RE: He said...She said...He said...etc. (Was Re: What's A TW Got To DO To Get A Job Around Here?!)

["Smith, Martin" <martin -dot- smith -at- encorp -dot- com>]

I've been following this thread with interest and have to take Andrew's side
on this one.

When I was in high school I worked nights bussing tables at a trendy
restraint. Late one evening we weren't very busy and I began talking with
one of the customers, who was there by himself. He asked if I knew what I
wanted to do for a living and I told him I was going to be a writer. He
chuckled and told me that was what he did for a living. It turned out he
wrote for the soap opera The Days of Our Lives.

Soon our conversation turned to writing. He asked if I had submitted
anything for publication and I told him about the (dreadful) short stories
that I had been submitting to magazines. He asked what they were about and I
said romance. He laughed and said "What could you possibly know about
romance at your age." He advised me to live life and seek out new
experiences, otherwise I would have nothing to write about. When he began
telling me about the many different ways a man could make love to a woman I
listened with fascination and comprehended the power of writing from
personal experience versus the theoretical.

The notion that one can write anything absent even the most rudimentary
level of personal understanding is absurd. Fiction writers know this fact
painfully well. The best nonfiction and technical writers know this fact as
well.

Martin R. Smith
Manager, Technical Writing
Encorp, Inc.


^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^
Now's a great time to buy RoboHelp! You'll get SnagIt screen capture
software and a $200 onsite training voucher FREE when you buy RoboHelp
Office or RoboHelp Enterprise. Hurry, this offer expires February 28, 2002. www.ehelp.com/techwr

Have you looked at the new content on TECHWR-L lately?
See http://www.raycomm.com/techwhirl/ and check it out.

---
You are currently subscribed to techwr-l as: archive -at- raycomm -dot- com
To unsubscribe send a blank email to leave-techwr-l-obscured -at- lists -dot- raycomm -dot- com
Send administrative questions to ejray -at- raycomm -dot- com -dot-  Visit 
http://www.raycomm.com/techwhirl/ for more resources and info.