Can you write a 'Bestseller' without ever reading one?

[gary compton]

I ponder the question; can a prospective author write a bestselling book without ever reading someone else's work?

I ask this question as their are some rare forms of dyslexia that make it difficult for someone to read the written word and hold their concentration long enough to understand the plot, but reversely the disability doesn't affect their ability to visualize and put their own words down onto paper in a coherent way.

Are their any current authors or has their been any successful scribe's in the past who suffered from this affliction?

What do you think?

[Dean F. Wilson]

Personally speaking I don't think you can be a great author if you don't read. You can have the technical skill, and you may be a good storyteller, but the art itself is developed intuitively through reading as well as overtly through the learning of new words, new ways to string sentences, developed plot and character, etc. All that experience that those successful writers have kind of "rubs off", you might say, through reading their work.

That said, I think you can still be a good author without reading. I'm just not sure it can go beyond that, but that's merely my personal opinion.

LLLSHJ,
Yechidah.

[John Jarrold]

I know dyslexics who write commercially, but I agree with Dean - it's incredibly unlikely that anyone who doesn't read, and read widely, would be successful in the commercial market.

[ctg]

Well, I would say that it is not just reading, but writing as well, as more you write, better writer you become.

The worst part of being dyslexic is, that one doesn't often understand when he or she has done a mistake or an error. This means that one can read his work, everything plays well, but there is a mistake in the sentence/paragraph that one misses, without ever seeing the mistake. Ever to understand that error is making the story too difficult for the audience to understand.

You can overcome dyslexia, but it requires that you are ten times more careful on how write, whatever you write. It might require that you rewrite your story ten times before it is good enough for the submitting. Even then it might still need a bit of editing.

However, I agree on above comments, that one has to read to gain the knowledge, and to develop the sense for understanding what is good storytelling and what is not. This comes via reading and watching on how others have done their stories. If everything clicks, then one day you have developed a critics skill, an inner-voice that tells you what is what, and why someone written the story in a way it has been written. At the end, if you are lucky, you have developed a style and an ability to churn out those best-selling stories ... and gain immortality for thy name.

If one - hypothetically speaking - hasn't done their studying via reading, then one has developed their story-telling skills by doing something else. This being telling a bed-time stories, creating a horror-stories for the camp fire sessions, or even by creating adventures for the role-playing games.

Nevertheless, it is the talent that separates one from the masses - the great from the good. Because no matter how good you are, you can never be as good as the talented ones. They have the edge. You see that same thing working in all parts of life. Not everyone can be a truly great writer, a multi-winning athletic, or even a high-rolling gambler. Although, a hint of luck, can help you here and there.

Note that there is a catch in the best-selling stories. You see, the publicity helps a great deal in that game. More people know your name, better chances you have on making that best-seller. The good example is the sad story of Philip K. Dick, no matter how talented he was, he just didn't make his name, therefore he remained poor and relatively unknown to the end of his life. In which point, like in many artists lives, his art (stories) became extraordinarily famous.

[Yunalesca]

Just a thought, but a dyslexic friend of mine used to listen to audio books all the time. Most bestsellers seem to get released in audio form these days, and they sell them in book shops and online.

[John Jarrold]

You still have to put the sentences together on the page, and hearing voices you have created/are creating is different from hearing them on a tape or CD. Books rule!

[j. d. worthington]

Originally Posted by Yunalesca

Just a thought, but a dyslexic friend of mine used to listen to audio books all the time. Most bestsellers seem to get released in audio form these days, and they sell them in book shops and online.

As John says, there's a world of difference. One doesn't learn how to write a poem, to take one example, by hearing them read. One also has to understand the structure of poetry, how the lines scan, the texture of it on the page, if you will -- at least unconsciously. It's absorbing the various techniques in the writing: grammar, sentence structure, types of prose (sketchy or lush, descriptive or expository, etc.); all of which (and many more) are necessary to be a good writer. While with good prose, there is a relation to oratory and rhetoric, the only real way to learn such is to study those who are the best at it, either contemporary or from the past (preferably both).

[RVM45]

.....Stephan J Cannel is a sucessful screenwriter despite a severe case of dyslexia. Nonetheless, I'd believe it would be a wooly-bear of an obstacle to overcome.

.....However, if Carppal Tunnel is psychosomatic, as the Australians proved (Once they legally defined it as a nonillness, people quit qualifying to draw claims for it.) Then it stands to reason that dyslexia is also psychosomatic.

.....RVM45

[The Ace]

The problem is that there's more to writing than technique. A story can have perfect punctuation, carefully chosen vocabulary and tick all the required boxes for style and structure....and still be a piece of cr*p whether the writer is dyslexic or an English Honours graduate.

It's tempting to say that someone incapable of reading a book hasn't a whelk's chance in a supernova of writing one, but life isn't like that. Stranger things have happened.

I still say there is no excuse for sub-standard spelling, inadequate research or bad grammar, though.

[Nick P]

Originally Posted by RVM45

.....Stephan J Cannel is a sucessful screenwriter despite a severe case of dyslexia. Nonetheless, I'd believe it would be a wooly-bear of an obstacle to overcome.

.....However, if Carppal Tunnel is psychosomatic, as the Australians proved (Once they legally defined it as a nonillness, people quit qualifying to draw claims for it.) Then it stands to reason that dyslexia is also psychosomatic.

.....RVM45

My dad had to have an operation to cure his carpal tunnel. He had long retired, so there was no question of disability payments.

The operation cured it too. Not bad for a psychosomatic syndrome.

[gary compton]

Originally Posted by The Ace

....and still be a piece of cr*p whether the writer is dyslexic or an English Honours graduate

Language Timothy!

[Marky Lazer]

Originally Posted by garycompton

I ponder the question; can a prospective author write a bestselling book without ever reading someone else's work?

I ask this question as their are some rare forms of dyslexia that make it difficult for someone to read the written word and hold their concentration long enough to understand the plot, but reversely the disability doesn't affect their ability to visualize and put their own words down onto paper in a coherent way.

Are their any current authors or has their been any successful scribe's in the past who suffered from this affliction?

What do you think?

Odd question. What does an author need to write a best-seller? Maybe that's a question you have to answer first.

[gary compton]

Originally Posted by Marky Lazer

Odd question. What does an author need to write a best-seller? Maybe that's a question you have to answer first.

Well I would say a brilliant idea, an abundance of talent and an ability to write in a style that is worthy of a Best Seller, not necessarily to have read one.

My original question was to stimulate a debate on this subject as a friend of mine is writing a book, he is very dyslexic and I have read his book and I thought it was well written, well researched, I hung on every sentence which surprised me. So I wondered if he might be successful.

[j. d. worthington]

Originally Posted by garycompton

Well I would say a brilliant idea, an abundance of talent and an ability to write in a style that is worthy of a Best Seller, not necessarily to have read one.

Ummm, not read that many best-sellers, have you? Seriously, the majorit of things that end up on best-seller lists fit neither with brilliance nor an abundace of talent. As for "an ability to write in a style that is worthy of a Best Seller"... from the majority of cases, I'd say I'd not wish that on my worst enemy....

[Ursa major]

You should read good books and (if you're a writer) try to write good books.

Whether any of them (read or written) are best sellers is beside the point, isn't it? (It's not as if you can guarantee a best seller: even a certain Mr S. King of Maine can't just produce utter drivel and expect it to sell.)