ON WRITING

I always wondered what inspired people to write.  I have come to the conclusion that people that have a stable home have nothing to say.  If one's life followed a predictable course of events what would one write about?  Most writers of good fiction are traumatized, nervous wrecks or under the influence of drugs.  Look at Shirley  Jackson.  Her "The Lottery" was a masterpiece, but I was sick for a week after I read it.  Who would write such a story?  She had a happy enough life with a husband and four children and found writing relaxing.  But then, she also had anxieties, so many that she had to seek therapy.  Is the abnormal mind, stuck between the rational and the unstable, the real author?  Would the Beatles have written anything worth listening to if they were not drowning in LSD?  There are millions of books to read, millions of people that write--of hope and despair, of love and hate, of social conscience and apathy, of philosophy, religion and science, of history, of the future and I alone find nothing to say.  I must be the happiest, sanest person ever.  Yes?