In order to know about yourself, you must know about others. When a person really writes, they are speaking all the words their insides want to say, but their outsides refuse to let out. When you hear someone speak, you can hear what their concious is saying, what is appropriate, and what follows the rules. When one writes, they are saying what they feel, and what they aren't allowed to say by that lawful mind that society gave us. In true writing, the writer feels no remorse or guilt in what they put down, it just comes out in full unabashed honesty that is kept hidden from the rest of the world. When you write, it is just you and that piece of paper you are using, and no other third party to interefere, or edit your words. A true writer can speak honestly to themselves on their thoughts and beliefs, and can translate their thoughts to written words. There are a rare few people who can truely speak their heart as one can when they write, such as Mahatma Gandhi, Martin Luther King, and many other historical people. These rare sorts can feel their heart, and don't let society control their ideas.
What I mean by all of this, is that when one reads a really good novel, you can hear their heart speaking to you. You can feel their emotions and their opinions, whether they be right or wrong in your eyes. This honesty that we harvest through the reading of other people's works helps your own honest opinions grow and shape. Soon you begin to grow your own inner ideas that you don't dare share out loud. At the point where you can feel your heart flow onto the paper, without a care, that is true writing in my book. Clearly, one can see the connection between reading and writing, the hidden chain that connects all writings and writers together.
Maybe its just that writers are too cowardly to say things to people's faces? Or maybe its because writers want to share with more people at once, through just copying their opinions over and over through a published novel. One can never truely know for themselves unless they try to read and write....
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I really liked what you said in your first paragraph, about the way a great writer truly speaks from his or her heart, rather than having to worry about guarding his or her speech and conforming to all of the rules and the social norms; however, I don't think poor writing - writing that doesn't come from the heart - is necessarily a result of cowardice. More often, I think communication that lacks that sense of genuine, heartfelt honesty is a result of an inability to communicate freely and truly, with "unabashed honesty", as you so eloquently put it.
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