To experienced professional writers I wouldn't say a word. My questions, on the other hand, would keep them humping.
Helen Topping Miller: My suggestion to beginning writers is: first, learn people. Know as many people from every walk of life as possible. Learn their lives, their troubles, their problems, the joys they have—their outlook on the rest of the world. Having acquired a strong sincerity in dealing with humanity, the writer must inevitably produce work which will ring true. In my opinion, giving convincing and appealing character plot becomes more or less a matter of mechanics and the employment of the dramatic sense. Second: learn the language. Study poetry, the psalms, songs, the Gospels—every form of tuneful, rhythmic writing. To make words sing is to my mind the supreme gift in writing English. And I can give no better advice to the practised writer than this.
Thomas Samson Miller: Never force yourself, for the stuff then comes from the head instead of from the heart. It doesn't ring true. Quit before you are tired and you'll be more eager to get at the work on the morrow.
Anne Shannon Monroe: I would suggest to a beginner that he first be sure he has something to say: then put it every bit on paper; then find the main thread and eliminate everything that does not make it stand out; to read it aloud, and get the sound of his stuff; to read it to other people and get their reactions; to lay it aside till he forgets it, and then go over it again—maybe half a dozen times. To eliminate every word he can eliminate and still tell his story clearly and convincingly. And then to copy it beautifully—and send it to an editor. One more point: to pay not an iota of attention to praise of his work, when he reads it to his friends, but to note their actual reaction—their interest, curiosity, enjoyment of his story. What they say has no value; how they enjoy it is everything.
L. M. Montgomery: As to advising beginners—why, I love to do it. Advice is so cheap and easy. First, I always tell them what an old lady used to say to me: "Don't marry as long as you can help it, for when the right man comes along you can't help it." So—don't write if you can help it; because if you ought to write and have it in you to make a real success of writing you can't help it. If you are sure you can't help it, then go ahead. Write—write—write. Revise—revise—revise. Prune—prune—prune. Study stories that are classed as masterpieces and find out why they are so classed. Leave your stories alone after they are written long enough to come to them as a stranger. Then read them over as a stranger; you'll see a score of faults and lacks you never noticed when they came hot from your pen. Rewrite them, cutting out the faults and supplying the lacks.
I would advise beginners to cultivate the note-book habit. Jot down every idea that comes to you as you go on living—ideas for plots, characters, descriptions, dialogue, etc. It is amazing how well these bits will fit into a story that wasn't born or thought of when you set them down. And they generally have a poignancy that is lacking in deliberate invention. For example, I was once washing the dinner dishes when a friend happened to quote to me the old saying: "Blessed are they who expect nothing, for they shall not be disappointed." I retorted, "I think it would be worse to expect nothing than to be disappointed." Then I dropped my dish cloth and rushed to "jot it down." It lay in my note-book unused for ten years and then it motivated one of the best chapters in my first book. This illustrates what I mean by the note-book habit.
Practised writers should try to avoid mannerisms and stereotyped style. They won't succeed, of course, but they should try. Also, they shouldn't presume on their success and think that anything goes because they write it.
Frederick Moore: Read and labor. Don't get out of practise.
Talbot Mundy: 1. Write. 2. Rewrite.
The beginner can learn to write only by writing, just as you can learn to run only by running, or to ride by riding.