Dear Writers: Twelve Tough Storytelling Truths from Stephen King’s ON WRITING

1. “If you’re a bad writer, no one can help you become a good one, or even a competent one. [But] it is possible, with lots of hard work, dedication, and timely help, to make a good writer out of a merely competent one.”

2. “If you don’t have time to read, you don’t have the time (or the tools) to write… You cannot hope to sweep someone else away by the force of your writing until it has been done to you.”

3. “If you expect to succeed as a writer, rudeness should be the second-to-least of your concerns. The least of all should be polite society and what it expects.”

4. We’ve all heard someone say, “I just can’t describe it.” If you want to be a successful writer, you MUST be able to describe it.”

5. “The key to writing good dialogue is honesty. And if you are honest about the words coming out of your characters’ mouths, you’ll find that you’ve let yourself in for a fair amount of criticism.”

6. “Some people don’t want to hear the truth, of course, but that’s not your problem… [Truth can] be a breath of cool, refreshing air in a room some people would prefer to keep shut up.”

7. “You can’t please all of the readers all of the time; you can’t please even some of the readers all of the time, but you really ought to try to please at least some of the readers some of the time.”

8. “Symbolism exists to adorn and enrich, not to create a sense of artificial profundity. None of the bells and whistles are about story, all right? Only story is about story.”

9. Only a slob says, “Oh well, let it go, that’s what copyeditors are for.”

10. “Subjective evaluations are a little harder to deal with, but listen: if everyone who reads your book says you have a problem, you’ve got a problem and you better do something about it.”

11. “On the whole, I think story belongs in front, but some research is inevitable; you shirk it at your peril.”

12. “I’m doubtful about writing classes, but not entirely against them… It seems to occur to few of the attendees that if you have a feeling you just can’t describe, you might just be, I don’t know, kind of like, my sense of it is, maybe in the wrong class.”

The end (of the article)

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