What did you first read? How did you begin to write? Who were the first to read what you wrote?
I first read the Giving Tree in 3rd grade. Something about that book really made me think and I realized even then that most books I had read by that time were really boring to me and after reading that I thought, "Man, I want to make people think, I want people to be interested in what I think about and have to say." The first person to read my work was my step-father who kept a journal with me when I was a kid. My handwriting was atrocious and he thought that would help. My handwriting is still atrocious but my writing style was greatly influenced by this practice and I am thankful he made me do it.
I came to literature very late after growing up in a home full of comic books and Life magazine. Neither of my parents went to college so they wouldn't know Fenimore Cooper from Gary Cooper. I read things like Welles' "Invisible Man" and Schulberg's "What Makes Sammy Run". All my serious reading came at Berkeley and carried over to my career in advertising. Since my college language was Russian I favored Lermontov and Chekhov. I wrote a jazz column in high school but nothing except ads, commercials and jingles till I retired. I then turned to essays, poems and memoirs which I usually stuck in my desk drawer although I did win a citation from Writer's Digest for a piece about building our dream house: "In the age of McMansions, Blandings lives on".
My first read was a Dick and Jane. It was actually what inspired me to write books for others to read. Funny, I can remember every detail of that day, of that moment. I was first read by close friends who built me up enough to give it to my Step-Mother. She actually cried when she had finished reading. I never felt a family members pride until that moment. No reviews will ever mean as much to me as that one did.
I wrote humor for my high school paper, then started writing again in "form letters" to my family as a way to deal with my daughter's severe birth defects. When my letters started to become humorous tales of family life, I turned them into articles and began getting published in magazines.
Like most children, I began mostly with fairy tales. I loved The Jungle Book (also one of my favorite titles). I loved Where The Wild Things Are. Books that took you to places that you'd never heard of or seen before, but that could be created through descriptive scene writing and mentally stimulating illustrations.
I began writing in high school. I think that sometimes I feel like no one will be interested in what I have to say, but I need to get it out. The other night at a bar, a girl mentioned that the town she was from had many Amish citizens. I told her how cool I thought the Amish were, and how I really admired the way they live... I believe it was at that point that she went to the bathroom and didn't return to the table we were sitting at.
So writing for me, perhaps started out of my own fear of rejection. As I got more comfortable with myself and the people I chose to surround myself with, I slowly started to show some of them a few of the poems and short stories that I had created over the years. Even though many of them seem to enjoy and encourage my writing, I can't help but wonder if it's only because they know how dear it is to me. This fear of rejection and it's relationship with sharing my work has driven me to distraction for some time now.   | | |
I first read any stories I could find about cats. I've always loved to write. I have a very vivid imagination. My parents were the first ones to read things I'd written when I was little.
The first book I read was Hop on Pop when I was four years old. My mom used to buy comic books for me and my brother to shut us up while in the car. I loved them but didn't understand why Thor and Batman were hitting people, I knew it had to be because of those strange symbols that floated above their heads. So, I taught myself (with my mom and others help) how to read that Suess book and soon after I knew that in order to stop someone from taking over the world all you needed was a killer uppercut.
Writing on the other hand did not take a spot in my life until I was 10 and in the 5th grade. Our teacher told us to write a short story about anything we wanted. I wrote 'Pablo and the well' in which the hero and his little sister find a well. The sister falls in and Pablo runs to the nearby city, gets help and saves his sisters life. When the teacher saw this she taught me what the word plagiarism means. So did the vice principal. They asked me question after question, 'Where did you copy this from?' 'Why would you do that?' and after I denied and denied they finally realized that I was the true author.
The story 'Pablo and the Well' went on to win the school's creative writing award. I was given something like $2 and the vice principal read the whole thing from start to finish to the whole school via the pa system. | | |
The first book I read is the children stories (which I can't remember) I had when I was a kid. I enjoyed reading all these tales and fables.
I began writing when I was in high school. I was a member of our school paper. I was a writer and editor of the features section of the paper.
Well, the first person (s) who read what I wrote were my parents. They normally check my assignments on essay writing.
As a child, I was constantly reading Laura Ingalls Wilder and Judy Blume. I began writing in college as part of a journalism minor. The first to read what I wrote would be my High School English teachers.
My first book was an english story book i found after dug my fathers archives. The book tells me about a little blonde girl.
I can't really remember when i start to write, but my older sister is one of my loyal reader. She read all my writings.
There are many books that I had read that I barely remember what was my first. I began to write by age of five. I was a very avid reader in my youth and being a very introverted internal person, I loved to go on adventures using my imagination. I soon found out that my imaginations were so vivid that I often communicated them through writing. I think the first people who have ever read my work was my family (mom, dad, brother and sister in law).
I started writing at the age of 11 when I fell in love for the very first time.
Really read? Peter Benchley, Jaws. Captivating. Then it was on to Michener, Frank Herbert, Thomas Wolfe, etc etc? What I wrote? Newspaper readers. Then I wrote "Where Hell Freezes Over" in 2005 (St Martins/Dunne Books)
As a child I hated school, it was like a prison. So I never voluntarily read books when I was young, and hated both reading and writing (especially as I was left-handed, had poor enough writing as a result, and was forced to use a fountain pen which often smudged as my left hand trailed after my writing). The first book that impressed me as a child was "The Silver Sword" by Ian Seralier. The first book I voluntarily read (ie, not in the school curriculum) was a book I received on my 15th birthday, called "Diary Of A Slave". I have no idea who the author was, but over the next two years I read over 100 books.
Wizard of Oz.
10 years old.
My teacher. |
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