Author's voice

How I found mine

I love Nabokov, and I’m sure many of you love him too. He’s a writer’s writer. Like many others, I fell under his spell, and I desperately want my prose to be like his. But it’s not…and it never will be.

I’ve been trying to improve my writing for years now, and I’ve probably spent the last 15 years seriously studying the subject. Over that time, I’ve learned a lot: grammar, meter, phonetics, rhyme, pacing, style, and a million other things. But the one thing I never improved was my author's voice. While I felt I was getting better in hundreds of different areas, I seemed unable to find my own voice.

I never tried to plagiarize Nabokov, but I always wanted to write in his style. I love hyper-intelligent, cerebral, witty prose; the kind Nabokov excelled at. Yet when I tried to write like him, my prose felt cold, dead, and utterly lifeless. Sure, I read hundreds of articles on “finding your voice,” but none helped, as it seems to be a personal journey you must take alone. Only you know yourself, and no one else can help you…so what can you do?

For years, I wrote one wretched thing after another, never producing anything I enjoyed reading, just one zombie paragraph after another. Recently, though, I had a breakthrough, and I thought I’d share it here. It began when I truly considered the writing I love; was it really about intelligent, witty, cerebral prose? I realized that this was only the DNA of what I admired; I came to the conclusion that I've never sat down and thought about the exact thing that really lights up my brain. What about the atomic structure of the prose? What was it exactly about certain prose that resonated so deeply with me? So I spent weeks compiling every line, paragraph, and book that appealed to me, searching for hidden patterns and something deeper than “witty”… and eventually, I found it.

After searching for so long, I finally narrowed it down: fragmented surrealism. I love the juxtaposition of unrelated ideas and the sparks that fly when they collide. What I truly adore is delight - the delight of random prose, creative metaphors, and bizarre word combinations. For 15 years, my boat had been sailing in the wrong direction. The writing I thought I loved? I didn’t love it at all (well, not for the reasons I thought, anyway), and I had been aiming at the wrong target all this time. “Intelligent, witty, and cerebral” only described the surface level, but it was the “delight” that really attracted me to that writing.

Now, with a clear goal, I revisited my work, but something was still missing. I thought deeply about my prose, and a second revelation struck: I’d never written anything I enjoyed reading. Every line I’d ever put to paper was for the reader’s benefit, not my own. I wanted readers to be amazed by my prose, dazzled by my metaphors, and blown away by my creativity. I wanted them to say, “This guy’s a genius! The next Nabokov!” I became so obsessed with the reader’s emotions that I never considered my own feelings toward my writing.

It reminds me of the difference between a good actor and a bad one - Daniel Day-Lewis versus the guy at the local theatre. A good actor “acts” as if the situation is real, so the emotions they convey are genuine. When Day-Lewis cries on screen, he’s truly crying. A bad actor, however, pretends the emotions are real. Instead of feeling sadness, they think to themselves, “What does a sad person do?” They wobble their bottom lip, rub their eyes, stomp their feet, and, if they are lucky, force out a single tear. They might believe they’re brilliant, but the audience sees right through it. The irony? It’s easier to be sad than to fake sadness.

That’s how my writing felt - like I was manipulating readers into feeling what I wanted them to feel. Like a bad actor, I faked it, hoping no one would notice. But my performance was dreadful. Now, knowing the style I love (delight), I understood the second half of my problem: I needed to stop writing for the reader and start writing for myself. If I write something sad, I no longer ask myself, “What will make the reader sad?” but rather, “What makes me sad?” If I write humour, I don’t wonder what the reader will find funny…I ask myself “What makes me laugh?”

This advice is as old as grass. We’ve all heard “Write for yourself” a million times before. But up until now, I never grasped how literal this advice was. When they say “Write for yourself,” they really mean it.

I revisited Nabokov’s work with this clarity. Before, I saw his prose as intelligent, witty, and cerebral. Now, I saw the truth of it all; I could hear Nabokov laughing to himself as he wrote his lines. I sensed his delight in playing with words. He wasn’t writing for the reader; he was writing for the sheer joy of it. He was writing to delight himself.

I still haven’t found my voice, but I’m a lot closer now, and I know I’m heading in the right direction.

So, how did you find your voice? What advice set you on the correct path?