The Stinging Fly are doing a series of posts on rejections.
This essay is not just about rejections and hence I am sharing it here. It’s by one of my favorite short story writers, Danielle McLaughlin, who is a very astute teacher and a brilliant and kind human being. Highly recommend her work if not familiar. :)
“‘All of writing is a huge lake,’ Jean Rhys said. ‘There are great rivers that feed the lake, like Tolstoy or Dostoyevsky. And then there are mere trickles, like Jean Rhys. All that matters is feeding the lake. I don’t matter. The lake matters. You must keep feeding the lake.’ This quote is something I find myself coming back to on days when I’m wondering: why bother? There already exists an abundance of books in the world, multitudes of them better than anything I will ever produce. Why keep going? I would never categorise Jean Rhys as a ‘mere trickle’, but I like her lake analogy. When we send our stories out into the world, when we feed that lake, they become, if I may be permitted a cliché, part of something bigger. I see writing as a way of going—or getting—through life, what a Buddhist might call a practice. It’s a practice that’s focused on creating, as opposed to destroying. Our stories might be mere dots, but they’re engaged in a sort of literary pointillism. And since we’re on the subject of rejection, it’s worth remembering that while the word ‘pointillism’ would in time come to denote an art movement, it was initially a pejorative term coined by critics to ridicule its practitioners.”
Also, Zadie Smith’s lock down essay collection, Intimations, has an essay titled “Something To Do” which is a sobering read on this act of creating and she concludes it’s no different than baking bread or whatever else we “do”. And all that matters is that we bring Love to the act of this “something to do.”
Appreciate your insight here. "And all that matters is that we bring Love to the act of this 'something to do.'" And it matters too because it also brings love and light into this world of ours that sorely needs it.
Thanks, Annie, especially for the recommendation of Danielle McLaughlin, with whom I'm unfamiliar but I so enjoy new literary finds, and the Stinging Fly links. As for "feed the lake" there's a wonderful collection of craft essay sparked by that phrase entitled, of course, "Feed the Lake" & put out by the North American Review Press. Some wonderful contributors. Available on Kindle (not sure if it's even in print), though the formatting is a little wonky. Still, very helpful.
Thank you, Rosanne. looking into getting it! FYI, Zadie Smith mentions in her essay an essay by by Toni Cade Bambara titled “What It is I Think I'm Doing Anyhow?" It’s found in a collection called The Writer and Her Work which might be worth having as well.
Hey thanks for your comment. It made me seek out the "Something to Do" piece by Zaddie Smith. Here's the link I found, on a YouTube channel called 'Me + You = Us' where Osei Kwame reads Zaddie Smith's essay to us: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UrOMrTR_7Ng
I like the feeling behind it. Also it seems that being in the creative brain is so different from the brain that wants recognition and a pat on the head.
Yes, indeed. Maybe you already read this excellent essay? It was making the nuthouse* rounds this week.
“That is, how easy it is to let the desire to be published (and by extension obsessed over by name-brand agents, editors, and publishing houses) completely outstrip the act of writing a good book.” - Carmen Maria Machado
George gave you a perfect answer. I’ll only add that I’ve been there, so i think i understand you. I wrote and wrote and wrote for years and then….stopped. I don’t know why, really. I think I just didn’t have anything else I wanted to say—in that way (through writing fiction). It felt done, though I continued to love words and sentences, and of course, books. But the need was gone. It kind of blew my mind, since writing was basically my everything for so long (besides my kids). Many people encouraged me to write again, as though all it would take was for me to sit down at my desk and another book would come to me. But that’s not the way it works. I did write a story recently and loved doing the writing. This club helped me find my way back—but I’m not all the way there yet. I don’t know when I’ll complete another story. My main point here is that if you are okay with it—and it sounds like you are—then that’s the best of all scenarios. It IS a weird feeling, I’ll grant you that. And I’ve found myself making visual art over the last few years. It’s like my mind just transferred that need to express myself to another venue. Anyway, you don’t need my comments or any help. Sounds like you are exactly where you should be. But, yes. It does feel strange. Thank you for your question to George which made me feel less alone.
Aren’t George’s answers always perfect? I’ve yet to read one and think, “OMG, this guy is so off base…” for me it’s more like, “OMG, how did I get so lucky to find this group?” And feeling less alone? Yes! Always good to have community.
YES! I don't know how many times I've read one of George's essays or scrolled through the comments here and thought, "this is exactly what I am struggling with right now and this is just where I need to be and just what I need to hear," so thank you, thank you! What a wonderful, rich community!
You’re making me blush! If I have any positivity to give off it’s only because I was for many years incredibly negative. I learned, from people blowing up at me, and from all the times I have trapped myself, to try a different outlook on for size. (It takes some work to stay on a more positive path, ha ha.) Anyway some great things have taken place in my life during the past six years. Story Club is a big one. I love reading posts by all these brilliant, thoughtful, funny, caring, creative people!! (By the way, Nancy, I like you too. But don’t tell anyone; it’s just between us!)
Is true liberation when we can just be ourselves, knowing some people will like us, some will despise us, many will be indifferent, and (the hard part, I think) all of that is perfectly all right? (Same for our creative efforts, and feedback.)
for me, I feel like I'm always spouting off, as if i know anything. I think it's so much better to listen than talk. But somehow, here, I'm always talking.
Stupid substack, i'm not sure if your comment here is for me or for David. But assuming it's for me(!), this is super nice to hear. You're really such a sweet light in this club, Stacya.
It's a funny thing, the 'having something I want to say'. We all talk about it a lot don't we, it feels sort of essential. Thought sometimes I've written stories I felt were good and I enjoyed, but when I started them, I knew I had nothing to say. It almost felt like I was leaving room for the characters and the story, that seemed to take a weight off my shoulders, to be the one doing the work. They just got on with it.
Tom, I'm right with you on this. I really never have written because i felt consciously that i had something to say. But then--it turned out that I wanted to express something because there it was on the page in black and white. I had a lot of bad years (didn't we all?), and my stories/books were all about being unhappy. Then i got happy! And now i'm in a new place, and seeing the world anew, and my lack of writing seems to reflect that. Though i also see this gentle push inside of me toward the page again. To write something broader, if that makes sense. Still me, but less self-absorbed, less blinded, more open. If this sounds vague, that's because i'm not clear on any of it myself. But getting happy (while still dealing with the past) is a bit of a mind blower and I'm still not perfectly comfortable with this new normal, as it's so different from a lifetime of thinking feeling bad was feeling good. WAY MORE THAN YOU ASKED FOR.
Mary, it's fascinating how 'ourselves' finds its way into our writing isn't it? A lot of my stories feature characters who are in some way parentless. I'd never really thought about my own dad being absent, he was loving but worked away in the week when I was growing up. Somehow that part of me surfaces in my writing, even though it was never something I set out to 'say' it is no doubt making itself heard!
Writing is like talking to the kind of therapist who just nods as you talk and waits for you to figure it all out. We end up completely writing about our own issues-- it can be so transparent. (My first book has no father in it. You better believe my own dad pointed it out to me, but until then I hadn't really noticed.)
So you bridged from written (seeing) to visual (seeing) art Mary, which is great as you've plenty of audible, touch, smell and taste art springboard to explore.
"Geez guys, ya'know what's really reached me, most, being in Story Club?"
"Reached ya'? Whaddya' mean?"
"Its the taste of Thursdays around tea time in my time zone, and then same time Sundays at the beginning the next week, that really reached. Mmm, I'm thinking, what will George's next twist do my my taste buds? Y'all didn't know this before I'm telling ya' like it is right now, but I'm one of those that had lost interest in reading short fiction for the better part of a decade or two until finding myself exploring short story with you guys. Now here I am, enjoying the arrival, first breaking taste and slow, reflective mastication of each Newsletter and the tsunami of constructive commentary that bursts out, like so many straight tastes of pure literary Tabasco, around it."
Few, best go lie down, one too many read hot tastes of Tabasco on those budding writers buds of mine ... and there's Balloo the Bear (aka by voice as Phil Harris) walking across backstage behind a flicked cartoon scene of Disney's Jungle Book sayin' wryly, seeming to seek soothing, to himself "That sauce was TABASCO!"
This is apropos of nothing, but when you mentioned Baloo/Phil Harris, it reminded me of this: My friend Digby Wolfe was the voice of Ziggy the Vulture in that 1967 movie. He died in 2012, and after the memorial, I told my young grandson Charlie about him. Later, Charlie told his dad, "One of the vultures in The Jungle Book died." His dad, Sheldon, was nonplussed and could think only "kids are weird, and this one is really weird." Sometime later I was talking about Digby, and the light dawning in Sheldon's eyes was beautiful to see. [consider this a tiny trickle into the lake of Story Club lore]
In another group we've doing a little work on the senses in writing. As it happens I've drawn 'taste' as the focus for a short input to session in September where each of five of us will be aiming to set members of the writing circle exploring how the senses do / do not feature in the way they write.
As ever serendipity strikes when you start exploring a topic and I ran across this item in Lit Hub https://lithub.com/what-exactly-do-words-taste-like/ . Imagine stations on rail routes around London being known primarily by their the way they taste rather than the way they are seen or lettered-up on the station name signs.
I think, in a similar way, synaesthesia can play a role in at least , and perhaps more than some, individuals respond to a work of art on gallery wall. "Ugh, that painting tastes too sweet"? Or the same person looking on an oil painting of a seascape "Ah, now that's a painting I'd love to chew on and get the full taste of"?
Imagine Mary. You've just had three of your artworks hung in a local gallery, as pieces on show the Autumn Exhibition of Artists in the Community. You're proud of them, pleased with the way they look set in their place in the exhibition. "Wow" you hear a visitor exclaim, "I really like these three, they taste just great!" Unlikely but not impossible?
JD, I'm glad you're here. It's easy to connect with people in the comment section, and George is simply the best. I think every writer should be in Story Club!
That is fascinating about the homeless camp and the bardo. I see it, and it’s such a great insight into that work. That’s one of my favorite books. And I love the - was it Flannery oO’Connor? - quote about not discouraging enough writers! I found it was a great hindrance to my imagination and my time to worry about what a reader might think of my writing or about whether someone might want to publish it. Just keep reading and you’ll be fine. It’ll come or it won’t. My hero is Emily Dickinson. That’s some advice from an old woman with a bad case of Covid here who’s reading The Overstory and thinking I’m about to have the first real conversation of my life with the tree outside my window ; ) I so enjoy reading all of the comments. Thank you, people
The questions and answers are blowing my mind. So good! Thank you again for making time for this. I hope you still like it. Also, Fresno is a tough place. I know the area well. It gets so hot there in the summer, my heart goes out to the unsheltered.
The not readily accessible Twain quote may be Hemingway:
“ A writer can be compared to a well. There are as many kinds of wells as there are writers. The important thing is to have good water in the well, and it is better to take a regular amount out than to pump the well dry and wait for it to refill.
Ernest Hemingway”
and
“ I learned never to empty the well of my writing, but always to stop when there was still something there in the deep part of the well, and let it refill at night from the springs that fed it.”
This may be slightly off-point, but not by much, I don't think. I subscribe to a daily newsletter from my hometown of Pittsburgh & I wanted to share with all of you something that arrived in my inbox this morning & which might be of help. It's from August Wilson, a Pittsburgh native & one of its prides. Here it is: "Confront the dark parts of yourself and work to banish them with illumination & forgiveness. Your willingness to wrestle with your demons will cause your angels to sing." I note two things: forgiveness and willingness.
August Wilson lived in Seattle for a time. I was lucky to meet him when I worked at the Seattle Rep Theater––all these amazing actors came from all over to do his workshops of new plays. What an amazing man, so kind to people, and the quote is so perfect. Rosanne, do you ever go to the Pittsburgh Public Theater?
I live in DC now & haven't been back to Pittsburgh in many years, a city much changed and for the better I understand. In my day it was the Pittsburgh Playhouse, long gone, that was the heart of the surprisingly vibrant theater scene.
Everyone has a trip they had to cancel because of the pandemic, mine was Pittsburgh, April, 2020. It was a bummer-- I had the coolest airbnb by a gorgeous park in Shady Side.
That's too bad. Shadyside & adjacent Oakland, where the universities are, are the city's two best & most beautiful neighborhoods. I'm guessing it was either Schenley Park or maybe Fern Hollow near where your airb&b was, both lovely. I spent every minute that I could in Oakland in the wonderful & gorgeous Carnegie Library, his best among the hundreds he'd built. Wilson haunted the library, too, though we weren't there at the same time. He got into Central Catholic, no easy feat, but was so mistreated by the brothers, this on account of race, that he skipped more than he went & spent his time in the stacks instead. Just as well, as it turned out. Hope you finally get your trip to Pgh.
My husband is the auctioneer for the theater's fundraiser, he goes every year unless the virus screws it all up again. I'll try again next time he works there and take all your tips.
Horrible to hear about August Wilson having to deal with those jerks.
I love Pittsburgh. My brother lives in Squirrel Hill and I've been there many times. He's a block off of Murray Avenue, if that means anything to anyone.
Very cool about your husband's work. He probably knows a lot more about the city than I do at this point. When I lived there Forbes Field still existed & you couldn't swim in the rivers or, on certain summer days of air inversions, breathe. Well, you could but at your peril. As for Central Catholic, my father, first-born into a large Irish Catholic family, went there too, although years earlier, & had, not surprising, a completely different experience.
A few months ago, something similar happened to me when the writing simply stopped. There were other things going on in my life, but usually writing was how I found my way through life's mess. This time, I sat with the idea, "what if I never write again?" and in that, I found peace. Three months later, the writing called, and I answered, but this time with expansiveness and openness. Will this last? Who knows. But for now, I'm having so much fun!
Thanks to the questioner and your response, George. Hope your beloved pup is healing.
Diane, I like the part about finding peace by asking that question. I too have found then when fear is driving my decisions it helps to run the worst case scenario in my head, then realize that I could probably handle that too. It’s sort of like turning to face the monster in a dream. You realize it is not as powerful as it seems. Then your own power is restored. It’s a relief.
Kurt, so well described. That's it exactly: look under the bed to find that the monster isn't as frightening as imagined and is, in fact, a dust bunny finding its groove. It's a huge relief.
The question about taking a break reminds me of a time soon after moving to New York where I intended to become an author. I had spent the previous two years working as a journalist in Europe, and although it was splendid for learning that craft, I ached to write in longer form: books. Specifically, fiction. My father flew out from St. Louis to visit my little garret on the upper-Upper West Side (this was early 90's when things were still rough around edges). He asked how I intended to make money to support myself. He understood I had a passion for writing, but he had a tried-and-true Midwestern sensibility. I assured him it was fine, and i had it worked out, and the break would come. Then he said something that has stuck with me ever since. "Listen, Neal, my suggestion is if there's anything else in this world that you are interested in doing, do that. Try it at least. Being an author, there's no stability in it. If you find you can't/won't pursue something else, then writing it is." Lacking some courage in my convictions, I tried other things: economic consulting (don't ask!) as well as being a book editor and literary agent). Time and again, I found myself back at the coffee shop, scribbling stories into my long yellow legal pad. If you're a writer, if that is what you're meant to do, you will always lead yourself back to it in one form of another.
So true, Neal. I'm just now getting my start as a full-time writer in my early forties. It's a bad career move financially. But I've always found a way to write via my jobs, because it's always been something I wanted to do. I'm not a woo woo person at all, but I read somewhere that a writer feels "compelled" to write, and I think that rings true.
I have an old, blind, deaf dog. He once told me, “You’re lazy, but don’t feel too bad about it because it’s not stopping you from anything you’re good at.” What a card.
I hope your pet makes a good recovery, and your trips are fun and fruitful.
Difficult to bs the 🐈! (Which is why most writers require one…”Hey, familiar, is this passage working for you?” Giant yawn; scary teeth. “Ok, ok, I planned on a total rewrite anyway. Don’t you want to go outside and play, my sweet?”
I’m embarking on the creative writing course I suspect I should have taken decades ago. Why? Because despite half a century of mostly fallow periods, the writing table never ceases to draw me back. But it’s not the well running dry that worries me. It’s the fear that the fallow periods are all I’m truly capable of. Perhaps you can lead a writer to water, but you can’t make them think. Sounds like Flannery believed that.
Leon, I posted my comment, then read through the others. Your own about the writing table never ceasing to draw you back tethers exactly with my experience.
Aside from the "news" imbedded in George's extraordinary post (see below), I was affected by the tone of kindness imbedded in George's extraordinary post.
We writers can be far too tough on ourselves, being ourselves up (quietly, hopefully!) for not getting pages done today, not getting enough words down--whatever the gauge is of your writing productivity. "Guilty" was a term George used. I can feel the sense that I'm letting myself down, or that I'm burning through another day of my limited number of days on Earth, one more day not improving myself as a writer.
But I think this is mental jiu-jitsu (or is it self-torture?). I'm in a down cycle in my actual writing-on-the-page writing right now, mainly because my current daily work involves a ton of other kinds of writing (journalism), and also because--to be honest--I haven't figured out the structure of my week to free up days, long patches of hours, for fiction writing. But I'm trying to be kind to myself. Not kicking myself for not doing it.
But something more. I know that my creative tank is getting re-filled, that strange phenomenon George cited from Twain. My head is exploding with little ideas (good for stories, not for novels), or images, or moments, or details, things that are sticking in my head. (The sticking is a good sign.) I'm not forcing it. I'm just letting it happen. I know that I'll be walking back into my writing room, closing the door, and letting it flow and see where it takes me. My gut tells me that it'll be soon, but I'm not sure. I think the difference is that--before--I was worried that I wouldn't close the door. (was it that thing called Resistance? don't know.) Now--I'm really not worried. Because I sense the well is being refilled. George's thoughtful answer to a great question clarifies this. Thanks.
"Enlightenment or excuse?" That's a question I've asked over the years, too. I can usually trust the quiet signal that comes (eventually, even if I don't like it). I'm just coming out of a seven-month non-writing period and suddenly all these ideas are exploding in my mind. I just needed to be ready to receive them. I had to trust I would someday be ready, and that they would appear. If something else appeared instead, so be it. Thank you for the wise and kind asking and answering.
Thanks so much to the person who asked the question, and to George for the answer, especially with all you've got going on. Speaking of taking a break, I've just come off my own "pause" of about 20 years. My work for much of that time involved writing, but after publishing one novel I found I couldn't get myself back to the writing table to write fiction, or anything for myself. Story Club has definitely been a part of finding my way back, and posts like this one help me worry just a little bit less about that extended hiatus, and look forward with curiosity about what might come out of that well I've been filling for the last two decades. So, thanks again, George. If you're ever wondering if this thing you've started is making an impact, let me just add my voice to those saying, "Yes." 🙏🏼❤️
I've been wondering: Can I say that I'm a writer if I'm not writing? My fallow period began once I finished a memoir that, when published, I was pushing to get it known. Then knee surgery. Then a broken ankle. All that time, I assumed when I next sat down at my desk, the stories would come. They always did before. But it didn't work that way, and after at least a year of sitting down, I decided to relax and trust the process. Except it's been more than two years, and while I've written several first paragraphs, the pieces get stuck in the mire and go no further.
Zilch. I have nothing. It's as though I've never been a writer. There's a distant memory and certainly lots of past stories to attest, but it's like that part of my brain has gone dormant. I don't know if I'll ever write again. I hope so because if I'm not a writer, who am I?
I don't know if this'll help, but I had an editor who used to say he didn't like writing, hated it really, but that he loved having written. Then, after a while, the writing part would start up again (as would the crabbiness). Maybe you're still in the "having written" stage, where I, and I'll bet every other Clubber, give you permission to linger.
I just looked you up. Wow! What a story. Unless there's another writer named Jody A. Forrester.
Years ago, I was trapped on a ten day cruise ship with my in-laws. I was miserable, having tried and failed to get out of going... not because I didn't enjoy my in-laws, but cruise ships aren't my thing. The second day at sea, my brother in-law suggested we all write haikus based on our experiences on the ship. I guess my intense boredom/restlessness brought out the haiku monster deep inside me. There's a lot going on in the world, times are dark. Your brain might just need a long stretch of rest and sleep, maybe get a little bored. And what Charlie Kyle said.
The Stinging Fly are doing a series of posts on rejections.
This essay is not just about rejections and hence I am sharing it here. It’s by one of my favorite short story writers, Danielle McLaughlin, who is a very astute teacher and a brilliant and kind human being. Highly recommend her work if not familiar. :)
“‘All of writing is a huge lake,’ Jean Rhys said. ‘There are great rivers that feed the lake, like Tolstoy or Dostoyevsky. And then there are mere trickles, like Jean Rhys. All that matters is feeding the lake. I don’t matter. The lake matters. You must keep feeding the lake.’ This quote is something I find myself coming back to on days when I’m wondering: why bother? There already exists an abundance of books in the world, multitudes of them better than anything I will ever produce. Why keep going? I would never categorise Jean Rhys as a ‘mere trickle’, but I like her lake analogy. When we send our stories out into the world, when we feed that lake, they become, if I may be permitted a cliché, part of something bigger. I see writing as a way of going—or getting—through life, what a Buddhist might call a practice. It’s a practice that’s focused on creating, as opposed to destroying. Our stories might be mere dots, but they’re engaged in a sort of literary pointillism. And since we’re on the subject of rejection, it’s worth remembering that while the word ‘pointillism’ would in time come to denote an art movement, it was initially a pejorative term coined by critics to ridicule its practitioners.”
https://stingingfly.org/2022/07/28/chop-wood-carry-water/
Link to the introduction:
https://stingingfly.org/2022/07/28/notes-on-rejection/
Also, Zadie Smith’s lock down essay collection, Intimations, has an essay titled “Something To Do” which is a sobering read on this act of creating and she concludes it’s no different than baking bread or whatever else we “do”. And all that matters is that we bring Love to the act of this “something to do.”
“Keep feeding the lake.” Amen.
Appreciate your insight here. "And all that matters is that we bring Love to the act of this 'something to do.'" And it matters too because it also brings love and light into this world of ours that sorely needs it.
Every act of love matters, and affects the world, even if we know it not.
Thanks, Annie, especially for the recommendation of Danielle McLaughlin, with whom I'm unfamiliar but I so enjoy new literary finds, and the Stinging Fly links. As for "feed the lake" there's a wonderful collection of craft essay sparked by that phrase entitled, of course, "Feed the Lake" & put out by the North American Review Press. Some wonderful contributors. Available on Kindle (not sure if it's even in print), though the formatting is a little wonky. Still, very helpful.
Thank you, Rosanne. looking into getting it! FYI, Zadie Smith mentions in her essay an essay by by Toni Cade Bambara titled “What It is I Think I'm Doing Anyhow?" It’s found in a collection called The Writer and Her Work which might be worth having as well.
“Something to Do” is a wonderful piece.
Hey thanks for your comment. It made me seek out the "Something to Do" piece by Zaddie Smith. Here's the link I found, on a YouTube channel called 'Me + You = Us' where Osei Kwame reads Zaddie Smith's essay to us: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UrOMrTR_7Ng
Thanks for the links and the perspective. I like that line of thought–– "Something To Do" like baking bread or other things we do in life.
It’s a humbling essay by her!
I like the feeling behind it. Also it seems that being in the creative brain is so different from the brain that wants recognition and a pat on the head.
Yes, indeed. Maybe you already read this excellent essay? It was making the nuthouse* rounds this week.
“That is, how easy it is to let the desire to be published (and by extension obsessed over by name-brand agents, editors, and publishing houses) completely outstrip the act of writing a good book.” - Carmen Maria Machado
https://carmenmariamachado.substack.com/p/on-writing-and-the-business-of-writing?r=7kshz&s=r&utm_campaign=post&utm_medium=web&utm_source=direct
*social media / Twatter :)
That was perfect! Thanks for the link, great read.
“Literary pointillism.” That’s exactly it. Thank you from the top and the bottom of my heart for this post.
I love Danielle McGlaughlin’s work too. Thanks for the link!
Great links, thanks Annie.
George gave you a perfect answer. I’ll only add that I’ve been there, so i think i understand you. I wrote and wrote and wrote for years and then….stopped. I don’t know why, really. I think I just didn’t have anything else I wanted to say—in that way (through writing fiction). It felt done, though I continued to love words and sentences, and of course, books. But the need was gone. It kind of blew my mind, since writing was basically my everything for so long (besides my kids). Many people encouraged me to write again, as though all it would take was for me to sit down at my desk and another book would come to me. But that’s not the way it works. I did write a story recently and loved doing the writing. This club helped me find my way back—but I’m not all the way there yet. I don’t know when I’ll complete another story. My main point here is that if you are okay with it—and it sounds like you are—then that’s the best of all scenarios. It IS a weird feeling, I’ll grant you that. And I’ve found myself making visual art over the last few years. It’s like my mind just transferred that need to express myself to another venue. Anyway, you don’t need my comments or any help. Sounds like you are exactly where you should be. But, yes. It does feel strange. Thank you for your question to George which made me feel less alone.
Aren’t George’s answers always perfect? I’ve yet to read one and think, “OMG, this guy is so off base…” for me it’s more like, “OMG, how did I get so lucky to find this group?” And feeling less alone? Yes! Always good to have community.
I know. I can't believe how lucky we all are here.
YES! I don't know how many times I've read one of George's essays or scrolled through the comments here and thought, "this is exactly what I am struggling with right now and this is just where I need to be and just what I need to hear," so thank you, thank you! What a wonderful, rich community!
Glad to hear that. Since your posts make all of us feel less alone, Mary.
David, your posts are always so positive and a pleasure to read. I like your insights and I like your tone. I like you.
You’re making me blush! If I have any positivity to give off it’s only because I was for many years incredibly negative. I learned, from people blowing up at me, and from all the times I have trapped myself, to try a different outlook on for size. (It takes some work to stay on a more positive path, ha ha.) Anyway some great things have taken place in my life during the past six years. Story Club is a big one. I love reading posts by all these brilliant, thoughtful, funny, caring, creative people!! (By the way, Nancy, I like you too. But don’t tell anyone; it’s just between us!)
It's true.
Thank you, David. Right back atcha!
Mary, I always have an eye out for your comments--always interesting, spot-on, and uplifting. You are one of the treasures of Story Club.
Thank you so much for this, Nancy. I often fret about my posts after hitting the "post" button, so it's lovely to read your words.
I do that, too. What is it about? Maybe we’re all traumatized by social media, and there’s a low level of anxiety about being misunderstood.
Or a high level.
Remember that Song “High Anxiety”? Mel Brooks.
Is true liberation when we can just be ourselves, knowing some people will like us, some will despise us, many will be indifferent, and (the hard part, I think) all of that is perfectly all right? (Same for our creative efforts, and feedback.)
for me, I feel like I'm always spouting off, as if i know anything. I think it's so much better to listen than talk. But somehow, here, I'm always talking.
I am a student, so your posts enhance my learning. No sunshine blowing, just truth.
Stupid substack, i'm not sure if your comment here is for me or for David. But assuming it's for me(!), this is super nice to hear. You're really such a sweet light in this club, Stacya.
It's raining here^^
Beginner’s mind.
It is better to listen, but, one of the things I love most about the Story Club is that all of us have much to give, and much to receive.
Symbiosis!
Aye, the type of treasure that inspires one to set sail for distant islands!
It's a funny thing, the 'having something I want to say'. We all talk about it a lot don't we, it feels sort of essential. Thought sometimes I've written stories I felt were good and I enjoyed, but when I started them, I knew I had nothing to say. It almost felt like I was leaving room for the characters and the story, that seemed to take a weight off my shoulders, to be the one doing the work. They just got on with it.
Tom, I'm right with you on this. I really never have written because i felt consciously that i had something to say. But then--it turned out that I wanted to express something because there it was on the page in black and white. I had a lot of bad years (didn't we all?), and my stories/books were all about being unhappy. Then i got happy! And now i'm in a new place, and seeing the world anew, and my lack of writing seems to reflect that. Though i also see this gentle push inside of me toward the page again. To write something broader, if that makes sense. Still me, but less self-absorbed, less blinded, more open. If this sounds vague, that's because i'm not clear on any of it myself. But getting happy (while still dealing with the past) is a bit of a mind blower and I'm still not perfectly comfortable with this new normal, as it's so different from a lifetime of thinking feeling bad was feeling good. WAY MORE THAN YOU ASKED FOR.
Mary, it's fascinating how 'ourselves' finds its way into our writing isn't it? A lot of my stories feature characters who are in some way parentless. I'd never really thought about my own dad being absent, he was loving but worked away in the week when I was growing up. Somehow that part of me surfaces in my writing, even though it was never something I set out to 'say' it is no doubt making itself heard!
Writing is like talking to the kind of therapist who just nods as you talk and waits for you to figure it all out. We end up completely writing about our own issues-- it can be so transparent. (My first book has no father in it. You better believe my own dad pointed it out to me, but until then I hadn't really noticed.)
One of my writing professors said that writers write to discover what they have to say rather than the other way round.
Yes, this is it exactly.
So you bridged from written (seeing) to visual (seeing) art Mary, which is great as you've plenty of audible, touch, smell and taste art springboard to explore.
"Geez guys, ya'know what's really reached me, most, being in Story Club?"
"Reached ya'? Whaddya' mean?"
"Its the taste of Thursdays around tea time in my time zone, and then same time Sundays at the beginning the next week, that really reached. Mmm, I'm thinking, what will George's next twist do my my taste buds? Y'all didn't know this before I'm telling ya' like it is right now, but I'm one of those that had lost interest in reading short fiction for the better part of a decade or two until finding myself exploring short story with you guys. Now here I am, enjoying the arrival, first breaking taste and slow, reflective mastication of each Newsletter and the tsunami of constructive commentary that bursts out, like so many straight tastes of pure literary Tabasco, around it."
Few, best go lie down, one too many read hot tastes of Tabasco on those budding writers buds of mine ... and there's Balloo the Bear (aka by voice as Phil Harris) walking across backstage behind a flicked cartoon scene of Disney's Jungle Book sayin' wryly, seeming to seek soothing, to himself "That sauce was TABASCO!"
"Oobee Doo ..."
This is apropos of nothing, but when you mentioned Baloo/Phil Harris, it reminded me of this: My friend Digby Wolfe was the voice of Ziggy the Vulture in that 1967 movie. He died in 2012, and after the memorial, I told my young grandson Charlie about him. Later, Charlie told his dad, "One of the vultures in The Jungle Book died." His dad, Sheldon, was nonplussed and could think only "kids are weird, and this one is really weird." Sometime later I was talking about Digby, and the light dawning in Sheldon's eyes was beautiful to see. [consider this a tiny trickle into the lake of Story Club lore]
Smell art? Hmmm. Think I'll stick to painting....
In another group we've doing a little work on the senses in writing. As it happens I've drawn 'taste' as the focus for a short input to session in September where each of five of us will be aiming to set members of the writing circle exploring how the senses do / do not feature in the way they write.
As ever serendipity strikes when you start exploring a topic and I ran across this item in Lit Hub https://lithub.com/what-exactly-do-words-taste-like/ . Imagine stations on rail routes around London being known primarily by their the way they taste rather than the way they are seen or lettered-up on the station name signs.
I think, in a similar way, synaesthesia can play a role in at least , and perhaps more than some, individuals respond to a work of art on gallery wall. "Ugh, that painting tastes too sweet"? Or the same person looking on an oil painting of a seascape "Ah, now that's a painting I'd love to chew on and get the full taste of"?
Imagine Mary. You've just had three of your artworks hung in a local gallery, as pieces on show the Autumn Exhibition of Artists in the Community. You're proud of them, pleased with the way they look set in their place in the exhibition. "Wow" you hear a visitor exclaim, "I really like these three, they taste just great!" Unlikely but not impossible?
You ran out of ink...no maybe it was paper^^
Ink, paper, motivation.
JD, I'm glad you're here. It's easy to connect with people in the comment section, and George is simply the best. I think every writer should be in Story Club!
That is fascinating about the homeless camp and the bardo. I see it, and it’s such a great insight into that work. That’s one of my favorite books. And I love the - was it Flannery oO’Connor? - quote about not discouraging enough writers! I found it was a great hindrance to my imagination and my time to worry about what a reader might think of my writing or about whether someone might want to publish it. Just keep reading and you’ll be fine. It’ll come or it won’t. My hero is Emily Dickinson. That’s some advice from an old woman with a bad case of Covid here who’s reading The Overstory and thinking I’m about to have the first real conversation of my life with the tree outside my window ; ) I so enjoy reading all of the comments. Thank you, people
Hope you recover soon. ❤️
Sorry to hear about the Covid, hope you feel better soon 💜
Get well soon Pam.
The questions and answers are blowing my mind. So good! Thank you again for making time for this. I hope you still like it. Also, Fresno is a tough place. I know the area well. It gets so hot there in the summer, my heart goes out to the unsheltered.
The not readily accessible Twain quote may be Hemingway:
“ A writer can be compared to a well. There are as many kinds of wells as there are writers. The important thing is to have good water in the well, and it is better to take a regular amount out than to pump the well dry and wait for it to refill.
Ernest Hemingway”
and
“ I learned never to empty the well of my writing, but always to stop when there was still something there in the deep part of the well, and let it refill at night from the springs that fed it.”
Also Hemingway
Thank you! That’s it.
I thought it was Hemingway as well, but couldn't seem to find. Thank you for adding this!
That is so perfect, thank you! (I need a better way to meter the water down there.)
This may be slightly off-point, but not by much, I don't think. I subscribe to a daily newsletter from my hometown of Pittsburgh & I wanted to share with all of you something that arrived in my inbox this morning & which might be of help. It's from August Wilson, a Pittsburgh native & one of its prides. Here it is: "Confront the dark parts of yourself and work to banish them with illumination & forgiveness. Your willingness to wrestle with your demons will cause your angels to sing." I note two things: forgiveness and willingness.
August Wilson lived in Seattle for a time. I was lucky to meet him when I worked at the Seattle Rep Theater––all these amazing actors came from all over to do his workshops of new plays. What an amazing man, so kind to people, and the quote is so perfect. Rosanne, do you ever go to the Pittsburgh Public Theater?
I live in DC now & haven't been back to Pittsburgh in many years, a city much changed and for the better I understand. In my day it was the Pittsburgh Playhouse, long gone, that was the heart of the surprisingly vibrant theater scene.
Everyone has a trip they had to cancel because of the pandemic, mine was Pittsburgh, April, 2020. It was a bummer-- I had the coolest airbnb by a gorgeous park in Shady Side.
That's too bad. Shadyside & adjacent Oakland, where the universities are, are the city's two best & most beautiful neighborhoods. I'm guessing it was either Schenley Park or maybe Fern Hollow near where your airb&b was, both lovely. I spent every minute that I could in Oakland in the wonderful & gorgeous Carnegie Library, his best among the hundreds he'd built. Wilson haunted the library, too, though we weren't there at the same time. He got into Central Catholic, no easy feat, but was so mistreated by the brothers, this on account of race, that he skipped more than he went & spent his time in the stacks instead. Just as well, as it turned out. Hope you finally get your trip to Pgh.
My husband is the auctioneer for the theater's fundraiser, he goes every year unless the virus screws it all up again. I'll try again next time he works there and take all your tips.
Horrible to hear about August Wilson having to deal with those jerks.
I love Pittsburgh. My brother lives in Squirrel Hill and I've been there many times. He's a block off of Murray Avenue, if that means anything to anyone.
Very cool about your husband's work. He probably knows a lot more about the city than I do at this point. When I lived there Forbes Field still existed & you couldn't swim in the rivers or, on certain summer days of air inversions, breathe. Well, you could but at your peril. As for Central Catholic, my father, first-born into a large Irish Catholic family, went there too, although years earlier, & had, not surprising, a completely different experience.
My angels are singing!
Yay!
Love that quote. Totally on point from where I stand. : )
A few months ago, something similar happened to me when the writing simply stopped. There were other things going on in my life, but usually writing was how I found my way through life's mess. This time, I sat with the idea, "what if I never write again?" and in that, I found peace. Three months later, the writing called, and I answered, but this time with expansiveness and openness. Will this last? Who knows. But for now, I'm having so much fun!
Thanks to the questioner and your response, George. Hope your beloved pup is healing.
Diane, I like the part about finding peace by asking that question. I too have found then when fear is driving my decisions it helps to run the worst case scenario in my head, then realize that I could probably handle that too. It’s sort of like turning to face the monster in a dream. You realize it is not as powerful as it seems. Then your own power is restored. It’s a relief.
Kurt, so well described. That's it exactly: look under the bed to find that the monster isn't as frightening as imagined and is, in fact, a dust bunny finding its groove. It's a huge relief.
Only thing under my bed is more books^^
The question about taking a break reminds me of a time soon after moving to New York where I intended to become an author. I had spent the previous two years working as a journalist in Europe, and although it was splendid for learning that craft, I ached to write in longer form: books. Specifically, fiction. My father flew out from St. Louis to visit my little garret on the upper-Upper West Side (this was early 90's when things were still rough around edges). He asked how I intended to make money to support myself. He understood I had a passion for writing, but he had a tried-and-true Midwestern sensibility. I assured him it was fine, and i had it worked out, and the break would come. Then he said something that has stuck with me ever since. "Listen, Neal, my suggestion is if there's anything else in this world that you are interested in doing, do that. Try it at least. Being an author, there's no stability in it. If you find you can't/won't pursue something else, then writing it is." Lacking some courage in my convictions, I tried other things: economic consulting (don't ask!) as well as being a book editor and literary agent). Time and again, I found myself back at the coffee shop, scribbling stories into my long yellow legal pad. If you're a writer, if that is what you're meant to do, you will always lead yourself back to it in one form of another.
So true, Neal. I'm just now getting my start as a full-time writer in my early forties. It's a bad career move financially. But I've always found a way to write via my jobs, because it's always been something I wanted to do. I'm not a woo woo person at all, but I read somewhere that a writer feels "compelled" to write, and I think that rings true.
I have an old, blind, deaf dog. He once told me, “You’re lazy, but don’t feel too bad about it because it’s not stopping you from anything you’re good at.” What a card.
I hope your pet makes a good recovery, and your trips are fun and fruitful.
I love it when my cat lets me know just what a fraud I really am!
Cats are great that way. 🐈⬛
Difficult to bs the 🐈! (Which is why most writers require one…”Hey, familiar, is this passage working for you?” Giant yawn; scary teeth. “Ok, ok, I planned on a total rewrite anyway. Don’t you want to go outside and play, my sweet?”
🐾🐾🥷🏻😳😎
Ha! Your doggo must be a Wiezenheimer. AKC may not recognize the breed, but we have one in our house, too, oh, boy.
I’m embarking on the creative writing course I suspect I should have taken decades ago. Why? Because despite half a century of mostly fallow periods, the writing table never ceases to draw me back. But it’s not the well running dry that worries me. It’s the fear that the fallow periods are all I’m truly capable of. Perhaps you can lead a writer to water, but you can’t make them think. Sounds like Flannery believed that.
Leon, I posted my comment, then read through the others. Your own about the writing table never ceasing to draw you back tethers exactly with my experience.
Aside from the "news" imbedded in George's extraordinary post (see below), I was affected by the tone of kindness imbedded in George's extraordinary post.
We writers can be far too tough on ourselves, being ourselves up (quietly, hopefully!) for not getting pages done today, not getting enough words down--whatever the gauge is of your writing productivity. "Guilty" was a term George used. I can feel the sense that I'm letting myself down, or that I'm burning through another day of my limited number of days on Earth, one more day not improving myself as a writer.
But I think this is mental jiu-jitsu (or is it self-torture?). I'm in a down cycle in my actual writing-on-the-page writing right now, mainly because my current daily work involves a ton of other kinds of writing (journalism), and also because--to be honest--I haven't figured out the structure of my week to free up days, long patches of hours, for fiction writing. But I'm trying to be kind to myself. Not kicking myself for not doing it.
But something more. I know that my creative tank is getting re-filled, that strange phenomenon George cited from Twain. My head is exploding with little ideas (good for stories, not for novels), or images, or moments, or details, things that are sticking in my head. (The sticking is a good sign.) I'm not forcing it. I'm just letting it happen. I know that I'll be walking back into my writing room, closing the door, and letting it flow and see where it takes me. My gut tells me that it'll be soon, but I'm not sure. I think the difference is that--before--I was worried that I wouldn't close the door. (was it that thing called Resistance? don't know.) Now--I'm really not worried. Because I sense the well is being refilled. George's thoughtful answer to a great question clarifies this. Thanks.
someone once said "Resistance is futile."
Be sure! Let Resistance become Renaissance.
"Enlightenment or excuse?" That's a question I've asked over the years, too. I can usually trust the quiet signal that comes (eventually, even if I don't like it). I'm just coming out of a seven-month non-writing period and suddenly all these ideas are exploding in my mind. I just needed to be ready to receive them. I had to trust I would someday be ready, and that they would appear. If something else appeared instead, so be it. Thank you for the wise and kind asking and answering.
Thanks so much to the person who asked the question, and to George for the answer, especially with all you've got going on. Speaking of taking a break, I've just come off my own "pause" of about 20 years. My work for much of that time involved writing, but after publishing one novel I found I couldn't get myself back to the writing table to write fiction, or anything for myself. Story Club has definitely been a part of finding my way back, and posts like this one help me worry just a little bit less about that extended hiatus, and look forward with curiosity about what might come out of that well I've been filling for the last two decades. So, thanks again, George. If you're ever wondering if this thing you've started is making an impact, let me just add my voice to those saying, "Yes." 🙏🏼❤️
Yes!
I've been wondering: Can I say that I'm a writer if I'm not writing? My fallow period began once I finished a memoir that, when published, I was pushing to get it known. Then knee surgery. Then a broken ankle. All that time, I assumed when I next sat down at my desk, the stories would come. They always did before. But it didn't work that way, and after at least a year of sitting down, I decided to relax and trust the process. Except it's been more than two years, and while I've written several first paragraphs, the pieces get stuck in the mire and go no further.
Zilch. I have nothing. It's as though I've never been a writer. There's a distant memory and certainly lots of past stories to attest, but it's like that part of my brain has gone dormant. I don't know if I'll ever write again. I hope so because if I'm not a writer, who am I?
I mean who else but a writer would join something called Story Club! :-)
Ha! Perfect!
I don't know if this'll help, but I had an editor who used to say he didn't like writing, hated it really, but that he loved having written. Then, after a while, the writing part would start up again (as would the crabbiness). Maybe you're still in the "having written" stage, where I, and I'll bet every other Clubber, give you permission to linger.
thank you.
I just looked you up. Wow! What a story. Unless there's another writer named Jody A. Forrester.
Years ago, I was trapped on a ten day cruise ship with my in-laws. I was miserable, having tried and failed to get out of going... not because I didn't enjoy my in-laws, but cruise ships aren't my thing. The second day at sea, my brother in-law suggested we all write haikus based on our experiences on the ship. I guess my intense boredom/restlessness brought out the haiku monster deep inside me. There's a lot going on in the world, times are dark. Your brain might just need a long stretch of rest and sleep, maybe get a little bored. And what Charlie Kyle said.
Yes, Jody A. Forrester is indeed me! Thanks Stacya for responding to my lament - much appreciated!