Do you believe people should "Write what they know" or not?

That's got my vote.

 

I went to college as an english major and always heard "write what you know"

 

I believe people should do whatever they want. You can say whatever you want about whatever you want-- but you have to sound convincing or no one will listen to you.

 

That's part of the fun for the reader is getting that little something extra (actually I remember that stewie on the family guy taunted the dog about just that) but it's true. Like in sci fi I have learned all kinds of things about the real world. I have heard that the What you know part is crucial, sure look at F Scott. Fitzgerald a one trick pony as he states he didn't have enough experiences to continue writing but some guy who has worked for the foreign service, etc might have some great things to weave into the story, that I the reader have learned, while being entertained.

 

Hey, Shakespeare wrote a lot about what he didn't know and rarely is he faulted for it. When writing character driven stories, one cannot help but write what one knows. Is what one knows the same as what one experiences? I think that is where the confusion may lie. I have written stories about people who kill children for picking the flowers in the garden, make shrunken heads from scratch, keep mad husbands locked away, people who paint portraits using the flesh and blood of their subjects, cannibalize their lovers ... yet I am a pacifist and was raised as a vegetarian. However, I do know about resentment, anger, lust, desire, obsessive thoughts ... and that is about what I write.

 

I think nothing can be expressed by ourselves quite like something we've personally experienced, but at the same time I think we limit ourself creatively by sticking only to things we know. I think writers have a right to write about anything that interests them. Of course, my opinion could be biased because most of what I write is stuff I don't know much about and things I'm humanly incapable of experiencing. But I love what I write, and I think that's what's important. If I don't understand something, I try to get information and that helps.

 

So many have taken this to mean, "write what you know (from personal experience)"... that's not really what the question is saying. For example; must I have been in battle to know of war?

 

I think the trick is to know what you write, rather than write what you know. You can guess about the little things, like what it would be like to be a farmer rather than a shop assistant, because it's just about swapping a few nouns around, but the big stuff is a lot harder. You can't write about being in love unless you've actually been in love.

That's the meaning, I think, behind it. Research is great if it's just about sounding like you know what you're talking about, but there's some things that you can't really look up. You can research what some specialist bit of equipment that a person might use to do a certain job, but you can't research how a person feels at the end of a long day at work; you have to have experienced it to really know it.

 

I don't know, but it would probably help if, for example, you knew what it was like to lose someone, or to risk everything you have simply because you were told to. Most of the time, we can tap into experiences we have had, and kind of modify them to apply to other situations that we haven't. You can go to the books and find out which weapons you'd be using in whichever war you're writing about, but it'd all be for naught if you got the feel of it wrong, if you had people dancing around laughing in the middle of a minefield or whatever.

 

Excellent point.

 

Well shit ^^. That was me! I forgot she was logged in....... again.

 

How else can one write, but of those things which one doesn't know, or knows badly? It is precisely there that we imagine having something to say. We write only at the fontiers of our knowledge, at the border which separates our ignorance from our knowledge and transforms the one into the other. Assholes.

 

I agree that a degree of research is helpful with particular writings. For some writers it is a key element in the construction of prose and is significantly useful in getting the 'facts' correct, but isn't that what creative writing is all about, posing questions what if?, what would? ... stimulating the minds' imagination to form particular opinion, judgement and conclusion?

Personal experiences can give you an insight into subjects such as; death, love, fortune, fame - though it, it is just that - 'your' personal experience.

I am getting back to writing after a period of frustration and enforced absence and currently have 5 projects in progress. Two of these do need some background study, though the others are based on an abstract principle from the images, sounds and thoughts within. In these cases a different perspective I feel needs to be employed.

Just as Art is in the eye of the beholder, good written work should be subjective to the individual, one should write what, and with a style that is particular to the authors contentment. I think that sometimes we forget that it is the writers work, and their choice of communication
<*Peace + Love ~ Save the Planet *>

 

I think the important thing is that, if you're asking "what if" questions, research allows the reader to focus on that, rather than, to cite the Throw Momma From The Train example, you writing a book set on a submarine and not knowing what a periscope is called. Plot and the human element is all well and good, and should be somewhat negotiable and creative. Getting the less important stuff right just makes it easier to do that.

The analogy I'd draw is to a theatre production. A play can be incredibly abstract and subjective, but you've also got to think about "suspension of disbelief" - that is, how to draw your audience in, so that they watch the play rather than the stage. Little things like set design can make all the difference here. So think of the research stage as set design, of trying to get the "stage" set in such a way that the reader is free to concentrate on the important stuff, rather than, re the previous example, trying to work out why you're not using the word "periscope".

 

Me and a friend were going to write a story that is effectively set in 2008, but just put all the dates mentioned in the book back 100 years. Not do anything else, just insist that e.g. Joey was mugged for his iPod in 1908.

 

I agree with the statement.
You know your real life experience, dreams, and desires. If you can imagine it you, in some way know it.

 

I don't believe that. I write science fiction and fantasy, mostly about aliens on distant planets. I live on this planet (Earth) right now, so I have met a lot of aliens... humans.