The quote below from Ernest J. Gaines (The Autobiography of Miss Jane Pittman) inspired this pep talk, even if only inadvertently.
I’ll explain, but first the quote:
“You need a good editor because every writer thinks he can write War and Peace, but by the time he gets it on paper, it’s not War and Peace anymore; it’s comic book stuff.”
Comic book stuff. Ouch.
Now Gaines was speaking in praise of editors, and quite rightly, but this post isn’t about editors. It’s about something else I saw when I looked at the quote: fear.
Simply put, the fear is this:
“I know I’ve got a great story inside me, but it keeps coming out sounding like drivel. I’m no good. I can’t stand this. Why the hell did I ever sell the furniture business?
Okay, sound familiar? I have two observations:
1) Look carefully at what’s actually going on. Do you recognize a familiar culprit? Behold–it’s your old pal Writer’s Block, the coiled worm at the heart of your ambition, the inner voice that taunts you into thinking, “if my writing doesn’t hit the page sounding like Tolstoy…I suck.”
What to do: Try to ignore your anxiety about not being Tolstoy–or Hemingway, or Faulkner. You don’t have the luxury for that kind of useless hand-wringing. When you chose to be a novelist you chose, in effect, to put on clod boots and work like a peasant every day, regardless of how you feel about it, until you write “The End.”
2) If you actually sold the furniture business, there’s no going back now–you’re in this writing thing up to your chin, whether you want to be or not.
What to do: Recognize the “we’re not worthy” feelings for what they are, sham judgements, and concentrate on telling your story. Even if there was once an evolutionary purpose for that belittling voice, it’s now a vestigial freak. You should no more heed it than you would a crazy old aunt, yammering insults from inside a locked attic room.
|
|
|
|
|
 |
