Harry Mathews, "For Prizewinners" -- the best writing advice I ever found

[tegeus-Cromis]

This is a long article, the text of a speech delivered by experimental novelist Harry Mathews (who passed away a couple of years ago) to students in the creative writing program at Queens College in 1982. It's long, but I promise you'll find it worthwhile. It's also beautifully written.

For Prizewinners. - Free Online Library

Free Online Library: For Prizewinners.(literary prizewinners) by "The Review of Contemporary Fiction"; Literature, writing, book reviews Authors Speeches, lectures and essays Authorship Analysis Creative writing Writers

www.thefreelibrary.com

 

[The Big Peat]

That's a *really* long article. I'm going to have to read the full thing some time when my eyes are closing - but there's definitely some thought worth nuggets there. I like the idea of choosing subjects so that we may discover and learn things we don't know.

 

[tegeus-Cromis]

I suppose it being written before the age of the internet may have something to do with the length? It's about right for the text of a one-hour talk. But the nice thing about it is that he gets to discuss things more complexly. It's definitely not writing advice 101.

 

[sknox]

I do very much like this statement:

"When someone asks me what I do, I usually say that I sell insurance. This sets both of us at ease. "

 

[The Big Peat]

I suppose it being written before the age of the internet may have something to do with the length? It's about right for the text of a one-hour talk. But the nice thing about it is that he gets to discuss things more complexly. It's definitely not writing advice 101.

I didn't realise it was a whole hour talk when I set down to read it - that might explain it, aye...

 

[sknox]

It wasn't all that long, though he did rather lose me in the later part. The whole business with the Kafka quote was too labored.

I absolutely agree that we are not directly communicating with our readers; one reason why "know your audience" seems like nonsense to me.

I did also like his closing statement:
"Write about the things that attract you. Choose your subjects the way you used to choose your toys: out of desire. "

 

[tegeus-Cromis]

I love the part about the Kafka quote. It shows that good writing depends as much, if not more, on sentence construction and rhythm as on subject matter. And that such construction plays an important role in communicating.

 

[tegeus-Cromis]

I just want to quote here the entire final paragraph, because I love it so much:

I realize that you think the world is a mess and that you have a responsibility to do something about it. The world is a mess, one of our very own making. Two points, nevertheless. First, all the solutions to the world's problems have already been written down, and this fact continues to make very little difference--the problems do not go away. We might even say that the problems are so mired in words that we can rarely manage to approach them directly, and that most of the time writing about them only stirs up other people's mud. Perhaps you may deal with them more usefully, if less obviously, by writing a romance about a butterfly and a lollipop--if that is what you feel like doing. Second, no one yet knows who you are--not the you whose secret story can be re-created in the medium of the written word. There lies the extraordinary contribution you can make to the world, and I recommend that you give yourself the chance to make it. Write about the things that attract you. Choose your subjects the way you used to choose your toys: out of desire. You have the universe for your toy shop now. The time has come for you to go out and play.

 

[tinkerdan]

If I were to write a book on writing--I wouldn't title it On Writing(just so that you know)--anyway; after writing such a monster I would think that it might require a foreword--written by someone else(which is what a foreword is)--I think that I would love this to be my foreword.

Not that I would write a book on writing.

However, if it existed, it would require something monsterous, convoluted and mind numbing as a foreword; and I think this has it all.

It might even appropriately be entitled Forewarned.

For such should be the condition placed on anyone looking into my book on writing.