The Five Writer Archetypes

Which are you?

A few years ago, I came up with a framework for helping my students understand where they’re coming from when they work.

I call it the Writer Archetypes.

There are five of them: Teacher, Spiller, Artist, Skipper, and Hesitater. I’m going to tell you a little bit about each.

Before you read these examples, answer this question: What motivates you to write?

The answer will help you to place yourself in one of these archetypes. You’ll find the motivations below bolded.

(If you’d like mentoring as you build your writing career, check out Working Writer here.)

Teacher

This is my own archetype.

A teacher writer is someone who (unsurprisingly) writes to teach. They are very outward focused. They write for their audience. They may not think about their writing as teaching, but whenever I meet a writer who gets excited about fitting their research into their work, I know I’ve met a teacher writer.

Without knowing that someone is going to read what they write, they struggle to write at all.

Teacher writers are often excited by the idea that writing can be their work or their job.

If you tell a teacher writer they can have a million dollars or million readers, they will pick the readers every single time. (Or at the very least, they’ll be torn—a million dollars is a lot of money, after all.)

Teacher writers are motivated by readers.

Outlander by Diana Gabaldon is an example of a Teacher-written book. Think about all the information in there about Scotland and history and natural medicine.

Spiller

A spiller is a confessional writer who spills their guts on the page. They are very inward focused. They write for themselves. Their writing is often very cathartic for them and for their readers. These writers often tell stories the rest of us are drawn to, but would struggle to tell ourselves. They’re always willing to be a little more vulnerable than average.

Whenever I meet someone who tells me they write for themselves, I know I have probably met a Spiller writer.

Without that feeling of vulnerability and cathartic-ism, they struggle to write at all.

Spiller writers, like teachers, are excited about writing as a job. The difference is that they’d write what they’re writing—even if no one else ever reads it. They are less focused on how they’ll get their work out there.

Spiller writers are motivated by themselves.

To Kill a Mockingbird by Harper Lee is an example of a Spiller-written book. Lee wrote a book with a very autobiographical bent, that exposed the racism of her childhood.

Artist

An Artist writer is someone is far more concerned about the art of their work than making money or gaining readers. They are highly motivated by writing beautiful prose.

When I meet someone who feels like writing as a ‘job’ makes them not want to write at all, I know I’ve met an Artist writer.

Without feeling like they’re creating something beautiful, they struggle to write at all.

Artist writers are motivated by write by their muse.

Demon Copperhead by Barbara Kingsolver is an example of an Artist-written book. While there are elements of both Teacher and Spiller writing in it, the book’s most distinguishing feature is how beautifully it’s written.

Skipper

A Skipper writer is someone who is happiest writing with an assignment or a contract. They are highly driven by being paid to write and want, most of all, a career as a writer.

They skip from one type of writing to the next, based on their next job. Most journalists and almost every happy freelance writer I know are Skippers. Fiction writers who think a lot about things like “writing to market” or who really struggle with the idea of writing something and not making any money at all for it are as well.

For instance, a Skipper writer I know wrote a single article for Medium. They earned less than a dollar for it and never wrote anything else to publish on the platform, specifically because they didn’t earn money for their previous work.

Skipper writers are never just Skippers. They are also either Teachers or Spillers. So they will be happiest with jobs that fall either into Teacher or Spiller categories. And when they’re able to work on their own writing, they’re most likely to work on Teacher or Spiller projects.

I’ve never met an Artist-Skipper—the two ideas are antithetical. Anyone who is a writer can freelance and I know a few who do, but they aren’t particularly happy and if they had a choice between more Artist-driven work and what they do for a living, they’d take it.

A Skipper prefers writing where they have an assignment of some kind and they know for sure that they’ll be paid.

If you find yourself struggling to write without knowing how you’ll get paid, then you’re a Skipper.

Hesitater

A Hesitater is a perfectionist—only instead of wanting their work to be perfect, they’re waiting until they feel perfectly ready to write. These writers have one foot on the gas and the other on the break.

Just like with Skippers, no one is only a Hesitater. When they take their foot off the break, they land in Teacher, Spiller, or Artist as well.

Hesitaters are consummate learners. They can get stuck in a cycle of taking classes, reading craft books, and getting ready to write—so much that they never actually write anything. And all that preparation feels like action, so it can take a long time for them to realize they’re revving their engines, but not actually moving.

If you find yourself thinking about writing a lot, but never actually writing much at all, then you’re a Hesitater.

Why it Matters

I’ve helped thousands of writers understand their archetypes. The reason it’s important to understand yourself as a writer is because knowing your natural inclinations lets you lean into them.

For instance, I know that I’m a teacher writer. I’m happiest writing books that allow me to both learn and teach something. (I’m talking about both fiction and blogging here, BTW.)

I’m less happy if I try to write something that is more inward facing. And I never really think about the artistry of my work. Sure, I want to produce something good—something beautiful, even—but it’s not my focus.

If I thought I was supposed to be focused on craft first and foremost, I’d make myself miserable trying to write like an Artist writer. Or, more likely, I’d give up.

In fact, nearly every time I talk to someone who is really struggling to write at all—even though they really want to be writers—when I dig into it with them, it turns out they are trying to write something that doesn’t suit their archetype.

A Teacher writer trying to be an Artist. An Artist who thinks they’re supposed to tell deeply personal stories like a Spiller. A Spiller who thinks they should put everything into world building, the way a Teacher does.

You get the idea. Knowing who you are as a writer will make actually writing so much easier and more intuitive.

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