I grew up believing there was a ‘right’ and a ‘wrong’ way to write.
I learned that good writing meant nothing if you didn’t follow the rules, and every misstep you took would make your creations stand out like a sore thumb.
The adults in my life acted like this wasn’t a problem—like they had their own easy-to-reference list of rules printed on gilded paper and embossed with the secrets of the universe, nestled in their back pocket at all times. In contrast, I felt like my awareness of writing rules more closely resembled a used Kleenex that missed the trash can and lay deflated on the floor.
Even worse, writing rules seemed to change all the time, and trying to keep up with them felt like chasing an elusive ribbon floating in the wind.
I lived in fear of being “found out” as a fake writer—as a toddler trying to sit at the big kids table.
It wasn’t until 2016, when I attended an advanced creative writing program at the University of Oxford, that I finally learned to throw all the rules out the window.
I was taught by multiple award-winning authors and industry experts. None of them thought the same way.
The writing program was designed to give us as much exposure to industry experts as possible within a short window of time.
Every morning, my classmates and I would wander down to a basement lecture hall in stunning Exeter College. We’d listen to a distinguished guest speaker share the ins-and-outs of the writing and publishing industries.
Later, we would cram ourselves into classrooms that smelled like history, knowledge, and coffee breath, shudder underneath the disapproving and watchful gaze of the various portraits of important, mustachioed men lining the walls, and learn from award-winning authors and writers in our chosen fields.
We had writing assignments due, class discussions every day, and a weekly event where volunteers read their work out loud to a crowd and invited feedback and constructive criticism.
Everyone had different opinions about what constituted “good storytelling,” and each answer made sense.
There is no secret sauce.
The classes, lectures, and discussions at Oxford were filled with contradictions.
Everyone had conflicting ideas and writing ‘rules’ that they followed. The halls and classrooms were filled with polite disagreements and animated, flailing arms as we surprised each other with our ideas and perspectives.
This pattern of discussion continued throughout the program: people knew what they wanted to read, but everyone had differing preferences.
There was no ‘ideal’ piece of writing; classifying something as ‘good’ or ‘bad’ depended entirely on the individual reading it.
There is no “one size fits all”—no way to appeal to every reader.
You can’t crack the universal code, because there is no universal code to crack.
This was an incredibly terrifying and freeing thing for me to learn.
Know what you like, not what ‘works.’
No matter how much we disagreed about how to ‘fix’ various books, essays, plays, and other pieces of writing, my classmates and I were often in agreement about what we liked.
We liked feeling a connection with a piece; we liked feeling like we were represented in the writing; we liked feeling like the author was offering us unprotected and bloody pieces of themselves, to do with as we pleased.
We liked feeling like we were being reached out and spoken to directly; we liked feeling like we were found.
We also discovered something exciting: when we wrote pieces from the heart--however weird, unconventional, or potentially off-putting--those pieces always seemed to attract the exact people who would respond positively to the material.
When we wrote for ourselves--wrote the kinds of pieces we liked to read--our audience found us. It was like a dog whistle for readers.
Forget what people have told you ‘works,’ and ‘doesn’t work.’
Write what you like to read.
Be open. Be honest. Be true to yourself and your writing.
Wiggle in the vulnerable spaces until you feel rubbed raw and scared. Chase after what appeals to you and sings to your soul.
Listen to the little voice that said “What if—” the day before you wrote your story’s first words.
If you like what you create, it’s safe to assume that there are people out there with tastes similar to yours, who will eagerly devour your work if given the chance.
They’re Schrödinger’s built-in audience: simultaneously existent and non-existent until you start sharing your work.
Show people your creation. Let them enjoy it as much as you.
If you like what you create, then you can be sure that there is an audience for your work. Show them what you’ve done. Let them enjoy it as much as you.
But if you’re still scared of writing something that others will see and want a more structured approach, here is the final lesson I learned from my time at Oxford:
You have to know the rules in order to break them.
This is a common saying in the writing world, and one I didn’t understand until my Young Adult Fiction professor put a confusing piece of paper down in front of me.
The paper had a list of things to never do when writing young adult fiction, along with some book recommendations.
What made the list so confusing was that several of the recommended books broke the rules our professor told us to heed. When we pointed out the discrepancy, our professor answered that those authors “knew how to break the rules,” and told us we weren’t ready for that, yet.
At the time it was frustrating, even insulting. But now I know what she meant.
Knowing the traditional rules for what ‘works’ in writing means you can break them on purpose, rather than on accident.
It’s the difference between walking and tripping: you can still get to where you need to go, but the journey will be a lot more difficult...and you’ll have a hard time recreating it on command.
You have to know what a conventional narrative arc looks like before you decide to reject it; you have to know why people advise against opening with a description of the weather or beginning with backstory in order to understand why either or both are the right way to introduce us to the world you breathed into being.
Just remember: keep the rules you like and throw out the ones you don’t.
Learning the rules is important; following them is not.
So, what did I learn from my time at Oxford?
There is no “correct” way to write
Write what you want to write and (more importantly) what you want to read
Listen to your instincts and your intuition and let them inform which rules you decide to follow, and which you decide to ignore
And the bonus lesson:
Someone out there is waiting to read your writing. You already have what they’re looking for.