Ask the Author: Scott Berkun
Answered Questions (10)
Scott Berkun
Hi Larry. The very idea of a memoir is openness and candor. It'd be a mistake to writing in this form without going all the way - to play it safe as you say could have been achieved by writing it as a novel where I could change things and have no obligation to be based in what really happened, but I like truth. I like the challenge of writing about the truth, or the truth as I understand it. I read many memoirs (dozens) to study how the form works, and what approaches work and don't work in writing about ones own life.
Scott Berkun
The best advice I've received is not to put too much faith in other people's advice.You should listen of course and spend time considering their point of view, but advice is far easier to give than to take.
If I were talking to my 20 year old self I would try of course, but i'd assume I'd be far too stubborn to listen. We only hear advice we're ready to hear, so it's a less a question of the advice you receive and far more about how interested the listener is in thinking about themselves or their lives differently. Few people want or are willing to change and no advice is likely to change that.
I stay productive by doing work I'm passionate about. I'm only on this planet a little while, and it's easy to see that if I'm productive I get to do more of the things I love.
If I were talking to my 20 year old self I would try of course, but i'd assume I'd be far too stubborn to listen. We only hear advice we're ready to hear, so it's a less a question of the advice you receive and far more about how interested the listener is in thinking about themselves or their lives differently. Few people want or are willing to change and no advice is likely to change that.
I stay productive by doing work I'm passionate about. I'm only on this planet a little while, and it's easy to see that if I'm productive I get to do more of the things I love.
Scott Berkun
I wish I knew what your question means.
Scott Berkun
I have and it's complicated. My brother is a fantastic father and I think his relationship with his children is self contained. Nothing my parents or I do can touch what he has created inside his family. I do hope that something improves in the wider shape of our broader family, but the odds of that seem very slim.
I don't have children and don't expect to. It seems self serving to say, but if I did have children I'd hope they'd be willing to write a book like Ghost. Even if it meant I'd failed them in some way as a father (which is probably unavoidable), it would mean they've thought deeply about who they are, where they came from, and what they want to do about it, three things that signify despite my failings they've sorted themselves, at least part of the way.
I don't have children and don't expect to. It seems self serving to say, but if I did have children I'd hope they'd be willing to write a book like Ghost. Even if it meant I'd failed them in some way as a father (which is probably unavoidable), it would mean they've thought deeply about who they are, where they came from, and what they want to do about it, three things that signify despite my failings they've sorted themselves, at least part of the way.
Scott Berkun
I don't believe in writer's block. Do you get donut block? Walking block? Writing is just putting words in a row. What people call writers block is really a mismatch of expectations: you can't write well all the time. But that's what the next draft is for. Anyone can sit down and write poorly and often that's exactly what a writer working on an early draft of a book needs to do.
Scott Berkun
There is no one singular thing. I love the challenge. It's a test of many of my talents to have an idea for a book, and then to spend the year or two years to actually create the book that matches the idea I had in mind. It's a thrill to see people respond to the books, and to see them on my shelf, but the challenge of doing the work itself is one of the best things. If it were easy I'd be bored, and so would many writers.
Scott Berkun
There is a great lie among writing advice. Reading about writing isn't writing anymore than reading about how to play guitar is playing guitar. If you want to write, write every day. If you struggle to sit down to write, even for 20 minutes, every day it means you don't really want to be a writer. If you want to write, write. Write badly, write poorly, but write. It's only through doing a thing that you get better at it. This seems obvious but so many people spend decades thinking about writing, reading about writing, yet never writing and they wonder what the problem is.
Scott Berkun
The Ghost of My Father launched this week, and books don't promote themselves. I spend at least the first two months after a new book comes out trying to find the book a good home in the world, in the hands of as many people as I can put it.
Scott Berkun
The mere experience of thinking and feeling invites me to write. When I figure something out or discover a good story to share it seems a shame not to commit it to words - if it never makes it into words much harder to share with other people. I think of writing as part of being alive. It's one powerful way to express myself.
Scott Berkun
My family fell into an unusual kind of crisis and as a writer of other kinds of books it seemed clear I was the only person who was going to make sure the story was told, even if only my nieces and nephews would read it.
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May 09, 2017 03:57AM · flag