fiction writers, write what you know

FICTION WRITING LESSONS, February 2007

"WRITE WHAT YOU KNOW"
by zentao

Lately, I read a book where the author convincingly managed to make the book so very real, that a reader would swear it was non-fiction…until that author, written into a corner by his lack of knowledge, contrived the impossible. Rather than abandoning the story or rewriting it (assuming he recognized his story's failing), he simply sent it off to the publisher as is. If a content editor was employed (doubtful), that editor failed to do his/her job, and the book was published with plot hole conundrum intact…much to the chagrin of the author, editor, and publisher once the edition received scathingly scornful reviews.

Write what you know. Most of you have heard this admonition. Some of you ignore it.

Don't. You cannot write what you do not understand and of which you do not own comprehensive knowledge and experience. If you are a nuclear physicist, you can write about something that involves intricacies of nuclear physics…provided that you have stayed current with present day understandings, postulates, theories, and discoveries in the field of nuclear physics. If you are a medical doctor, lawyer, judge, meat packer, successful robber, magician…you can write about these things in a knowledgeable way. Otherwise, don't. Don't even try. You cannot get enough expertise from outside sources to effectively deliver a story. Why? Because owning knowledge allows you to inherently incorporate subtleties to the story that often even you the author do not recognize, but these subtleties are the very things that make it real. Attempting instead to fake your way through sticks out to anyone who does own the knowledge, and they will discover your lack of expertise, broadcasting it to the world at large to make you seem the fool…and that is something you do not want happening.

If you are not an accomplished mountain climber, you cannot write a convincing story about mountain climbing. However, if you have, in fact, climbed even one mountain with or without the help of an expert, you can write into your story a sequence that permits your character to climb as you did. What you cannot do is to write as if an expert mountain climber. Nor can you have climbing mountains integral to your story. You don't have enough experience to be convincing.

Likewise, if you are a doctor but have never experienced life as a gas station clerk, please don't try to write a story from a gas store clerk's perspective. You have not experienced it, and cannot assume the experience. You can, however, have your character interact with a gas store clerk if you yourself have in fact interacted with a gas store clerk, using your own experience as a stencil.

Many beginning story writers write into their stories elements that they either have never experienced or never researched to such an extent that they are, in fact, experts upon the subject. If you haven't experienced it or you haven't studied it so exhaustively that you own every intricacy and nuance, keep to something you yourself have experienced and know.

Even if you have researched it exhaustively, but lack hands-on experience, your lack of hands-on experience will demonstrate itself to any knowledgeable reader. You can't write about riding a horse if your only experience is that of book-learning and observation. Not even if you have ridden a camel can you write about riding a horse. And, in fact, you cannot write about riding a camel, not even once, if in fact you have never ridden one -- not knowledgeably. What you can do is find someone who has ridden a camel, get them to describe that experience, get the permissions to use that experience, and write your sequence using that within the limits of the experience. A better example for our discussion would, however, be an automobile. If you have ridden in a car, you can write about riding in a car; if you have never driven a car, you can't write about driving one…and let's take this one step further: if you have driven a car, but never raced on a track, you cannot write about driving in a car race.

If the sum total of your experience is high school and growing up, stick to a story about high school and what it is like to grow up in those circumstances. If you worked in a motel, write about motel life as seen from a perspective of someone similar to you, assigned your job duties, your character observing and acting from that position. Don't try to write from a maid's perspective if you were in fact the manager…and vice versa.

But…but…but.

I want my character to….

Yes. I know. Girls want to write from a boy's POV and boys want to write from a girl's POV. Clerks want to write from a brain surgeon's POV, brain surgeon's want to write from a Holocaust survivor's POV, and everyone who wants to write a heroic he-man or she-hero novel wants their portagonist to be an effective gun-toting, sword-wielding, knife-fighting, and hand-to-hand combat expert without said author knowing how to load, handle, carry and accurately shoot a gun, wield a sword, handle a knife, or effectively defeat an opponent in hand-to-hand combat. The problem is that, most of the time, you simply cannot convincingly pull off faking your way or imagining your way through something for which you have no experience. Instead, what you write is laden with unbelievable circumstances, misinformation, impossibilities, blatant errors and embarrassing contradictions, the entire work toppling over because the flaws in what you know nothing about causes the plot and story structure to utterly fail in its logic and/or its pragmatic underpinnings, completely destroying all credibility.

But…but…but, part two.

I want my character to….

All right.

Females wanting to write males: Get some help. Ladies, learn how a man thinks and acts. How? Ask a man who matches the man you are attempting to write. Males wanting to write females: Get some help. Men, learn how a woman thinks and acts. How? Ask a woman who matches the woman you are attempting to write. If you do this enough, over time you will be able to write characters of the opposite sex effectively enough to be convincing…at least those whose personalities match those you've learned. And, in fact, if you are writing about someone of the same sex, but who have personalities and perspectives very different from yours, do get help from someone who is very similar to your character's personality and perspective.

But I need my character to be a…. First, RESEARCH, then collaborate with someone who is and does the things you need them to be and do, whether a cop, a detective, a lawyer, an archer, a preacher, a carpenter, a drugstore cowboy, or a pig rancher.

So what are we talking about here? Credibility and believability. Write what you know, from the perspective you know it, or, if you simply MUST step outside what you know, RESEARCH, RESEARCH, RESEARCH EXHAUSTIVELY, then hire or beg help from someone who is an accomplished expert in that occupation, endeavor, or activity, whether a gas station clerk, a brain surgeon, or….

Lesson TOC (Table of Contents)…4

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