Why write?
On the eve of the release of The Second Fall, book #2 in the Exiled Trilogy, I am filled with gratitude and, naturally, the desire to wax philosophical about writing.
Writing is a joy and a beast. It’s wonderful to fall into a world, get lost in the story of my making. Whatever story I’m working on is constantly rattling around in the back of my mind, somewhere, even when I’m not sitting down to write.
We all have a creative impulse. Creating is part and parcel of being human.
You may be inclined to retort, “Well I guess I’m less than human since I’m no Martha Stewart.”
No, no, no. There are many ways we create. If we judged creativity on craftiness and the ability to cut in a straight line, well, I ought to give up the ghost right now.
The way you choose to construct your life, your day, this very moment, reflects your creativity. We humans can’t stop doing it! We create, we make. In fact some have argued it’s more accurate to describe humans as makers (homo fabers) instead of knowers (homo sapiens).
I don’t think we have to choose between being primarily creators or knowers, because the one entails the other. It’s both, always both.
It is because we are rational creatures that we create. We see the world around us and we construct, we build, we place, we mold, we interact with the world, not simply on the world’s terms, as if there are brute facts in the world for us to discover. We are interpreters of the world, constantly constructing.
Do we construct in a vacuum? Do we create reality, as the nihilist might say, against no backdrop other than sheer force of our passions and will?
I don’t think so. We create in tandem, in relation, with others, with our experiences, with the world itself. As partners, as travelers, as strangers, as investigators.
And so I write. I write because I have stories to tell. I write because I want to connect with others. I write because I want to immerse myself in the mystery of life.
I write, because as Lizzy and her sisters and brothers proclaim, “Beauty will
redeem the world.” I believe it, and by working through the puzzle of the human condition by way of writing YA paranormal fiction, I hope to draw closer to the Beautiful and source of all being.
