Writing & Reading

[solarpsychedelic]

“If you don't have time to read,
you don't have the time (or the tools) to write.
Simple as that.”

-- Stephen King

In theory, I agree with King. A writer needs the fundamentals just as a house needs a floor. It’s basic architecture.

On the other hand, there are practical issues that get in the way like how to focus and conduct time management in an attention economy.

King wrote this book back in the good old days of 1999 when the internet was still new and self-publishing had not yet added millions of titles to the market. He’s also from the last generation of writers who could make a decent enough living at it, when magazines paid for short fiction and there were more publishing houses looking for authors.

But now? There’s so much, maybe even too much content demanding our attention. Given the emphasis on constant content production this internet culture demands, authors might feel compelled to keep writing and publishing which leaves little time for reading. And then there’s the marketing and promotion work, and yeah, there goes the day.

Writers also have jobs, families, maybe a social life of some sort (that’s important too!).

I’ve noticed that when I read a lot, I don’t write as much and vice versa. Periods of reading are followed by periods of writing and the cycle continues.