Everyday Canvas

Influences

Prompt: Who or what are the most important influences on your writing?

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Shucks! I don’t take my writing that seriously, but as far as people go, it was my uncle, first. Second, during my earlier teens, it was a poet, a friend of the family. Then came the lit teachers in school who really encouraged me without spoiling.

As to what, words always intrigued me. In the beginning, when I was a very small child, letters seemed to be mysterious, wonderful things; puzzles, in fact, waiting to be solved. I learned to read when I was 3.5, my mother used to say. I guess she had a hand in it, too, because she read to me a lot, from all kinds of books and not just stories. But then, everyone in the house was into books. I recall falling in love with The Little Prince by Antoine de Saint-Exupéry. I used to wish he were real.

Reading at an early age pushed me into writing, I suspect. Later on, when I turned fourteen or so, through a lit teacher, I discovered Dostoevsky. He’s the first real influence on me, and I began to read world literature like crazy. Around the same time, I read (or thought I read) Faust and I discovered Rumi, and with him, real poetry. Before that, poetry, with end rhymes and all, felt like a jingle. With Rumi, Emerson, Whitman, and others like them, I began appreciating the depth of true poetry. Then, for a short time, I fell under the influence of the French existentialists, too, but I recovered soon enough. Other influences as the result of my admirations followed.

To this day, I read a lot. Much more than I write. Therefore, I have to say reading has been the biggest influence on me, not just with writing but with every area of life.