DISHER ABOUT WRITING

Garry Disher has shown a steady interest in the craft of writing as an author, teacher of creative writing and author of writers' handbooks. New writers might find it useful to read Disher's interviews, articles and handbooks, as they present valuable insights on this specific art and craft, as well as advice offered with professionalism in a clear, focussed manner. Titles to check on:

• Writing Fiction: an introduction to the craft (1983); revised second edition in 1989
• Writing Professionally: the freelancer's guide to writing and marketing (1989)
• Plot and Structure (in How to Write Crime, ed. Marele Day, 1996)

Here in a nutshell are Disher's 'guidelines' for writing for children (if not for readers of any age):

• You shall not preach or instruct
• You shall not condescend
• You shall not write badly
• You shall not view the world with rose-coloured glasses, but nor shall you deny the existence of humour and love
• You shall not have the cavalry ride to the rescue
• You shall not seize upon fashionable material such as incest, suicide, cyberspace and homelessness to make a quick buck, but only if the story demands it
• You shall treat the outer and inner challenges of life with honesty, integrity and hard thought, avoiding easy answers, no answers and reductive sentimentality
• You shall be true to the work rather than to what is said to be best for young readers; to graft an uplifting ending on to a story that demands another is to betray the work, the reader and yourself
• You shall entertain
• You shall always push at the boundaries that you've set for yourself.

From a speech given by Garry Disher at the Melbourne Writers' Festival Youth Literature Days, on October 13, 1996, reproduced in Viewpoint, Volume 5, Number 4, Summer 1997

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