Chances are, if you’re a writer–professional, aspiring, tech, vengeful–you don’t need another reason to despair. The economy stinks, publishing is pretty selective, agents are harder to come by, the ice caps are melting and soon polar bears will be moving down into your neighborhood to do the writing jobs and the herring they work for is at a premium. Yes, things can be pretty gloomy.
So you don’t really need to read this piece here from an anonymous midlist author expounding on why it can (and frequently does) suck to be an author. You could compare salaries, you could identify with her envy complex with books by other authors, you could sympathize with her lack of jobs and still feel slightly enraged for her bringing this upon you when you didn’t need it.
And if you read it, you probably will. I can’t say I was immune to the despair that crept over me.
Being an author is sometimes like being back in high school.
No, not in the sense that there are people waiting to stuff you in lockers. I’ve never been anything but aggressively honest when I say that there has never been a non-supportive author or peer in this industry. Everyone remembers what it’s like, everyone remembers how hard it is and everyone wants you to succeed.
Nor in the sense that there are superiors that you privately resent. Your editors definitely are invested in your success and frequently in you as a person. And if I ever called my editors Mr. Spanton or Mr. Anders, they’d probably look at me real weird and then maybe push me down a flight of stairs.
Rather, being an author is occasionally like high school in that you instantly become the same insecure, crackly-voiced soothsayer who divines omens in coincidence, conspiracy in misfortune and crisis in the natural passage of time. Thoughts of “is she prettier than me,” “does he think he’s bigger than me,” “have their pubes come in yet” rather swiftly turns to “does she have foreign-rights deals,” “does he think his twitter followers makes him more important,” “oh my god, they definitely got pubes now.”
I exaggerate.
But not by a lot.
The truth is that writing, especially professional writing, is unnervingly like going through puberty again. You’re embarking on something that’s entirely new to you. It’s slightly less sweaty, of course, but frequently as awkward and often difficult to get by. The chief problem is that, although there’s books, classes and talks on the subject, all of them (including this one) will fall short of what you really need because it’s different for everyone and the only thing you have to compare against is your peers…for whom it’s entirely different.
So, if you’re anything like me, you stress yourself out. You cringe when you hear other peoples’ good news, no matter how much you might have wished that good news for them. Your neck tenses up when you look at your manuscript and wonder exactly what it is you’re doing with it. You panic and run naked in the streets screaming “I’M DOING IT WRONG! I’M DOING IT WRONG!”
Eventually, you pass out. You wake up on the floor of your office. You find your trousers. You sigh and crawl back up and you start writing again.
Because this is pretty much the only universal truth in writing: if you’re going to, then you will.
This is the sole constant of writing and the most-often underrated aspect. You will use talent a lot in writing your book, in the initial spark, in the prose, in the narrative and voice. You will use luck once or twice, in things that are largely out of your hands. You will use persistence, perseverance and everything else that implies sitting down and doing it even if you don’t feel like it for absolutely everything else.
Because what other people do, what other people experience, what deals they make, what money they get, what followers they have, they’re going through the same stuff you are. And if they weren’t, it wouldn’t matter. Your writing moves the way it does. You can nudge it along, you can try marketing techniques, you can try holding your breath and whistling Dixie if you think it’ll make your moustache grow quicker. But the only way to succeed at being a writer is to write, no matter what else happens.
Because no one really knows what’s going to happen. You can look to agents and publishers like they know, and they might have a better idea than you do, but ideas is ideas. No one knows what will hit next, when it will hit, why it will hit. No one knows what’s going to spend years writing, only to take off suddenly one day. No one knows when you’re going to get hair on your body. Certainly not you. I wouldn’t advise asking your publishers, either. They’ll be weirded out.
Has this helped the despair you may feel? Probably not. Will it ward against the despair you’ll feel in the future? I can almost assure you it won’t. Did this blog post solve all your problems? Not a chance in hell.
Because, like puberty, it’s not a choice for a writer. What else are you going to do? No matter what the others are up to, you’ve still got to write. Not for the editors, for the money, for the fame. It’s just something you’re going to do. Because you’re a writer.
Duh.
Man…I wanted to read about Ozymandias…
It’s a disease, I tell you. A disease!!
I think people need to get over the idea that “artist” is a job. Either write for money or write for yourself. Don’t write to make some meaningful statement about the world’s bleakness and expect millions of weary people to shell out 1/10 of their minimum-wage paycheck for the privilege of sharing your despair. Decide which sort of book you’re writing, and what you want to get out of it. If it’s money you want, be an entertainer.
We need to quit thinking of fluff books as some kind of cancer. They serve a valid purpose; they lift people’s spirits in a world that serves daily to bring them down. “Entertainer” is a job. The job of the entertainer is to create joy from a dismal vacuum. It’s a job that can be learned by anyone who stops thinking about herself and her Agenda for five seconds and starts thinking about what others might want and need.
“Artist” is a compulsion, and if you get a few bucks for it, count yourself lucky, since most people’s soul-searching and demon-battling is done on their own time. Them’s the breaks. Either be proud to be an artist, and quit being resentful of the more financially-successful entertainers, or be an entertainer, cash the checks, and quit feeling inferior to the artists. Some precious few people manage to be both (Dickens, Shakespeare, Bach) but I’m willing to throw money down that anyone reading this is not the equivalent of any of those people. Sorry.
I feel for yer Sam.
I get so bummed out sometimes forcing myself to write when every mote of my being is against it. I’m a non-fiction, technical/academic writer, so I’ve actually got a detailed plan and page templates waiting for me; it should be a lot easier than your creative fiction bit it ain’t. Some nights I manage a page, sometimes a paragraph and sometimes – more often than I care to professionally admit – I just poke words around with my shameful stick of procrastination and disinterest. My favorite OCD trick at the moment is to refresh the table of contents every few minutes on the off-chance it changes.
Fact remains, however, that there are entire strata of writers beneath you, equally resentful of authors who are internationally published at 25. There are people reading this blog who just wish they could call themselves professional authors.
Being a technical writer, I was never mislead by dreams of an adoring readership gushing adulation, Amazon 5-stars and offers of coupling. So I wasn’t too disappointed at the reality of being a writer. Still, I do compare myself to my peers, some of which have built entire brands on one successful book.
Write or die. Wring the white from the page, one twelve point letter at a time.
It made me mildly annoyed to read that article (though I enjoyed this post!). The guy made a bad decision straight-up: he quit his day job. While it’s the Grand Dream of every author to be able to write full-time, it’s probably unwise to do this before you have a steady income from royalties and a good solid nest egg.
I don’t know what it’s like to be on the ‘published’ side of the fence, so I can’t pretend to have the perspective necessary to agree/disagree with his experience. But I don’t see how anybody could have any response other than creeping fear and gnawing despair after reading that. I understand his message was essentially ‘caveat scriptor.’ I get that. And I appreciate the guy’s honesty. But writers are already notoriously plagued by self-doubt. Do we really need to pile on an extra helping of fear of the future?
I’m not in the market for a reason to turn away from doing what I love. You’re right–what else are writers going to do? It’s not like they can just stop. [g] Well–maybe that’s not true. They can. I did. But in my experience it always seems to find a way back to you. In the end, you just gotta do it.
This is all the more reason to do your best work all the time, every time. Push yourself to the limits, and not only find out how truly awesome you really are, but write something that’s rewarding both for you _and_ the reader (and the editor, and the agent, and the publisher…). Go big or go home, as it were. And since we’re not going home…[g]
Part of high school is growing pubes, sure. Part of high school is also learning not to give a shit about the stuff that isn’t important. It is–and always will be–about the work. The rest is just window dressing.
The article sounded a lot like sour grapes to me. I’d love to be able to support myself with my writing – but that’s not why I’m creating these stories. I won’t quit my day job unless something fantastic happens. But I could have two jobs and be attending school full time, and I would still write. I know, because I’ve done that. I could have no job and be lazing about by the seaside, and I would still write. I know, because I’ve done that.
I agree with the author of the article that the system is skewed – but I write first.
Thanks for this, Sam. I guess I never picture you going through this kind of rough spot. It’s not good to hear that you feel some of the same frustrations I do, but it does help.
So there’s that.
Your message is one I give myself every frelling day: you just have to keep going, keep writing. Even when it’s hard. Even when there’s SWTOR releasing in two weeks 🙂
We keep going.
Thanks again, Sam.
Actually that did make me feel better. So 😛
Boy that linked post was depressing :/ I liked what her friend Patty said at the end though.
I’ve never felt defined by my writing or as a writer and I battle daily to keep it that way. The fact they’re making 60% of my R&D group redundant tomorrow is not helping the cause!
Seems to me writing (coupled with publishing) is a vicious business and like the music business it will spit you out with no mercy. I aim to see it as that bucking bronco machine. Ride it as long as you can, laugh like a maniac. When you hit the ground, haul in a breath, dust yourself down, and go back to the real world.
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I’m certainly not a writer (or an aspiring one), but it’s always interesting to hear from people in the writing world. It takes a certain brand of courage that I lack almost entirely to put yourself and your work on the public stage, even more so if you are passionate about your writing (and there seems to be an appalling lack of passion on the bookstore shelves these days). I admire that kind of courage and the commitment it takes to put out a solid piece of literature.
Also, so sorry about your cat.