Tracy Kidder, Interviewed

The author of The Soul of a New Machine and Strength in What Remains sat down recently with the Bygone Bureau to discuss writing.

From the piece...

What are some of your thoughts on young writers interested in going into MFA programs and the like?

I do think that it is a little bit analogous to music. If you want to learn how to play a musical instrument, you go and get some lessons from someone. I’m not sure if those programs will give you a leg up on trying to get a job. I mean, I think trying to make a living as a writer is always hard in this country. Maybe in every country, I don’t know.

What do you think it was about how you went about it? Was it, obviously was it talent, luck, subject matter, I mean, it’s difficult to say, I know.

Well, I think any writer who makes a living in this country writing and doesn’t admit to being extremely lucky is probably deluded. I know some wonderful writers who never had any real luck, you know. So I think I was mostly really very lucky. I had a great professor in college, a literary person named Robert Fitzgerald who talked about the luck of the conception. I didn’t go out to write about this team of computer engineers because I was interested in computers, it just seemed like something that might be interesting. I didn’t foresee about what was going to happen.

But I think that that was probably a pretty lucky choice for two reasons: one was that it was a really good story that I wandered into — that’s the biggest reason — but also because it was a really good story that happened to coincide with a really interesting subject. Largely because these companies were minting money, I mean, this had become an enormous source of wealth, manufacturing computers.

Anyways, talent… I’ve never understood what that really is. There’s no question that some people have real literary talent. It doesn’t necessarily track with other kinds of intelligence, though. It’s interesting. I think it’s curious.

As a writer?

Yeah. I don’t think that all really good writers are very smart in a sort of academic way. In fact, some seem downright stupid. (laughs)