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Do You Think That You’re a Better Writer Than the Average Reader of This Blog?

January 21, 2009 by Nathan Bransford 207 Comments

A little experiment and conversation starter for this Wednesday.

We all know that getting published is hard and that only the strong survive, to the point that agents only take on a handful of clients a year despite thousands of submissions. At the same time, accurate feedback is rare in this business, and it’s hard for someone to get a sense of their abilities. This might be a way of measuring that.

So You Tell Me: based on what you have seen from comments and contests, do you think you’re a better writer than the average reader of this blog?

Then let’s discuss the results and implications in the comments section.

Filed Under: The Writing Life Tagged With: Life of a Writer, You Tell Me

Reader Interactions

Comments

  1. DCS says

    January 23, 2009 at 7:36 pm

    You’re asking my opinion, right? Naturally my opinion is that I’m better than average. I may in fact not be better than the average reader here, but I’m assuming that most of us have not gotten a book published. Publication is a surrogate objective measure of writing skill, granting that some great writers don’t get published while some mediocre ones do.

    Reply
  2. Lea Schizas - Author/Editor says

    January 24, 2009 at 1:09 am

    The only thing I can add to what everyone wrote is this:

    when you are presenting yourself on blogs and emails, your writing voice is still there. You can’t turn it off.

    Reply
  3. Jude Hardin says

    January 25, 2009 at 5:58 am

    If you think you’re better than average, then you haven’t set the bar high enough.

    Reply
  4. Eva Ulian says

    January 25, 2009 at 2:03 pm

    In answer to Jude Hardin: “If you think you’re better than average, then you haven’t set the bar high enough.”

    None of us set the bar in the first place, a certain Literary Agent did to find out how many of us could, in Jim Lamb’s words be able to:

    “temper one’s egotism with humility before being thought of as an ass.”

    Reply
  5. Vicky says

    January 25, 2009 at 5:17 pm

    I voted yes; however, there are only certain areas that I feel as if I can write better than others.

    Reply
  6. Yvette Davis says

    January 27, 2009 at 1:08 am

    I don’t know about you, but I write because I like to write and I want to learn more about how to write.

    Does that require arrogance?

    I can think of other things to be arrogant about. Like what constitutes entertainment and what doesn’t. Benjamin Button sucked in my opinion. And everybody who says it didn’t is just plain wrong!

    😛

    Reply
  7. Wanderer says

    February 3, 2009 at 8:58 am

    Good question! I voted No. I know I can have my moments of brilliance but then I’ll read someone else’s comments that make me lmao or leave me deep in thought. There are so many great minds out there that I’d be crazy to claim that my milkshake is better than all in the yard.

    P.S. Also, the fact I used ‘lmao’ as part of my explanation further enforces my No. 😉

    Reply
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Hi, I’m Nathan. I’m the author of How to Write a Novel and the Jacob Wonderbar series, which was published by Penguin. I used to be a literary agent at Curtis Brown Ltd. and I’m dedicated to helping authors achieve their dreams. Let me help you with your book!

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