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books, discussion, elif shafak, international writers, politics of fiction, ted talk, video, write what you don't know, write what you know, writing, youtube
I watched this video about a week ago and I just loved it so much that I wanted to share it on Ermilia. There are so many interesting points Elif Shafak raises about books and writing. One of the most interesting ones was ‘write what you don’t know’. I feel like writers are often encouraged to write what they know. I don’t think that’s bad since writing what we know increases the likelihood that we are more accurately writing the event/characters etc. But I’m a writer who keeps wanting to venture out and write what I don’t know. Is that bad? I want to explore other races, cultures, and worlds that I have had little or no contact with. Although I will add that I believe in these circumstances the author has a greater responsibility to do their research.
I also found her point about multicultural writers being pigeonholed was interesting and I had never paid much attention to it before. International writers shouldn’t just be famous because of a novel that is perceived to represent them or their culture in some way. Why can’t their interesting novels be promoted in English-speaking countries, even if they have nothing to do with the author’s home country. How many interesting stories are we missing out from international writers just because the stories aren’t “international”?
What spoke to you the most from this talk? What do you think about writing what you don’t know?
– Ermisenda
Ermilia 
What we actually ‘know’ is more likely to be our own emotions and thought-processes. Conveying knowledge of how human beings feel is what makes a book credible; the ability to place that in the context of a different time, place, or culture, and thus to exercise the imagination, is something that makes a good writer.
So eloquently said, Marie. I totally agree.
What still sticks with me the most about this talk is the power of circles. To me, the power of circles has always been a constructive one, such as a circle of friends. Using them as a destructive force to kill acne or whatever it was completely shocked me.
What she said about the circles was really interesting. I’ve always seen the idea of circles being positive. But I guess, killing acne, in the eye of the person with acne is good. The circle had ‘healing’ properties rather than ‘destructive’ properties. I guess its perspective?
She said, “If you wish to destroy something in this life, be it…a human soul, all you need to do is surround it by thick walls and it will dry up inside.” She said it in the context of social circles. That’s what stuck with me.
Oh, you’re right. Forgot about that part. Mmmm… interesting… I guess everything can be used for ‘good’ or ‘bad’? It’s definitely a new perspective.
I like some exposition in my stories and in that case it is good to know what you are talking about (or at least be able to fake it 😛 ). But that being said, if you don’t know it before you write, doing some research so you do know, cannot hurt and will only help in the long run.
Haha, fake it till you make it. 😛 Yeah, as long as you do your research I can’t see the harm either. It should make you grow as a writer and as a person. At the end of the day, the writer should write the stories that come to them.
Most of the team members at The Netherworld are straight, middle-aged, white women. We also have one gay, middle-aged white man, a bisexual, middle-aged white woman, a straight, middle-aged Asian woman, and a straight, middle-aged Latina. The point is, we’re a pretty homogenous group, and it would be pretty boring if the only characters we wrote about were straight, white characters. We like to include all kinds of characters. Some of them aren’t even human!
I do think that an author has the responsibility to do at least a modicum of research when writing about other cultures. For instance, I’ve never been to Scandinavia, but the book I published last year is partially set in Scandinavia. Although I couldn’t travel there to study Swedish and Norwegian culture first-hand, I wanted to be respectful and write about realistic people, not stereotypes.