I don’t think so many people want to write—I think people want to be writers. Dorothy Parker said, ‘I love having written, but I hate writing.’ I think it’s the same with a lot of people. And everybody believes that they have a story in them—everyone wants to believe that they could do it if they wanted to.
They think they have a story, and maybe they do. But just because you have a story inside you, doesn’t mean you can write it, any more than having a gallstone means you can pass it. I no longer believe that everybody can write. It’s not that easy.
When parents ask me how they can encourage little Johnny’s talent for writing, I say that no good writer had a Norman Rockwell childhood. It’s a truthful answer. I look at all the good writers I know personally, the good painters, the good sculptors, and they all had unquiet, even unpleasant childhoods. I say, ‘Look. I can’t guarantee this won’t turn your child into a psychotic—but the psychotic may be a writer.’
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