''Write what you know' is a tautology. You have no choice -- you have to write what you know, and in order to write something new, you have to learn something new.' Similar to a quote from the 1996 Boskone convention when Bujold was Guest of Honor.
About this quote
- What does it mean?
- Writing what you know is necessary but learning new things allows for new stories.
- In plain terms
- You must write what you know but learn new things to write new stories.
- What can you take from it?
- Learn new skills to expand what you can write.
Where it applies
Putting it to work
Questions to consider
- What do you know to write about?
- What should you learn next?
Another view
It calls a heuristic a tautology without explaining the nuance.
More from Lois McMaster Bujold
'I have this thing for generating character-oriented plots, where you look at a character and say 'What's the worst thing I could do to this guy?' I've found t…
Permalink to quote #1 'It's a bizarre but wonderful feeling, to arrive dead center of a target you didn't even know you were aiming for.'
Permalink to quote #3 All great human deeds both consume and transform their doers. Consider an athlete, or a scientist, or an artist, or an independent business creator. In the ser…
Permalink to quote #4
Related quotes
You advise me, too, not to stray far from the ground of experience, as I become weak when I enter the region of fiction; and you say, 'real experience is peren…
Charlotte BronteCharlotte Bronte quote #1 Books, the children of the brain.
Jonathan SwiftJonathan Swift quote #4 If you gotta ask, you'll never know.
Louis ArmstrongLouis Armstrong quote #6