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But I’m an Astronaut! (AKA write what you know)

March 7, 2014/in Blog / Caitlin Bagwell

Hello, fellow scribes!

We meet again.

Today, I want to talk about something that has been bothering me for a while because I just now (after years and years) got it. All you have to do to be a good writer is write what you know.

 

Wait!

I know what you’re going to say:

http://media.catmoji.com/post/vzbg/cat-astronaut.jpg

BUT!

I’m an astronaut!

I only know about space related things like physics,

or aliens.

I can’t write about anything else because I don’t know about anything else.

STOP!!!

http://www.jayforce.com/music/the-supremes-stop-in-the-name-of-love-yoroku-saki-remix/

 

You would be wrong!

If the idiom “write what you know” was limited to vocation

or location

http://im.rediff.com/money/2013/may/28odd-homes1.jpg

 

Or even avocation…

http://artists.ultimate-guitar.com/profile_mojo_data/9/0/3/0/903003/pics/_c691552_image_0.jpg

 

(By which I clearly mean dressing your cat up like White Snake)

We would not have a lot to read:

http://galaxyzooblog.files.wordpress.com/2012/05/bargastitle.png

 

It would just be an exchange of information, and that’s boring. If we just wanted to sit around and exchange information all day then phone books wouldn’t have died out. We want something more out of what we read, so how do we put it into what we write?

According to J.D. Salinger you need to have fire

between the words.  

http://www.balondekor.cz/assets/images/hlavni-nabidka/dospeli/fakir/fak22.jpg

 

Consider Catcher in the Rye, what is that story about, really?

http://www.brown-liquor.com/wp-content/uploads/2011/03/catcher-rye-full-300×198.jpg

 

Catcher in the Rye is about a boy named Holden Caulfield who is kicked out of his latest prep school and decides to run away to New York before his parents find out what has happened.

Wait!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Is that what the book is really about?

http://media.npr.org/assets/img/2012/08/14/catcher-in-the-rye-bd2b890bf098c45932a2e5d6662144fdc1644e9b.jpg?s=4

Would this book be as popular as it is if it was just about a rich kid afraid to go home and face the music? Would the rest of us relate to Holden if that were the case?

 

Here is the secret to Catcher in the Rye and the many many books out there that we all hold beloved…

Empathy

http://www.lifewithdogs.tv/wp-content/uploads/2013/09/9.17.13-Dog-Elephant2-590×378.jpg

 

 

That’s it.

It is the ability to reach out across the void and see the kindred spirit in the other, be it elephant, dog or that other person across from you on the bus.


http://www.geh.org/fm/mismis/m196900290001.jpg

 

SO?

 

How do you take what you know and make it so it matters to everyone?

 

Simple:

Let everyone see your heart.

http://d7c2b0wpljtwf.cloudfront.net/var/ezwebin_site/storage/images/media/images/e-anatomy/heart-pictures/atlas-of-anatomy-of-the-human-heart/4391373-1-eng-GB/atlas-of-anatomy-of-the-human-heart_medical512.jpg

 

We have all been in love:

We all know about war.

We are all going to die.

(Thanks David Haglun, I died a little bit inside too when I found out about the movie.)

The human experience is vast and there is so much to say about it.

(Or you can just read ANYTHING by Shakespeare!)

Being able to tell us all your fears, for example, about love, death or war brings us closer to you the author, and more importantly, it brings us all a little bit closer because we share an understand of the other person.

Just remember a good writer has empathy, even if that author happens to be an astronaut.

http://astrobob.areavoices.com/files/2010/11/Astronaut-6-1024×639.jpg

 

I’ll leave you with Holden telling us all what makes a good author:

 

“What really knocks me out is a book that, when you’re all done reading it, you wish the author that wrote it was a terrific friend of yours and you could call him up on the phone whenever you felt like it. That doesn’t happen much, though.”

How about you? Where do you find your empathy?

 

 

Caitlin Bagwell, author photo

Caitlin was born and raised in Portland, Oregon. She still lives there, and this makes her a rare unicorn in a sea of transplanted twenty-somethings who came to be artists and drink cheap beer. Also, she is now in her 30s and has moved on to Bourbon. She is a current MFA candidate in fiction at Antioch University LA. She has been published here and there with the last one being in Chiasmus Press’ Stories from the Edge: A Northwest Anthology.

https://lunchticket.org/wp-content/uploads/2014/03/LT-Featured.jpg 1080 1080 Caitlin Bagwell https://lunchticket.org/wp-content/uploads/2021/12/lunch-ticket-logo-white-text-only.png Caitlin Bagwell2014-03-07 16:20:192022-02-10 14:48:55But I’m an Astronaut! (AKA write what you know)

Friday Lunch Archive

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Midnight Snack

A destination for all your late night obsessions.

Tonight’s bites:

QVC-land

May 6, 2022/in A Transfer, Midnight Snack / D. E. Hardy
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https://lunchticket.org/wp-content/uploads/2022/05/Diana-Hardy_QVC_Feature_Photo.png 533 800 D. E. Hardy https://lunchticket.org/wp-content/uploads/2021/12/lunch-ticket-logo-white-text-only.png D. E. Hardy2022-05-06 23:45:322022-05-06 23:45:32QVC-land

Escape Artists at the End of the World

April 29, 2022/in A Transfer, Midnight Snack / Lisa Levy
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The House in the Middle

April 15, 2022/in A Transfer, Midnight Snack / Megan Vasquez
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https://lunchticket.org/wp-content/uploads/2022/04/alec-douglas-iuC9fvq63J8-unsplash-scaled-1.jpg 2560 1707 Megan Vasquez https://lunchticket.org/wp-content/uploads/2021/12/lunch-ticket-logo-white-text-only.png Megan Vasquez2022-04-15 23:45:322022-04-15 23:45:32The House in the Middle

More coming soon!

Amuse-Bouche

Little bites every Monday to whet your appetite!

Today’s plate:

Eggs, No Basket

June 27, 2022/in A Transfer, Amuse-Bouche, CNF / Kelsi Long
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https://lunchticket.org/wp-content/uploads/2022/05/raiyan-zach-jDkrpWtSkb4-unsplash-scaled-1.jpg 2560 1440 Kelsi Long https://lunchticket.org/wp-content/uploads/2021/12/lunch-ticket-logo-white-text-only.png Kelsi Long2022-06-27 11:55:552022-06-27 11:55:55Eggs, No Basket

The Revolution Began at Book Club

June 20, 2022/in A Transfer, Amuse-Bouche, Fiction / Sari Fordham
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https://lunchticket.org/wp-content/uploads/2022/05/alexis-brown-omeaHbEFlN4-unsplash-scaled-1.jpg 1707 2560 Sari Fordham https://lunchticket.org/wp-content/uploads/2021/12/lunch-ticket-logo-white-text-only.png Sari Fordham2022-06-20 11:55:162022-06-20 11:55:16The Revolution Began at Book Club

A Letter to the Dead Grandmothers That Raised Us

June 13, 2022/in A Transfer, Amuse-Bouche, Poetry / Levi J. Mericle
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https://lunchticket.org/wp-content/uploads/2022/05/khamkeo-vilaysing-AMQEB4-uG9k-unsplash-scaled-1.jpg 1829 2560 Levi J. Mericle https://lunchticket.org/wp-content/uploads/2021/12/lunch-ticket-logo-white-text-only.png Levi J. Mericle2022-06-13 11:55:132022-06-13 11:55:13A Letter to the Dead Grandmothers That Raised Us

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School Lunch

An occasional Wednesday series dishing up today’s best youth writers.

Today’s slice:

I’ve Stayed in the Front Yard

May 12, 2021/in School Lunch, School Lunch 2021 / Brendan Nurczyk
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https://lunchticket.org/wp-content/uploads/2021/05/SL-Insta-Brendan-Nurczyk-2.png 1500 1500 Brendan Nurczyk https://lunchticket.org/wp-content/uploads/2021/12/lunch-ticket-logo-white-text-only.png Brendan Nurczyk2021-05-12 10:18:392022-02-01 13:24:05I’ve Stayed in the Front Yard

A Communal Announcement

April 28, 2021/in School Lunch, School Lunch 2021 / Isabella Dail
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https://lunchticket.org/wp-content/uploads/2021/04/SL-FB-Isabella-Dail.png 788 940 Isabella Dail https://lunchticket.org/wp-content/uploads/2021/12/lunch-ticket-logo-white-text-only.png Isabella Dail2021-04-28 11:34:132021-04-28 11:34:13A Communal Announcement

Seventeen

April 14, 2021/in School Lunch, School Lunch 2021 / Abigail E. Calimaran
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https://lunchticket.org/wp-content/uploads/2021/04/SL-Insta-Abigail-E.-Calimaran.png 1080 1080 Abigail E. Calimaran https://lunchticket.org/wp-content/uploads/2021/12/lunch-ticket-logo-white-text-only.png Abigail E. Calimaran2021-04-14 11:22:062021-04-14 11:22:06Seventeen

More School Lunch »

Word From the Editor

The variety in this issue speaks not only to the eclectic world we inhabit but to the power of the human spirit. We live in an uncertain world. In the U.S., we’re seeing mass shootings daily. Across the world, we’re still very much in a pandemic, some being trapped in their homes for weeks on end, others struggling to stay alive in hospitals. War continues to wage in Ukraine. Iran and North Korea are working diligently to make nuclear weapons. The list goes on. Still, we have artists who are willing and able to be vulnerable with one another, to share stories and art to help us try and make sense of our world.

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