Advice from D. Watkins on how to start your writing career
By Shantika Bhat and Kristiana Smith
D. Watkins is an amazing writer who has published The Beast Side: Living (and Dying) While Black in America, The Cook Up: A Crack Rock Memoir, We Speak For Ourselves. He was selected for One Book Baltimore, a campaign that encourages Baltimore City seventh and eighth grade students to connect with literature by reading the same book during the month of October. Although he has become successful, this journey wasn’t always easy for him, coming from Baltimore with only a head full of ideas. He has a goal of helping fellow Baltimore writers become successful with his guiding words down below.
Graphic by Kristiana Smith for CHARM: Voices of Baltimore Youth
“Get a medium account and start putting things out now.”
You’re never too young to start writing (CHARM is proof of that!) and share your work with others. By the time you go into higher education you have covered a lot of learning material such as your writing style and flow.
“Study what's happening in the publishing industry so you know what you are going into.”
You will already have the knowledge of how the field works. An example is if there are new regulations in publishing work, having knowing this beforehand will give you a leg up.
“Read everyday.”
You can learn about different styles and get ideas about how you would like to publish your work, just like our CHARM: For Your Inspiration publication! Reading others’ work helps your creative juices start to flow.
“Share your work with a community of people who will give you real feedback and constructive criticism to push you further.”
Practice makes improvements! Think about the first drafts you wrote in English vs the final draft, obviously the more you practice and receive constructive criticism the more your writing improves.
“Try finding an agent that could help to manage you and find someone to represent you in the publishing industry.”
This is so that you can start publishing your work in various ways.
“Network with various people in the media.”
They could help you in the future. Mentors are always needed everywhere you go to help push you to your writing dreams. Not sure where to start? Try following journalists and writers you like on social media.
“Make yourself projects. Assign yourself tasks to write a whole book, comedic book, or a book of poetry, so that you can show people your work and experience.”
Having the ability to make yourself do big projects may seem to be hard but, this gives great practice for what you want to do in the future. The skills you gain from these tasks will help show others that you are the real deal because you are able to challenge yourself.
“Write something that is the best representation of you so that if you get the opportunity you already have something to publish.”
The ability to show that you have practiced and produce quality content can help show others your true skills. In addition, you can take your projects and already have something ready for publication.
Advice from CHARM EDitor and poet, Rashad
1. “Write as much as you can.”
Practice makes perfect...write often.
2. “If you write about your emotions and just how you feel about certain topics, you’ll slowly start to get into your groove.”
Turn to your emotions for inspiration.
3. “Your words aren’t going to be as crisp as they were earlier.”
When inspiration strikes, don’t wait to write it down.
