Heidi Fisk's Blog - Posts Tagged "writing-diversity"
Artistic freedom and expectations.
Well, the title for this is somewhat of a lie. It's less about writing for an audience, and rather if you should change the content of your book or story to fit a wider or smaller range of people.
This topic came to mind where I often see people complain about the lack of certain character types etc in a genre.
This is a...rather interesting problem. I will, however say this as bluntly as possible. Everyone has the right to create the story they want, as diverse or lacking in diversity as they wish it to be.
To remove such a thing from the author whether it be due to profit or a misinformed sense of self-righteousness of doing the right thing.
The one beautiful thing about books is that they are usually a result of one person story and ideas. And while there are editors and cover-artist that may pop their head in and make a few changes. Usually what is on the page came directly from the writers head.
Even more so with self-publishing, there are far less things to worry about compared to something like a movie or a video game. Even comics have things they have to worry about.
I would never want someone to tell a writer to change a gay character straight because it would be more profitable. Nor would I want them to be forced to add a gay character or a minority for the sake of pure diversity without any context to that diversity.
We should be letting each author voice sing and filter as little as possible form their head to the page.
Sorry if this feels odd. I was wondering if I should even publish this Blog since I know it's very much a hot-topic currently.
Above all I value individuals being able to create what they want to create. Even if I may not enjoy it, doesn't mean it doesn't have an audience or doesn't need to exist. I just wished more people thought that way.
This topic came to mind where I often see people complain about the lack of certain character types etc in a genre.
This is a...rather interesting problem. I will, however say this as bluntly as possible. Everyone has the right to create the story they want, as diverse or lacking in diversity as they wish it to be.
To remove such a thing from the author whether it be due to profit or a misinformed sense of self-righteousness of doing the right thing.
The one beautiful thing about books is that they are usually a result of one person story and ideas. And while there are editors and cover-artist that may pop their head in and make a few changes. Usually what is on the page came directly from the writers head.
Even more so with self-publishing, there are far less things to worry about compared to something like a movie or a video game. Even comics have things they have to worry about.
I would never want someone to tell a writer to change a gay character straight because it would be more profitable. Nor would I want them to be forced to add a gay character or a minority for the sake of pure diversity without any context to that diversity.
We should be letting each author voice sing and filter as little as possible form their head to the page.
Sorry if this feels odd. I was wondering if I should even publish this Blog since I know it's very much a hot-topic currently.
Above all I value individuals being able to create what they want to create. Even if I may not enjoy it, doesn't mean it doesn't have an audience or doesn't need to exist. I just wished more people thought that way.
