Writing Workshop: “Writing What You Know”

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Anyone one that has ever written a story has most likely heard the phrase “Write what you know”. It sounds simple, but there’s more to it than what’s on the surface.

Let’s begin with the obvious, of course you should have some knowledge for what you want to write. It would be like spouting off an opinion about some movie you haven’t seen. You’ll come off as ignorant and incorrect in your beliefs. The same goes for writing, if you try to make things up as you go. Even the most causal of readers will take notice that you don’t know what you’re doing.

But what does it mean to “know” what you’re writing about. Well there are a few areas that you can use your knowledge base in to write proper stories. The first being your personal experiences. It’s not a bad option, seeing as this is one field you can use to make your stories stand out. While I don’t think we that unique, for the most part our experiences are different enough from others to make it worthwhile for separation from the pack.

This part is best suit for stories that are grounded in reality. Some examples might include a childhood misadventure with a group of kids, or a retelling of how you fell in love with your significant other. Though you kind of had to live a life that wasn’t devoid of interesting events for this to work. So while I think it’s a decent method to explore, it certainly isn’t for everyone.

The better method, and which is what this saying is really about, is to do your research. This is how so many authors succeed and where just as many, if not more, fail in writing. This is not a recommendation, I’m saying that this is a requirement to good writing. If it wasn’t for this, then many popular genres would not exist at all such as fantasy or sci-fi. These types of genres are the ones that, while they may have some basis in reality, don’t exist in our current realm and time. We don’t have magic or dragons, nor do we have space travel and lasers. Yet some of the greatest stories ever told come these genres.

People are able to write them, and very well at that, because they do their research. Either it comes from studying stories that came before them to understand how these stories function at a basic level. In the case of sci-fi some take a look at experimental tech and incorporate it, creating a timeless story where readers say that they predicted the future.

Yet, even if your confident in your knowledge, or even have experience in, your planned topic/genre. You should still do this every time you want to start a new story. You can and should always learn about your craft. For me, that’s part of the fun. I’m confident that many writers actually enjoy researching because you learn things you never knew about.

The final part I want to cover is the field of fanfiction. One that I’m sure many reading aren’t proud of, but given its popularity in amateur writing I would be remiss to not cover it. This area is different from original fiction in that some aspects come from an established work.

This adds not only taking the time to learn about the genre you going to enter by doing so, but also of the work your adapting in the first place. Of course I imagine that if you wanted to write fanfiction of something, you already are a rather big fan of whatever that something is. But I believe that it goes further than just watching every episode of that show or watching the movie.

Instead I implore anyone that wishes to do this to take the time and really learn about the characters in this story, the world they live in, and its history. Take the time to analyze it and create something that could almost pass for official work.

I hope this is helpful to your next story. I believe that a great story is told from taking careful attention to the details in your work and researching your topics, genres, and even source material. This is a good beginning to have when your starting out writing your first story and one that I hope more people take with them in their journeys.

Writing Workshop is a series I’m creating as I learn more about writing. I am no expert, but I believe that I can help beginners find their words and create stories that are well made with less struggles during the process.

There are many amateur writers that I don’t believe take the time to really learn the craft and I hope that this series can at least change it, if only a little. That said, I myself am still learning and I would love to hear feedback in the comments below on how to improve myself in writing fiction as well as writing this series over time.