I Want To Be A Writer People Remember
An Inside Look At My Writing Process
Reading Madly, Deeply: The Diaries of Alan Rickman inspired me to evaluate why I journal and how it's become a crucial part of my writing process.
I read a lot of celebrity memoirs because analyzing how people I admire make decisions in their personal lives and careers gives me the insight to make better decisions in mine.
It sounds intimate to say I read Alan Rickman's journal the same way it sounds intimate to say that I've read a compilation of the letters that Scott F. Fitzgerald wrote to his daughter Scottie, but the private thoughts of public figures are often released and made public after their death.
It's common for the estates of late writers to donate their papers (letters, unfinished drafts, diaries, plot notes, etc.) to universities that archive them to be studied and analyzed by literary scholars. That's how they become part of our history.
I want to be a writer that people remember.
If something ever happens to me, I want my papers to become public so people can follow the development of my ideas and the events that influenced them. I hope writers build on my work and use what they have learned from me to become better writers themselves.
