Why write? It’s a question writers get asked a lot. There are a lot of challenges to writing, both internal and external, and overcoming them can take persistence and focus and a good handle on what and why. So I periodically ask myself just that: why write?
Jamie Coomarasamy speaks to Patricia Cornwell, one of the world’s best-selling crime writers, whose books have sold more than 120 million copies worldwide… Her imagination became a refuge during difficult years, shaping the stories and characters she would later create.
Ann Patchett’s The Getaway Car is another interesting look into the author’s development as a writer, but everyone’s answer is different.
My version of why tends to revolve around an essential truth: I want to be part of the worlds I’ve loved since I was a child. I want to be a book in the library of life.
Star Wars: The Force Awakens has premiered and the hype it is a-ramping! I’m excited. Really excited, like Fanboys excited, but I can’t see the movie just yet. Why not? Why am I not suited up in a Han Solo outfit (complete with super cool hip holster) and posting this from the ticket line at my local theatre? Because Star Wars isn’t just my thing, it’s a family thing.
See, I grew up without a television. My father had a minor (read major) TV problem and realized that having one meant watching one. All the time. So no TV. What we did have was a black and white lab monitor and a tape of Star Wars. On Betamax:)
We watched that tape a lot. Until the video track died, actually, and for a while after that. Most nights after dinner, Dad would make giant bowls of popcorn spackled together with butter and salt and we’d settle on the couch for the movie.
The. Movie.
Yeah, I was that kid, the geeky one who could quote the whole thing. (Droid dialog included, of course.I can’t tell you what it means to have your mostly secret childhood obsession become the new cultural darling, but I may not have to. Maybe you were that geeky kid too. Awesome, right?)
The original Star Wars was a great movie but it was also an anchor in turbulent times. My parents split up around then, my mother had health issues, I moved to a new school. The usual kinds of transitions children go through, and need a foundation to weather well.
Star Wars, and the bond that formed with my brother and father around science fiction and fantasy, was a big part of that anchor. It’s also a big part of why I write speculative fiction. In the way only fiction can, the movie proved that the good guys can win, that wrongs can be righted, and that a scrappy band of rag-tag rebels can change the course of history. (Also that parsecs are a measure of time, support garments aren’t necessary in space, and that no matter what Obi-Wan says, stormtroopers can’t shoot worth a damn. Hey, nothing’s perfect;)
My father also read us Tolkien, and when the The Hobbit and The Lord of the Rings movies came out we all went together. Now those movies are done but we have a new hope (see what I did there?;). This year I’m going home for Christmas, and for Star Wars: The Force Awakens.
But, that means I won’t be able to see the movie for ten days. In the meantime? There’s time for a bit of fun:
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