Why do people think writing is easy?

[KnuteRockne]

I'm astonished by those bloggers who can just pour **** out. For me writing is like pulling teeth. My internal editor is a ****ing stingy ASSHOLE.

If you really care about it, that's usually how it goes.

I read a great interview with Richard Ben Cramer where he said he just figured Tom Wolfe was on another level from the rest of us and the words just poured out of him like that, his pieces and books and novels fully formed from the womb.

Well he walks into the Rolling Stone office one day to write a story or something along those lines, and there's Wolfe at a desk, struggling over his sentences. He recognized "the look" as Wolfe struggled to write whatever he was working on and it was a revelation for him: "Tom, you M.F.," he says he thought to himself, "you're a working-class stiff just like the rest of us after all."

 

[Cansportschick]

I always get comments like "it doesn't take much to write", "writing is the easiest and laziest profession".
It infuriates me >:( to hear stuff like that. It takes a lot to craft a story and do research to compliment stories, get comments/quotes for the story, create a catchy lead/headline. It takes a lot of effort, and if you get writer's block or brain lapses, it takes longer and it is harder. I always tell people who say that to me to go ahead and write a 500 word story on a sports issue and see if they can do it in 30 minutes. That is when they realize how hard it is.

 

[Duane Postum]

What's that quote?

"Easy writing makes for hard reading."

 

[Johnny Dangerously]

Not sure if this belongs here or on the journalism only board, but since I'm referring to fiction, books, screenwriting, etc., I'll put it here.

Seems every time the topic of me carving out my writing career comes up arounds friends and family, the response seems to be, "Oh, that shouldn't be a problem for you. You're such a good writer! You're good at it!"

When I read that, I didn't understand why this thread has the subject line it does. I interpreted the comments the way I do when this happens to me: that people know writing isn't easy, that it doesn't come easy for them, and they marvel when someone can write well, and they're paying you a compliment. Whether or not they think writing is easy for me (or you), I can't say, but I've never took it that way.

I've always accepted it as a high compliment. I'm also certain they have no idea how hard it is, but they know how hard it is for them.

 

[wickedwritah]

I find that most people are under the impression that writing isn't physical work, therefore requires zero effort. I find those people to be assholes, but that's just me.

Interesting take. Maybe it's because of the gut and the fact that I was born with few athletic genes, but I admire anyone who can bench press 400 like it's nothing. Makes me realize how lucky I am to be a hack and not a construction worker.

 

[MartinEnigmatica]

This whole dynamic is a similar to comedy in many respects. I bet there are people out there, friends of comics, who tell them all the time, "you'll make it, you're hysterical!" Likewise, there are people out there who think stand-up comedy is a piece of cake.
Then they sign up for a 4-minute spot during community night at the local Chuckle Wagon and they change their thinking.

 

[In Exile]

Some people think writing is easy because the very best writing, when the writer has done his or her job well, often comes off as absolutely effortless.

 

[GuessWho]

It's not hard to write. Anyone with a high school education can do it. Writing well, on the other hand ...

When I was just starting out in the 1960s (and I was in high school), my crusty old city editor told me, "You know you're getting better as a writer when it gets harder for you." I didn't know what the hell he was talking about at the time, but I sure do now.