Who are you? I always hear this in the caterpillar’s voice from Alice in Wonderland. “WHO are YOU?” I love unique stories and unique authors. I love reading about people that are different than me but I think we are losing some of the uniqueness of the author’s voice. Put Jane Austen, C.S. Lewis, and J.D. Salinger side by side and I can pick out which is which. They had distinctive voices. Heck, even put Tolkien and C.S. Lewis side by side and I can pick out which one is which but I think so much of the craft of being an author is being lost.
The uniqueness of an author’s voice is a beautiful thing. It can’t necessarily be captured in words but I do know that it is beautiful.
In the movie “Music and Lyrics” there is a rather negative line written towards a character that says, “she was a great mimic”. This can be both a positive and a negative. If all you can do is mimic others, you lack your own creativity, but if you can’t mimic others, you lack understanding of how others write. Both can limit you. I tend to be good at mimicry. I already know I will never be someone to sit down and write a novel. I have too much going on in the world around me to create a brand new one, but I do love to think about what I could add to a story.
I did a book club on “Speak” by Laurie Halse Anderson last year. My final meeting included having the teens write their own epilogue to the book. Just for fun, I’ll let you all see what I wrote in a later post this coming week.
But authors are losing themselves. You have authors that take over a series and just continue on someone else’s work. Where are the new distinctive voices? Where are the ones that I can’t wait to read because I know they will draw me in. Rarely do I find I book that I just can’t put down anymore.
Many author biographies I read talk about how much the author loved to write just for themselves. It wasn’t necessarily about creating something for other people, it was about writing something they could enjoy. They loved the process. They loved coming up with something new.
So I challenge you to go out and create something new! Do it for yourself! You don’t have to publish anything. You don’t have to do it for anyone else. Part of the joys of writing is for your own enjoyment. Go create. Make art or a story. Make a pie or a painting. Go create. Add beauty to the world. Share the beauty with your friends. You don’t have to have everyone love you. Stop writing for the world. Go write for you. To quote The Greatest Showman
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The Sparkling Librarian 