An Interview with William T. Vollmann
November 9th, 2005By now you know about my love for all things William T. Vollmann. I finished You Bright and Risen Angels last week (finally!) and am taking a WTV break before delving into my next title. In the meantime, I’m going to thoroughly enjoy an interview with my favorite author by my favorite lit blog, Bookslut.
What advice does he give aspring writiers?
“I would say, don’t fixate on getting published because that’s really the least important concern. If you really care about writing, you should do it because it makes you happy and you should be just as happy if you can write something that you think is beautiful and you can keep it in a drawer and show it to a few people and they’re thrilled. That’s just as important. If you can have that attitude, then no one can take the pleasure of it away from you. So often there are beginning writers who put “copyright by” on every page of the manuscript, and they’re so anxious to get an agent and do this and do that. That stuff is irrelevant. That’s like asking a photographer, which is the best equipment, and all that matters is the image. With writing, all that matters is the word.”
File….Print!