Do Writers Have The Wrong Stuff?

My English teacher in High School (appropriately named Mrs Cranke*) once accused me of being a ventriloquist. It was the morning after an episode of LA LAW where a chap was tried for making scathing remarks through a puppet. He was shy and retiring, but the puppet was a cheeky alter ego. My English teacher accused me of doing the same thing. Accused is probably the wrong word, except it felt a lot like an accusation. When I corrected her she was adamant: "No, Nicolas, you definitely do do that."

I maintain that my cheekiness extends to my conversations, and as an active sportsperson (especially in cycling) I've been accused of similar arrogance. I'm not proud of it. But I think I am particularly impatient with what seems to me to be inferior wisdom. If I could separate from myself I would probably get supremely frustrated with me.

But here's the rub. The danger of writing, it seems to me, lies in the introspection involved, and also, the loneliness. Why do writer's write? Because they're painful, pedantic perfectionists? Because they have a strong need to express themselves? Because there is a particular way they need to express themselves? Because some part of them has given up on the (real) world? Because they have a cowardly impulse to attack in a forum where they expect they are more practised and thus, possibly, better skilled and someone else? But all these reasons may be hogwash next to this one: writers write because it's not enough for them just to say what they think to one or two a handful of human beings. They (we?) want a lot of people to know and agree with them (us?), and they (we?) write to effectively say: check out what a smarty pants I am! Stry!

I have said this many times: I avoided writing for several years after school because of my awareness of the tragic fates of so many poets, and the likes of Ayn Rand, Virginia Woolf, Enid Blyton and so many others who wrote well, but lived poorly. I intended not to make the same mistake, and so resolved NOT to write as far as possible.

There is something innate about the process though. Some people definitely have a feel for language. But Charlene Smith is spot on when she says that even the most astute writers can be embarrassingly inarticulate. I've had my moments when I've made notoriously terrible statements both grammatically and otherwise. Lack of social interaction begins to erode the vocal slime, it seems, that allows for a free flow, a streamlined dialogue. And worringly, the more time we're on our own the more we tend to jabber, interrupt and throw in apparently random disconnected statements.

Writers I respect combine writing with something else in the real world. For example, writer/directors, writer/filmmakers, and especially writers who work in teams and brainstorm concepts (TV writers are a good example). Writers do play a crucial role in setting the thoughts and minds of others in motion. In this sense they have a vital role to play. But writers have a greater responsibility to live as well, in order to better reflect reality, and to better portray the smorgasbord of life in the limiting and sterile spaces of typewritten letters on blank backgrounds.

*She was actually one of my favorite teachers and a salt of the Earth human being.

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