Audience of One

A is for Author

For as long as I can remember I’ve been writing stories. I remember when I was five or six being taught about speech marks for the first time and not understanding the point. I grew up wanting to write a novel, a desire now countered with realism (I’m not especially good at writing fiction) but still present. My love of creative writing led me to take English at AS level, as a third of the subject was original writing. However, writing about why I’d written something a particular way didn’t come naturally to me and I missed the top A grade because of it.

I’ve also been writing for the internet for almost as long as I’ve been using it. Writing online can be very different from writing anywhere else; then again, it can be very similar. There is no real equivalent of the weblog away from the internet, but weblogs can include the same kind of writing as newspaper columnists, for example. I tend not to classify weblogs on the fiction–non-fiction scale – they can be both, even within one entry. As a weblog author, I try to get a mix.

If I ever write a book it’s much more likely to be non-fiction than fiction; I find writing fiction more enjoyable though. The freedom to create characters how you want, to build up a picture of them in so many different ways; using words to convey subtext or explicit meaning or both; there are so many things to enjoy in writing fiction that I wish I had more ideas for stories. Maybe it’s busyness that keeps them from me, I don’t know. Writing stories is a fantastic feeling. I’d love to have the time just to think and write, but somehow I doubt that even with the time I’d write anything good. It’ll stay a dream, though.

Matthew @ 20:29, February 19, 2005 to ABC | Comments (0)