The Trick to Writing Honestly.

“The only way to write honestly about the scene is to be part of it.” Hunter S. Thompson

“Is it best to write a novel the way you would talk to a person?” someone asked me the other day, and I told them “It depends. If you haven’t experienced what you’re writing about, I’d use someone who has.” 

Maybe that sounds facetious, but too many writers are online asking questions like “How do you perform an appendectomy?” If you haven’t performed one — or watched one performed on you — stay out of hospital garb. Better still, leave it out altogether before you’re called a fraud.

So many writers feel insecure about what they’ve done or where they’ve been. They like the idea of saying ‘I was crossing the Gobi on a dying camel, maybe both of us wondering who would die first.” As colourful as it sounds, your knowledge of camels or deserts — or dying — is severely limited (just like I doubt T.E. Lawrence ever wrote about appendectomies).

As insecure as you may feel about your own experiences, they’re all you’ve got. Either you’ve lived or you haven’t. As Hunter S. Thompson also said “Who is the happier man, he who has braved the storm of life and lived or he who has stayed securely on shore and merely existed?”

That’s a question for every writer. It’s one thing to write the way you talk, it’s another to have something worth talking about. Experience is what separates hacks from honesty, and hackery is the closest cousin of fraud.

I say this because we’re in the business of realism — even when it’s fiction. Believability isn’t about research, it’s about knowing something firsthand. If you’ve been a baker all your life, that’s what you are. Write about that. If you don’t think anybody’s interested, George Orwell devoted much of “Down and Out In Paris and London” to his time working in Parisian restaurants.

When I wrote my first novel, I was just leaving corporate advertising. It was a long, tough ride, as Charles Bukowski liked to say. The book was supposed to be about my time as a copywriter. Then I thought about my last day, walking down the hall, leaving on the elevator. I suddenly realized the story wasn’t about advertising — it was what happens after.

Without giving away the novel itself, my main character gets a job house painting. It’s a revelation of sorts, a type of found happiness. “I like it better up here with the bees,” he says, “then down there with the weedwackers.”

What did I know about house painting? I was a house painter many years ago. I knew what it meant to be up there “with the bees.” Later in the book, my character takes up ballroom dancing. I painted a ballroom one time while a class was going on. I remembered the instructor, an Argentinean, had a very clipped voice. That voice stayed with me for over 40 years!

Each of my characters grew from voices of my past. I kept them like a vocal library. In some respects, I met them again during the book. We became better acquainted, we discussed things, our relationship grew.

That’s the intimacy of writing. The best writers are the most respectful of their characters. Even the louses and losers get their chance. Creating realism is more than adopting a personal voice. It’s about using your life, your experiences, your time on this earth to give your work personal meaning. That’s a matter of trust, both in yourself and your characters.

You’re actually sharing your life experience with your characters, and they share theirs with you. It’s a collaboration of sorts, borne out on the pages of your book. When you try to manipulate your characters, you lose their respect. They return the favour by being phony.

Remember that person who asked if they should write like they’re talking to someone? They also asked if there was a formula. Every time I hear the word “formula,” it sounds like a recipe. Writing isn’t a recipe. It’s also not a contrivance. Here’s what I wrote back to him:

I wish I could say there’s a formula, Victor, there’s not. For all my years of writing, only one thing has worked (Hemingway: You learn to write by writing). Maybe I can add something here. You have to live in a book, knowing intimately everything about the people, places, etc. Once you can turn them on at will in your mind, writing becomes a type of reporting and transcription. You follow your characters, you watch, you listen. You allow them to lead their own lives. Never, ever, make people do things for your benefit. In a sense, this is Chekhovian. He always let his characters play in his mind, sort of like a movie that starts as soon as you sit down at your computer (okay, he didn’t have a computer). Look up instead of down. Let the movie form around you. When your characters feel comfortable, when they feel you’re reporting honestly and not imposing yourself, then they come to life. They do the work for you. They go about like a reality show, with you following as the cameraman. If this seems undisciplined, believe me, it’s not. It’s hard building trust with your characters, but until you do that, until they’re relaxed, your book will be stiff, stilted and boring. All novelists learn this eventually, Victor. It’s the only way to write if you’re writing believably.

My favourite anecdote involves Jim Capaldi (of Traffic). Keith Richards mentions it in his book “My Life.” Jim came out of a bar washroom one time and sits down next to Richards. Someone at the table says, “Did you know your fly’s undone?” Capaldi replies, “Know it? I lived it.”

That pretty much says it all.

Robert Cormack is a freelance copywriter, novelist and blogger. His first novel “You Can Lead a Horse to Water (But You Can’t Make It Scuba Dive)” is available online and at most major bookstores. Check out Yucca Publishing or Skyhorse Press for more details.