Original subtitles

The only commitment a writer needs

is the commitment of the seat of his pants

to the seat of his chair.

In other words, just sit down and do your work.

I one or two writers who write standing up.

But actually sitting down is really important.

Sit down and don't get up until you've written something.

So now that we're coming towards the end of this conversation

we've been having, I thought I'd try

we've been having, I thought I'd try

and sum it up by offering you some of the best bits of advice

I can think of giving you.

And I think basically I want to offer you

seven tips that you might use as you think about your own work.

The first thing I would say is that I

believe that there are two ways of writing really, really well.

believe that there are two ways of writing really, really well.

One you would call maximalist.

And the other you would call minimalist.

Minimalism would mean that you have a very tight focus

on one beautiful strand of story,

like one hair from the goddess of literature.

And you turn it in the light.

And you see how it catches the light.

Very, very simple and pure piece of storytelling.

Very, very simple and pure piece of storytelling.

That can be extraordinary.

At the other end of the spectrum,

the maximalist spirit is one which

tries to scoop up enormous armfuls of the world

and try and put as much of the world as you can fit in there.

Henry James used to call books like that,

he used to call them loose, baggy monsters.

In my view, they don't have to be loose or baggy.

And they're not necessarily monsters.

But it gives you a sense of what they're like.

But it gives you a sense of what they're like.

They're encyclopedic books, books which

try to be everything books.

It seems to me that you can either write an everything

book, or you can write a very pure simple something book.

And the middle ground, to my mind, is less interesting.

But you have to find your own ground.

I'm just saying, think about those two extremes.

Think about, which is your temperament?

Is it your temperament to tell a single pure story?

Is it your temperament to tell a single pure story?

Or to go with a wheelbarrow and try

and scoop up the whole world and put it in your book?

I mean, myself I have been more often on the maximalist than

on the minimalist side.

But some of the writers I most admire, like, for example,

W. G. Sebald, are on the minimalist side.

So try and think which side you're on.

That's the first tip.

The second question you should ask yourself

is whether you are better served by planning

something out very carefully or by allowing yourself

space to improvise.

And again, there isn't a right answer.

The only right answer is, which is right for you?

There are writers who benefit enormously

from the comfort of a carefully worked out scheme.

from the comfort of a carefully worked out scheme.

And there are writers who benefit

from being allowed to kind of wing it, to make it

up as they go along.

And again, think about which, temperamentally,

is closest to your nature.

And then try and stick to that path.

The third thing I would say is, whatever you write,

The third thing I would say is, whatever you write,

it should feel deeply necessary to you to write it.

I mean, really, don't write it just to make money.

Don't write it to be famous.

Those are, in my view, terrible reasons to write.

Write because it comes from some very deep place inside you

that you really, really, really need to express.

And I've always thought the world is full of books.

And I've always thought the world is full of books.

There's a zillion books out there.

And none of us in a lifetime will read all the great books

there are to read.

So nobody needs your book.

If you're going to add to the mountain,

make sure it feels essential to you to do so.

Make sure that you can't not write it.

If you can find a reason for not writing a book, don't write it.

Write the books that you can't avoid writing.

The fourth thing I would say to you

is try to do something dangerous.

I don't mean physically dangerous to you.

I mean artistically dangerous.

Take risks.

There's a thing I've always loved,

that in one of Hemingway's bullfighting books, he says,

the great matador works closest to the bull.

I mean, I don't like bullfighting either.

I mean, I don't like bullfighting either.

So it's not about that.

But what he's saying is that if the bull is passing by so close

that it brushes your thigh as it goes past, then every move

you make has to be perfect.

Otherwise, you get a horn in your side.

And it'll be disastrous.

But if the bull is far away from you, it's not dangerous.

But it's also kind of not exciting.

So try and find a way of working close to the bull.

Try and find a way of taking the risk that

Try and find a way of taking the risk that

means that your book has a high risk of not coming off.

But if it does come off, it's extraordinary.

Take the risk.

I seem to be talking about Hemingway a lot.

Because he's good at writing tips.

But he was asked--

I think it was in his interview for the Paris Review.

I think it was in his interview for the Paris Review.

He was asked about commitment.

Writers are being always asked about whether they should have

political commitment, social commitments, whether they

should write out of a sense of commitment to some cause.

And he said, the only commitment a writer needs

is the commitment of the seat of his pants

to the seat of his chair.

In other words, just sit down and do your work.

There are writers--

I one or two writers who write standing up.

But actually sitting down is really important.

But actually sitting down is really important.

Sit down and don't get up until you've written something.

That commitment, the commitment to sit there and not get up

until you've done some work.

A thing I was told, actually, by a film director--

and I think it applies just as well to books--

is that if there's a problem, if you've

is that if there's a problem, if you've

identified some kind of a problem in your storyline,

the solution almost always is to cut that out.

One has a desire to get in there and fix it.

But a lot of the time, it's just easier

to think, OK, that doesn't work.

Take that out.

Let's get on.

You might well find that the book

is clarified if you have the willingness

to discard what's not working.

And the seventh, and I think, in a way, essential thing to say,

is that writers are people who finish books.

That's to say, they get to the end.

It may seem like a truism, but there's

an awful lot of people who, in a way,

may have a book in their head to write,

but they never get it written.

So just make sure that you don't stop until you get to the end.

Also, in my experience, every time

Also, in my experience, every time

I have got to the end of a manuscript,

I have immediately been able to see what it needs.

To have the whole thing there in front of me,

I can see, oh, I need less here.

I need more there.

I need to explain that more.

I've gone on too long over there.

It suddenly becomes clear.

So make sure that you finish the book.

And then you will be a writer.