On Writing

February 28th 2005 at 9:57 am

Charles Stross talks about why he writes:

Most normal kids decide they want to be a football star or a ballerina at some time; a few of them are stubborn enough that they actually persist with the ball-kicking or dancing for years after their less fixated peers give up on it, and get good enough to fully develop their potential. I just knew I was going to be a novelist. If I’d realized back then just how unlikely this ambition was — and indeed, it’s even less likely than becoming a football star or a prima ballerina — I’d have settled for something reasonable, like training as a brain surgeon or running for parliament. But nobody told me until I’d already persisted for more years than was sensible, written probably a million words of complete crap, and was beginning to acquire some basic skills: by which time the thought of giving up on those wasted years was too depressing to contemplate.

As does John Scalzi:

I am happy to say I do not have Charlie’s difficulty in answering the question as to why I write. I write for the following reasons, which I present in no particular order:

1. I write because it’s fun.

2. I write because I get paid.

3. I write because I’m pretty good at it.

4. I write because most other jobs I could do constitute actual work.

I initially wrote because my books kept getting taken away by teachers for reading in the middle of class, and it looked like I was taking notes if I were scribbling away in my notebook. As time passed the fragments and ideas and sketches started being just as fun as reading, and something I was loathe to give up.

Once I got the bug in my head that I could be a ‘writer’ it kind of lodged. Around that time it also become quite clear to me that my teenage tendency to stay up late and struggle to get up in the morning was not a ‘phase’ and I came to realize that I was going to have aim my life eventually towards something that allowed me to set my own schedule and was something I was very passionate about or I’d go nuts.

Thus writing.

I initially wanted to be an astronaut though.

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