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‘You must not come lightly to the blank page,’ reminds Stephen King, the one-of-a-kind writer and a huge commercial success. He maintains that writing is refined thinking and reading is the creative centre of a writer’s life. Taking solitary walks, having an honest critique right by your side, and a boring routine do help. Having published two non-fiction books and with two more on the anvil, I not only resonate with King’s vantage point on authoring but also credit the King of Horror to have oversimplified the process. Perhaps he intended to motivate writers and not mere readers, knowing well that it takes a lot more than external motivation to ship a well written manuscript. So here are my insights on how to go about writing, especially in the non-fiction genre.
The first sobering reminder must be that no one, and by that I mean ‘absolutely no one’, is waiting for your book. The only other party interested in you maintaining a cadence is your publisher (if you are lucky to have one). So, you might as well take your time and do a good job. And since all deadlines are fake, especially those in the realm of writing, your book can wait. And it must, for in the sphere of non-fiction writing you are better off substantiating your ideas with hard fact, your imagination with grounded research, and your parochial view with given wisdom. Unlike in fiction, of the stature of Slaughterhouse-Five or A Confederacy of Dunces, you need more than your prose to move people. A book out in 2025 will do equally well debuting in 2027, except that you will regret from having put a half-baked dish for people’s consumption. Even if your work doesn’t come up to other’s expectations, it shouldn’t fall below yours. In this matter, time and slow gestation is of essence. Let a good content take its time, first in your mind and then on paper.
The second aspect is of the topic – should it be a market pull or an author’s push? Good books create their own markets. Akin to movies, there’s always a good time to tell a good story. It takes me back to my PhD days where I was advised to sift through endless journals and research papers to identify a ‘research gap’ that’s important enough to be impactful and narrow enough to be viable. Thankfully I pivoted, heeding to my internal compass and rather bridging a gap between my potential and my reality. A decade hence, the same rudder propels my writing journey – tell a story that you know well. Indeed you must be close to your audience, for you are speaking to someone, but the inspiration and material must emerge from inside, and that’s what ensures that it’s proprietary, authentic and enduring. Both In Search of Excellence and Good to Great, two of the most celebrated books in management research, stemmed from personal biases and detailed investigation—the market followed. So, follow your biases.
Having invoked King, how can I not talk about discipline. But the discipline that I am eluding to is not about the time of the day you write, or the number of words that you must write, or God forbids, your favourite place of writing. You must condition your mind to think in any situation and to be able to write almost anywhere. A ‘writer’s block’ is not so much of a cerebral chasm as is a fixation with the conditions when one can write. If you are used to a certain schedule of writing and for some reason those conditions don’t present themselves, you feel stuck. Such pretexts were anyways of your own creation, allegedly as enablers, but much more debilitating. Chris Kyle wrote American Sniper right in the middle of the Iraq war, Paul Kalanithi penned down When Breath Becomes Air in between his chemotherapy sessions, and Viktor Frankl’s Man’s Search for Meaning was a lived experience etched across multiple lives. If you have a thought, nothing must come in between you and it’s expression, least of it your own conveniences and inhibitions.
Reading – writing – speaking is the triad that facilitates fluency of thoughts. This is especially vital in non-fiction writing. You read widely, speak selectively and write sharply. The more you read, you pick up the elements of style, ideas whose time has come, and render those in your own unique style. By not rushing into your writing journey, by searching inside, and by dislodging yourself from the vagaries of the external world, you get the focal of your work inward. A final thought on commerce. Books take time to pick up. You must be willing to wait at least for a decade for your work to get noticed. Till such time keep writing. Write essays, small articles, stories, book chapters, book reviews, opinion pieces—all of these not only help you test the water but also keep you fluent. And then every once in a while will happen a commercial breakthrough. And even if it doesn’t, at least you led your time being engaged meaningfully.
These pieces are being published as they have been received – they have not been edited/fact-checked by ThePrint.