Topic: Advice for Beginning Writers

Question: What do beginning writers have to learn?

Answer: “The most important lesson I learned…was that to be a better writer, you have to write, and write all the time…. Beginning writers sometimes have a hard time understanding how much practice is required to get anywhere with your work. Part of this means…being able to write 10 pages and then, when you realize those pages aren’t working, you cut the ten pages.”

“Now that most writers write first drafts on computers, there’s almost no reason not to be willing to experiment and fail again and again. So a lot of what I do is to try to get students used to the habit of writing something, not having it work out, rewriting it, rewriting it again, make some decision, rewrite it again—and then try to finish the thing.” Joe Meno.

Comment: You need to practice writing, even if it doesn’t work out. Many writers tell how they have written a great deal, with only a few pieces actually published. RayS.

Title: “Imagining Out of the Box.” Mort Castle’s interview with Joe Meno. The Writer (January 2011), 18-20.