Learning From Your Writing Heroes

Most writers know that reading improves your writing. It's one of the reasons so many avid readers encountered childhood teachers who were so complimentary about their writing in school. All that reading was quietly training their brains about language, plot, characterization, and all aspects of storytelling. The reading was teaching them writing, and it was teaching them to think and imagine. And that translated into written works of above average quality and creativity in school.

But what if all the books we read had even more to teach us? What if we could learn from and be inspired by the writers themselves? 

Perseverance Pays 

Let's consider one of my huge writing heroes as a child, Ray Bradbury. By the time I reached high school, I had read every book or story I could lay my hands on by Bradbury. I loved how his books took me to new places but always made me think about bigger things. I eventually discovered this author had still more to teach me and to inspire me as a writer through the things he shared as and about being a writer. 

When I was most dejected about trying and failing, about rejections and as the fear that all I would ever see were rejections began to make it difficult to find the energy to create, I read these words by my writing hero: “When I was fifteen I began to send short stories to magazines like Esquire, and they, very promptly, sent them back two days before they got them! I have several walls in several rooms of my house covered with the snowstorm of rejections, but they didn’t realize what a strong person I was; I persevered and wrote a thousand more dreadful short stories, which were rejected in turn. Then, during the late forties, I actually began to sell short stories and accomplished some sort of deliverance from snowstorms in my fourth decade. But even today, my latest books of short stories contain at least seven stories that were rejected by every magazine in the United States and also in Sweden!” 

I was stunned to realize this man I admired so much had been through what I was going through and had been through it for much longer. He didn't give up. And my life was better because he had refused to give up when in the midst of the rejection storm. I began to wonder if someday there may be people who would benefit if I didn't give up. So, I stuck with it. 

Writing Heroes are Personal 

I was a little too old for Judy Blume to be one of my favorite authors to read when I was young, but my little sister adored her. She read every Judy Blume book she could lay hands on, and some of them she read over and over. She found something in Judy Blume's writing that resonated with her. Eventually I read all those books too, but though I recognized the books were good, they didn't resonate with me as they had resonated with my sister. That's because writing heroes are personal. Mine won't be yours. And yours won't be mine. And that's fine, because yours will be the ones who speak to you though their work. Though sometimes, even the writers of books that weren't your favorite can give advice that is. 

Eventually, I found Judy Blume had some things to say to me during a rough time, though she didn't know it. She was responding to interview questions with Neal Conan in 2011: “I mean, you know, I would cry when the rejections came in—the first couple of times, anyway—and I would go to sleep feeling down, but I would wake up in the morning optimistic and saying, ‘Well, maybe they didn’t like that one, but wait till they see what I’m going to do next.’” 

She went on to say something that has come back to me a number of times when my writing was flirting with burnout, “The thing is that nobody writes unless they have to. So, if you have to write because it's inside you, then you will.” That's when I realized that if was okay to take a break. It wouldn't keep me from coming back. Writing was part of me. I couldn't quit writing even if I wanted to. That realization was surprisingly helpful during that rough spot. 

Like Us 

I enjoy reading what writers say about writing. When I see J. K. Rowling said, ““We do not need magic to change the world, we carry all the power we need inside ourselves already: we have the power to imagine better,” I find myself rolling it over and over in my head, asking myself about the world and about my own imagination. And, a little bit, I might ask myself if that sounded just the tiniest bit pretentious. Because, honestly, I'm a writer. I can be pretentious. That doesn't mean I'm wrong. And Rowling wasn't wrong either. The more I read the words writers have said about writing, the more I see all the things we have in common. We're all in this together. 

In many ways, that's what seeking out more information about the writers you admire can do most for you. It can remind you that writers are simply people. People who worry about their aging parents. People who fret over their pets. People who worry about the future. And people who write. They don't belong on a pedestal, because pedestals give them a long way to fall. But they do have value whispering in our ears, because, in many ways, they are us. They do good things. And sometimes they do dreadful things. But I still find value in hearing about the writing journey of others and how I might learn from their mistakes and their successes.

Ask Yourself 

Who wrote the books that inspired you as a kid? Who wrote the books that inspired you recently? What have those writers said about writing and their lives spent with it? 

Look for more from authors. More books, sure, that's always great, but also interviews and useful quotes. Listen to them tell their tales of the challenge of being a writer. Listen to them laugh about their own ridiculous mistakes. Hear about the times they fell down and got back up. Learn how they navigated the same tough times you are experiencing. And let their words be a kind of pep talk so you give yourself space and time to grow into the writer you're meant to be. These writing heroes may never know they gave you a pep talk, but that's okay. You get the pep anyway. 

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