Why Do You Even Want a Book?
Writing students seem to have a common obsession, getting a book with their name on it. I had a friend in undergrad who would always talk about how she just wanted a book. One book and she would be happy. She disregarded all criticism and fired all of her editors, because she felt they were getting in the way of her dream by telling her to slow down. Now she has the book, a novel. It’s available to buy now. I would link it, but it’s the worst book I have ever read, and I can say that without hyperbole. After the novel came out the head of the fiction department at her MFA said that this book might ruin her career as a writer. She was so driven by her goal of getting a book out that she ignored any reason why she wanted a book to begin with.
“This is my book, and people are going to read it…by the Christmas shopping season, regardless of how many more edits you think it needs!”
Asking someone why they want a book seems almost too obvious to answer, yet after they actually think about the question, they realize it’s actually much tougher than they thought. The answers I’ve mostly gotten were desires for attention, celebrity, money, etc. Of course, keep in mind nobody actually gives up these answers so easily or in so many words. Everyone’s like a contestant on “The Bachelorette,” even if they’re not playing “for the right reasons” they’ve all learned how to talk like they are. And no self-respecting writer readily thinks of themselves as a hack.
If anything I’m surprised how many people are willing to admit that they write as a means to get a book, and the book is the means to money, attention, fame, validation, whatever else they are looking for instead of the book. It’s a dangerous question: “Why do you want a book?” because it calls into question why you’re devoting your life to something. It’s a scary idea to think that you have no fucking clue, and believe me, many people don’t.
“I’m not on ‘The Bachelorette’ to find love. I’m mostly just publicizing my website. Getting physical with a hot white girl is just a bonus.”
And so you see students who will write anything to increase their publications. I’ve been lectured by a writer about how it’s about the quantity and speed of publications and not the quality of the writing. I had another writer go on for days about how Native American literature was the new trend in writing (apparently) and how she wished she was Native American so she could get the book deal (This isn’t just a willingness to compromise self-expression, but the entirety one’s self!) I heard about a student, without any fight, agree to his thesis adviser’s recommendation that he write genre fiction. That student admitted a hatred for genre fiction and a want to do a literary novel, but the adviser had a connection to a publisher. So he agreed so he could get the book. When he told me this story, he wanted me to pity him for having such a terrible thesis adviser, but I was just filled with contempt. If his own vision wasn’t something he could stand up for, then why should I care when it’s taken away?
“So I can’t adopt your culture for financial gain?”
I know the writing field is not as much of a meritocracy as it should be. I think all arts are corrupt in that way and probably always have been. So I won’t say that these people are going to fail, but what I am saying is that I don’t think these people will be proud of themselves in the end. There’s a difference between an artist and a content creator. The difference is that an artist owns their vision and manifests it, while a content creator manufactures a product. Maybe it’s just me projecting myself onto others, but I couldn’t be happy as a content creator.
I’ve never made a compromise with my editors or instructors that I didn’t agree with, that I didn’t feel still captured myself, my vision, my writing. I think the rarest and best answer is, “I want a book, because I write.” I want to share my stories with other people. The book is a venue for that. That’s why I want to be published, to serve my ideas. I see a book as a service for my stories; I don’t see my stories as a means to a book.
When I publish a book I want to be proud of what I wrote, not that I caught the market at the right time. I’m a writer, not a god damned real estate agent.
Then again, I’ve been spit on and dismissed as a writer, a theorist, and an editor so many times during my career as a student that I’ve developed a pretty mean chip on my shoulder. I know if you dissected me enough you would find vanity and validation motivating why I want a book, underneath the desire of serving my ideas. Maybe I’m also a Bachelorette contestant, here for the wrong reasons, but I’ve learned to talk the talk so well that I’ve tricked myself into believing my own fairy tales.
“I’ve never seen writing like yours before. Now if that sounded like a compliment, let me disambiguate, there’s no market for you. Who you are is someone nobody is interested in. Become someone else or you will fail.”
“I’d rather try and fail as myself than ‘be smart’ and succeed as someone else. An attempt, I owe that little to myself and my dreams. What will your definition of success bring me when I’m old and wondering what it is I’ve done with my life? Am I going to wonder what would have happened if I only had more courage when I was younger? Besides, I’m a damn good writer. I dominate the audience at readings and have little trouble getting published. I’m working out just fine as a humor writer, so thank you for your concern.”
“You? A humor writer? That’s funny, because your writing makes me laugh…wait. I mean your writing is a joke. There, much better. Good self-edit.”
Who knows? I never put much thought into this question until I started my master’s program, which has a (sub)culture of among the students of being more interested in learning how to be a successful writer than in learning how to write (as if the two have nothing to do with each other). Considering my program is called a Masters of Professional Writing instead of a Masters of Fine Arts, this really should have been no surprise. I just wish someone would have told me earlier. I’m kind of lonely here, and I’m becoming angrier the longer I stay here. I’m having a harder time not just shouting “If you don’t have any fucking passion for writing, maybe you shouldn’t be getting a masters degree in it! Clear the bookshelves for people who care! Your life is too short to do something you don’t love! Maybe writing isn’t what your cutie mark is telling you.”
Note: I don’t know if this is a majority of people in my program or just a vocal minority, but it’s draining me just the same, and I want it to change.
Now, I’m not saying to give up if you’re not very good or not very successful. We all start off with varying degrees of bad writing. We have to work our way up. Writing well is something you can learn with focused study, right reason, time, and practice. I would never tell someone to give up on something they’re passionate about (#ratatouille). What I’m saying is if you don’t have passion for what you do, regardless of what you’re doing, you owe it to yourself as a mortal creature to be honest with yourself about it and not waste your life on it.
Maybe I’m the not the unheeded prophet, maybe I’m just wrong, naive, & idealistic. But I spent several weeks showing people how to SELL their creative works on Kickstarter. It’s not like my head is completely in the clouds and not grounded by captialism reality…right?
7 Comments
All the lols for people who are writing for the money. Hahahahahaha. Good luck with that, chumps! That said, you have a very strident division in your mind between art and commerce, but me thinks it’s a bit blurrier than that. Writers are essentially entertainers. They needn’t cater their work for strictly $$$ (because again, lololololol on the dollars), but there is something to be said for finding the right way of connecting to the audience such that they want what you’re creating. Otherwise, you’re just jerking off on the page.
Perhaps I miscommunicated or the frustration on this blog focuses too much on the commerce, because another person is saying similar things. Maybe it’s the expectation of what people think I would say that is distracting from what it actually says. But I don’t think I have a division between art and commerce.
There is actually a point where I directly say that writing well and selling are not mutually exclusive. In fact I think the following is true. Given proper marketing something written well will sell well, but not all things that sell well are written well.
I agree with your point. If an audience doesn’t want someone’s work, the writing is shitty. It means they have no control or understanding of the human response and fail to make the work interesting. That’s the one thing a writer needs to learn how to be, interesting. I don’t see that as selling out; I see that as craft, an artistic side, not a business side of writing. There is a difference.
I love how in My Little Pony they actually intertwine the sales with the plot. I want people to be like MA Larson, who is incredible with this. He sold both Glittering Ponies with “Sonic Rainboom” and Princess Twilight with “Magical Mystery Cure.” Both are great episodes. I respect that. As a TV writer I want to be as good as him to be able to take the job of being forced to sell some bullshit and be able to turn it into dynamic, interesting and even heart warming story.
However, I think people are seeing me as Lauren Faust who threw her arms in the air and probably still gets into a fit because Hasbro wanted her to have a train go through Ponyville and that didn’t match her perfect vision. While Faust is someone I look up to, I know that all arts have a business angle to them and you must play the game, but I think a good writer like MA Larson can play the game without losing his soul.
I write because I appreciate the challenge of telling a story well. I post to my blog because I am vain and think that I have written well enough to deserve the attention – look, I wrote a thing and wrote it well! I expect my answer for, “Why do I even want a book?” is the same: vanity (if I were Rarity I might be so vain as to claim this is generosity to readers!).
Then again, I’m not devoting myself to getting the book like other people are. I’m pursuing a different career path entirely. It’s a long-game for me. Someday I want to be sufficiently financially stable and have honed my craft enough that I can take a crack at it. Maybe in a decade, maybe in two. It’s a life goal.
But a life has constraints. Like rent, food, clothes. Upkeep, generally. Some goals get pushed aside to satisfy the constraints at this moment.
Sharif, when you talk about contempt for a writer willing to write genre to get the book, I wonder how much contempt you must have for me? I have a vision, for sure, but it’s not what I’m doing right now. I definitely don’t know how the career game works for writers, but it sounds like the writer you described is willing to set aside the goal (literary novel) for the moment because of the constraints (graduation, advancement, career growth, income stream, you name it). That sounds rational to me. But then, maybe I misread you. Maybe the contempt comes from complaining about it later?
“I know the writing field is not as much of a meritocracy as it should be.” I don’t know of any field that is a complete meritocracy – unless you count schmoozing as merit-worthy. You can’t stop the schmooze.
As for art versus content, I’m sure you’d compromise. There’s some percentage of content creation you’d be willing to accept as part of a job for the sake of the art. We all have a price, and sometimes the price is not extracted in terms of money. Sounds like you accept that already in your comment above.
As for, “Your life is too short to do something you don’t love!” I wonder how the gardeners and street sweepers feel about that. I hope they feel they get paid enough not to care. Maybe you’re surrounded by people cursed with the skill to write? People who would have been happy as garbage collectors, but they’re just crap at throwing garbage into trucks. Or they sucked at the claw game in arcades, so they could never drive the really cool trash collectors. I’m with you on the integrity line, though. I just like giving you a hard time because this next line hit home: “What I’m saying is if you don’t have passion for what you do, regardless of what you’re doing, you owe it to yourself as a mortal creature to be honest with yourself about it and not waste your life on it.”
Are you my conscience?
How about this: maybe this outrage is not appropriate for hard jobs that no one wants to do. Maybe the outrage comes from the fact that in the hierarchy of jobs, writer is pretty damn high. Maybe you can apply a higher standard to writers because crap is crowding out talent on the shelves. Maybe. Or maybe writing is just another job and the test of whether it is well done is all in the sales.
In terms of conformity I think every genre has a level of conformity which is not only tolerable but expected. Screenwriting you should expect your name on something you don’t even recognize. But the thing is that people are ready and eager to conform to unreal constraints. Not really states in the essay, but most of the conformity is to imagined constraints caused by hearsay and rumors and maybe very credible sources. I feel like this is a woman going to the Amazon and cutting off her breast because she thinks that the women there cut off their breasts to shoot arrows better. Then she arrives and all the women actually just use a type of natural sports bra. She prematurely jumped to a sacrifice to satisfy certain constraints that didn’t even apply. It’s not so much the conformity but the brash and premature over zealousness about it.
While I’m fully aware of the possible hypocrisies of this statement, I feel the difference between you and him is that you evaluated your life and made a decision which you think would make you have the best life you desire. I’m also not someone who believes that education is necessarily mandatory for a writer…at least not a formal one. I wouldn’t be trying to start up a youtube channel to teach writing if I felt that a university was the only way. However, you’re exactly right, it is because he complained.
In his mind he is not taking an opportunity, but rather is taking a greater opportunity cost by not taking the full educational advantage of the $6,000 he will pay to have this person show him how to write a genre novel. Even if he has a net financial gain, which may not even happen, he had wasted an opportunity to polish his own skills and become what he wanted. He had lost sight of why he wanted the book in the first place. Since he’s not counting money, but lamenting the decision, I’m assuming that he wasn’t motivated by the low income potential of publishing. And in the end who is to say that the book he wanted to write would have failed? He didn’t even try.
For the street sweepers comment I think that comment is pretty much a “check your privilege” comment. And checking it I have to say, yes, saying that people should only do what they want is coming from a point of privilege from an educated class. Out of context, the comment is valid, but I’m talking about people who can afford at least 6 years of college education and are still trying to do a crap job that they don’t care for. If you’re privileged enough to go to college and get more than one degree, then at the very least it would be good advice to do it in something your care about. It’s almost like being a soccer player in the world cup final match with nobody guarding the goal, and you still miss.
And yes, writing is a personal thing and will differ from person to person. How invested someone will be is up to them. I shouldn’t judge, but I can’t stand it anymore. I want to be a anthropologist who just studies it, writes about it, and moves on with my life, but it drains me to hear these people talk. And I don’t recharge easily.
I don’t know whether Lauren Faust really got upset with Hasbro asking to put in a train or change Rarity’s house, or whether it was the whole environment. If it was one or two changes then I don’t really like Lauren’s reactions to it. It’s being too picky and too controlling over trite details that could be altered without hurting the integrity of the work. However, if these are just her examples of being in an environment where people are too focused on sales and not enough about art (again sales and art are not mutually exclusive) to the point where it just drains you creatively, then I know that feel, Faust.
Is it okay to not know what I want? I’m young, majoring in something completely unrelated to writing, and write in my free time aside from work. Looking forward I’m starting to notice how damn hard it’s going to be to both write and work, but I currently feel like if I’m not doing something creative then I’m living to work, living to go to school, living for the means to an end with no end in sight so to speak.
Right now I’m working to get good enough to get published. But getting published for me at this point is validation that I am a writer. I don’t rightly know if I’ll switch to something relating to writing in the next couple of years. In the grand scheme of things, I don’t even know how good I really am. Am I worth something? I’ve always told myself that if I work hard with this passion, the answer is yes no matter what I create, but if I switch my career to something relating to writing and it’s no longer a question of writing in my free time, will the money be there? Will society value what I can do? I don’t have the slightest fucking clue what society wants, to be frank, and the idea of dropping a career in Computer Science for something I find valuable enough to do in my free time is frankly terrifying because that means I’m exposing my life to failure if I’m not good enough.
How good is good enough? I could really use to find out what jobs for writers are actually like. I could really use to find out if I can make a living doing this, or if I should ‘give up’ if you can consider planning to continue writing alongside another job ‘giving up’.
Throughout writing this I’ve accumulated an awful feeling of trepidation. As it is now, I just go on my merry little business, writing whatever I want to write, spurred on by the fans that I have accumulated. I’ve come to terms with the idea that writing in my free time is equivalent to working in my free time, and done so deeply enough that I’ve considered quitting my job to write 40 hours a week or more instead of 20, because I feel like even though I don’t get money from writing, the things I DO get are inexpressibly more valuable.
And now, as many things that I write end up becoming, this tiny little text box has become a 400×100 pixel window of introspection for me, perhaps begging publically for answers that I can really only find myself. Egh…
Idylia, I’m going to not answer this question right now. It’s too important and big for the limited pixels of this box. Also, even though I was in the exact same position as you, I don’t know if I readily have the answer for you.
With your permission I would like to do a whole blog post on this. You’re not the only one in this spot and this needs greater attention. I promise you I won’t half-ass my response, but I cannot promise you that I have any answers.
But I should say that your questions are exactly what you should be having. If you jumped into writing I’d say that you were stupid, idealistic and stupid. In a way that’s what this blog post was about. It’s about making sure you’re doing something because you really want to. My program is full of writers who have no idea what they are doing, or even if it will bring them happiness, because they failed to take seriously the questions you are asking yourself right now. Why do you want a book? Or publication? This is important, because it will decide how much effort and sacrifice you should put into it. Is it right for me? What do I want from writing? Can I still obtain it without choosing the difficulties of a writer’s life, or do I want to jump head first into an uncertain future?
This is the rest of your life; trepidation is a sign of wisdom. In fact, this kind of introspection and wonder makes for a good writer. One thing I can say is don’t become a writer to become a writer. Become a writer because you love writing…and if you love teaching, because that’s probably how you’ll make your money. People will not respect you as a writer. I will be honest with that right now. Your fellow writers all think they’re better than you, whether they are or not. Your family and friends will all think that they can do what you do. Society will automatically assume you’re a failure or don’t know what you’re doing based upon whether there is a movie based on your work. Will it pay off? I still haven’t reached that stage myself…
I didn’t mean that everyone who wants to write should give up everything for writing. William Carlos Williams was a doctor. He didn’t go to school for poetry and is one of the bests. It’s just that in my writing program there are a lot of people are throwing away everything to be a writer, but are also throwing away everything meaningful to being a writer in order to be a success. I think to keep this from being a tragedy, you need to ask these questions.
So yes, it’s okay to not know as long as you’re aware that you don’t.
By the way, feel free to use my comment section for introspection at any time.
Haha, you don’t need my permission. I’d love to see a well thought out post on the nature of what I ranted about. Thanks for the replies, as always.