In her article, “Stephen King’s Top 20 Rules for Writers”, Lauren Passell rounds up some of her favorite pieces of advice from Kings’ manual “On Writing” for aspiring writers just such as me. Of these twenty, I had a few favorites of my own. Two, which go hand in hand include his rules “Read. Read. Read.” and “You become a writer simply by reading and writing.” King asserts that reading provides the necessary tools for writing, and you need to make time to read if you intend to improve and discover yourself as a writer. It is through incessant and diligent reading and writing that you learn to write, “and the most valuable lessons of all are the ones you teach yourself” rather than those you would pick up in a writing class or seminar. Writing education is largely a self-taught process through reading, more reading, writing, and of course, more writing!
In her Essay, “On Not Winning the Nobel Prize”, Doris Lessing emphasizes the importance of reading in education and how it can singularly change lives. Lessing describes how those of North-West Zimbabwe in the early eighties, desperate for food and basic needs, long for any materials to read and ask for books. She presents a thirsty mother of two, in drought ridden Africa, who has a page of a story of a Russian woman that seems so out of place in the life of this woman, but it reaches her and speaks to her too. This woman reads and hopes that her children will read too so they can get out of that place. In contrast, a privileged boy’s school in North London, with a library seemingly outside the dreams of those of North-West Zimbabwe, have access to a vast catalogue of literary works that will go largely untouched. “Reading, books, used to be part of a general education” Lessing says. And this is true! We take for granted what reading can do for us, and how much we have in front of us. What we have and where we are going is because what we have learned, and so much of what we have learned is from what we have read. This is part of our education, and it continues to shape us and our access to opportunities and future jobs.
After processing the readings of Jose Schall’s “Writing the Conventional Resume” and James Mulvey’s “How to Write a Cover Letter that Gets You Hired, mulling over the utility of each document and advice for preparing them, I’ve had a huge shift in mindset surrounding the function and importance of both documents. In truth, I have never written a cover letter for a job or a promotional opportunity, and so I hadn’t placed much value in the document. But I have created a resume. And so, in my own mind a resume had become mandatory to score a job, and the cover letter optional, or by request of some employers. The resume is a bit fixed by its nature. Sure, there’s is room to highlight pertinent background experience or at least skill sets (an important task still!), but experience and education is what it is up to whatever point you’re at, and in some cases – like my own experience at least in the field of writing – that is limited or little. The cover letter, however, is my pitch. It is an opportunity. It is not where I’ve been (like my resume), it’s where I’m going and a sense of who I am, that hopefully makes a prospective employer think wouldn’t it be awesome to have a woman like this on my team? One important piece that I hadn’t realized a cover letter could include is what you’re reading to expand your knowledge in the industry and relevant work in the field. The truth is what you read, shapes who you are, especially if who you hope to be (like myself) is a writer.
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