The Best Writing Advice You’ll Ever Get…(Guest Post)

Posted on by Chris The Story Reading Ape

Andrew Joyce

For a few years now, Chris has been posting articles to help us with our craft. I’ve learn some valuable things on this site, from editing to copywriting to marketing books and everything in between. I might have missed it, but there is one bit of advice that I have not seen here. And that is, if you want to write well, you must read.

Reading to a writer is as medical school is to a doctor, as training is to an athlete, as breathing is to life. Think of reading books as taking a writing course.

I would suggest reading the classics: Hemingway, Fitzgerald, and, of course, Steinbeck, to name but a few. These three authors made up their own rules. (Hemingway couldn’t get published at first because his writing was so different from the writing that preceded him.)

Below are three examples of Steinbeck’s writing. If you read stuff like this, you can’t help but become a better writer. Please note that the first example is one long sentence that makes up an entire paragraph. That, of course, is a big no-no . . . or so “they” say.

Steinbeck

• • • • •

“The concrete highway was edged with a mat of tangled, broken, dry grass, and the grass heads were heavy with oat beards to catch on a dog’s coat, and foxtails to tangle in a horse’s fetlocks, and clover burrs to fasten in sheep’s wool; sleeping life waiting to be spread and dispersed, every seed armed with an appliance of dispersal, twisting darts and parachutes for the wind, little spears and balls of tiny thorns, and all waiting for animals and the wind, for a man’s trouser cuff or the hem of a woman’s skirt, all passive but armed with appliances of activity, still, but each possessed the anlage of movement.”—John Steinbeck, The Grapes of Wrath

• • • • •

“The afternoon came down as imperceptibly as age comes to a happy man. A little gold entered into the sunlight. The bay became bluer and dimpled with shore-wind ripples. Those lonely fishermen who believe that the fish bite at high tide left their rocks and their places were taken by others, who were convinced that the fish bite at low tide.”—John Steinbeck, Tortilla Flat

• • • • •

“June is gay—cool and warm, wet and shouting with growth and reproduction of the sweet and the noxious, the builder and the spoiler. The girls in the body-form slacks wander High Street with locked hands while small transistor radios sit on their shoulders and whine love songs in their ears. The young boys, bleeding with sap, sit on the stools of Tanger’s Drugstore ingesting future pimples through straws. They watch the girls with level goat-eyes and make disparaging remarks to one another while their insides whimper with longing.”—John Steinbeck, The Winter of our Discontent

My first bit of advice is to read.

My second: don’t pay so much attention to the “rules” of writing.

Thank you for listening to my morning rant,

Andrew Joyce

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92 thoughts on “The Best Writing Advice You’ll Ever Get…(Guest Post)”

  3. Reblogged this on Smorgasbord – Variety is the spice of life and commented:
    Andrew Joyce guesting on The Story Reading Ape this morning. The saddest words that I have heard spoken by children and adults is ‘I don’t read books’ For me as a child and still they are stories to be devoured word by word and the more exciting the better. I joined wagon trains across the African Veld, flew in jets across Israeli skies and hunted monsters in cold dark waters. There is a special part of the brain that is activated when we hear music and words that evoke emotion. What a loss to have never felt that rush.. Do go over and add your views on reading on Andrews article.

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    • I’m an old codger. But can’t one delete the autocorrect on those new fangled devices? That would drive me crazier than I already am. I hear people complain about autocorrect all the time. I say stand up and throw off your shackles and chains. Take your life back from the machines!!! POWER TO THE PEOPLE!!!!

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  5. Thanks Andrew, I like especially the second advice: don’t pay so much attention to the “rules” of writing… 🙂
    About good read I might also mention the classics Lev Tolstoy (war & peace) and Fëdor Dostoevsky (the idiot)… these are quite “heavy” read material but instill a great descriptive potential underlined by a also great inner knowledge, for somebody interested in these type of matter.

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    • I read all of Fyordor”s books by the time I was twenty. When I was sixty, I decided to read Leo’s books. You are right they are “heavy,” but well worth wading through.
      “Everyone thinks of changing the world, but no one thinks of changing himself.
      If you want to be happy, be.
      All, everything that I understand, I understand only because I love.” — Leo Tolstoy

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  7. I agree, Andrew. Being an avid reader I have learned more from reading than I ever imagined I would. Also, I always have a book started and another one in the wings waiting to take flight. When I write I think of myself as the reader since I write off the cuff and let the characters take over. Like my motto says, Reading Gives You Wings to Fly!

    Thanks for the interesting post, Andrew and Chris!

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    • I find that I cannot read while I’m writing. I get too caught up in the book and neglect my writing. But when the writing, editing and marketing are out of the way, watch out, because I’m gonna make up for lost time.

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