The First 12 Years are the Worst

Below is the inimitable Anne Enright on her ten rules for writing fiction, courtesy of The Guardian . She and I shared the same hotel at the Auckland Writers and Readers Week. I ran into her at the front door, and we talked a little. She's very spiky and funny on stage and her Booker book The Gathering is spiky and dark on the page. Her descriptive powers are heavenly. So here she is, predictably spiky and honest about writing ... and in the same article you'll also find  Atwood, Gaiman, Ford, Franzen and others.  


Anne Enright's Ten Rules for Writing Fiction

1 The first 12 years are the worst.

2 The way to write a book is to actually write a book. A pen is useful, typing is also good. Keep putting words on the page.

3 Only bad writers think that their work is really good.

4 Description is hard. Remember that all description is an opinion about the world. Find a place to stand.

5 Write whatever way you like. Fiction is made of words on a page; reality is made of something else. It doesn't matter how "real" your story is, or how "made up": what matters is its necessity.

6 Try to be accurate about stuff.

7 Imagine that you are dying. If you had a terminal disease would you ­finish this book? Why not? The thing that annoys this 10-weeks-to-live self is the thing that is wrong with the book. So change it. Stop arguing with yourself. Change it. See? Easy. And no one had to die.

8 You can also do all that with whiskey.

9 Have fun.

10 Remember, if you sit at your desk for 15 or 20 years, every day, not ­counting weekends, it changes you. It just does. It may not improve your temper, but it fixes something else. It makes you more free.