IF A TREE FALLS BY CAMILLE MINICHINO

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Here’s a philosophical question of unknown attribution: if you write a book and no one reads it, is it really a book?

Yes! we shout. We write out of passion; we write because we have to; we write for ourselves.

Not me.

I don’t have to write, and I have other passions, all of which energize me. I hope I never have to pick one.

I write to share, to pose questions, to educate, to argue, to find an audience, to exchange ideas and stories. I don’t write for myself. I write for you.

I never had a diary as a kid, or a journal as an adult, other than a notebook of pieces that would eventually be the subject of a query letter. I’ve never written anything I didn’t want someone to read, whether it’s a letter to one person or a novel for . . . well, ok, maybe only a dozen or so.

That’s not to say I get nothing personally from writing. With Stephen King, I’m a firm believer in writing as therapy, but even as I’m pouring out a feeling onto the screen, I’m shaping it for a reader. What’s “true” no longer matters to me; I fix it so YOU will get my message or enjoy my story.

There are many things I love about writing-the clarity that comes with stepping back from an experience in order to put it into words that will carry the meaning; the delight in conjuring up fictional people and places and giving them an interesting, twisty story; the fun of producing a clever phrase once in a while.

But if you’re not reading, I’m not writing. I’m going to the movies. Or I’m rolling a ball down an inclined plane and calculating the acceleration.

How about you?

4 thoughts on “IF A TREE FALLS BY CAMILLE MINICHINO”

  1. B. Lynn Goodwin

    I love your passionately articulated convictions, Camille. As you know I journal frequently. It’s how I process anything that requires careful thought.

    Lately, though, my writing for outside audiences has kept me so busy that I rarely have time to journal. Interesting the way writing goes in cycles and we have seasons in our writing lives.

    I thoroughly enjoyed this blog. Wouldn’t it be fun to trade lives and talents for a few days?

    Lynn
    http://www.writeradvice.com
    Author of You Want Me to Do WHAT? Journaling for Caregivers

  2. Camille Minichino

    Thanks for your comment, Lynn.
    It is so interesting-there are as many writing processes as there are writers.

    I often think that what keeps many people from achieving their writing goals is that they think there is ONE way, and they need to find that way, instead of finding their own way. (Well that’s a long-winded sentence; the thought is buried in there somewhere.)

  3. Ed Miracle

    I write because I want to explore the consequences of certain concepts and possibilities without the bother of actually doing them. Call them thought experiments, or a lazy man’s scheme to live more than one life at a time. Also, I got tired of waiting for someone smarter that me to write the story I wanted to read. The waiting became a sort of pregnancy in which certain ideas demanded to be brought into the world, or they were going to to terrible things to my gizzard. I wrote them down and poured them over my characters, and–voila–out pops a novel. Which was way more work than I expected, but it sure beats being pregnant all the time.

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