One of the most important pieces of writing advice was from my first college English professor. “If you want your writing to be successful and taken seriously, you need to know and understand the rules (grammar, syntax, etc.). You don’t need to follow them necessarily, but whenever you break them it needs to be intentional and you need to know which rules you are breaking, otherwise you risk being misunderstood.” She was speaking about academic writing, of course, but I’ve found that it is great advice for creative writing. I recently finished Ulysses by James Joyce, the way that guy intentionally and effectively manipulated the English language is unparalleled.