Read! Read! Read!

The best advice the Grumpy Vegan could give to anyone who wants to write is to read. Read. Read. Read. Read the writers that inspire. Not to mimic them. But to explore and understand how and why they wrote what they do. Read as much as you can of what they’ve written. For example, one of my favorite writers is Virginia Woolf. Each summer I treat myself to one of her novels. Today, I’ve just finished The Years. Throughout the reminder of the year I periodically read randomly selected extracts from her diaries and letters. The range of her writing styles is vividly displayed in her novels, diaries, letters and criticisms. There’s a difference when she’s writing for publication in a novel and when she writes for herself in a diary and when she writes a letter to family and friends. I don’t share any pretense of wanting to write like her. She’s truly unique, which is why the Grumpy Vegan thinks Michael Cunningham’s The Hours should have been seen for what it was — plagiarism. And whoever thought to cast an Australian to play dear Virginia? Shocking!