Can Just Anyone Be a Great Writer?

It’s happened before…

A person with no formal education goes on to write a bestselling novel. A retiree gets an idea for a story, and the next thing they know, they’re signing autographs for a line of people at Barnes & Noble. An ordinary person lives through an amazing experience, and it becomes a popular memoir that everyone is reading on the beach. Helen Keller wrote 12 books throughout her lifetime despite being blind and deaf. Nothing should get in the way of wanting to write, and for many people, it hasn’t. But can just anyone be a great writer?

Keep writing, whether you’re good or not?

In the movie Wonder Boys, Michael Douglas’ college creative writing professor Grady Tripp states:

“You tell the ones that have it to keep at it. You tell the ones that don’t have it to keep at it too because that’s the only way they’re gonna get to where they’re going.”

This quote contradicts the sentiment that anyone can be a writer, but I think it’s true. A natural ability can be apparent early on, but every writer needs to practice in order to reach their full potential. Those who love it will stick with it. Those who don’t move on to other things, but they can, and sometimes do, come back to it later in life.

I’m not saying that if you’re not good at writing that you shouldn’t do it. If you love it, do it.

I love to make art, and I’m proud of some of it, but that doesn’t mean that even my best work belongs in a museum. The more I do it, the better at it I get, but I don’t think I’ll ever reach the level of a “great artist.” Some creative projects are not meant for public display. Those should be reserved for the best in their craft by those who have earned their stripes through time, study, and effort.

That’s difficult to hear in an age where anyone can hit “publish” on a piece of writing and send it out into the world. But it can be a harsh reality check when the writer who pushed that button doesn’t see the results they expected in response to their work.

This doesn’t mean that an author has to be financially or critically successful to be considered great. Over the past few years, I’ve read tons of great work from modestly successful writers. They just have to put out quality work, whether it’s self-published or traditionally published, whether it makes one dollar or a million dollars. If it’s going out into the world, it needs to be worthy of its shelf space or Amazon listing.

Don’t make writing seem easier than it is.

Anyone who has been writing for a while knows the following.

1. Writing is hard.
2. It takes years of frequent practice to get good at it.
3. You’re always getting better, but you need feedback from others to know if something is truly good.
4. It’s not going to make you rich overnight.
5. You don’t want your efforts to be belittled by the idea that anyone can do this.

They say it takes 10,000 hours of practice to master a skill. Writing is a skill. It takes practice, imagination, time, and a ton of failure, even if success ends up coming earlier for you than for most. But don’t belittle the process to fit the effort that you feel like putting in by ignoring the parts of the process that you don’t want to deal with.

Don’t assume that you can do it alone either.

First, you have to be comfortable enough to show your work to someone else.

Then, you then need to grow skin thick enough to take criticism and advice as easy as the praise.

Finally, you need to go back and keep working at it.

Utilize those outside viewpoints to locate the weaknesses that you couldn’t see yourself, and make it better. You learn to recognize the difference between one person’s opinion, whose suggestion you can either take or leave, or the crucial advice for improvements that many readers will agree should be corrected.

Pointing a critical finger at myself.

I’ll admit, I’m guilty of doing exactly what I’m complaining about above. I took advantage of the convenience of self-publishing and self-published my first three novels in a trial-and-error approach. I was smug enough to think that a bachelor’s degree in Creative Writing (the ink barely dry on my diploma) and minimal research on self-publishing was enough to make me an expert.

My first edition of my first book was a disaster. The cover was awful, it was full of typos, and the formatting was off. I was in such a hurry to publish a book that I rushed through the process. Then, I ignorantly thought that Amazon would do the work of selling my book for me. I would just plug it on a few free websites, and then I would have a best seller in no time.

I went through three post-publishing edits and two covers before I had a more polished first novel. After that, I took a more serious approach to marketing. I ordered hard copies to take to bookstores and sales and sprayed my meager social media followers with constant posts about my books. But I couldn’t undo the mistakes I had already made.

Learning from my mistakes.

Deep down, I knew I could do better. My second and third books were an improvement, but I still made rookie, uneducated mistakes, mostly in an attempt to rush along the process and watch the sales, however meager, come in.

I’m proud of all of my books, and they generally received good reviews. But they should have been professionally edited with professional covers. I also should have done thorough marketing research from the start. I shouldn’t have been in such a hurry or thought enough of my writing abilities to assume that the rest would take care of itself and that I could do it all on my own at little to no cost.

No writer can catch every mistake or be able to view the book entirely from the reader’s point of view. I should have been more aware of the quality of work that I put out with my name on it.

Respect the craft and the writing industry.

When I see self-published authors ignore basic writing mechanics and shoo it away as unimportant to the overall result, it drives me crazy.  This attitude demeans some of the most important aspects of writing. These are the skills that other writers spend years perfecting. You can’t dismiss these basic mechanics and expect to put out quality work.  

Serious writers respect the process. They wade through the mud that is the publishing industry. They write frequently, take classes, read, workshop, blog, freelance, research, and submit. It’s understood that overnight success is as rare as hitting the Power Ball. They know that they may never make it as a full time writer, but they do it anyway.

As for the people who decide that they want to write a book, I say, that’s awesome. Welcome to the club. But don’t jump in thinking that you know what you’re doing and that you can bang out a classic unless you’re some anomaly of “a natural.” Cause we’ve all been naturals. We’ve all heard the encouraging remark, the gold star on the book report. But we’ve all had a lot to learn.

So, respect the craft. Learn the rules. Put in the time. Make the effort, and be prepared to stick with it for however long it takes.  Don’t act like you know it all and that the things that you don’t know don’t matter. Because it all matters. And your efforts will result in work that you can be proud of. That’s true success.

How do you judge when a person has earned the title of writer? Leave your comments below!

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