“There are three rules for writing the novel. Unfortunately, no one knows what they are.”
— W. Somerset Maugham
There are no rules. Or if there are any rules, they are only there to be broken. Embrace these contradictions. You must be prepared to hold two or more opposing ideas in the palms of your hands at the exact same time.
To hell with grammar, but only if you know the grammar first. To hell with formality, but only if you have learned what it means to be formal. To hell with a plot, but you better at some stage make something happen. To hell with structure, but only if you have thought it through so thoroughly that you can safely walk through your work with your eyes closed.
The great ones break the rules on purpose. They do it in order to remake the language. They say it like nobody has ever said it before. And then they unsay it, and they keep unsaying it, breaking their own rules over and over again.
So be adventurous in breaking—or maybe even making—the rules.
Quoted from: Letters to a Young Writer Some Practical and Philosophical Advice by McCann Colum