Edgar Rice Burroughs, born September 1 in 1875, is arguably one of the most important writers of the 20th century, for better or worse.
As with many bestselling writers who almost seem to fall into success, Burroughs had a varied employment record ranging from ranch hand to teacher and ad man before turning to fiction in his 30s. Once he started with the first Tarzan of the Apes stories in 1911, he never stopped.
By the time of his death in 1950, Burroughs had published nearly 70 adventure novels ranging from the Tarzan series to John Carter of Mars and other fictional universes involving dinosaurs, civilizations under the surface of the earth, and so on. His books were translated into dozens of languages and spawned innumerable movies, comic books, and TV and radio series, not to mention creating the DNA of the century’s pulp fiction aesthetic.
In 1939, when Burroughs was as big in the cultural imagination (if not bigger) than James Patterson or Stephen King today, Alva Johnson published “How to Become a Great Writer” in The Saturday Evening Post. Using Burroughs as a template, Johnson included a list of what helps make a great writer:
- Be a disappointed man.
- Achieve no success at anything you touch.
- Lead an unbearably drab and uninteresting life.
- Hate civilization.
- Learn no grammar.
- Read little.
- Write nothing.
- Have an ordinary mind and commonplace tastes, approximating those of the great reading public.
- Avoid subjects that you know about.
Johnson’s tongue is planted in cheek here, but only somewhat
In other words, ignore the history and habits of bestselling writers at your own peril.
Chris Barsanti 