Writer and society

Writing as a career manifests itself in many different ways and can offer a range of professional awards. It enables people to express themselves, as well as to entertain, inform and influence others.

Now, in the 21^stcentuuury, writers can choose from a variety of tools with which to accomplish their work. These tools range from pen and paper to computers and tablets. Each tool affects the writing process differently and allows the writer to produce the material in a specific way.

Most authors spend hundreds of hours perfecting their skills before they can sell any of their works. A person who wants to be a writer should set aside some time to write every day. Writers will often choose one or more specific workplaces and go there daily like other professionals. Some writers will sometimes even set a page count to accomplish each day. Stephen King has said that he likes to get at least ten pages a day, or around 2,000 words. Thus, the idea of a daily schedule is often associated with discipline and not exactly creativity and inspiration.

Learning to express ideas clearly and effectively in writing takes a great deal of practice. Beginning writers should read many kinds of writing encountered every day and pay special attention to what they find most interesting. A beginning writer who reads much and carefully will develop an appreciation of different writing approaches and styles. In time, the writer can acquire a more flexible approach to his or her own works.

Successful authors draw their inspiration from their own experience, sticking to writing about subjects they know. Some rely on history, religion or ideologies. Others seek it in nature and still others venture into the realms of the imagination. Some writers find it helpful to keep a journal of their ideas, experiences, and observations in order to draw material from later. They sometimes take weeks or months revising or refining an article, poem or story. Beginning writers usually benefit from finding one or more friendly critics who will read their work and discuss their weak and strong points.

There are two main kinds of writers – staff writers and free-lance writers. Staff writers are the professional writers who work for a salary. Many earn a living as newspaper reporters or columnists. Others work as technical writers, who express the complex ideas of engineers and scientists in words that a non-expert can understand. Many staff writers prepare documents for public agencies. Others work as editors for book publishers, magazines and newspapers. Free-lance writers get paid only if a publisher buys their work. Free-lancers write most books – both fiction and non-fiction, as well as many magazine and newspaper articles. Many staff writers create free-lance writing and tell how to submit works for publication.

Writers are those people who create with hope to influence people’s minds and souls by way of discussing important and complex problems of the world. Conventionally an artist is not supposed to have responsibility for his talent or calling. But if Nature endows one and if this talent is found socially important, then it is no longer just a talent but a duty. And its mission is to affirm life in all its diversity, to assert everything the human soul has always aspired to. This is very important today when the question of moral values is arising in all its urgency. Spiritual values are not only a legacy coming down the centuries; they also must be created and enlarged today for the development of the civilization. That is why great writers always remain the contemporaries of later generations. Each new generation finds something new in their works, something concerning its own epoch. A great poet is always the voice of his epoch. Although he may glorify the heroic past, his eyes are always directed to the future.

L. P. Hartley is one of the most distinguished novelists and one of the most original. For the word of his creation is composed of diverse elements. On the one hand he is a keen and accurate observer of the process of human thought and feeling; he is also a sharp-eyed chronicler of the social scene. But his picture of both is transformed by the light of a Gothic imagination that reveals itself in fanciful reverie.

T. Shevchenko has gone down in the history of world literature as a great people’s poet and the voice of his epoch. He was a truly national poet, a poet-fighter. T. Shevchenko was the founder of the new Ukrainian literature, he created a poetical language all his own, realistically accurate and saturated with the imagery, thoughts and feelings of his own people. The most progressive tendencies of his epoch and the most advanced aspirations of the public circles, the cherished thoughts and hopes of the people found their expression in Shevchenko’s works.

Mark Twain showed race discrimination and false democracy in his stories. In the story “A Defense of General Funston” he criticized the policy of the American Government and protested against slavery in the novel “The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn”.

1. As you read the text a) look for the answers to these questions:

1. What are types of writers? 2. How can one become a writer? 3. How are the successful authors described? 4. What is the mission of a writer? 5. What are the topics tackled by the writers? 6. Should writers speak about the future? 7. What is L. P. Hartley famous for? 8. What contribution did T. Shevchenko make to the Ukranian literature? 9. Have you read M.Twain stories? What did they tell the reader about?