Am I Old Enough to Write About This?
If you're a young writer (by which I mean, you're between the ages of 10-20 and you write), you've probably wondered if you were old enough to write about some of the situations/emotions/relationships you want to write about. You wonder if your young age, or lack of experience, might prevent your writing from being believable, or well-received.
I feel you.
I started writing when I was twelve. (More specifically, I mean that I started working on my first novel when I was twelve... of course, I wrote lots of other things, like homework assignments and diary entries, before that). That first book, although it was pretty bad and extremely embarrassing (check out the snark and the glory of my review of Chapter One if you missed it).
Cutesy, earnest awkwardness aside, there are some kind of dark themes later in that book. Death, ostracism, danger. And I distinctly remember asking myself, "Am I too young to write about this? Will this be believable, written from the perspective of someone my age?"
I also remember being pretty concerned that my boy character would not sound believable, because up to that point, my only real interaction with boys had been exchanges of the "You're fat and ugly/Well you're an uneducated troglodyte" variety. My boy character wasn't like that at all. After every line of dialogue he spoke, I would wring my metaphorical hands, wondering whether a boy would really talk like that. But that issue probably falls more under the dilemma of "write what you know," which I've already taken to task.
As I've been working on my new book (updates on that coming soon!), I've been asking myself about the themes in this book. It gets pretty grim, in parts. Death, ostracism, danger. Sometimes I have to ask myself, "Am I old enough to write about this?" Sure, I might technically be 25, but inside, I'm still a geeky 12-year-old who's not all that sure her male characters are believable. Or her female characters, for that matter.
After thirteen years of dealing with the same worries and fears, I've come to suspect that there is no age at which we'll feel old enough, experienced enough, or knowledgeable enough. Of course, maybe that magical age is 26, or 35, or 70-- but do we really want to wait until then? The perfect age to start writing is the age you are when you start wanting to write. Yes, you are old enough now to write about what you want to write about. On the flip side, you're not too old to write about whatever it is, either.
BOCTAOE. I mean, if you're six years old and you want to write an erotic murder-mystery-crime-thriller about Mexican drug cartels... actually, scratch that. I would love to read that.
Go forth, young ones. Write dangerously.
I feel you.
I started writing when I was twelve. (More specifically, I mean that I started working on my first novel when I was twelve... of course, I wrote lots of other things, like homework assignments and diary entries, before that). That first book, although it was pretty bad and extremely embarrassing (check out the snark and the glory of my review of Chapter One if you missed it).
Cutesy, earnest awkwardness aside, there are some kind of dark themes later in that book. Death, ostracism, danger. And I distinctly remember asking myself, "Am I too young to write about this? Will this be believable, written from the perspective of someone my age?"
I also remember being pretty concerned that my boy character would not sound believable, because up to that point, my only real interaction with boys had been exchanges of the "You're fat and ugly/Well you're an uneducated troglodyte" variety. My boy character wasn't like that at all. After every line of dialogue he spoke, I would wring my metaphorical hands, wondering whether a boy would really talk like that. But that issue probably falls more under the dilemma of "write what you know," which I've already taken to task.
As I've been working on my new book (updates on that coming soon!), I've been asking myself about the themes in this book. It gets pretty grim, in parts. Death, ostracism, danger. Sometimes I have to ask myself, "Am I old enough to write about this?" Sure, I might technically be 25, but inside, I'm still a geeky 12-year-old who's not all that sure her male characters are believable. Or her female characters, for that matter.
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| This is about the age I feel today. |
After thirteen years of dealing with the same worries and fears, I've come to suspect that there is no age at which we'll feel old enough, experienced enough, or knowledgeable enough. Of course, maybe that magical age is 26, or 35, or 70-- but do we really want to wait until then? The perfect age to start writing is the age you are when you start wanting to write. Yes, you are old enough now to write about what you want to write about. On the flip side, you're not too old to write about whatever it is, either.
BOCTAOE. I mean, if you're six years old and you want to write an erotic murder-mystery-crime-thriller about Mexican drug cartels... actually, scratch that. I would love to read that.
Go forth, young ones. Write dangerously.
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