It’s unusual
to be completely thrown by a question from the audience, but a teenager in the
audience at my most recent event managed to do just that.
The event was
the Hay Festival, my fellow panellists were Sally Nicholls and Anne Cassidy and
the question was this: ‘If you could be any other writer, who would you be?’
‘Homer,’ said
Sally, for his wonderful stories and use of language. ‘J K Rowling,’ said Anne, ‘just think of the
money.’
I mumbled
something about Shakespeare, but it wasn’t really true, and over the last few
weeks I’ve been wondering which writer I should have picked. Anne Tyler, whose
novel ‘The Accidental Tourist’ is written so beautifully that I have line-envy
on every page? Antonia Forest, because then I’d know more about the Marlows,
possibly my favourite family in children’s fiction? Hilary McKay for creating
the Casson family, who run the Marlows a close second? Lauren Child, because
I’d love to have her visual imagination? Jodie Picoult or Joanna Trollope,
because I feel I could do what they do, but then I wouldn’t have to do it and
I’d have all their royalties.
No. The
answer, I realised was simple. I write because I like to create my own stories.
I don’t want to write other people’s books or plays, even if they are more
lucrative than mine, win more awards, are better written. I don’t want to be
another writer, is what I should have said. I just want to work on being an
even better version of me.
How about
you? Is there an author you’d like to be?
