Member Spotlight: Cate Rubenstein

Why is writing important to you and why do you think it’s an important medium for the world? Writing is a release, a pressure valve of sorts, for complex thoughts and emotions I don’t always even know how to articulate until I find myself typing. It’s also a snapshot of moments that could easily be forgotten, and ideally- a way to connect. I hope it will always be important for us as a species to wonder how other people think and feel, and want human connection with other imperfect minds more than we want perfect technology.

What are your tried and tested remedies to cure writer’s block? Movement beats anything. Just get going! Exercise gets the blood going, even just going for a walk and changing scenes visually. Step away, let it go – and come back refreshed.

What is your favorite time to write? If I’m inspired—I will wake up early and still be writing well into the night, nonstop, never moving. If I’m not… nothing can make me. Unfortunately.

What’s the best piece of writing advice you’ve ever received and would like to impart to other writers? Hemingway nailed it: “All you have to do is write one true sentence. Write the truest sentence that you know.” Just write the truth. It’s infinitely more interesting than what we might wish were the truth.

What excites you most about being a writer in today’s age? The sense of nihilistic impending doom that’s artistically freeing, if that didn’t sound too bleak.

Cate Rubenstein’s Voices in Pop Music: Taylor Swift is out now with Creative Paperbacks.