Comment by zkmon

The primary goal of writing is communication. If you are trying to convey information, you need someone to actually sit down and read it. Most of the time, this isn’t a problem, you’re writing for someone you have a pre-existing relationship with and they want to read what you have to say, whether that be a friend, a coworker, or your future self.

Problems arise when you move from one:one, to one:many communication. If you are trying to pass knowledge on to people you have no prior relationship with, you do need to attract their attention in a sea of options. If you actually have something important to say that other people need to hear, it does nobody any good for you to go unnoticed. In those circumstances, I don’t see anything wrong with taking Gwern’s advice.

I agree with your first assertion but not so much on the rest. There is more than one reason to write and for many it is about communication, they have something they want to express and you would be wise to consider your reader if that is your goal.

Hooking the reader with the opening page is swinging to the other fence of having a terrible opening page that no one will get through, generally not good to swing to the fences. I think the writer should be honest and upfront with the reader, the opening pages should be representative of what is to come, they should represent the whole and not just the beginning.

> Keeping the reader glued to the screen is not the primary goal of writing.

This is common advice in English classes and it predates the World Wide Web (and likely the Internet).

Hook them in the first few sentences or lose them.

And yes, of course, it does depend on who the intended audience is. You wouldn't do it in The New Yorker.

> You don't write for the reader. You write for yourself first. Readers sometimes, just happen to appreciate it about as much you do.

Depends very much on the medium. It's definitely not true that most professional writing is written for the author's sake. It is for an audience. Read books on writing and you'll often find the advice to cut out things if they won't interest the reader - no matter how valuable it is to you.

I myself struggle with this. Some years ago, I took a trip to my childhood home in another country after being separated for decades. Almost none of my friends from the time have been there in decades either. I made notes during the trip, and when I got back I started writing what I saw, and shared it with my friends who grew up with me. How various neighborhoods have changed. Anecdotes from my childhood tied to those places. And a lot more.

I got 30% done, and then decided to hold off sharing till I'd written the whole thing. I now have a first draft. It's the size of a proper book. It contains a lot of stuff that is of value to me, but likely not to most of the (small) audience. I know if I share it with them, chances are high no one will read it.

On the one hand, the stuff I wrote is highly valuable to me - it's become an unintentional memoir. But on the other hand, I do want to share quite a bit with my friends, and I know they'll value it if they actually read it.

I'll either have to cut a lot out, or write two versions (impractical).

The point being that even when you have a very limited audience, it is important to care about them and sacrifice your needs to an extent.

> Keeping the reader glued to the screen is not the primary goal of writing [...] You don't write for the reader.

This is contrary to all writing advice I have read, from Robert Olen Butler to John Gardner. Sure, the natural geniuses might write from themselves or their friends (like Kafka) and because they're geniuses the writing is good, but most people aren't geniuses, so they need to keep the reader and its needs firmly (VERY firmly) in their minds.

Speaking of John Gardner, here is a quote about writing that perfectly encapsulates what the job of writer is:

"A true work of fiction does all of the following things, and does them elegantly, efficiently: it creates a vivid and continuous dream in the reader’s mind; it is implicitly philosophical; it fulfills or at least deals with all of the expectations it sets up; and it strikes us, in the end, not simply as a thing done but as a shining performance."

..."Make me care" is part of the "expectations it sets up". "Make me care" begins with the first word of the first chapter, continues with the first paragraph and the first page and, through the first scene, it eases the reader into the "vivid and continuous dream" from which the author should never jolt awake the reader.