Authors as Audiences

[guildrone]

So, I’ve been on an especially ruminative self-reflective bent as of late—and as per my most recent check-in over on justcreate, one case of such involves questioning where exactly my creative drive comes from. More specifically, I’ve been sitting with a well-worn motto that I once thought I’d taken to heart…

Write what you want to read.

…But might have instead been taking for granted, in the sense that what I’d for a while considered as a writer to be a core appeal of much of my work is something I doubt I’d appreciate as a reader from the outside looking in—if I weren’t the one doing the aiming in the first place, in other words, I don’t think I’d be included in the target (audience) I’m trying to hit.

So, I figured I’d spin this uncomfortable case of arrested authorial development into my first shot at actually sparking discussion around here—and thus pose this variably obvious question to you in turn: What is the relationship between what you read(/watch/play/etc.) and what you write?

Comments

[osteophage]

Tough question... What comes to mind first is that there's a lot of things I like to read that I don't feel all that capable of replicating myself, whether due to narrative complexity or just technical knowledge. I don't feel up to writing a murder mystery, for example, even though that's a genre I like to read. But on the other hand, there is some overlap between what I like to read and write, what with my general interest in suspense, fantasy, supernatural creatures, etc.

Are you saying that what you've been writing is something you would otherwise dislike as a reader, or just something that would lack appeal for you?

[guildrone]

Tough question... What comes to mind first is that there's a lot of things I like to read that I don't feel all that capable of replicating myself, whether due to narrative complexity or just technical knowledge. I don't feel up to writing a murder mystery, for example, even though that's a genre I like to read. But on the other hand, there is some overlap between what I like to read and write, what with my general interest in suspense, fantasy, supernatural creatures, etc.

Yeah, from what I hear this is pretty common—and something I sympathize with myself; I doubt I’ll ever write something with wholesale political drama in mind, for instance, but I’m totally down to try and digest it myself.

Are you saying that what you've been writing is something you would otherwise dislike as a reader, or just something that would lack appeal for you?

At best, some of the ethos behind my work is something I think I’d only like it in spite of—as per my response to mific.

[mxroboto]

I feel like what you've described is very similar to how visual artists gather inspiration (and how my own visual creative journey's going) -- where the eye for detail evolves a few steps ahead of your skillset.