Simply drinking without talent is just drinking, while drinking and claiming to be a novelist suggests potential for being a brilliant tortured artist. Bottom line? If the term "sober novelist" isn't an oxymoron, what is?

 

Some background. Before people got drunk and went on social media, people got drunk and went to

gallery openings, book signings and rent parties.  Many a reputation was built upon getting smashed

and acting out in semi-public to let the world know the high price paid for being an unrecognized genius. It showed that one was serious about one's craft. What's more, in public, your terrified audience can properly connect with your biting sarcasm, untamed wit and extreme boorishness. Online

it's often hard to tell if your obnoxiousness is real, what with the 140 character limit and all.

 

There's basically no downside to drinking if you're serious about posing as a novelist. If for some reason you really can't or shouldn't drink, at least keep a glass in your hand and act like you are pissed, literally and figuratively.