Stephen King is the one who started it, when I really think about it. I hate to admit this, although I don’t think anyone else has ever come close to making me want to write the way he has. The thing people often don’t realize about Stephen King is the way he writes about friendship. Stand By Me, arguably the first friendship centered classic movie you think of when you hear “movies about friends” is based nearly word for word on his book “The Body.” My entire desk is covered end to end in Stephen King, as though I’m a recluse from society, interested only in killer clowns.
The next, and possibly most important influence, to not only my writing, but also the way I go about my days, I attribute to Amy Hempel. From what I hear, not many people know about her and her work. I firmly believe that everyone needs to read “In the Cemetery where Al Jolson is Buried” at least twice in their life. And when you’re done with that, move on to “Beg. Sl. Tog. Inc. Cont. Rep.” Writing teaches us about grief, teaches us what to do, and teaches us what others tend to do. There is no guide to what to do in the moments she writes about, but her stories get pretty close to showing us how we feel. The mundane is never mundane when you can write well.
On the topic of the mundane, Raymond Carver is the godfather of mundane fiction. Although, I really don’t think there’s anything mundane about the way he writes. He’s got something almost Hemingway-adjacent about his writing where it’s stripped down to the bones, until something happens. Someone dies, or someone is sad, or someone hears their own heartbeat. You can read all the horror and fantasy you want, but you need to be able to read about people like you living life just as you do.
I believe that Joan Didion is the master of the personal narrative essay. I know that this isn’t an unpopular opinion, but I’ve been surprised in my classes to find how few people know about her. I believe she was decades ahead of her time and writes about the experience of writing in a way I’ve never see anywhere else. That the act of keeping notes on the things you see every day is the act of building a book of your life over time.
While these are probably my all time favorites, I think every thing I’ve ever read is a part of the way I see the world, even the things I hated to read. The same way the best English teachers I’ve ever had have shaped my life forever, is just the same way the bad teachers did.
Good writers show you how to write good; bad writers show you how to write better.