Member Spotlight: Claudine Griggs

Why is writing important to you and why do you think it’s an important medium for the world?
I first learned that writing was important when I became an early-age reader. Growing up in a family that did not always value literacy and seeing the resulting varieties of impoverishment offered convincing evidence that writing and learning were important. Once I embraced reading, it soon seemed necessary to become a writer.

What are your tried and tested remedies to cure writer’s block?
Set a time to write, stick to it, and try to write every day. And when that fails, look around the world at all the possible improvements that might be made. Remind yourself that right voice at the right time just might be yours.

What is your favorite time to write?
In the morning after first my first cup of coffee; say 9:00-12:00. Longer if my brain permits it.

What’s the best piece of writing advice you’ve ever received and would like to impart to other writers?
I think it was Steinbeck to advised writers to forget about the faceless audience and write to an individual. When my writing starts to get over-inflated or over-indulgent, I start writing directly to someone who has a topnotch bullshit meter.

What excites you most about being a writer in today’s age?
Taking readers and myself out of the mundane for a little while. A writer’s universe is almost as big as the real one.

Claudine Griggs’s Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell is out now with Not a Pipe Publishing.