You Should Be Reading Like a Writer
In this episode of “Writer’s Digest Presents,” editor-in-chief Amy Jones and senior editor Michael Woodson discuss what it means to read like a writer.
In the February episode of "Writer's Digest Presents," managing editor Moriah Richard and senior editor Michael Woodson discussed performing reading audits and what they can do for your reading life.
In this episode of "Writer's Digest Presents", editor-in-chief Amy Jones is talking about the importance of reading like a writer to benefit your writing life. But what does that mean—to read like a writer? For Amy and Michael, it means doing a deep dive into reading the kinds of books they'd like to be writing, what they can learn from them, how to incorporate a writing process that encourages failure, why writers should completely reject AI, and more.
From the Episode
On Changing Your Writing Process: "My version of 'reading like a writer' in the past has never brought me much success because I'm looking at something that's in its best form and then trying to immediately replicate that. My past 'process' would be—I'd sit in my office or I'd go somewhere, bring a couple of books that always inspire me, and I'd start to read and try to let that soak up. And then I'd just start writing. And I'd be writing in a way that I was trying to trick my brain into skipping all of the drafts and almost transcribe what had 'already been written in my brain.' Every single time, I come up against a wall because I've done no planning whatsoever. Only recently have I told myself, 'You have got to change your process. You have to be comfortable with those first few messy drafts.' Because writing is not convenient. It is inherently inconvenient, and the process is too."—Michael Woodson
On AI: "When I was in undergrad, my minor was in Victorian Literature. There was an essay we read by John Ruskin—it's called 'The Stones of Venice.' It's about architecture, the nature of gothic, but there's this little section in it about commodification and skilled craftsman. It talks about beads, and how glass beads are all the same and it requires no skill or effort to produce them—they're mass produced by people, and that's sad. And then it talks about glasses or vases or more unique items. And they're going to be unique and have errors and be interesting, and they're more exciting for the creators to create. It was at a time when manufacturing was staring to increase and change the way people produced things. It kind of makes me think about AI and writing now. AI is the little glass bead that is basically identical and not fun for anyone to create or to use. It doesn't bring joy. It takes the creativity and life and humanity out of it. And why?"—Amy Jones
