It is never too early to start writing. It is also never too late. When you are young, writing is a release of passion, a trigger for introspection and an effort to turn vanity into art. With age comes experience. At least it is if you do it right! Age means that you have something worthwhile to write about. Hopefully it means that your edges are softer and you are mellowed by trials and suffering. Youth may write convincingly about passions' first blush. Age writes with authority.

Some writers decide to write before they have learned anything true. I am brought to mind of the very successful author of the series of books about dragon-riding knights. Well, I am glad he has met with some success in spite of his young age, but he hasn't written anything worth reading. Kids may not see the difference, but a McCaffrey has already done it better. Her stories are better because she knows things about being an adult and being responsible for more than yourself. She has read and suffered and thrilled. That takes a little time.

Ray Bradbury promised himself to write every day. Isaac Asimov did the same. As young men they produced works of art. But the more they advanced in age, the more their efforts produced not just art, but masterpieces. From Harriet Beecher Stowe we should learn that experience does not preclude art. Her magnum opus, Uncle Tom's Cabin, arguably changed the world.

Although the events of Elie Weisel's book, Night, occurred when he was a youngster, it wasn't until he had achieved an important distance from those events that he could write about them with a level of sincerity and power that will change human hearts. Had he written the book when he was very much younger, those events would have appeared to raw and his language too feeble to turn tragedy and heartbreak into art and meaning.

When Frank McCourt writes his wonderful novels about his life he is writing them from a distance that gives his stories weight. He is now able to turn anecdotes into drama. Age is not a disadvantage to a writer, it is a necessity. A young writer's works may be filled with talent and even genius. But age provides more. It provides a patina of wisdom; something that children do not understand. It is any wonder that Shakespeare as a young man produces barkers like Titus Andronicus? Are we surprised when he conjures Macbeth, Othello and Hamlet when he is ripe? It is never too late to begin writing. It is only too sad if you never begin.

Learn more about this author, John Devera.
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