How to Become a Great Writer by Stealing From Other Writers

And no, I don’t mean plagiarism.

We can’t produce quality unless we consume quality. If we take time to read good work, then we’ll learn how to create it for ourselves.

Now, copying someone’s writing word for word won’t get us anywhere, and it sure as hell won’t make us better writers. However, borrowing a writer’s voice is a whole other story, and that is ultimately what will help us succeed.

The first thing a reader notices about a writer is their voice. It is what shines through because it’s a way for us to show our personality — which ultimately creates a writer to reader connection.

But when we’re just starting, whether that’s writing professionally or for fun, we often struggle to find our voice. And our voice matters — a lot.

“People come to books looking for something. But they don’t come for the story, or even for the characters. They certainly don’t come for the genre. I think readers come for the voice.” — Stephen King

Consume what you want to create

I struggled a lot with my writing style when I first began writing. Sometimes, I still do, which is why I read a lot of work from the people who are successful and who have mastered their voice.

Stephen King wrote a memoir called On Writing, where he explains how a writer must read the work of others to find their voice. He also explains how writers can structure their sentences and write to compel the reader to keep reading.

If we aspire to become a great writer, we have to learn from the best. The key is to learn everything we can from them. In this case, that is done by reading their work. We have to find someone who knows their way with words and has an admirable voice and learn from them.

Part of finding our voice includes using the words that first come to mind. We can check for synonyms to the words we use, but they are rarely as good as our first choice.

When we edit our work to the point of exchanging a lot of the words for their synonyms, then we’re removing our personality from the pages.

If we focus on reading work by great writers and trust that we pick the right words, then our writing will get better. It’s as simple as that.

Becoming a great writer

We can write an article packed with valuable information and tips, but if the writing isn’t lined with our personality, then it won’t be interesting to read.

A great tip I often hear is to write an article as if it were an email to a friend. It should be informative, but also have the added touch of personality.

It’s so important to make sure we find our voice before we expect to create anything amazing. Our way with words can make or break an article, which is why it’s so crucial to find our voice.

Finding your voice

By reading the work of multiple writers, we get influenced by multiple voices. That is when we can combine the aspects of their writing that we like, add our touch, and create a voice of our own.

It’s good to borrow someone else’s voice, as long as we add originality to it.

Eventually, we will have found what style fits our writing, and we will adapt it to fit our personality. The thing is that it’s a lot easier to build from someone else’s idea and work off of that instead of creating our voice from scratch, without any influence.

These things combined are what will help us find our voice. In short, we have to read great work, trust our word choice, listen to those who have found their voice, and adapt the voices we find to fit our style.

It’s simple to find our voice by adjusting someone else’s voice, applying it to our writing, and then turn it into our own. Here is how we can do that:

• Recognize what you dislike about your writing
• Make a list of a few admirable writers
• Research the work of at least two writers
• Acknowledge what you like and dislike with their writing
• Combine the styles you find and experiment
• Add your touch of personality
• Try it out, practice, and always look for ways to improve

“Contrary to what many think, I don’t believe readers are attracted nearly so much to plots and characters as much as they are to the personality of the person regaling them on the page.” — Les Edgerton