My Concept Of Writing

The little ditty below is a brief statement I wrote a couple of years ago for posting on the internet literary website, "Creativity Webzine", which is based in Germany and on which I have had three short stories published over the recent years.  It is separate on that website from my primary biographical statement and was published as part of a larger section by numerous writers about how and why we write.  While this little piece and about two dollars will buy you a cup of bad coffee from your favorite gasoline station, some of you who read this blog regularly might find it interesting.  As for my work on "Creativity Webzine", you can go to this link "Creativity Webzine: Fiction" and by using the "Find On This Page" function in your web browser with my name "Roger D. Hicks" and find each of the three stories.  Sadly, the website does not have a direct search function which can take you directly to any particular author, story, or other aspect of the voluminous website.  If you actually go to all the trouble of finding and reading any of my stories there, I'd love to hear what you think of them by having you leave a comment on this blog post. 

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My Concept Of Writing

Roger D. Hicks grew up in Appalachia, writes as an Appalachian with publications in numerous print and online venues, and was mentored by nearly a dozen of the best writers in the history of Appalachian Literature.

For me, writing is a natural part of life.  I write to help explain, preserve, protect, and defend the vibrant culture which made me what I am today.  I write both fiction and non-fiction with the intention of producing the best work of which I am capable.  My writing has been influenced both by the Appalachian writers who have been my friends, mentors, and role models and by the great masters whom I have read for my entire lifetime: Hemingway, Faulkner, Steinbeck, Pearl Buck, Flannery O’Connor, P. J. Laska, Bob “Billy Greenhorn” Snyder, James Still, Kate Chopin, Kerouac, Solzhenitsyn, Tolstoy, George Eliot, Guy de Maupassant,  and dozens more.  I don’t write to emulate anybody but I attempt to learn from everybody whose work I read from the penultimate masters to those mistaken idiots who crank out drivel without the ability to understand just how awful their scribblings are.  Examples must be inspirations, objectives, and warning signs along the road of literature and life in order to be well rounded and useful as a whole.  I hope that the last thing I write is the inscription on my tombstone.