The Saying – Is It Accurate?

Probably the most popular advice a new writer will ever find online is ‘write what you know.’ It’s in all the books and articles, and is one of the first answers to questions new writers have, like ‘What should I write?’ ‘How do I write?’ ‘How do I make my book really affect people?’

When I was a new writer, I was always confused by the saying ‘Write what you know.’ I could not understand what it meant. Did it mean what I knew in theory and from hearing other people talk about, or did it mean what I had experienced? I never wanted to write what I experienced, I wanted to write what I wanted to write! A 9 year old doesn’t have much experience, anyway!

I quickly discovered that that saying was not the best advice to give a writer, especially a young writer. Writing what you know either limits you to your personal experience – and a mind full of imagination cannot stand to be limited in that way – or it limits you to things that not only have to be real, but that the average person has experienced. You can’t exactly learn what it’s like to be a knight in the middle ages or a sailor in the 1700’s, since no one is alive now who is able to know through personal experience what either of those are like.

Then What Do I Do?

And so I forgot that advice. Then the question came up, ‘How do I make my story seem real if I’m writing about things I don’t know?’ I had two options, either not to worry about making it seem real and just write because I wanted to write. Or, to do a lot of research.

In the end I found that a good mixture of imagination, intuition, and research can make up for the fact that you are writing about something you have never done or experienced. There is only so much I can research what it is like to be a middle aged man. And there is no amount of research I can do to give me a better idea what it feels like to be a middle aged male squirrel (like Aylmer MacKennan, the main character in The Last Captain Sails Again)

Conclusion

A writer’s imagination and intuition are the foremost tools in a writer’s journey, and researching the topic you are going to write about is probably one of the best ways to hone those tools. If you are an American teenage girl who is homeschooled, you are not restricted to writing characters who are American teenage girls and who are homeschooled, and who have led the life that you have led. Use your imagination! Use your intuition! And research the things you are interested in and need to know to make your writing the best you can make it.

As always, keep writing, keep learning, keep growing.