A Fake Interview with
Real California Authors
We can’t claim that we caught up with any of these literary lights. We simply did a little research. We found advice and observations, then made up questions to go with them. Every answer flowed from the mouth or pen of the quoted source. Steinbeck, Didion, Tan and the rest really did say these things. Just not to us.
Showcase: Do you like big words?
Mark Twain: I never write metropolis for seven cents because I can get the same price for city.
Showcase: What tips do you have for being funny?
Will Rogers: There’s no trick to being a humorist when you have the whole government working for you.
Showcase: Sometimes we get manuscripts back from proofreaders, and we want to scream about the changes. You expressed an interesting response in a letter that appeared in a 1948 Atlantic Monthly. Tell us what it said.
Raymond Chandler: Would you convey my compliments to the purist who reads your proofs and tell him or her that I write in a sort of broken-down patois which is something like the way a Swiss waiter talks, and that when I split an infinitive… I split it so it will stay split.
Showcase: Sometimes we stare at blank pages and struggle with writers’ block. Is it foolish to try so hard?
Mark Twain: The difference between the almost right word & the right word is really a large matter – it’s the difference between the lightning bug and the lightning.
Showcase: What about writing as a career?
John Steinbeck: The profession of book-writing makes horse racing seem like a solid, stable business.
Showcase: What does writing do for you personally?
Joan Didion: I write entirely to find out what I’m thinking, what I’m looking at, what I see and what it means. What I want and what I fear.”
Showcase: Same question.
Amy Tan: I write because I know that one day I will die, and thus I should experience as many deliberate observations, careful thoughts, wild ideas, and deep emotions as I can before that day occurs.
Showcase: Must you adore writing if you’re going to do it right?
Ray Bradbury: You must write every single day of your life… You must lurk in libraries and climb the stacks like ladders to sniff books like perfumes and wear books like hats upon your crazy heads… may you be in love every day for the next 20,000 days. And out of that love, remake a world.