Why Write?

So, why do I write? I realise nobody is actually asking that, but I'm going to answer it anyway.

When I was a child, my mother read me stories like most kids. The Chronicles of Narnia, Hob, Dr. Seuss, among others. I remember them vividly and I loved them. As I grew I began finding my own books to read. Tintin, Choose-Your-Own-Adventure, Fighting Fantasy, and later, as a teenager I found Terry Pratchett and Tolkien. The early reading I did certainly informs my writing today, even though I never imagined I'd write back then.

Fast forward to my early twenties and I was a rather left-field lad. I was heavily influenced by Kerouac, Bukowski and all the other Beats as well a plethora of crazy music and films. A good friend of mine also read Kerouac heavily and together we formed ideas and I began writing. Mainly it was total homage to Jack himself and I guess I was just swept away by the idea of being a carefree, rebellious writer throwing away the rulebook of grammar and form. In retrospect, I realise now that Jack's writing was massively informed by great literature and he knew exactly what he was doing in order to break the grammatic rules. But it was a start. I had found my voice.

I wrote sporadically back then, and eventually I slowed to a standstill with it.

I was doing a dead-end job. I was in my thirties. I had come to middle age and wanted a career after years of bouncing from job to job. So, University it would be. I decided that as I had played music for years, I would naturally study for a degree in music. I signed myself up for the Open University. My first courses were broad humanities courses. As well as music, I studied Art History, Philosophy, Architecture, Literature, and Creative Writing. As I went through the various levels of courses, Creative Writing grabbed me. I realised that there was so much more to it than I had thought when I had written previously. I loved it. The more I wrote, the more I understood it and longed to be better.

Then, in parallel with my degree, I had kids. First came my son, then later, towards the end of my degree, my daughter. They changed everything for me. I realised, that I was no longer writing just for me. I was writing for them. I've always had this morbid fascination with my death and what would remain of me beyond that. Now that I had kids, I realised; they would be my legacy. I think I have an interesting world view. Certainly not unique, but interesting nonetheless. I found more and more, that I wanted to put my views, my ethics, my fantasies, my hopes, my dreams, my fears, my lessons down on paper. For them. So that long after I am gone, I can still be with them. Still have an impact on them. Parents are always in a hard position; too old to be relevant, to relate to, to close to understand with perspective. Maybe my writing will stand for itself with them. Maybe they can see me with distant eyes if I'm writing from beyond the page. It's probably naïve. It's bound to have zero impact on them for years, if at all, but all the same, that's why I write.

M