“Conrad Aiken worked at a refectory table in the dining room; Robert Graves wrote in a room furnished only with objects made by hand. Ernest Hemingway wrote standing up; D. H. Lawrence under a tree. William Maxwell preferred ‘small messy rooms that don’t look out on anything interesting.’ Katherine Anne Porter said she got her writing done in the country, where she lived like a hermit. Ben Franklin wrote in the bathtub, Jane Austen amid family life, Marcel Proust in the confines of his bed. Balzac ate an enormous meal at five in the evening, slept till midnight, then got up and wrote at a small desk in his room for sixteen hours straight, fueled by endless cups of coffee. Toni Morrison found refuge in a motel room when her children were small; E. B. White sought it in a cabin on the shore. Due to her problem back, Penelope Lively works in an armchair, with an “ancient electronic typewriter” on her lap, while A. L. Kennedy finds comfort in a ‘monster black chair’ in a room ‘the color of blood.’”

This excerpt is from an article by Alexandra Enders in Poets and Writers entitled “The Importance of Place: Where Writers Write and Why.”

Also, here’s a collection of photographs of science fiction and fantasy writers that I stumbled upon and where they write. And for anyone interested, below is a photo of the coffee shop I frequent where I write (and edit) a lot of my prose.

Do you think it’s important where a writer writes? As a writer, do you have a favorite place where you put pen to paper or fire up the lap top? Please let me hear from you.

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