The Draft

You Don’t Have to Write About the Virus

But if you do, here’s how to find something new to say

Welcome to The Draft, an advice column about writing and life from Eileen Pollack, former director of the University of Michigan MFA Program. We’re here to answer your questions about storycraft, writing, and telling the truth.

Have a question? Share it with us.

Dear Draft,

I feel as if I should be writing something about the pandemic. But what do I have to contribute that others don’t? I worry I might be taking advantage of a disaster to get my name out or earn some money. Working on my novel feels even more self-involved and irrelevant.

Signed,
Quarantined and Confused

Dear QC,

Of course you feel you should be writing about the pandemic. We are living through a historic event, and you are a witness to the drastic ways our world has changed.

But don’t write an essay whose only goal is to earn you views. Whatever you churn out would be insincere — the literary equivalent of those colloidal silver “cures” you see charlatans hawking on the internet. And why chime in by repeating what everyone else is already saying about the horrors of standing in line at Trader Joe’s…