My apprenticeship

A lot of rot is talked about writing, in my humble view. Amongst the largest of the dung-heaps is the oft-heard claim of someone being a "born writer".

I think it's quite true that some people have a natural aptitude for writing, as with so many areas of life.  But what narks your spleen-venting author is the assumption that those lucky enough to have a modest talent in a certain direction then go on to churn out wonderful works of literary art in the passage of almost no time, and with the expenditure of little, if any effort.

Nonsense!

Time for the traditional Hall aside here, and I think that must be the shortest paragraph I've ever written in a blog. I confess to feeling quite pleased with myself for that, I do like a first.  An innovation a day keeps boredom away in my eyes, or some such thing, but anyhow, back to my narrative of choice, or somewhere close...

What I was saying was how I find it galling that some people seem to think writers are born and not made, and simply need to wander up to a piece of paper, armed with a pen, to then go about setting down strings of enchanting words.

My experience is to the contrary, to say the least.  I'm penning this today, because it's a kind of anniversary for me. I have now been writing (or attempting to write, at any rate) for seven years.

And in simple summary, this is how it went.  To start with, I had little, if any idea what I was doing, and the consequent product was of the most dubious of quality.  But I kept working and working and working away at it, learning what made for the better ingredients of a book and what didn't.

After almost four years of labour, I finally made enough progress to get published, which was wonderful, a milestone, an achievement, all that stuff, don't get me wrong.  But...

But... even looking back today on the first of the tvdetective books to be published, The Death Pictures, if I were writing it now I would go about it so very differently.  Because I believe that each time you write, you learn a little more about this subtle and beguiling art.

That's the point of this blog.  I reckon that now, I've - more or less, give or take, leave me a little leeway, with due and appropriate modesty etc. - got to the stage where I can claim to be a mostly passable writer. And seven years it's taken for that.  Seven! 

So, all this stuff about born writers... I wish!  It would certainly have saved me a great deal of time and effort, were that the case for me.

Finally for this blog, a quick plug and a couple of thank yous. The lovely people I met at the Swanwick Writers' Summer School were kind enough about my efforts to teach writing to suggest a new page on the site dedicated to my work.  And the clever people who run the site have duly obliged, so if you get a moment, please do see what you think - www.thetvdetective.com/teaching.html

I'm off now to continue with my apprenticeship. That's one of the great things about writing - the training course lasts for the whole of your life and never, ever gets dull.