What To Write About

Had the great privilege of hanging around Colum McCann for three days last week. If you're unfamiliar, he's the 2009 National Book Award winner for his 9/11 allegorical novel Let The Great World Spin, and he's arguably one of the best writers I've ever read, and he's working with J.J. Abrams to make Let The Great World Spin into a movie, and he's totally Irish, so yeah, it was a great three days. 

He said some really smart things about writing over those three days as well. Here's one of them:

"Everybody says that you should write about what you know about, but my theory is that you should write about what you don't know about. Or, you should write towards what you want to know. And in that way, you sort of liberate yourself. You're not concerned and boxed in by your knowledge or your application of knowledge."