Charles Johnson : The Way Of The Writer
I had bought this book in 2016, and had dragged it with me on every vacation, no matter how short it was - like Bilbo's Red Book or Leonardo's Mona Lisa, but it couldn't quite catch it, no matter how much I tried.
Now, I was ready.
I had a incredibly silent and great one-week-vacation in a really ,
really small town out in the country, in a place where the sound in the night is actually NOTHING.
NOTHING. No sound. Nada. Niente. Nichts. Rien.
That, together with the small mountain/hill looming over the two-to-three towns in the background, that was a fascinating way of wandering within the summer's naturre. No exscessive heat, it was close to perfect.
There, I was writing on my second attempt of a longer story. and how I … I … brooded about it !
The book needs quite some time until it catches fire, but the deeper I read into it, the deeper the feeling grew of "this man knows about writing !".
(You'd say : "Of course he does !" - but to me, this man was no-one I knew, because I don't read "high literature".)
Last night, I was able to FINALLY resolve a "plot knot" ! I was SO HAPPY afterwards !
And today, I really learned through him, through his writing, that he really knows what the problems of true writers are. Even although he has an immensively HUGE professional background, and probably wouldn't even understand me, I understood him. Or so, his words spoke to me, as I finally read today his article/essay about "The Alpha Narrative". Or, as I'd rather like to put it with his own words from his own book : "What is the difference between a storyteller and a writer ?"
And, for the very first time in my whole life, I felt UNDERSTOOD as an author ! As a writer ! As a Storyteller !
Thank you, Mr. Johnson,
and please note that some kind of wisdom needs its time to ripe until it can be plucked by the pupil.