To be good at writing, you have to be a ‘born author.’ That’s what quite some people still believe today. Strangely enough, they don’t say the same about painters, sculptors, or composers. All of those fields need a certain talent so you can thrive in them, but only one, writing, is considered something you need to be a ‘natural’ at. Why is that? Well, I blame the Romantics.
The Romantic movement, starting in the late 1700s, was a counter-movement to neo-classicism. The neo-classicism clung closely to the art as made by or inspired by Ancient Greece. Plays were based on Aristotle’s five-act structure (which is, to be fair, not a bad structure to use). Statues were sculpted to be similar to the marble statues of Ancient Greece (yet, people didn’t know that those were originally painted in strong colours, so those new statues were kept in a pristine white). Paintings were often based on Greek mythology, depicting the gods and heroes of Ancient Greece, too. Only the composers, to stay with that list above, were spared it, because we know little about the music then.
The followers of the Romantic movement rebelled against all of that. They didn’t want the strict rules and structures of neo-classicism, instead they wanted for everything to be ‘natural.’ It was a first dip into realism for painters or sculptors, but it came at a terrible price for writers. By the idea of the Romantic movement, writing was an act of instinct, of following inspiration without any plans or structures to cling to. An author was either good at their job or not, there was no room for improvement.
This, of course, is an epic level of bullshit. Yet, the idea still persists today.
Germany is one of the countries where the idea of the ‘born author’ is still going very strong - not a surprise, as it is where the Romantic movement was born. When I started writing, there was exactly one very heavy book on writing in German which, I have to say, is next to useless for the casual writer who wants to know how to do it well. It’s pretty useful if you have some bugs in your flat, though - nothing can withstand the weight of this book.
It was only when I started buying books on Amazon, where I could get books from all over the world, that I began to gather my own books on writing advice. They, unlike that German brick, were useful. They helped me with structure, with plotting, and with wordcraft. Wordcraft especially is lacking in German writing advice - ‘born authors’ know how to spin their words.
Finding those books and, later on, blogs on writing, has proven invaluable for me and certainly helped me on the way to better writing. Like painting, sculpting, or composing, writing is a craft as well as an art and there’s no way of getting better at it without practice.
The idea behind the ‘born author’ is that if you are an author by birth, if you’re destined to be an author, the book will happen by itself. You simply need to touch the nib of your pen to the paper (or the fingers to the keyboard) and the story will flow out of you and find its way, perfect for publication, to the paper or the file.
If that is not true for you (and it won’t be, that I can guarantee), then you’re not a ‘born author.’ If you’re not a ‘born author,’ there’s no point in trying to write at all. There is the occasional author whose first try at writing is already a success (and often it’s their last success because they buy into the ‘born author’ legend), but even that story will be heavily edited before it goes public, so it has been changed after it has flowed out of the writer’s pen or fingers. It has not naturally come out in a perfect shape, it has been reshaped to be in a better condition.
Why are we still keeping to this idea such a long time later? The Romantic movement (and neo-classicism) has run its course and is no longer prevalent in art. Other movements and art styles have replaced it and been replaced in turn.
Perhaps this has to do with the fact that authors don’t need physical tools the majority of the population doesn’t know how to use. What I mean is that the painter needs to learn how to use a brush and other tools of their trade. The same goes for the sculptor who needs to learn how to use their chisel and hammer and so on. Even the composer needs to be able to read musical notes and composers usually also play several instruments. An author merely needs to be able to put words to paper - a skill anyone who might become an author will have learned already.
The art of writing is not to put words to paper, but to put them to paper in a way that makes them interesting to read. That is what wordcraft is all about.
Storytelling is a natural impulse for humans. We understand our world by telling each other stories about it. About the sun and the moon who chase each other around the sky. About gods who wield thunder and lightning. About the atom with its core and the electrons orbiting around it like the planets of a miniature solar system. That doesn’t mean all of those stories are wrong (although some are), but that it is the only way we can understand our surroundings.
Yet, even if every human has the ability to tell stories - and enjoys both telling and consuming them -, that doesn’t mean that if you’re not ‘natural’ at telling perfect stories you shouldn’t do it. Nobody would say that a ‘born athlete’ doesn’t need a lot of training to become the best in their field. Having a talent for running faster than average is something one might be born with. Without hard training, running faster than all the other above-average runners it not going to happen.
Yet, the elitist view that only certain people - only those ‘born authors’ - are meant to write hurts many who could be good or even excellent writers in time, but never get into writing because they didn’t do it perfect the first time around. Like painting, sculpting, and composing, writing takes practice and coaching to become better. ‘Practice makes perfect.’ as they say.
There is nothing wrong about practicing, starting with small stories, writing fan-fiction, letting all that ‘bad writing’ out so it can be replaced by better writing. Writing can only get better that way.
There’s also nothing wrong with writing a genre which the elites deem ‘below them.’ Romance is a genre regularly looked down upon (gee, I wonder if the fact that it’s mostly written and consumed by women has something to do with that?), yet it’s the highest-grossing genre overall. Fan-fiction is full of the early works of authors who at one point ditched the pre-made characters of others and began using their own. They practiced with pre-prepared worlds, so they could focus on other parts, and eventually got around to making their own. That’s fine - we know today that fan-fiction has been around for as long as literature has.
There’s also nothing wrong about taking a course in writing or reading something about structures, wordcraft, or the use of tropes. Writing is both an art and a craft. You need the talent for the art, but you need practice to master the craft.
Ignore people who tell you that you need to be a ‘born author’ to enjoy writing and produce literature. Nobody is a ‘born author’ above the fact that we all like to tell stories. If you want to write, then write. Get information, read blogs or books about writing, practice your wordcraft. Don’t buy into the hurtful lie that only some people are destined to write, because that’s not true.
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