Why I Write

August 8, 2025 | Jonathan Burdick

In George Orwell's 1946 essay "Why I Write," he broke down what he called the "four great motives to writing." All four of these motives, he believed, "exist in different degrees in every writer," although in different proportions from writer to writer and, even then, it fluctuated individually throughout one's life.

First, Orwell wrote, there is sheer egoism. Explained Orwell, "[There is the] desire to seem clever, to be talked about, to be remembered after death. ... It is humbug to pretend this is not a motive, and a strong one." I mean, let's be real: even the mere idea that I think anybody would considering reading what I'm writing on a website named after me involves, at the very least, a slightly-above-reasonable level of ego. 

Orwell listed aesthetic enthusiasm as the second motive. This is the desire to express the "beauty of the external world" and "to share an experience which one feels is valuable and ought not to be missed." A genuine love for words and language can capture this.

Third is historical impulse, or the hope "to see things as they are, to find out true facts and store them up for the use of posterity." 

The last motive then, Orwell argued, is political purpose, or the want to "push the world in a certain direction, to alter other people’s idea of the kind of society that they should strive after." No piece of writing, he argued, is "genuinely free from political bias."

Orwell opened his essay stating that he knew from the age of five or six that he wanted to be a writer. In his late teens and early twenties, he then gave up on such dreams. "I tried to abandon this idea," he wrote, "but I did so with the consciousness that I was outraging my true nature and that sooner or later I should have to settle down and write books."

Like Orwell, I also wanted to be a writer from a young age. There has never really been a period in my life that I wasn't writing consistently. Even so, I've always had difficulty referring to myself as a writer. When I was in my twenties, I felt I didn't deserve the title unless somebody was paying me to do it. In my thirties, when folks started paying me to do it, I then decided I needed to have a book published or, at the very least, do some gonzo piece in Rolling Stone or something first. After having over 100 published stories on my resume, some of them pretty good, there's still that lingering (and cliché, but real nonetheless) imposter syndrome that creeps in anytime I refer to myself or, even worse, someone else refers to me as a writer. Then, of course, there's the a constant mental high-wire act of wanting people to read what I wrote while simultaneously wanting to throw up at the thought of self-promotion, basically a requirement nowadays to get eyes on something in the ever-expanding battle within the attention economy.

Going back, I became self-conscious of my writing in high school, and did so mostly in secret, whether in cheap spiral notebooks during study hall or on the family computer. I discovered Orwell's essay around this time and found it meaningful and useful. I reread it many times throughout college while I was writing mostly snobby, unimpressive movie reviews for the student newspaper. I'm sure I referred to them as films or cinema. I dabbled in some online writing where the pay was "exposure." Like every other millennial, I blogged, but being a time predating algorithms, this meant search engines were still useful and could sometimes funnel thousands of strangers to one of my posts about whatever nonsense had caught my attention that day. 

By junior year of college, I was going through that phase of reading too much Bukowski, Kerouac, Updike, Hemingway, et al., so it's no surprise that my writing absorbed a slightly more pretentious tone. Around this time was the 2008 election too, the first in which I really paid attention, so I started dabbling in writing, probably rather annoyingly, about politics, even if I didn't understand any of it all that much. 

Really though, I've been writing as long as I can remember. During my kindergarten era, I spun the yarns of Tex, a humanoid circle that was a hybrid rip-off of Mario, Clint Eastwood, and Wolverine from X-Men. Then I moved onto "The Adventures of Me Me and We We," a comedic rip-off blending the humor of The Muppets with Ren & Stimpy, following the zany misadventures of the backwards hat wearing skateboarder Me Me and his best friend, a wisecracking anthropomorphic hot dog named We We. It all made perfect sense in my 8-year-old head.

A couple of years later in 1996, my friend Tyler's dad took us to the movies to see "Twister." I was immediately captivated by tornadoes (and, of course, Helen Hunt) and was convinced that I would study meteorology and spend my adult years chasing tornadoes. What followed that summer were my first hand-written "novels," a trilogy called "Tornado Alley" that, although scientifically questionable, took place in northwestern Pennsylvania. This "Twister" rip-off followed fictionalized adult versions of Tyler and I chasing tornadoes around Pennsylvania, getting way too close, not doing anything remotely scientific or helpful, and then having a thrilling action sequence where we escaped. Rinse and repeat for the two sequels.

That school year, I penned what was sure to be my 4th grade magnum opus: "L.A.P.D." Hand-written in a flimsy spiral notebook, it was more or less a 75-page knock off of "Die Hard" and "Beverly Hills Cop." On the cover, I even included my dream cast, cutting out actors from my mom's People magazine -- you know, just in case Hollywood was interested.

The following year, my dad purchased the family our first computer. This is when I wrote "Alien Havoc," a sequel to the "Alien" franchise set on Earth centuries later. This was my first story that I took to school to share with peers. Over a few weeks, it was passed around friend to friend , a bona fide hit with my 11-year-old classmates. The creative ways in which I had xenomorphs dispose of characters probably didn't hurt. Thankfully, my teacher never confiscated it or I likely would have been sent to the guidance counselor. To be perfectly honest though, the attention felt pretty good, a fuel to that sheer ego. 

In sixth grade, we moved off of our rural dirt road and into town. While I hadn't switched schools, I was now a townie and I was deeply depressed about it. I missed the woods. The silence. The cows in the field our porch overlooked. I couldn't sleep hearing the constant buzz of cars at night. I channeled this into a story about a 6th grade kid named Kevin Morris and it was basically a ripoff of The Wonder Years set in the late-90s.

I think about these stories sometimes. Part of what I find so interesting about them is I wasn't writing for anybody. There was no intended audience. The writing was solely an outlet for ideas bouncing around my head while daydreaming during Sunday sermons and long car rides. There was no Blogger or Substack to share it, no quest for likes and shares and comments, no hopes of Someone of Importance noticing it online. 

Corny as it is, I was writing for the sheer enjoyment of writing. Unlike some literary greats, I've never considered writing some romantically painful slog. Even in "Why I Write," Orwell described  the process as "a horrible, exhausting struggle." That never really resonated with me. All these years later, I still just enjoy writing. So, I'd probably add a fifth reason one might have for writing: pleasure.

I reread those childhood stories or even some of those self-important blog posts and, frankly, outside of the absolute absurdity of some of it, I can still sense the joy and wonder in it. There's a throughline of hope and optimism in it all. Those voices often quiet as one gets older, a steady but low hum in the backdrop of  the mind. But while I sometimes may come off as a cynic, I've always been and continue to be an optimist -- maybe just a more cautious one. 

Orwell concluded in his essay, "I am not able, and do not want, completely to abandon the world view that I acquired in childhood." Nor do I. So, who knows? It could mean that another story inspired by my daydreams is coming or hey, better yet, maybe just a sequel involving a skateboarder and his wisecracking anthropomorphic hot dog best friend.