How to Write Like a Writer: A Sharp and Subversive Guide to Ignoring Inhibitions, Inviting Inspiration, and Finding Your True Voice

by Thomas C. Foster

Overview

The New York Times bestselling author of the beloved classic How to Read Literature Like a Professor teaches you how to write everything from a report for your community association to a meaningful memoir in this masterful and engaging guide.

Combing anecdotes and hard-won lessons from decades of teaching and writing—and invoking everyone from Hemingway to your third-grade teacher—retired professor Thomas C. Foster guides you through the basics of writing. With How to Write Like a Writer you’ll learn how to organize your thoughts, construct first drafts, and (not incidentally) keep you in your chair so that inspiration can come to visit.

With warmth and wit, Foster shows you how to get into (and over) your best self, how to find your voice, and how to know when, if ever, a piece of work is done.

Packed with enlightening anecdotes, highlighted with lists and bullet points, this invaluable guide reveals how writers work their magic, and reminds us that we all—for better or worse, whether we mean to or not—are known by what we put on paper or screen, both our thoughts and our words.

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9780063139428
Publisher:	HarperCollins
Publication date:	09/06/2022
Sold by:	HARPERCOLLINS
Format:	eBook
Pages:	320
Sales rank:	26,672
File size:	2 MB

About the Author

Thomas C. Foster is the author of How to Read Literature Like a Professor, How to Write Like a Writer, How to Read Nonfiction Like a Professor, and other works. He is professor emeritus of English at the University of Michigan, Flint, where he taught classes in contemporary fiction, drama, and poetry as well as creative writing and freelance writing. He is also the author of several books on twentieth-century British and Irish literature and poetry.

Table of Contents

Introduction: Can't We Just Text or Something? 1

Why Write? 7

1 The "I" at the Center of "Write" 9

2 I-Thou Relationships 21

3 Writing as Exploration of Self 37

4 Writing as Exploration of Subject 47

5 Writing as a Locus of Play 65

Interlude: The Writer's Seven (or However Many) Deadly Sins 77

What to Write and How 85

6 Tell Yourself What You Want to Say 87

7 Voice Actor 99

8 Beginning Before You Begin 111

9 Beginnings 125

10 The Part Between the Ends 139

11 Endings 155

12 Don't Edit a Flying Leap 163

13 The Problem with Process 173

14 Detailing Your Prose (1) 181

Soaring Practice 189

15 Exercises from Literature 191

16 Writing Exercises That Illuminate Academic or Professional Tasks 201

17 Sentences and Their Friends 213

Interlude: Rules to Live, or at Least Write, By 227

18 Oh, Yeah? Prove It! 231

19 Even the Nile Has a Source 241

20 Revision: It Ain't Pretty, But … 251

21 Detailing Your Prose (2) 261

Conclusion: The Exquisite Pain of Never Being Quite Finished 275

Appendix: Bold Statements (and Bald-Faced Truths) 281

Acknowledgments 287

Index 289

Editorial Reviews

06/27/2022

Foster (How to Read Literature Like a Professor), an English professor at the University of Michigan, Flint, offers in this friendly guide practical advice on developing a voice and writing “like you mean it.” The bulk of his instructions come on the topic of building confidence, for which he provides numberous exercises—one can get in touch with their “intellectual/emotional response system” by writing a fake review, and writing about “a complex painting in massive detail” can sharpen one’s description chops. Foster insists that the key to writing is “having something to say” and “knowing what that something is,” and gives a rousing “pep talk” about how to get started writing, which, he claims, is the hardest part. He urges writers to “burn your thesaurus” and frequently references the works of Ernest Hemingway, John McPhee, and Joan Didion as examples of sentence structure and voice. Though his personal examples feel a little self-indulgent and unnecessary (ironic, given that he warns against the dangers of using the first person), he’s solid on classroom tips and tricks, as in his point-by-point list of what makes a good thesis. Students will appreciate these handy notes. (Sept.)

Publishers Weekly

Foster […] offers in this friendly guide practical advice on developing a voice and writing ‘like you mean it.’”  — Publishers Weekly

“Foster brings his experience as a teacher and writer to this genial guide to the writing process.”  — Kirkus Reviews

"A writing guide that digs below thesis, punctuation, paragraphs, and sentence structure to offer a philosophical view of the art of written communication." — New York Journal of Books

“Thomas C. Foster must have been the sort of memorable college professor whose classes filled up fast with long-waiting lists. Fortunately, he has written this bright, positive and helpful work . . . . This is truly an inspired writing manual for everyman. Writing can be a struggle but this slender volume can offer fine assistance in making it better.” — BookTrib

From the Publisher

2022-06-15
Encouragement for beginning writers.

Foster brings his experience as a teacher and writer to this genial guide to the writing process. Any piece of writing, he notes, is a conversation between writer and reader, a notion exemplified by his own chatty, informal style. Though focusing on nonfiction writing, such as essays, newsletters, opinion pieces, profiles, and reports, Foster acknowledges that the techniques and guidance he offers can just as well apply to fiction, poetry, or drama. Rather than approach writing as rules to be memorized or “formulas to be copied and applied as needed,” the author presents writing as a way of discovering the world as well as “an occasion for increasing self-knowledge.” In his view, “it is okay to have a writing personality, to not erase yourself from your writing,” and even to use I, which some writing teachers forbid. He cautions against what Gail Godwin famously called the “Watcher at the Gate,” the pesky self-editor that threatens to silence a writer’s voice. As Foster sees it, writers can be undermined by worry, self-doubt, overconfidence, vagueness, poor structure, and dishonesty—i.e., deliberately spreading misinformation. Throughout the book, he provides exercises—in argument, analysis, description, and crafting an introduction, for example—and lists of guidelines. He breaks down the writing process, beginning with “invention,” which can include daydreaming and journaling; and proceeding to organizing, crafting an effective ending, and—crucially important—revising at the sentence, paragraph, and structural levels. He underscores the importance of supporting claims with evidence: facts, data, testimony, experts’ findings, anecdotes, and quotes. At a time when shifty disinformation seems to be everywhere, he discusses how to evaluate the credibility of a source. “Every piece of writing,” he emphasizes, “is an argument, even if its only point is, ‘I’m worth reading.’ ” His overarching advice to writers is simple: “Write every day….Read. Widely.”

Sturdy practical advice to build confidence and skill.

Kirkus Reviews