How to Be a Writer: Hemingway’s Advice to Aspiring Authors

by Maria Popova

“As a writer you should not judge. You should understand.”

Ernest Hemingway has contributed a great deal to the collected advice of great writers, from his famous admonition against the dangers of ego to his short and stellar Nobel Prize acceptance speech. But some of his finest wisdom springs to life in this excerpt from his 1967 nonfiction piece By-Line, found in the altogether excellent Hemingway on Writing (public library) — a compilation of the celebrated author’s most insightful meditations on the craft, culled from his published works and his private letters. Writing as “Your Correspondent,” abbreviated to “Y.C.,” Hemingway addresses the archetypal aspiring author, nicknamed “Mice,” and offers this characteristically wise-in-a-no-bullshit-way advice on becoming a writer:

MICE: How can a writer train himself?

Read here to get the answer, and more…

Blog authors note: I’m having a lazy day with regard to blogging, and had kept this one on file for just such an occasion! To all the writers out there, get writing. I’ve become one, and find articles like this really helpful…