Oftentimes, people think that being a writer and being an author are the same, especially because they are in the same line of work. Their work might be similar, but they are not the same.
First, definitions.
A writer is someone who carefully puts words together in a written form for a particular purpose, while an author is someone who has a published work to their name.
They are two very different paths. Here are some important differences between a writer and an author, as well as their responsibilities:
1. An author has the luxury of contracting their work to a ghostwriter while taking the glory. This simply means that one of the things that make one an author is having the idea behind a work. You might not be responsible for fleshing it out, but you have to be responsible for coming up with the idea behind the book. The writer in this case is a ghostwriter – that is, the one responsible for bringing an author’s idea to life, but taking no outside credit for it.
2. An author is someone that has had his works published. This is pretty straightforward. Someone becomes an author as soon as the credit for their work is given to them through publishing. A writer’s work is usually not recognized and many times they write without being given public credit.
3. An author is usually streamlined to a particular form of writing. That is, he is usually known for the kind of writing his work is published for, and hence does not have the luxury of writing and publishing his works under different kinds of genres. A writer, on the other hand, can write under almost any genre. All it takes is having a good understanding of what they are supposed to write and doing a good job of writing it.
4. Authors do not necessarily need the basic requirements of writing. They can write as they please and then send their work to editors who would do a good job of editing it. Or they can always contract professional writers to do the job for them. As for writers, they need more than basic knowledge and understanding about writing and have to do a good job of writing whatever they have been assigned to write, so as to capture the thoughts of their employers.
In conclusion, we can see from the above that there is a clear distinction between a writer and an author, but it does not mean that they both cannot be successful or happy in their career paths. They can be. The most important thing for any of them is to pick a path they are comfortable in and toe the line.
Olamide Omolawal is an avid research enthusiast with an interest in creative and content writing. She can be reached via email at oomolawal@gmail.com.
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