Thursday, July 29, 2010

Why I Do What I Do?

Recently, the media has been going crazy over the website I Write Like http://iwl.me/ So, I checked it out.  The first time I copied a snippet of my WIP,  the site claimed I write like *insert drum roll here* David Foster Wallace.  The second time, my style matched Stephanie Meyer.  I don't really care who they say because when I type the last word, I write like me.

But I thought about why I write.  Writers have their own reasons to put themselves through the crazy, euphoric states that writers deal with.  For me, the answer is simple.  Adventure.  As a little girl, I wanted nothing more than to be an actress.  I wanted to inhabit other people [not in a creepy body snatchers way], to wear their skin and live their lives, to feel what brought them joy or pain and discover what they love dand hated.  I wondered about people's flaws and talents?  I was curious about their lives.  Still to this day, I love to hear people's stories and I often wonder about the emotions that charge through them, the choices they made that they're proud of or wish could do differently.  I love to know what makes people tick.  When people didn't tell me or couldn't, I made up stories.

A favorite game of  mine in the car was concocting stories about the people who lived in the houses  we drove past.  I wondered about their kitchens, the secrets they kept even mundane aspects of their lives.  Soon, the stories weren't enough to stay in my head so I had to put them to paper.  Acting lost my attention after time but I couldn't stop thinking about the characters that existed out there or the ones that I could create.

Now, I spin lives from a few snippets of ideas that float around and grab me.  While I write and flesh out the characters, I feel like I become the heroine with her inner conflict that must be healed or a hero, all Alpha but with his much guarded love deep inside his hard masculine shell.  To put it simply, I write because I want to be a thousand different people whether a heiress, rake or It girl and writing, just like reading, lets me experience worlds and adventures that no travel agent can get a ticket for.
Tell me why you write?

3 comments:

Joan Leacott said...

Lovely post. I write for the sheer fun of it. Like you, so many minds to occupy, so little time. I'm waiting for them to invent a mind-controlled keyboard.

Jill James said...

I write because I want to give the feeling I get from reading a book to someone else. I want to tell a grand adventure and take others on the ride with me.

Tarot By Arwen said...

I write to tell the stories in my head. I can't find them in other books so I have to let them out. I love twisting and torturing my characters only to have them battle through it all to find love. :)