\n\t\t\t\tReporting on women’s rugby\n\t\t\t\t<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n\t\t<\/div>\n\nSo what is a writer?<\/h3>\n
There are, of course, all kinds of writers \u2013 poets, novelists, copywriters, journalists, diaryists, playwrights. \u00a0I can\u2019t claim to speak for them all.\u00a0 All I can say is that, for me, this is what being a writer means.<\/p>\n
A writer is a listener<\/h3>\n
The kind of writing I do is rooted in journalism.\u00a0 Whether I\u2019m writing a book, a company brochure or the content of a website, I\u2019m creating a story out of what people have told me.\u00a0 So writing involves listening.\u00a0 And I mean really careful listening – listening in such a way that you get right to the heart of the person or the situation you\u2019re writing about.<\/p>\n
A writer is a thinker<\/h3>\n
Writing is hard because it involves thinking in a more precise way than we do in conversation. When we put something down in words, we have to use the fine motor movements of the brain. We haven\u2019t really understood something until we have written it down. \u00a0Thinking that deeply and clearly is a process we tend to avoid because it’s difficult\u00a0\u2013 I know I do anyway.<\/p>\n
A writer is a changer<\/h3>\n
Writing is not a neutral activity.\u00a0 It changes things. Listening to people is powerful. Analysing and synthesising a situation through writing it down causes\u00a0people to understand it \u2013 and therefore experience it \u2013 in a new way.\u00a0 That can be transformative.<\/p>\n
So what is a writer?<\/h3>\n
A writer is a listener, a thinker and a transformer of people and situations. \u00a0But I can’t say all that, when people ask me, can I?<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
When people ask what I do for a living, I tend to say I’m a writer. \u00a0Maybe I should think of a different answer, because too often people imagine my work involves sitting at home all day coming up with inspiration.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":2870,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[12],"tags":[236,237,204],"class_list":["post-1812","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-writing","tag-journalist","tag-transformation","tag-writer"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/joind.co.uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1812"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/joind.co.uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/joind.co.uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/joind.co.uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/joind.co.uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=1812"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/joind.co.uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1812\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":2874,"href":"https:\/\/joind.co.uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1812\/revisions\/2874"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/joind.co.uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/2870"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/joind.co.uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=1812"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/joind.co.uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=1812"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/joind.co.uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=1812"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}
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