First, read this.
I admit, I pay more attention to the goings-on in YA than one might think. A lot of that is because we tend to share the same tone and themes through our writing: triumphing over hardship and growing through adversity, embracing the fact that philosophy and ethics grow and wither instead of being set in stone, acceptance of the truth that bodily functions are usually hilarious.
Whatever the reason, I’ve often felt that YA and fantasy tend to have a kindred connection and that, in recent years, we’ve undergone transformations that are getting us closer together. Both genres tend to be used as vehicles for human exploration, with YA serving as mostly a discovery of youth and fantasy serving as a discovery for everything else. You can argue this if you like and maybe scratch your beards, possibly bring up the influence of Tolkien and the power of true myth. Feel free to. That’s not what we’re talking about here.
If you’ve been with the blog for a bit, you probably know my opinion of mainstream literature’s opinion of fantasy literature. If not, let me summarize: who cares? We’re not writing for them, we’re not trying to reach them, we’re not talking to them. If they happen to find something in our work that they can relate to, then great. If not, then it’s not really our concern as writers and readers of fantasy.
There’s a lot more to go into there, but I’ll end that particular thought by summarizing one of their usual cries against fantasy: it’s escapism. It has no real value. It does not relate to the human experience.
In more than a few ways, they’re actually right, and we’ve talked about them on this blog before. The concept of Chosen Ones, prophecies, clean conflicts with neat endings, absolute good and evil, unquestioningly accepting a fate based on whether your mother was an elf or an orc. Traditions. Proud traditions. But left as they are, unquestioned and unaltered, they move us further away from humanity.
Realism is overrated. We’re not aiming for realism. But we are aiming for honesty: honesty to humanity and honesty to the art. This is the chief reason that I frequently rail against the status quo (the other reason being that I am consummate attention whore).
And yet, some people prefer that. They like their orcs evil, their princesses in peril and their heroes to say no to tobacco and whores. Admittedly, they can make a pretty good case against a trend in fantasy that everyone has to be grimy and gritty for the sake of being edgy (which is as dishonest as the other end of the spectrum, I feel). I don’t blame them. Some people read for the sake of comfort and that’s absolutely and utterly fine. I’m not suggesting that there is only one way to write and if you dare enjoy your heroes and villains then you’re not hanging out in reality, maaaaan.
Rather, I’m suggesting that we need to avoid taking the comfort as canon and the tradition as unalterable. Disliking, criticizing or outright not reading something uncomfortable is fine. But denying it totally as a contribution to the work seems to be all too common. And going even further than that, we seem to use it as an excuse to reject any part of humanity we find uncomfortable. Hence why we often see a lack of non-straight, non-white non-male protagonists.
As evidenced by what happened in Ms. Verday’s story (you didn’t think I had a point, did you? DID YOU?)
Admittedly, this is a subject I’ve grappled with for awhile. For a long time, I was leaning toward the theory that it’s more honest to not put in a non-straight, non-white non-male protagonist in a story if you are a straight, white male. After all, how could you be honest about an experience you’ve never had? Then I realized that I write about suicidal people, religious xenophobes and schizophrenics without being any of those things.
And that’s why I’ve changed my opinion to “there is value in trying.”
I’m not going to say there’s no harm in trying. You might completely fuck something up and be ridiculed and shamed for it. You might be utterly rejected as a writer for it. Yeah. That sucks. Rejection, though, is going to be ever-present in your life as a person. I can tell you it doesn’t stop after you get published, either.
But if it’s what you want to do, you have to try. Even if it goes against tradition. Even if you’re worried you might screw it up. Even if it runs the risk of someone proposing the same ultimatum to you that they did to Ms. Verday.
We should all strive to do the same, then, and do our best to stick to our guns.
There might be some decrying that a YA author is experiencing this sort of thing before we big bad adults are tackling the issue. After all, we’ve been pretty aware of this as an issue in our genre for a while. I see it more as an inspiration, though. As I said, and it might still be just me, but there is a connection between YA and fantasy and I don’t think it’s a bad thing that we take cues from each other now and again.
I don’t think it’s a bad thing that we try something new. I don’t think it’s a bad thing that we occasionally meet a stumbling block like Ms. Verday did. I don’t think it’s a bad thing that we sometimes mess it up entirely.
I do think it’s a bad thing if we feel constrained in our writing. I do think it’s a bad thing if the urge to be published overwhelms our urge to explore. I do think it’s a bad thing if the fear that we might be ridiculed, rejected or loathed for what we honestly try keeps us from doing so.
Admittedly, it’s easier for me to suggest that getting published is not that big a deal, since I am. But what I’m not is award-winning, best-selling or possessing any other honors that might or might not be helped by writing something more safe and traditional. And I still believe what I’ve just written.
You might dismiss this blog post entirely on that basis, though. Or you might just roll your eyes and see another Sam Sykes anti-establishment rant. You might just decide that this particular call isn’t for you.
That’s fine.
Because, in a way, this is another anti-establishment rant and what I’m suggesting is not for everyone. I never suggested it should be. What I am suggesting is that there is always value in fearlessness, that a fear of rejection is as weak an emotion as a fear of something new, that there is always room to learn and you will only ever do so by actually trying.
Think less.
Do more.
I love this post. I absolutely agree with your assertion that the pressures of opinions or norms shouldn’t stifle what you intend to create or say. Not being a published writer, my opinion in this matter may have little value to those that are, but art should also be an expression, not just a faithful recreation of the world as it is, or as a select few see it. Literature’s function is vast, but one of its greatest assets is its potential to create and bring the impossible into existence.
I suppose it can be as how a select few see it, if you are, in fact, one of the select few. Honesty is what will end up driving your work. Nothing else.
I think at some stage we all come to the conclusion of “fuck it, I’ll do it my way”. I’ve always been a very tough judge of my own work and unnecessarily harsh on it but it makes me push myself, jump with both feet into those uncomfortable areas. I don’t know if the book will ever see publication but I do know it’s a book my inner critic genuinely loves and I know that some people will loathe it… and I mean really loathe it!
If I ever get to a second book, I know I want to do things to a protagonist that are going to challenge me as a writer. In fact, from where I stand now, they feel pretty impossible to achieve. But you know what? I’m just a slave to the story. It’s not meant to be easy.
If it’s hard, you’re doing it right.
Very valuable statements all. I did read the linked post, and nodded along, and when I got to the update I very nearly physically banged my head on the table. NEVER ASSUME.
I am querying a fantasy novel with a M/M relationship, have gone back and forth about keeping it vs changing it so often I’ve worn a groove in my brain, and I finally decided to keep it like it is. Whatevs, folks, it’s the 21st century, even if we’re still writing about castles and dragons. 🙂
That’s kind of the thing: if you change it, change it because you want to and because it’s right for the story, not for anyone else. It’s inevitable that we’re going to start talking about these things more often. It might as well start with you!
Its only the fearless that create great work. Even work I despise, I can appreciate at the level of its fearlessness. (see Faulkner as my prime example of this)
What is funniest is that what we fear is often baseless and what we should have feared we step into blindly and usually struck all unawares.
The editor of the anthology was afraid for no apparent reason.
I would guess that Rowling and publisher had not clue that every fundamentalist crazy would come out the woodwork and call the Potter series the work of the devil.
You might as well be fearless. You are not going to guess where every attack is going to come from.
I do occasionally fear that I’m going to repeat myself to death, what with the reiteration of the contempt for fear, but I think it’s such a prevalent emotion (that only gets more prevalent with time until you master it) that it’s worth discussing about.
Even after you’re published, you shouldn’t worry about who hates your work. If they have criticism, then consider it carefully. But if they outright dislike you (and some people will), then there’s not a lot you can do for them, least of all be afraid of them.
You know my thoughts on this.
Why don’t you share them with the rest of the class?
Very well.
One has to do what you are compelled to do. Everything else is sales and marketing. If you are willing to bend with the wind perceived as ‘marketable’, you might have better sales, but unless you’re a very skilled technician, people may see where it happened.
For example, while not a book, the new version of Red Dawn will never be the success the original was, if for no other reason than the producers have caved completely to a desire to sell to the Chinese (who were set to be the invaders in this one). Instead they digitally modified everything to make the main adversary the North Koreans. Anyone knowledgable about the power of states will tell you the North Koreans pose no invasion threat to anyone but the South Koreans. The Chinese don’t have the lift capacity to move a viable invasion force to these shores, but they still make a better adversary than the North Koreans.
But I digress.
It is hard to place oneself in the body of another. If it was easy, everyone would write. To make the characters true to themselves is the goal I aspire to with what I write. If I succeed at it, I can change gender, drop someone ignorant of mayhem into bloody mayhem and draw the reader through such transitions without ever slapping them out of the story. All because the character’s voice is believable, the writing good.
Have I stretched very far? Not yet. I have a secondary character that’s a gay male. His sexual orientation doesn’t enter that strongly into it, except that he’s a man’s man. The title character of the same book is a female, whom I am told does not come across as a man with breasts. Race doesn’t enter too strongly into my stories, though culture does.
I try not to worry about the middle man: the sales, etc. Then again, that may be why I haven’t yet sold my novels. In addition, as a buffer against bending to the perceived desires of the market, I have a day-job still.
In the end, the artist should always be a bit uncomfortable, it makes for better art. On the other side of the coin, society should be driven to uncomfortable thought by some art, it makes for a better society.
It makes the comments or it gets the hose!
I apologize in advance for being the old lady who drops in and kills the coolness of your blog! I just want to say that I read an excerpt of an interview (?) on your mother’s site & it brought me over here & to follow you on Twitter. (Sorry, I haven’t read your books. Yet.) But what I want to do is thank you for your honesty about your creative process. Like your mother, you are so generous with sharing your talents. I’m revising the 1st draft of my 1st novel, and whenever I get down or stuck, posts like this inspire me to keep going in my own way, to hold tight to what is mine, and to persist in bringing it forth.