“But I Can’t Spell!”: The Dumbest, Most Annoying Statement To A Writer
Because We Know What You Really Mean
“But I can’t spell” is the “It’s not you, it’s me” of the writing world. You know the situation:
You’re hanging out with a friend or relative, they sketch out a story idea, and you say, “Cool! I’d read that.”
Alternatively, and more annoyingly, they are explaining how they really should write this book they’ve been thinking of, and you say, “That sounds like a great idea.”
And then they say, “BuT I CAn’T Speeeelllll…”
You, someone who writes on the regular, facepalm and kick yourself for even responding.
There are two meanings to this statement in this situation. Neither are good.
Meaning 1:
They are telling you that they don’t want to write the story, but, weirdly enough, think you will be offended or argue with them if they just say that.
I’m not some kind of writing evangelist who showed up at your doorstep with the book “On Writing” in my arms and the words “Have you heard the good news about pantsing?” on my lips. I genuinely do not give any kind of expletive about your writing choices. If you don’t want to write that cool story idea, no one will mind if you say, “I don’t think I have the time.”
Or, “I communicate better with another type of art.”
Or, “It’s just a passing fancy. I don’t really want to.”
These are all perfectly legitimate, unproblematic reasons to not write a darn word. There are a million other perfectly good reasons: you don’t have the money for proper editing, you feel out of your depth, and the list goes on forever.
There are millions of noob writers and professional writers in this world, spewing millions more words onto paper and the internet. If no one ever decided to write again, we would still be inundated with written matter. We aren’t missing anything if someone who does not care to write a book doesn’t write it.
Meaning 2:
They are clueless about writing professionally.
Meaning One and Two are connected. If they think that being unable to spell is a sure-fired, ‘get out of writing, free’ card, they don’t understand the process of writing at all.
Spelling is the easiest part to fix when it comes to writing. Even the most basic writing software comes with spellcheckers these days, and misspelled words are the simplest typos to catch for you or an editor.
What’s more, there are dozens of cures for misspelling regularly. Take a class, get a line editor, ask your beta readers to go over it, use a dictionary- any of these things will work fine. I regularly put words that confuse me in the search bar of Google or Bing and read the top entry that comes up.
It’s not that big of a problem if you miss a word or two, either. The occasional ‘I love my dark angle’ for ‘I love my dark angel’ is totally forgivable in a book or article that is otherwise in good shape. If you catch most of the typos and misstatements in the editing process, readers won’t mind that you spelled nice ‘niec’ that one time.
And bad writing? An aimless mess of word salad can have perfect spelling and still be completely unreadable. I tossed that book by the weed-smoking philosopher because he kept inserting random parables about the Age of Aquarius while making ridiculous statements about time in his stupid, disorganized, idiotically-formatted book. ‘Bunk’ was a book with perfect spelling but was organized in a way that was impossible to follow, and whose central thesis seemed to be ‘Some people sometimes lie or don’t, I don’t know. In the past, too.’
The cardinal sins of writing are muddled thinking and boring readers. Spelling is way down on the list. If someone tells me, “I’d write a book, but I can’t spell,” they are actually saying, “I don’t know how to write, nor do I care to learn.”
So long as the next words out of their mouths aren’t, “Can you write the book for me?” I am happy to move on to another topic of conversation.
Just…can they not parade their ignorance like it is a badge of honor?