Robert Howard is a man who readers of this website won’t need any introduction to. One of the titans of pulp fiction, and the creator of timeless characters like Conan the Barbarian and Solomon Kane, Howard has certainly made his mark upon generations of readers—including yours truly. But you already knew that. What you may not have known is that in addition to his works of heroic fantasy, Howard was also a semi-professional boxer and a sports correspondent for his local newspaper.
Jumping ahead 55 years into the future and across the planet, allow me to introduce you to somebody you may or may not be familiar with already: Mangaka Kentaro Miura, the creator, sole artist, and sole writer of the grimly fantastical (or perhaps fantastically grim) manga series Berserk, which is like Howard’s work thematically if not in content—another dark fantasy epic starring brutal, fanatically driven men. Miura is also like Howard in another way—his memetically hilarious love of the ultra-girly Idolmaster video game series aside, Kentaro Miura is legitimately a black belt in judo and kendo.
And those are not the only two fantasy writers that had intimate, first hand knowledge of violence: none other than JRR Tolkien himself was a veteran of the First World War, and had undoubtedly seen death and destruction up close and personal.
Want more? Marvel Comics kingpin Jack Kirby grew up brawling in the mean streets of 1920s Brooklyn before being drafted into the Army and being decorated for valor with a Bronze Star in the Battle of the Bulge (and for that matter, Stan Lee was also a military veteran, albeit not on the front lines like Kirby was).
So what do all of those men have in common? Two things—they were intimately familiar with dishing out and receiving violence, and they are all heralded as legends and pioneers in the world of speculative fiction. I see a connection, and judging from their impact, I doubt I’m the only one.
Despite the inherent falsity of works of fantasy (derp), the best examples of the genre have one foot in some aspect of reality—whether it be interpersonal relations, politics and history, psychology, or, yes, realistically portraying violence. All four of the guys I namedropped above pen battle scenes that galvanize and draw in the reader, in a way that some noodle-armed geek that’s never fired a gun or thrown a punch could ever hope to portray. And if you don’t believe me, take a look at how the sales of superhero comics are plummeting (NOT the movies based on superhero franchises, the actual pen-and-ink comic books. Most of the movies are based on old stories from those franchises).
While the over-proliferation of both blockheaded leftist politics and wink-y hipster irony are likely the main reasons for this (and you have my word that the Marvel Cinematic Universe will begin to hemorrhage money once they’ve used up their supply of classic stories and try to shoehorn crap like this into the movies), it certainly doesn’t help that these stories of muscular supermen are being written by pencil-necked twerps who have no experience whatsoever with anything that goes on in their comics—to cite one example, look at how Kevin Smith admits that he’s too weak to pull a bowstring; I don’t know about you, but I find that to be a bit…”problematic” when the guy is writing Green Arrow comics, a character who’s entirely defined by being really good at archery!
Obviously, nobody has the power to fly or lift many tons, but if you’re incapable of jumping off the ground or lifting 100 pounds…maybe you shouldn’t write stories about superhumans until you’re at least at the human baseline.
Now, I’m not saying that the only way you can write good fiction is to have first hand experience with injuring other people—it’s a necessity *if you’re writing fiction in which violence is a major theme*, but there’s lots of works of art that don’t involve any violence—and needless to say, if you’re attempting to write a teen slice of life romance, your experience with curbstomping people is going to do more harm than good.
No, what I’m essentially saying is that age-old adage: to write what you know. And to that I will add the always implicit but usually unspoken corollary: make sure that what you know is interesting. No matter what kind of creative output you’re attempting to produce: a novel, a comic book, a movie, a song, a video game, or anything else, don’t depict emotions and actions you have no experience with. As we’ve been discussing, if you have no experience in handling violence, don’t depict characters that do because your utter ignorance in the subject will show itself. If you have no experience in relationships, don’t write a romance or a romantic ballad! And etc.
“But I don’t have any interesting experiences!” you might be whining right about now. Well, that’s entirely your problem then. This is a great and practical reason to become an interesting person, now isn’t it?