Can one be too young to write good fiction?
Here’s a question a reader sent to me recently:
I’m a amateur writer, only new to it for about three years now. I know, it’s cliche that a teenager should even both[er] writing until they have some life experience under the belt, but I just to happen to have that, well, some of that […] I’ve been told over and over again how young people shouldn’t write, due to limited life experience. What is your opinion on the matter?
There are two ways to take this question:
- Should teenagers bother writing fiction?
- Should teenagers try to get their fiction published?
My first thought upon reading this question was that this reader has misinterpreted the advice he or she has been given. Most likely, the writers or teachers giving the advice didn’t mean teenagers shouldn’t write, but that teenagers don’t usually have enough life experience to write fiction that is publishable and saleable.
In most cases, teenagers—even the ones who’ve lived through some hard knocks—are still on the beginning end of building their life experience.
I think this reader has misinterpreted the advice to mean he or she shouldn’t write, when what was probably meant was “don’t be disappointed if you don’t see the fruits of your labour until you reach adulthood–or perhaps even middle age.”
The New Yorker published a list called 20 Under 40, which features up-and-coming writers under the age of 40. Yes, in this business, 40 is still considered relatively young to be a successful writer.
Still, there are young people who have been published in novel-length fiction; Alexandra Adornetto published her novel The Shadow Thief at age 14, for example.
But, consider that Adornetto’s book is a children’s fantasy, so she was free to create a world of her own, and she was writing for an audience the same age as herself, or younger.
Now, would I want to read a contemporary adult romance written by a 14-year-old? Probably not.
Getting Published is Difficult
If the underlying question is really, “Should teenagers try to get their fiction published?” then let’s forget about novels for a minute and start with publishing a short story.
When I was in high school, my creative writing teacher told us it was extremely difficult to get published, even in short fiction. We all thought she was trying to discourage us from writing, but now I see she was just being honest.
Consider this adult writer who received well over 50 rejection letters before she finally published a short story. You can see each of the letters here on her website.
Remember, too, that most literary magazines take anywhere from 3-9 months or more to respond, and while some now accept simultaneous submissions (where you send your story to a number of different magazines at once), the majority still discourage them.
So, we’re not talking about firing off a hundred form cover letters with your story and just waiting until one of them accepts you. The process is slow and arduous.
To become a published writer takes dedication to keep submitting, even in the face of rejection. And, as many published writers can tell you, there’s little fortune or fame to be had, even after you reach your writing goals.
Tips for Teenage Writers
There is no time limit for getting published. People can get published until they day they keel over of old age. Some even get published posthumously.
With that in mind, consider that your vocabulary and use of grammar naturally grow and become more refined as you get older. You see things from a more mature perspective as you get older. And, very few people become excellent writers overnight, so expect the process to take many years.
Teen writers should view their youth as a time to lay the groundwork for later writing endeavours.
If you’re a young person with a passion for writing, then of course you should write. You should write like crazy! Here are some tips to get you started:
- Write something every day
- Read every book you can get your hands on
- Carry a journal with you everywhere
- Take courses—either through your high school, community college, or online—that will help you refine your craft
- Start a blog to showcase your writing skills
- Attend local poetry readings and book signings
- Find a critique partner and swap work with them
- Subscribe to articles from helpful writing blogs
- Submit your work to magazines that are specially geared toward young writers
- Join (or start) a writing club at your school
- Volunteer to write/edit for the school newsletter or magazine
- Remember that even most writers have day jobs, so make sure you study the right subjects to help you establish a career
I certainly hope that nobody would discourage young people from putting pen to paper, but sometimes we adults think we’re giving kids a reality check, and it ends up coming across in a discouraging manner.
Teenagers shouldn’t be expected to write the same things adults write. It’s apples to oranges—they can’t compare. A 5-year-old can write a great story. A 15-year-old can write a great story. You wouldn’t expect a 5-year-old to write a story that compares to a 15-year-old’s, would you? They might be equally good, but good in different ways.
So, my answer to this reader’s question is that nobody is too young to write, or even to write well, but what constitutes ‘writing well’ depends on the age of the writer.
In terms of getting published, the fruits of your labour may not pay off immediately, but that doesn’t mean you should quit. Anyone who has a passion for the written word should seek to know more about the craft and practice often.
Who knows? Maybe all that practice will pay off sooner than you think.
What’s your opinion on teenagers writing? What advice do you have to give to the younger generation?
I wrote my first novel when I was 15. It was cr*p. I wrote my second within a year. It was not quite so cr*p but still very bad. I stopped writing novels and wrote poetry instead – I was quite good at that (I got paid real money for commissions).
Fifteen years later I wrote another novel. It was much better – though looking at it now it was still pretty poor. And a few years ago (after another 15 years) I wrote a YA novel -which was pretty reasonable (I think).
I have a friend who wrote 22 novels before he got published – he’s doing very nicely now (Roger Jon Ellory). Yup, it’s a tough world in publishing.
Advice? Write. You can only get better.
The road to success is littered with the bodies of those who gave up.
I still remember some of the ‘novels’ I wrote as a teenager. Personally, age has been a huge factor in improving my writing. I agree with your advice. I don’t think anyone ever got worse with dedicated practice! Cheers.
ask hannah moskowitz. (http://www.untilhannah.com/)
Thanks for the link. Looks like she’s done very well!
Teens should totally write! Look at Stephanie Bowie and Kody Kiplinger. If you’ve got it in you, get it out there. I don’t think anyone is ever too young to start pursing their dreams. Rarely do we know what we want out of life in our teens, so if you are blessed enough to know take the opportunity and go for it! The only caution that I make is: don’t get discouraged by criticism. I know that the first critique I got as a teen had me setting aside my dream till after college. Be strong, know that you need critiques, and never quit–if you keep going you won’t fail.
Good point about not getting discouraged by criticism. I remember getting some pretty harsh remarks on a high school story that made me think twice about whether I had any talent or not.
Do it. Start building that Craft from the very beginning; there’s a lot there to learn. “Adults” are still taking years to learn even the basic Craft, why should a teenager loose 10, 15, or 20 years to learn the basics of how to write fiction? They shouldn’t.
“Life experience” isn’t everything; the younger ones will gain it whether or not they want to. Just don’t expect to have a commercially-viable story/novel written in the latest teeny slang filled with whatever fad-chasing is happening at the moment.
Get the Craft well under way as soon as possible. When a writer has a decent foundation in Craft, he can not only express himself well but also present a fundamentally-sound novel.
Only when the Craft is utilized to the best you can does any artistic ability or talent shine out its best. Creativity, talent, or whatever you call it belongs to all ages, not just the old farts.
Go write something great.
That’s right—if you spend your teen years learning about writing, you’ve already got a good ten years of practice over those who start in their adult years.
This post is great advice for young writers. I think it comes down to what you said: write every day, read every day, and live every day. Some writers do make it at a young age, like S.E. Hinton. She wrote “The Outsiders” when she was 16. While it’s considered a YA novel, its message and story appeals to adults too. She was a very talented and wise-beyond-her-years young lady. That’s pretty rare for teenagers, but those kind of teens do exist!
The great thing for young writers today is that there’s such a great variety of YA novels available for them to read. Even just swapping an hour of TV for an hour of reading every day will amount to a lot of learning over the high school years.
Now, I want to seek out the clarity of words written by the younger mind.
Cheers!
Oh, and… Stephen King received is first rejection letter at 9yrs. old…?… and then many more after that. But, note… the writing is open and available to all, and not limited to where we are on the calender.
If you’ve read King’s “On Writing,” you’ll know just how much rejection he faced, even into adulthood. Look where he is now!
Christopher Paolini became a published author with “Eragon”, at the age of 19. He began writing that book, when he was 15. So teens can absolutely write good fiction. If you know that’s your skill set, take the time to craft it. So should you expect your first product to earn you a movie deal? No. But can you be an awesome writer as a teen? Heck yes. And here’s a few more for inspiration.
Amelia Atwater-Rhodes – “In the Forests of the Night”, published at 14.
Cameron Crowe (Screenwriter/Film Director) – Hired by Rolling Stone Magazine at 15.
Nancy Yi Fan – Author of “Swordbird”, which was sold to Harper-Collins at age 12.
Alec Greven – Wrote “How to Talk to Girls”, which was published when he was 9! (ladykiller, lol)
Sonya Hartnett – 1st novel “Trouble All the Way” was published at 15.
Anne Frank – Her diary was written from ages 13-15.
Thanks for the other names. Much appreciated!
write! write with abandon! you have plenty of time to worry about rejection and critique – don’t worry about it! write! i read a story my friend’s 13 year old daughter wrote and it was heartbreaking in it’s innocence and perception. don’t think about your audience, this may be the one time you can write completey for yourself. keep writing. don’t look at “rules” and “tips” right now, just let your voice develope. oh, and read all of eudora welty’s short stories.
There is no one-size-fits-all answer to this question. It depends on the teenagers, their life experience, and what kind of story they write – and it doesn’t have to be a short story. Carson McCullers published THE HEART IS A LONELY HUNTER – an American literary classic and arguably her greatest work – when she was 23 (and she’d been working on it since she was a teenager). S.E. Hinton wrote THE OUTSIDERS while she was in high school. Two recent examples: Steph Bowe sold her novel, GIRL SAVES BOY, when she was 15, and Kody Keplinger published THE DUFF when she was 18. The Carson McCullers novel is the only one written for adults, the other three are all young adult. So while many teenager writers may not have the experience to write an adult novel, they do have a set of experiences they can draw on. As for being able to write well and to tell a good story, that’s a matter of craft, which is something anyone with the motivation to write can learn.
I’m 21. I have been writing short stories since I was 13 and novels since I was 18. I do agree with you when you say the older you get, the more experience on life you acquire and your perspective on matters become more mature (don’t worry, I know 21 isn’t an old age).
But you know what I actually regret when I was a teenager? The fact that I didn’t start writing novels earlier! In writing, what I’ve found is that there is absolutely no substitute for practice; when I look at the first novel I wrote three years ago, I laugh my head off becuase it was horrible, complete garbage. Now I’m not saying that I’m an incredibly talented writer – I’m just saying that I’ve improved since vastly since I was 18. Why? Because like you say in your advice, I wrote (also read) like crazy. I spent six hours each day sitting in front of the laptop, churning out novel after novel. I still do today. I’m a much better writer than I was three years. I’ve written six manuscripts, two of which I’ve tried to get published with no luck. But I still write and I won’t let rejection discourage me, no matter how hard it is to swallow. I know that if I keep writing, I’ll get better just like I have over the last few years and thus it will increase my chances of achieving my ultimate dream.
It all comes down to practice and commitment. If there are any teens reading this, I’d very much tell them to start writing. NOW. Like one of the people that commented said, there’s no reason teens should lose ten years just becuase they don’t have life experience. Within those years of constant reading and writing, they will vastly improve and thus increase their chances. A good friend of mine is 18 and she wrote her first novel when she was fourteen. Granted, the older she’s gotten and the more practice she’s had, the novel has been redrafted and edited intensively. It’s much better than it was when she wrote the first draft at aged 14. I have absolute faith in her talent. But that’s just the kicker; if she didn’t write that novel when she was 14, there would be nothing there. There would be no way for her to improve. I know cliches are things writers should stay away from, but when it comes to writing, you don’t win the ticket if you don’t buy the raffle.
Don’t wait. Just write!
The best advice given so far is to help our kids develop craft as children or teens. Why wait and learn it all wrong first? Fill their minds with delectable books, give them lots of paper, turn off the stinking screens, and let them go. In my house I have an aspiring film maker, an aspiring 3D animator/video-game maker, one song writer, one opera singer, and one writer (and one Lego fanatic, but I digress). We’re going to go through Larry Brook’s Story Engineering together this summer to get the framework of craft into them, upon which their creativity can build.
Yes, by all means, if you want to write, write.
If you’ve got something to send in, send it in. It will probably be bounced, but at least you’ll get practice in finishing things, sending them out, and getting rejected.
Although there are few authors who are published in their adolescence, there are many who started the habit of writing and began to learn the craft.
I think this advice to teen writers is dead on. Some teens beat the odds. Most don’t, but that’s no reason not to cultivate their writing skills.
My advice: WRITE! I was told as a child that I couldn’t write. Not in so many words, but the implication was there. My elementary school did not encourage creativity. By the time I was in High School I had abandoned all writing except for homework and journaling. Several decades later I’m beginning to know my creative side– one buried so long the dust is six feet deep. I wish, oh how I wish, I had kept writing. Maybe, just maybe, by now (I’m in my 40s) I might have something published. With all the catch up I have to do I will probably never get anything published. Fortunately, I have finally learned that it’s about the journey and not the destination. I’m having fun and I keep on trying, and that’s good enough for me. But if I could go back and change anything it would be that I believed my third grade teacher when she told me I wasn’t good enough. So to all the kids that have been told they can’t write– WRITE ANYWAY! Ignore us ignorant adults. Seriously. On this issue at least.
The worst thing you can do to aspiring writers of any age is to tell them they can’t write. No one can write the first time they pick up a pen. Almost every famous writer you can name, in their early years, wrote lots of crap. But they got better. To all of the budding writers out there, if a teacher tells you that you can’t write, dismiss their comments and show your work to someone else who will give you CONSTRUCTIVE criticism. That’s how writers improve. And I applaud you, Kathi, for returning to writing after all these years.
My answer is a resounding “yes!”. Teens can write good fiction. I’ve read published fiction by adults that was not nearly as well written as fiction written by unpublished teens. Teens can write good non-fiction, too. I am a 17-year-old freelance writer whose work has been published by a variety of online and print publications. My age has actually worked to my advantage in some instances since it is unique to be a teen freelance writer and for kid/teen publications, I can relate well to young people since I am one myself. Yet there are editors who don’t know my age but still liked my writing and wanted to pay me for it.
There are some magazines and lots of contests that only accept writing submissions from teens…submit to those before it’s too late!
For aspiring teen writers, I recommend the following two websites:
http://www.calebbreakey.com/ (This is a wonderful teen writers community where you can receive constructive criticism and read other teens’ writing! They are some very talented teen writers who participate on this site.)
http://goteenwriters.blogspot.com/ (Every couple weeks there is a prompt challenge for young writers and you receive feedback from at least one judge just for entering! The prompts are fun and don’t take much time since you must write 100 words or less. Right now the site is having its first freewrite where you can submit the first 150 words of your novel or some other work. It ends today.)
Writing Kid Newsletter is another valuable resource.
I think if you have the skill and work ethic, age shouldn’t be a limiting factor. Sure, you won’t be writing about marriage or parenting but there’s plenty of topics that you can write about. Don’t be hindered by low expectations. Realize that rejections will come…but dare to hope and work for acceptances as well.