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  • Writer's pictureDawn Robinson-Walsh

I’m an author, but not a real one!


Charlotte Payne-Townshend, my current research squeeze!

A lot of people say: I am an author, I am an artist, I am a musician or a poet, I am successful and so on.

Well, good. I say: I’m an author but not a real one. Why?


Do I sell millions of copies? No.

Can I live off the proceeds of my books? Obviously not.

Am I a household name? Nope.

Does any of this matter? No. Reality is I’m not trying to convince anyone. I'm just doing what I love, and I'm not courting popularity. The day people stop me in the street to talk books is the day I've lost focus from my writing.


I am a published author, and I continue to spend rainy Sundays researching and writing. I spend a lot of time writing stuff that brings no fame or even money (like my hyperlocal website).


Now for some controversy ...


Author and writer (journalist)


I’ve toyed with why I don’t feel a need for thousands of social media followers, and why I don’t desire any fame or popularity. Why I don't want people to tell me how great my books are, whether they are or not. The reality is, I'm not really writing for an audience, I'm writing for me!


The reason is this. Once I’ve met the challenge of researching and writing my latest project, I want to move on. Commissioned books (like my Bude books) are work, books I choose to write are my hobby. I just do it anyway for as long as people continue to publish them because I enjoy it.


That, folks, is one reason I prefer to have publishers producing my books rather than me, because I then know they have value and viability and thus I can shrink away from the vainglorious self-promotion I simply don't enjoy. So, one of the key questions I ask writing students or wannabe writers is this: why do you write? I probably should also ask: why do you want to be published?


Author/writer? Does it matter?


I saw this comment on Quora:

To be an author is to share. A writer is a person whose works never see the light of day while an author is (an) individual whose literary works have been seen by someone other than themselves.

Therefore, you can call yourself an author when you share a finished work with other people. When you find the courage to step out of the shadow of the writers before you and put ink to pen, then pen to paper and discover your own writing style, you become a writer. When you actually accomplish transforming an idea into an outline and that into a deeply thought out piece of literature, you begin the ascension from writer to author.

Whether your work is a collection of poems, a series of short stories or a full length novel, to be an author is to be an individual who has amassed a collection of words over the course of many, many long hours. From there you analyse, rearrange and revise sentences or paragraphs over countless more in order to either strive to educate others or provide them with entertainment.

Being an author, however, doesn’t constitute finding an agent or seeing your work published, it's witnessing your work be loved.

Can you be both writer and author? I would argue yes, and neither is better than the other.

An author is someone who writes what they want to write, who thinks little of making money, and of market conditions. If they are interested in it, they write it, whether anyone else likes it or not. The day you start writing to please others is when you are a writer. A writer writes to sell, or they write for a specific audience (my Bude & Beyond website or professional copywriting are cases in point), they often write using words ideal for SEO (search engine optimisation.) Both are equally valid activities.



All writers craft words and phrases, to create readable copy that sells, intrigues, invites,and meets the needs of a specific audience. A writer writes quickly, with clarity, and s/he always meets a deadline. It is not for a writer to have a 'block' because the focus is on the craft, not amazingly original ideas. It is content development.

Authors, fiction or nonfiction, have an idea they want to run with, articulate, often not 100% sure in which direction it is going. In fiction, you learn to create a narrative arc, plausible characters; in non-fiction, you learn to research and structure the results of that work. You may screw it all up and throw it in the bin, or the electronic equivalent.


You can be both and some of us are. I guess my response to whether I am a writer or an author would be: both,so what? Lots of people write and many of them write so much better than me, so it is pointless me comparing or trying to make myself feel good by courting favour.


In a world of self-promotion, a little humility goes a long way. If nothing else it stops you worrying what others think of you and your work - well worth developing!


This is writing ...




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