Write What You're Interested In

I was giving a lecture at the local university this week and we were talking about how to choose what to write. Which genre should you pick? Fiction or non-fiction? And inevitably someone piped and and said that writers should only write what they know.

I hate this little bit of "advice" that seems to pop up frequently. It really doesn't help anyone. Why should a writer confine herself (I'm a woman, I'm going to use the feminine here; no offense to the guys) to what she currently knows when she can go out and learn just about anything. It's a limiting viewpoint and not something I subscribe to. Especially when it comes to giving advice to students, since they don't know as much now as they will 10 years from now. They could get stuck in a mentality that will never lend itself to the best they're capable of.

So I amended the statement. My exact words were, "Let's change that up a little bit and say that you should write what you're interested in. You can always go out and learn something new." What does this mean? Well, maybe you want to write a non-fiction book on learning to ride horses but you've never even touched a horse in your life. You can still write the book. Get out there and learn to ride and write a book about it.

Doesn't this mean that you're now writing what you know? Well, yes, but you didn't know how to ride a horse before you got the idea for the book. The point is that you should never let the statement "write what you know" direct your writing. Instead, go with your heart. What do you love to write about? Horses? Fantasies? Murder mysteries? We all have things we love, and we should direct our efforts to these areas.

If you can do this, you'll soon find that the words just pour out of you and take their place on the page.