Neil Gaiman Reveals a Secret of Writing

[psychotick]

Hi,

Also if I hold two of these berries under my tongue am I at risk of contracting beriberi?

Cheers Greg.

 

[Hex]

I need to know what book this is now.

Hexwood. Diana Wynne Jones dedicated it to him, and it is twisty and strange and fabulous. You can also see him in Nick Mallory, a character who appears in Deep Secret and The Merlin Conspiracy (or elements of him, anyway).

 

[Stephen Palmer]

It's funny, but the harder I work, the luckier I get.

I think it is true that you can make your own luck, but that's a very time-consuming, difficult way of doing it...

 

[Ursa major]

But if you're fourteen (which is pretty clear from the photo, also), being soft-skinned is kind of what you do.

Is the site one where the photos are vetted to see whether they're accurate (both in terms of them portraying both the actual person and their current age)?

(Apologies for not noticing that yours was far from being the last unread post in this thread.)

 

[Dan Jones]

Or you could catch the crow, put it in a pie, publish the recipe and become a slebrity chef writer.

Everyone's a winner.

 

[Ray McCarthy]

Cow pie maybe, crow pie is something people only eat if forced to.

 

[JoanDrake]

Gaiman told the reader what to do first and then gave him an illustration of the skill that kind of work could develop. He did so in a way only Neil Gaiman could. It goes without saying that he's an absolute master but I always say too much

 

[jastius]

Well, first question was fairly specific, rather than of the "where do you get your ideas from" variety:



The serious part of the answer was this:



To me that's a non-answer, pretty much along the lines of "bang your head against the wall harder" and "charge harder at the machine guns, mon frere." The rest is NG showing off how witty and creative he is.

He could have ignored the question. He could have answered honestly but helpfully, "It's so long ago I can't remember how I learned to write - go ask somebody else I hear Stephen King wrote a good book on it."



This is all on tumblr. If you click through to the questioner's tumblr site you get:


...plus a helpful countdown to his 18th birthday.

As it is "Moppy" took this quite well:


And later a rueful...



But there was no way of knowing that. For a teenager, contacting an author he likes can be a big thing.

So I think in this specific case - rather than in general - I think NG was indeed being an arse.

if there any way you can tell young moppy that neil gaiman recently did a project in partnership with deviantart, and there is still a q and a session he answered upon beginning writing there..?

poor moppy. no one ever told him how to make an idea file.
or how to keep a little hemmingway notebook.
a lot of back up to writing is noticing life around you and interpreting that into words on paper.
the big things moppy is having difficulty with is that his idea and story pipes are not connected yet.
i wonder if HMO's cover that?

 

[Phyrebrat]

But Gaiman never says anything about commercial success. In fact I've never seen any author say anything like that. He says write, finish what you write, and do it a lot, and you'll be a writer. No mention of publishing. No mention of commercial success. He isn't saying you're not a writer if you're not published or a commercial success. He's basically saying the only way to learn is to do, and that practice makes perfect (or at least competent).

Conversely, if you say you're going to write, and don't write, then you're not a writer. Full disclosure - this is probably me!

I agree, I didn't mean to put words in anyone's mouth - I meant we as in 'people'.

I was a writer on Monday. I have not been a writer since

pH