Susan Swan

Living the Questions: Should You Have Children if You Want to Write?

Years ago, a science-fiction writer named Judith Merrill told me she couldn’t write after her children left home. Without the structure children imposed on her day, she was lost. My daughter Sam transformed my day too. In order to raise her and write fiction I had to learn to say no to other people’s expectations. …

Living the Questions: What Advice Gives Writers Confidence?

Ignore the advice to write about what you know. Write about what obsesses you and what you know will transform every word you say. Why? Because what you know will come into play naturally and that’s the best way to write.

Living the Questions: Where Do Writers Live?

Anywhere that’s cheap. Writing is a lifestyle and luckily, it has perks. People often rent to writers at a discount because writers are quiet. (Well, most writers.) That’s how it was for me at the Hotel Chelsea when Jerry Weinstein ran the desk. There’s a Jerry Weinstein for every writer if you keep an eye …

Living the Questions: How Do Writers Make a Living?

This new series on the blog is inspired by the poet Ranier Maria Rilke, who wrote in a letter to a toiling poet: “Be patient towards all that is unsolved in your heart and try to love the questions themselves. Live the questions now. Perhaps you will find them gradually, without noticing it, live along …

Some Terrible Men Are Ruining Our World

Some terrible men are ruining our world. Terrible, terrible men who mutilate the bodies of women and blow up people who live in far away cities on the pretext that they have a right to strike back. Strike back? The terrible men are always striking something. They don’t care who gets hurt as long as …

Appointment to the Order of Canada

Thanks to the Governor General of Canada and the Carol Shields Prize for celebrating me today. Congratulations to my fellow recipients. Toronto, ON — Susan Swan, award-winning author, journalist and professor, has been appointed as Member of the Order of Canada by Governor General Mary Simon. Established in 1967, the Order of Canada is one …

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Living the Questions: Should You Have Children if You Want to Write?

Living the Questions: What Advice Gives Writers Confidence?

Living the Questions: Where Do Writers Live?

Living the Questions: How Do Writers Make a Living?

Some Terrible Men Are Ruining Our World

Appointment to the Order of Canada