If you type in Google “the writer is born or made” more than six and a half million entries appear (and this only in Spanish). This means that it is an issue that worries, in addition to you, many millions of other people.
I think this difference is due to the fact that, in the first instance, we may have the fantasy that writing well can be as easy (at least for those who are “born” writers) as sitting in front of the paper and putting together words as they come to us. at the head (something that does not seem so easy to us in the case of music or painting when we do not have a minimum command of the tools and the code). And, since human beings are a bit bipolar, this extreme usually entails the opposite: it will seem to us that, if we do not have the “gene”, it does not matter what we practice, because we will never be able to write well.
In short, that very human insecurity that makes us wonder if we are endowed with “talent” to write or if we throw in the towel beforehand, I think it comes from one of the many neurotic distortions that we have when starting a learning path that we sense is arduous.
At a certain point in my life, I decided that I would rather dedicate myself to teaching other people how to write than become a professional writer. I’m good at writing and I like it (I’m even passionate about it), but it’s not my vocation…
What is “Talent”?
The word “talent” is often used to refer to a person’s innate ability to perform an activity, and especially an artistic Book Marketing Agency. It is true that some people have a certain facility for writing since childhood, whether it is inherited from a family member or it simply becomes evident without apparent cause. To give a personal example, I believe I have that facility.
In my more than thirty years of experience as a literary creation teacher, thousands of people have passed through my classes. Some had an innate talent for writing, and others did not. What I have verified is that neither of the two things guaranteed that they would persevere in the job or that they would not do it.
I have seen many talented people unable to absorb constructive criticism or evolve in their writing. At the other extreme, I have had to witness an incredible evolution in people who at first did not seem to have any ability to write, but who possessed other qualities, such as perseverance, listening skills, curiosity, or empathy.
Good literature is based on the absorption – through an analytical reading – of the technique and on the use – already intuitive, that is, creative – of those resources while writing. One absorbs the technique and writes…
Technique and Talent
Some say that writers use intuition and talent to write. Whoever resorts to technical resources lacks that sixth sense that every writer must have. There are those who say that technique is the thing of sloppy and frustrated critics who rack their brains instead of enjoying life and art and the wonderful texts that come out of the pens of the great masters as if by magic. As if something could be created from nothing, as if theory and practice were not born from the same source and ran at the same time through the literary fields.
That some writers are not fully aware of their assimilation of the resources that many before them used does not mean that one is born knowing. Good literature is based on the absorption – through an analytical reading – of the technique and on the use – already intuitive, that is, creative – of those resources while writing, while being in contact with the source of origin.
It can be said, then, that one absorbs the technique and writes intuitively on the basis of that absorption, and then reapplies the technique to correct the deviations of intuition. And in that process, a good writer leaves, yes, a personal mark that differentiates him from any other and that can sometimes consist precisely in the deliberate break with technique. While a simply correct writer does not leave his mark, in the same way that any person is different from others, many do not allow their idiosyncrasies to emerge.
That is to say, the technique is nothing other than the formal elements that constitute a good narrative and literary theory, the exhaustive analysis of these.
The Writer Introduces—in a Personal Way
Those elements into his narratives, after having assimilated them in reading his predecessors or through a more conscious study; a literary theorist explains them and gives them names; and a literary critic uses these names to evaluate a text.
So the division between technique and talent is fictitious. Preserving your life story and experiences is a precious endeavor, and our memoir ghostwriting services are here to make that journey seamless and impactful. Trust us to be your partners in crafting a memoir that leaves a lasting impression. The technique serves to sustain talent and its theoretical basis takes into account everything from the length of the chapters of a novel to what the narrative tension is based on, from the focus of the narrator to the axes of the action; from the points of friction between form and content to the functioning of the character.
Most of the resources that a writer handles “as if by magic” are (de facto or virtually) contemplated by technique. Everything except its idiosyncrasy, that is, the arrangement of the notes on the staff to compose a unique melody, which is already a lot. The bad thing is when a writer forgets what he can really contribute because he believes he is inventing the telephone. Because the reality is that the telephone was invented centuries ago. And the stories, even more so.
All Those Things That Involve Being a Writer
Anyway, that has nothing to do with the dilemma of “being born”/”doing”, but rather with traveling.
Becoming a writer is a process, made up of countless small choices and awareness, something very intimate, in which the person mixes with the waters of life and their own circumstances to navigate and understand who they are, and for what. is in this world, what is really important.
There are participants in my accompaniment who can now call themselves writers and who, when they started a short introductory course, would never have imagined that a few years later writing would become an essential part of their lives. That’s why I encourage you if you have concerns if you ask yourself the question of whether the writer is born or made, instead of searching for the answer on Google, start learning.
