Writers: social experts?!

Let me be so free to tell you something about writers...

When you think of a writer, a certain type of person will come to your mind, complete with assumptions you have made about writers.
This picture is very personal and different from others, caused by several factors, such as: experience, personality, capability.
Apart from the different views on writers, some assumptions seem to be very common.

One of these assumptions is that writers always know how to react on others or situations. (Someone actually once told me to fix a situation. Me: "How?" The other: "You know it, you write about it...")
This is downright nonsense! Writers - novelists and script writers in particular - love to exploit their imagination. To feed their imagination, they observe. This is merely to fill in the blanks, the spots where their own experience or empathy lacks certainty.
Although a writer might write the most genius of dialogues, the sharpest comments or describe the most detailed personality, they always create the complete picture in which they have total authority over the characters and scenes.
In other words, they create a dimension in which they know the characters, who are based on characteristics from the author himself, his acquaintances or his observations.
Since the character is fully known by the author, the characters can't pose a threat to the author, he can freely play with them by creating scenes.
The author can't blunder, he knows exactly how the other characters will respond, resulting in interesting dialogues that make sense, which will lead the story towards the desired plot twists and outcomes.

A good writer is able to write convincingly about almost any scene imaginable.
This does not mean that a writer has to have experience in most scenes, it's merely a matter of observing skills or imagination and some empathy.

So social experts? I wouldn't be too sure about that..

It's common for writers to observe a lot. A good observation is one in which you yourself aren't involved. (imagine observing the natural behavior of a cat while you're stroking it... not successful!) For that reason writers can be quiet and distant, which isn't something you'd say about a social expert. My teacher once said: "I have interviewed many writers when I was still a journalist. Writers aren't talkers, they're thinkers." ^^ And that definitely applies to me too! ;)

-♥- the writer~ ...LOL!

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*~Maria