Writers are warned about the fiasco of their first novel before they even begin covertly scratching bits of dialogue on legal pads during business hours, much less birthing characters and their capers. Of course there are many good reasons why writing and sending out that first novel can be hairy at best, but before images of the martyred writer start dancing in your head, consider the six little words that have sparked many a revolution: what have you got to lose?
If you fear that your book will not make you a literary celebrity, that's probably true; but you have more of a chance of remaining in anonymity if you aren’t finishing and sending out that first work. The worst that will happen is that that your novel will be forced to endure the writer’s spring cleaning, taking up residence in the sock drawer with the sobering knowledge that the socks are more likely to get a publishing contract. Just remember the old adage, though, that the first novel is meant to function as a sort of lubrication for the next tome to come shooting out of the writing mind.
Besides, you’re a writer and must be prepared to make a living off being a glutton for punishment. The act of creating even the briefest anecdote involves a number of verbal sacrifices and downright word deaths. Each term is chosen over countless others that could have filled the same slot. You are the alchemist who can convert your joy and pain into words, but you dream of the impossible: of placing your thoughts down whole on the page.
The crux of the writer’s pain, then, is that, although you have articulated some part of your imaginings, you know those images will always exceed that attempt, remaining imprisoned in your head. However, the real artistic impasse is that, although the image will not make it to the other side whole, it won’t make it there at all if it’s not translated. This makes the art of a writer like a creation myth, as the idea must be sacrificed before it can be resurrected into words.
Writers are doomed to repeatedly undergo this perverse exercise in order to make their art. Ultimately, what you hear when you read is the torture music of the author caught in the midst of the painful process of expression. Let me leave you with one thought: if you live with this ache every day, you can handle the rejection letters, my friend.
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Comments
http://open.salon.com/blog/randomidiociesblogspontcom/2009/09/21/the_best_advice_on_writing_a_first_novel_dont
R
Right on Berrycomposer
The classic fantasy is someone who may or may not have been an English major in college slaving away at their computer and producing the next great American novel or the next bestseller (depending on their fantasy).
That's kind of like assuming if you can make it as a sport star without ever having had a single lesson or session with a coach.
Write the novel, but just expect your first try to be publishable. There are lots of resources for getting good feedback without paying a professional to do it for you.
November is National Novel-Writing Month. Write 50k words in 30 days. I dare you. nanowrimo.org
Clarice Lispector started publishing when she was 23. When she was older, she lived a modest life. She always said that she wrote to avoid getting crazy. She was reclusive. Money and fame were not her priorities.
Ben Sen: And I think that as long as you're not doing it for the money, then you really have nothing to lose. You're going to write it for the sake of writing it and that's that; anything else that happens with it is just gravy.
Malusinka: that's right--as long as you're taking all the necessary steps to grow as a writer, there really is nothing more you can do than just write your heart out.
Gwool: keep the hemlock for the cool literary death reference, but just don't use it. It can go in the sock drawer with the first novel:)
Harry Homeless: no, that most certainly ain't gonna fly. With that sound logic behind you, you'll have a home in no time, Harry.
berrycomposer: this is good conversation Ben sparked. It's such a balancing act because you have to be able to have some income (if writing or composing is what you do for a living), but you also have to be able to make the work that will most likely not make the agents come a-calling.
catnmus: good point: there's no harm in getting it out of you; you can always decide what to do with it later. Also, great challenge. I accept.
CarolinaBlue50: I'm so glad to hear that. I think the most exciting thing for me as a reader is to read something that reminds me that I'm not alone in a thought or feeling, and my favorite thing as a writer is to do that for someone else. Keep on truckin'; you have our support.
austinstranger: I've always like that line of thought: you don't have to feel like a failure because perhaps you'll attain posthumous success as a writer. Hey, if it worked for Clarice Lispector, whose mind was positively phenomenal, then it's the way to go.
Darryl: I eagerly await the crushing arrival of your tome.
The great events of the world have often been discovered by those who were prepared to take the risk whatever the discouraging words surrounding them.
There are those who will dream their dreams, but the dream means nothing unless one prepares to live the dream.
My own inspiration in writing can be found in a series of posts at
http://open.salon.com/blog/jonmagee/2009/06/02/paperback_writer_the_beatles_the_omnibus_edition
There was a time when I think the novel could come from the heart and the world listened. In England especially I think of the Victorians. This is when I think the form took hold in the imagination that still reverberates in the minds of those few who can actually tell the difference between art and conventional morality.
Today, if you look at the list of what is being read if one in ten are more than entertainments at any one time it's a stretch. Kind of like plucking the golden ring from the merry go round while the little horses bob up and down.
Question is...should a novel be written about it...and you both disagree. : )
Nice, you eternal optimist !!!