Rupert Pollard
This is not a simple question to answer, and the answer might change over time.
There are two things that are really great about being a writer.
The first is writing. Preparation work might seem like drudgery until you do it, and then the story begins to take a life of its own. It starts growing in your mind and details begin suggesting themselves to you. The disconnected bones start giving you clues about how to assemble the skeleton. Writing the actual story, stepping into the characters' shoes, getting to know them up close and personal, creating their speech and behavior patterns, putting them through their paces and playing with their emotions is incredibly fun, but every once in a while they pay you back by actually surprising you with the things they do, the decisions they make, or some secret that was hidden in the back of your mind that gets revealed while you're putting the words on the page. Those surprises, the entirely serendipitous moments when something unexpected happens in the story you are creating, are probably my favorite thing about being a writer.
The second is talking with someone about your story. When someone sees something, relates to something, or a concept catches their imagination and they get excited, that has few parallels in life. Performing in front of an appreciative audience, which I've done as a drummer and a singer, is a similar feeling.
Choosing between the two is difficult. They are both very rewarding but unique, almost incomparable. The first is a connection with someone, and sometimes something, in your own imagination that has taken on a life far greater than you thought you had imagined, and the second is a connection with someone else who appreciates the story you worked so hard to deliver.
There are two things that are really great about being a writer.
The first is writing. Preparation work might seem like drudgery until you do it, and then the story begins to take a life of its own. It starts growing in your mind and details begin suggesting themselves to you. The disconnected bones start giving you clues about how to assemble the skeleton. Writing the actual story, stepping into the characters' shoes, getting to know them up close and personal, creating their speech and behavior patterns, putting them through their paces and playing with their emotions is incredibly fun, but every once in a while they pay you back by actually surprising you with the things they do, the decisions they make, or some secret that was hidden in the back of your mind that gets revealed while you're putting the words on the page. Those surprises, the entirely serendipitous moments when something unexpected happens in the story you are creating, are probably my favorite thing about being a writer.
The second is talking with someone about your story. When someone sees something, relates to something, or a concept catches their imagination and they get excited, that has few parallels in life. Performing in front of an appreciative audience, which I've done as a drummer and a singer, is a similar feeling.
Choosing between the two is difficult. They are both very rewarding but unique, almost incomparable. The first is a connection with someone, and sometimes something, in your own imagination that has taken on a life far greater than you thought you had imagined, and the second is a connection with someone else who appreciates the story you worked so hard to deliver.
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