"Write what you like; there is no other rule"
About this Quote
O. Henry’s line is the kind of advice that sounds liberating until you notice how quietly merciless it is. “Write what you like” isn’t permission to be self-indulgent; it’s a dare to stop hiding behind respectable formulas. The subtext: if you can’t find energy in your own material, no craft trick will save you. Taste becomes discipline.
Coming from a writer famous for clockwork plots and twist endings, the quote also carries a sly wink. O. Henry wasn’t arguing against technique; he was reminding you what technique is for. His stories were engineered, but they were engineered to deliver pleasure: the snap of reversal, the street-level comedy, the sentiment that arrives just before it curdles. “There is no other rule” reads like a rejection of workshops avant la lettre - a preemptive eye-roll at gatekeepers who turn art into compliance. It’s anti-priestly, anti-canon, and faintly suspicious of any literary culture that confuses virtue with difficulty.
Context matters: O. Henry wrote in a fast-moving, magazine-driven marketplace, where clarity and momentum weren’t aesthetic compromises but survival skills. So the line doubles as a professional ethic. Write what you like because liking it is the only renewable fuel; everything else - trends, prestige, “importance” - burns out. The rule is personal, not moral: your genuine appetites are the most reliable compass you’ll ever get.
Coming from a writer famous for clockwork plots and twist endings, the quote also carries a sly wink. O. Henry wasn’t arguing against technique; he was reminding you what technique is for. His stories were engineered, but they were engineered to deliver pleasure: the snap of reversal, the street-level comedy, the sentiment that arrives just before it curdles. “There is no other rule” reads like a rejection of workshops avant la lettre - a preemptive eye-roll at gatekeepers who turn art into compliance. It’s anti-priestly, anti-canon, and faintly suspicious of any literary culture that confuses virtue with difficulty.
Context matters: O. Henry wrote in a fast-moving, magazine-driven marketplace, where clarity and momentum weren’t aesthetic compromises but survival skills. So the line doubles as a professional ethic. Write what you like because liking it is the only renewable fuel; everything else - trends, prestige, “importance” - burns out. The rule is personal, not moral: your genuine appetites are the most reliable compass you’ll ever get.
Quote Details
| Topic | Writing |
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