to this forum. Basically I to write because I can and feel I have something to share with the world outside my head. Often a line or phrase will come to me, I'll jot it down, put it in my bits bin. Sometimes it grows and I want to share it. While dreams of avarice may occasionally pass through my , mind, I'm mostly trying to put something out there and perhaps get a reaction from the void. I appreciate comments, both positive and constructive criticism.

Poetrywise I still favour free verse but am coming to appreciate the discipline and rigor of working within and occasionally outside of a set form. I'm not a contest person but am enjoying many of the challenges in this forum.

 

[Sinseria]

First an observation, the last place I'd expect to see a discussion of why I write is in the back boards of Literotica. You are truly one of the most interesting groups I've come across. With world events as they are, I am continually grateful for the freedom, luxury and opportunity these forums afford.

here here! I will second that one sir! hole heartedly!

I wish I could just reach through the screen and give you all a great big hug and smoochies ...Ive only been here a short time but you guys are like an addiction ...if you haven't noticed and its nice to know these intimate things about everyone makes you all seem more real!

I didn't actually start writing myself until I was 18 ..took LOTS of alcohol and pot to find my words as I was so very secluded child ...went from painting to writing to painting to writing ...my family did not write or read or draw ...was just something I think I just did constantly ...though it sounds like a bunch of us writers had a thing for drawing of some form ...did go to college for a little took an English class ...swore my teacher hated me every paper I turned in would be a c or even a d omgds ...the writing I have posted the gift letter to the dead was from her class ..she was just pushing me to do better though ...the board of English teachers that graded my portfolio commented on there comparing my work to Poe's ...and I got an A for the class ...that's when I started reading actually reading ...as before then I hadn't read any poetry in truth ...I to was offered a spot to write in the newsletter for the school on the following year ...but life struck and I had to move ...heh guess I have a thing for English teachers spent the rest of my life writing in secret ...not sure why I write as up until recently ...I know I have an obsession for the words ...the feelings and passions and power each one has pending how its used ...always about the feeling for me the emotion in it be it dark or not dark ...I think it has always been a have to or die type thing for me ...and I know my writings are SO estranged from everyone and way darker than most here heh thanks for not killing me for that by the way ! my hardest challenge is trying to let everyone else feel it instead of just me ...as I feel my works and I wrote secretly for so long with no other idea ...

but I am definitely learning here from you guys ...with the challenges and sharing of everyone's works! even that iambic format ...pfft evil !

 

[Ashesh9]

I wholeheartedly agree with Butters' sentiment " something burrows up from the depths of consciousness "...........amen

 

[Penuche]

Why do I write? Because I can't not do it for long.