Here we are on the cusp of another Office Hours message from George, and I'm stealing time this morning to read through the comments. Sigh .Thank you all for un-shrinkwrapping George's lovely letter to add your own experience.
One summer in the late 90's, I worked for NYPIRG (New York Public Interest Research Group --- the environmental org. started by Ralph Nader). My job: to drive a van of college kids to various regions of upstate NY where we'd spend late afternoons/early evenings going door to door asking for money. I needed the gig for rent, but I also hoped to take advantage of the daily doses of rejection, thinking it might inoculate me --- toughen me up. Having doors slammed in your face takes the metaphor out of it, that's for sure. Still, it toughened nothing. But canvasing in Nyack, Jonathan Demme wrote a check, and Ellen Burstyn, too - --- and it came to me that in whatever ways that life says "yes" to me, I might ought to pass along that "yes" to someone "at my door." Like George, writing that beautiful letter.
A quick review of my Dashboard tells me that I stumbled onto this platform some seven months ago, lacking the slightest notion of what I sought. You’ve not seen me, as you were doing just fine without me, but I have lurked with the efficacy of the Viet Cong. From the shadows I have delighted in the richness of your mojo, been staggered and stultified by the credentials and experience and accomplishment and talent you’ve piled on the alter. Holy shit! Easily more august than my MFA class back at Boston U. some thirty years ago. As I look back, that was a siege. So much fear, and so much of fears FWB, ego. Of course, being a bunch of writers, ego is present here, but so is authenticity and compassion. It is a goddam privilege to be among you.
I feel as though my larger point is approaching. What if I told you that for the last eighteen months a copy of Lincoln In The Bardo has sat undisturbed on my nightstand since being gifted to me by a friend who loves me and wanted me to have her copy. It looks good there, in its book-like dignity, intimating that it could hold wisdom or some-such. I wouldn’t know, but it has provoked me to ponder how I was able to remain completely oblivious to this Saunders fellow for so long when he seems to occupy the realms to which I aspire?
The late John Gardner said novelists are “...too complicated to settle upon any single neurosis.” I spend quality time with my neurodivergence and a professional who knows where to find it in the DSM. With some work, I can have a happy life. But as far as my avoidance proclivities that manifest in rejecting myself before giving you the opportunity to do so, I need the dharma. I need you, sharing our weaknesses that we can render alchemy to transcend. And I see that all through this course.
I’ve gathered shoeboxes full of rejection. During the Great Minimalism Insurgency of the 80’s Gordon Lish would get back to me in twenty minutes and seem so forlorn that he was returning my work. “I so wish it could have been otherwise,” he had scribbled. Adorable! I applied to three grad schools. Two said no. One paid me to go there. Remember Hyman Roth told Michael Corleone, “This is the business we’ve chosen.” And Michael had him wacked. My dear departed father used to relish telling me that “The world doesn’t owe you a living.” Thanks, Dad! I’ve got novels on FLOPPY discs that have waited for decades to go Velveteen Rabbit. I get that I don’t fit into your particular vision this semester. Jesus, I was so callow that I don’t blame you for bouncing my stuff. That isn’t what mattered. What mattered was when my sainted teacher Mary Robison told me she would always start by finding what was good, what was working, in a manuscript, and that there was ALWAYS something good to find. And having done that, then she could encourage the student to bring the rest up to that level. How crazy is that in this 330-million-member gang war? That is the priceless stuff: honest, real criticism. A path out of the miasma of my own creation. Not an up/down vote. This isn’t fucking congress.
The Universe ALWAYS gets what it wants. Thanks to all of you for reminding me of this, as well as for the jump-start. More will be revealed.
I guess that's the overriding sentiment. But he kills with his layers of anecdotes, as if we need an endless recounting of the failures, the misery. Maybe what I'm finding offensive is his relentlessness, as if he needs to get something off his chest. But that is a good take away. No whining indeed.
I recently told my rejection story live on stage at Fitzgerald's nightclub in Berwyn, Illinois as part of a series mixing song and storytelling called Voice Box. After it was over, Cathy Richardson, lead singer for Jefferson Starship, came up and sang in homage to my rejection story, "Paperback Writer".
Hi, Justine. Thanks for viewing. It was difficult though the retelling of it has been 100% cathartic. It permits me to remember what I experienced without the trauma or feeling icky about the whole thing. I also feel more comfortable about oversharing now that I'm a branded oversharer and my friends and I can joke about it. I furthermore stoutly believe that most of the world's greatest sins issue from undersharers. So, hah!
THANK YOU. I don't know why but I got stuck on the concept of ambition. After reading and rereading, I've been mulling over a lot. Is fear of rejection interfering with my current writing process before my manuscript is even finished? Maybe. The last few days I asked is that deep yearning to connect with An Other through story different than the desire to publish? I think it may be . At least for me. Is the depth of that desire to connect where true persistence comes from? These are rhetorical questions maybe only relevant to where I am in my life as a human being trying to be and not just a writer writing. Overhearing heated arguments in our book shop about a certain book changed me as a writer. How deeply attached we all can be to our opinions!. Response to a work can be as varied as readers are from one another. And I think that is so juicy! I still like to think the mean spirited arrogant snide sarcastic rejection says more about the rejectors and less about the work . Reminding myself that a rejection is just an opinion and an opinion is not The Truth whole truth and nothing but . .still comforts me. Kindness and honesty in any rejection letter I received mostly always served the work and my committment to the next revision. Respect even in rejection kept and keeps me going. I appreciate the honesty and respectfullness here in this space. Thank you all.
In reality, there is probably little consolation one can offer struggling writers, but this piece has to be the most eloquent and sensitive and realistic response to rejection I have ever read.
Idealistically, I agree with Saunders, and have already shared his reflections with many of my old creative writing students. Most of them are uplifted by what Saunders says, though they all add, "I get it, but he's George Saunders." I think what they are saying is that someone as hugely popular as George Saunders trying to assuage their pain (though Saunders doesn't sugarcoat anything), is like having Jesus on your deathbed appear to tell you, “Don’t worry. You’ll rise from the dead. Look at me.” And you want to reply, “That's easy for you to say. You’re Jesus. And while You're here, can I have some details about the Hell and Purgatory thing?”
Having said this, Saunder's email should be required reading for all fledgling and long-haul-suffering writers. Which includes just about everyone.
As I used to tell my students, “If you are going to be a plumber, you’re going to end up with bad knees, and if you're going to be a writer, you're going to get kicked around, so just do the work and try to have a little fun. Enjoy the little things and hope for lightning to strike."
Fifteen years ago, my first "literary" young adult novel did fairly well, with a few stupid but mostly excellent reviews and “stars.” But the best response I have ever received on a poem, short story, or an essay came from a young man attending a school for “troubled boys.” His teacher had gotten a grant and had purchased 80 copies of that YA book, and after reading the novel, the kid, who the teacher said hated reading, wrote me to say, very simply, “Finally a book that doesn’t suck.”
That comment, more than any awards my work has ever received, makes the whole crazy process worthwhile.
Here is a view from the other side, about how an editor feels about handing out rejections, and what they look for in stories. From The New Yorker no less. Somewhat old from 1994, but still interesting:
Story Clubbers may have come across this before, but if you haven’t: When Norman Maclean submitted to Alfred A Knopf, Inc. the manuscript that became “A River Runs Through it and Other Stories,” Knopf rejected it. After its publication by another publisher (and great success), Charles Elliot of Knopf wrote to Maclean trying to solicit Maclean’s next book. Maclean responded with what I’ve seen described as the “ultimate fuck-off letter.” It makes for a longish post, but here it is:
Dear Mr. Elliott:
I have discovered that I have been writing you under false pretenses, although stealing from myself more than from you. I have stolen from myself the opportunity of seeing the dream of every rejected author come true.
The dream of every rejected author must be to see, like sugar plums dancing in his head, please-can't-we-see-your-next-manuscript letters standing in piles on his desk, all coming from publishing companies that rejected his previous manuscript, especially from the more pompous of the fatted cows grazing contentedly in the publishing field. I am sure that, under the influence of those dreams, some of the finest fuck-you prose in the English language has been composed but, alas, never published. And to think that the rare moment in history came to me when I could in actuality have written the prose masterpiece for all rejected authors – and I didn't even see that history had swung wide its doors to me.
You must have known that Alfred A. Knopf turned down my first collection of stories after playing games with it, or at least the game of cat's-paw, now rolling it over and saying they were going to publish it and then rolling it on its back when the president of the company announced it wouldn't sell. So I can't understand how you could ask if I'd submit my second manuscript to Alfred A. Knopf, unless you don't know my race of people. And I can't understand how it didn't register on me – 'Alfred A. Knopf' is clear enough on your stationery.
But, although I let the big moment elude me, it has given rise to little pleasures. For instance, whenever I receive a statement of the sales of 'A River Runs Through It' from the University of Chicago Press, I see that someone has written across the bottom of it, 'Hurrah for Alfred A. Knopf.' However, having let the great moment slip by unrecognized and unadorned, I can now only weakly say this: if the situation ever arose when Alfred A. Knopf was the only publishing house remaining in the world and I was the sole remaining author, that would mark the end of the world of books.
Thanks so much for writing on this topic, George. It is one of my favorites in the writerly conversation; will you please keep it on rotation? I love the distinctions you so sagely made, about how getting your story rejected is not the whole answer, just a part of it. I think in the end, yes, we must keep writing regardless of how it may be received...and at the same time receive the feedback. Like so many other things, it's a dance. Didn't you say once in a post that you would almost advise a young person NOT to take this path because there's so little likelihood of success? So few of us actually get published. But isn't that kind of exciting? Doesn't it make you want to write something truly fantastic? What fun, if nothing else.
I think I was recycling that old line about “if a person can conceive of doing anything but writing, they should” - which I always understood to be about the level of commitment that writing takes. But yes: no one can predict who or what will get published - what an adventure, either way.
Ah thank you Richard and others. I hope my novel will find a home in the hearts of good people. Writing a book is such a massive undertaking. I'm now on my next and it has been hard turning back for last edits before publication, for me the pages are closed and this book, The Seasonwife will now have a different life, one I cannot control.
Oh yes! Eleanor Catton is a great writer and part of the backlash against her was her criticism of the lit scene in her country, and the narrow-minded power base that exists here. It is as though a writer is supposed to play the game of supporting their country, as though a writer must play the game sportspeople play - no wonder so many sportspeople wind up depressed! Catton's greatest revenge will be to keep being great.
Another aside, I like George and this substack so much. I have have been passionate about George's work, his voice in writing, ever since reading 'Mother's Day' a short fiction I have read so many times since it first appeared in the New Yorker. I am constantly astonished by the way he imbeds the reader in the character. The reader cannot help are pulled through the tide of story with characters swimming them along. Afterwards I feel refreshed and amazed at life. And as I do after reading Russian greats, that I lived other lives.
Thank you, George, once again, for your time-tested wisdom.
I spent 35 years as an advertising copywriter & creative director (where rejection comes with the territory like stinky cow patties come with the Texas Panhandle). It took me many years—and with lots of coaching/encouragement—to separate "myself" from the "work " as it began to run the gauntlet of sometimes cruel and thoughtless commentary by the clients (the primary "rejectors"). Reactions could be in-your-face (literally, across a conference room table) "Why were you even born?" BRUTAL.
Today, I'm a 66-year-old geezer having the time of his life writing fiction with feverish urgency/honesty, hoping to to keep the separation of church/state, trying not take things so personally. Especially when 40 queries go out, five are answered with a two-line form reply, or I post a new story and think my handful of followers will like it but, you know, crickets on the stats page. (As I write that, I think about the possible difference between the ad work and fiction writing: the former seems more contrived with elements from the cultural landfill but the latter seems more inspired by one's undigested emotional garbage of a lifetime. More personal exposure in the latter, which is why it might possibly sting more when somebody says "nope" to whatever squirts out of our creative birth canals).
Rejection, as I'm sure everyone knows, is just a part of living a creative life. But I think the trade off is worth it. If we keep out butts in the chair, we get to experience magic, don't we? And every now and then, something that truly pleases us will indeed please someone else—and maybe a few hundred or thousand or million someone else's - as George you stated in your thoughtful response to Mr. Novel #4.
I've been reading, sporadically, a pamphlet called Writing and Failure, by Stephen Marche. I recently heard it reviewed by Maureen Corrigan on NPR, a source I trust. I'm reading it sporadically for the simple reason that it is depressing in the extreme, and demotivating. Essentially, Marche says a writer needs to throw him/herself against the door, tirelessly, although the door rarely opens. It's incredibly defeatist. Writers are idiots, masochistic, crazy. Writing is a fool's errand.
My take away, half way through it, is that we need to write for ourselves, and writing well, if only in our own view, is its own reward. Visions of greatness - forget about it and just write. Apparently James Baldwin said the same thing, as have countless others. Damn the torpedos, full steam ahead, and enjoy your own talent even if others probably won't. From an editor's point of view, Marche didn't need a pamphlet to convey this message. It could be severely condensed and written on his headstone.
I briefly studied an Indonesian martial art known as "Silat" when in school. It is much like Kung Fu and has movements based on different jungle animals like the tiger. We practiced movements solely based on the crane. We were told the following story.
One day two instructors decided to leave their students who were practicing holding a stance to walk to the village. In the village, they decided to catch a movie. When the movie ended over two hours later, they walked back to the training hut and expressed surprise to find their students still in their stances just as they had left them.
Thanks for mentioning this NPR podcast, Toby. Just as you say, writing does sometimes seem to be a fool's errand. This reminds me that I do write for myself, that it is rewarding and fun, and that I can't really control what others think about it.
"Visions of greatness--forget about it and just write." Yes, that's where I am. No illusions about agents, editors, publishing, etc. All I can do is write from this place on the spectrum where I fall in terms of talent and craft. I'm still a beginner. I'm not even thinking that much about getting published right now. I'm just thinking more about how to tell the story I'm working on and get it finished.
"We need to write for ourselves" -- yes! And perhaps cultivate other passions in addition to writing, so that we are, in theory, happy/satisfied/fulfilled whether we succeed at the writing or not?
To me the idea that all writers deal with failure is comforting, not depressing or demotivating. That is, having received rejection after rejection, it's nice to know I have company in my misery.
At some point we have to ask why we write--not why we try to get published, but why we write in the first place--and if it's not to please ourselves we should probably be doing something else with our lives.
Big caveat: I have a day job, so I don't need to make money from writing. I can only imagine the misery of rejection for people who depend on writing for their livelihood.
Hi, David. I react and have reacted the same way as you describe. Rejection is legitimizing! I have now reached the perverse attitude where this happens: "I send something out, have misgivings, look forward (or actually start hoping for) the rejection, so I can use the spur of rejection to write something better, which is inevitably the result. So I am eager to have my stories in circulation but not necessarily accepted. Does that make sense? John
Sounds like a great attitude to have, John! I have to admit that I'm not quite there. I feel a fresh sting with every rejection. It's this damned hope I can't seem to crush.
But there is some value just in getting your stories in circulation. It reminds me of something I read by Erika Krouse.
"Remember that rejections are more than rejections. Editors are reading your work, and you may be making friends without realizing it. You'll get a form letter 5 times, but maybe an editor has been secretly enjoying your work, fighting for it, getting shot down, etc. Putting your work out there is the best exposure."
Oh, yeah. It surprised me when it all turned around and I started feeling this way. Probably Story Club helps a lot because by the time I get a story back I have one if not several ideas I've picked up from the club I'd like to try on it. Rejection also makes me more ruthless since a series of rejections makes you eager to change it. I have pieces that have been circulation for years but I still believe in them and am often surprised that I can still find ways to make them better.
I agree -- the company of the rejected is so comforting. Mitzi Rapkin, on her blog, First Draft, asks every writer-guest, "How have you handled rejection?" It's always my favorite part of the show. Apparently, F. Scott Fitzgerald at one point had 122 rejection slips pinned around his bachelor bedroom. I'm only at 11!
Toby, Stephen Marche had a piece in the NYT recently, the link to which I posted here. "A Writer's Lament: The Better You Write, the More You Will Fail" appeared Feb 11 in the Books section. As Marche writes: "Writers' abilities and their careers simple do not correlate; they never have." He goes on from there with some wonderfully funny examples, including Jesus himself, who he describes as a "spectacular failure" to the point of crucifixion, and not in the bad review sense. After his death, his disciples "gathered a bunch of his speeches into a handful of biographies that contradict one another", their readers using these to, among other things, "justify brutal empires." Two thousand years later and Jesus's "fans" get together weekly to "read his stuff out loud." A career, as Marche has it, "could not have gone much worse or better." Ha!
Thanks, Chuck! Loved Aunt Agatha’s, now gone, alas. Bleak Harbor also collected 26 rejections before someone bit. Very different book than the SL trilogy.
Yes, it was the most authentic thing anyone ever said about my work.
Great read. Thanks!
Here we are on the cusp of another Office Hours message from George, and I'm stealing time this morning to read through the comments. Sigh .Thank you all for un-shrinkwrapping George's lovely letter to add your own experience.
One summer in the late 90's, I worked for NYPIRG (New York Public Interest Research Group --- the environmental org. started by Ralph Nader). My job: to drive a van of college kids to various regions of upstate NY where we'd spend late afternoons/early evenings going door to door asking for money. I needed the gig for rent, but I also hoped to take advantage of the daily doses of rejection, thinking it might inoculate me --- toughen me up. Having doors slammed in your face takes the metaphor out of it, that's for sure. Still, it toughened nothing. But canvasing in Nyack, Jonathan Demme wrote a check, and Ellen Burstyn, too - --- and it came to me that in whatever ways that life says "yes" to me, I might ought to pass along that "yes" to someone "at my door." Like George, writing that beautiful letter.
A quick review of my Dashboard tells me that I stumbled onto this platform some seven months ago, lacking the slightest notion of what I sought. You’ve not seen me, as you were doing just fine without me, but I have lurked with the efficacy of the Viet Cong. From the shadows I have delighted in the richness of your mojo, been staggered and stultified by the credentials and experience and accomplishment and talent you’ve piled on the alter. Holy shit! Easily more august than my MFA class back at Boston U. some thirty years ago. As I look back, that was a siege. So much fear, and so much of fears FWB, ego. Of course, being a bunch of writers, ego is present here, but so is authenticity and compassion. It is a goddam privilege to be among you.
I feel as though my larger point is approaching. What if I told you that for the last eighteen months a copy of Lincoln In The Bardo has sat undisturbed on my nightstand since being gifted to me by a friend who loves me and wanted me to have her copy. It looks good there, in its book-like dignity, intimating that it could hold wisdom or some-such. I wouldn’t know, but it has provoked me to ponder how I was able to remain completely oblivious to this Saunders fellow for so long when he seems to occupy the realms to which I aspire?
The late John Gardner said novelists are “...too complicated to settle upon any single neurosis.” I spend quality time with my neurodivergence and a professional who knows where to find it in the DSM. With some work, I can have a happy life. But as far as my avoidance proclivities that manifest in rejecting myself before giving you the opportunity to do so, I need the dharma. I need you, sharing our weaknesses that we can render alchemy to transcend. And I see that all through this course.
I’ve gathered shoeboxes full of rejection. During the Great Minimalism Insurgency of the 80’s Gordon Lish would get back to me in twenty minutes and seem so forlorn that he was returning my work. “I so wish it could have been otherwise,” he had scribbled. Adorable! I applied to three grad schools. Two said no. One paid me to go there. Remember Hyman Roth told Michael Corleone, “This is the business we’ve chosen.” And Michael had him wacked. My dear departed father used to relish telling me that “The world doesn’t owe you a living.” Thanks, Dad! I’ve got novels on FLOPPY discs that have waited for decades to go Velveteen Rabbit. I get that I don’t fit into your particular vision this semester. Jesus, I was so callow that I don’t blame you for bouncing my stuff. That isn’t what mattered. What mattered was when my sainted teacher Mary Robison told me she would always start by finding what was good, what was working, in a manuscript, and that there was ALWAYS something good to find. And having done that, then she could encourage the student to bring the rest up to that level. How crazy is that in this 330-million-member gang war? That is the priceless stuff: honest, real criticism. A path out of the miasma of my own creation. Not an up/down vote. This isn’t fucking congress.
The Universe ALWAYS gets what it wants. Thanks to all of you for reminding me of this, as well as for the jump-start. More will be revealed.
I guess that's the overriding sentiment. But he kills with his layers of anecdotes, as if we need an endless recounting of the failures, the misery. Maybe what I'm finding offensive is his relentlessness, as if he needs to get something off his chest. But that is a good take away. No whining indeed.
I recently told my rejection story live on stage at Fitzgerald's nightclub in Berwyn, Illinois as part of a series mixing song and storytelling called Voice Box. After it was over, Cathy Richardson, lead singer for Jefferson Starship, came up and sang in homage to my rejection story, "Paperback Writer".
Here was my delivery: https://youtu.be/wyAhfMJxtaY
Thank you, John for sharing this. I found it sad and beautiful and funny. What a difficult time that must have been.
I'd also like to say that I too can be an oversharer and I loved your idea that we don't judge undersharers in quite the same way.
Just wonderful to watch and listen to.
Hi, Justine. Thanks for viewing. It was difficult though the retelling of it has been 100% cathartic. It permits me to remember what I experienced without the trauma or feeling icky about the whole thing. I also feel more comfortable about oversharing now that I'm a branded oversharer and my friends and I can joke about it. I furthermore stoutly believe that most of the world's greatest sins issue from undersharers. So, hah!
THANK YOU. I don't know why but I got stuck on the concept of ambition. After reading and rereading, I've been mulling over a lot. Is fear of rejection interfering with my current writing process before my manuscript is even finished? Maybe. The last few days I asked is that deep yearning to connect with An Other through story different than the desire to publish? I think it may be . At least for me. Is the depth of that desire to connect where true persistence comes from? These are rhetorical questions maybe only relevant to where I am in my life as a human being trying to be and not just a writer writing. Overhearing heated arguments in our book shop about a certain book changed me as a writer. How deeply attached we all can be to our opinions!. Response to a work can be as varied as readers are from one another. And I think that is so juicy! I still like to think the mean spirited arrogant snide sarcastic rejection says more about the rejectors and less about the work . Reminding myself that a rejection is just an opinion and an opinion is not The Truth whole truth and nothing but . .still comforts me. Kindness and honesty in any rejection letter I received mostly always served the work and my committment to the next revision. Respect even in rejection kept and keeps me going. I appreciate the honesty and respectfullness here in this space. Thank you all.
In reality, there is probably little consolation one can offer struggling writers, but this piece has to be the most eloquent and sensitive and realistic response to rejection I have ever read.
Idealistically, I agree with Saunders, and have already shared his reflections with many of my old creative writing students. Most of them are uplifted by what Saunders says, though they all add, "I get it, but he's George Saunders." I think what they are saying is that someone as hugely popular as George Saunders trying to assuage their pain (though Saunders doesn't sugarcoat anything), is like having Jesus on your deathbed appear to tell you, “Don’t worry. You’ll rise from the dead. Look at me.” And you want to reply, “That's easy for you to say. You’re Jesus. And while You're here, can I have some details about the Hell and Purgatory thing?”
Having said this, Saunder's email should be required reading for all fledgling and long-haul-suffering writers. Which includes just about everyone.
As I used to tell my students, “If you are going to be a plumber, you’re going to end up with bad knees, and if you're going to be a writer, you're going to get kicked around, so just do the work and try to have a little fun. Enjoy the little things and hope for lightning to strike."
Fifteen years ago, my first "literary" young adult novel did fairly well, with a few stupid but mostly excellent reviews and “stars.” But the best response I have ever received on a poem, short story, or an essay came from a young man attending a school for “troubled boys.” His teacher had gotten a grant and had purchased 80 copies of that YA book, and after reading the novel, the kid, who the teacher said hated reading, wrote me to say, very simply, “Finally a book that doesn’t suck.”
That comment, more than any awards my work has ever received, makes the whole crazy process worthwhile.
'Finally a book that doesn't suck' would definitely be splurged across my front cover with five stars next to it :)
Here is a view from the other side, about how an editor feels about handing out rejections, and what they look for in stories. From The New Yorker no less. Somewhat old from 1994, but still interesting:
https://www.newyorker.com/magazine/1994/06/27/storyville
Thanks for this - I see I wasn't done with grieving the loss of Roger Angell. Terrific piece.
Story Clubbers may have come across this before, but if you haven’t: When Norman Maclean submitted to Alfred A Knopf, Inc. the manuscript that became “A River Runs Through it and Other Stories,” Knopf rejected it. After its publication by another publisher (and great success), Charles Elliot of Knopf wrote to Maclean trying to solicit Maclean’s next book. Maclean responded with what I’ve seen described as the “ultimate fuck-off letter.” It makes for a longish post, but here it is:
Dear Mr. Elliott:
I have discovered that I have been writing you under false pretenses, although stealing from myself more than from you. I have stolen from myself the opportunity of seeing the dream of every rejected author come true.
The dream of every rejected author must be to see, like sugar plums dancing in his head, please-can't-we-see-your-next-manuscript letters standing in piles on his desk, all coming from publishing companies that rejected his previous manuscript, especially from the more pompous of the fatted cows grazing contentedly in the publishing field. I am sure that, under the influence of those dreams, some of the finest fuck-you prose in the English language has been composed but, alas, never published. And to think that the rare moment in history came to me when I could in actuality have written the prose masterpiece for all rejected authors – and I didn't even see that history had swung wide its doors to me.
You must have known that Alfred A. Knopf turned down my first collection of stories after playing games with it, or at least the game of cat's-paw, now rolling it over and saying they were going to publish it and then rolling it on its back when the president of the company announced it wouldn't sell. So I can't understand how you could ask if I'd submit my second manuscript to Alfred A. Knopf, unless you don't know my race of people. And I can't understand how it didn't register on me – 'Alfred A. Knopf' is clear enough on your stationery.
But, although I let the big moment elude me, it has given rise to little pleasures. For instance, whenever I receive a statement of the sales of 'A River Runs Through It' from the University of Chicago Press, I see that someone has written across the bottom of it, 'Hurrah for Alfred A. Knopf.' However, having let the great moment slip by unrecognized and unadorned, I can now only weakly say this: if the situation ever arose when Alfred A. Knopf was the only publishing house remaining in the world and I was the sole remaining author, that would mark the end of the world of books.
Very sincerely,
Norman Maclean
That’s amazing! I love that book, too.
Hilarious!
agreed!
Thanks so much for writing on this topic, George. It is one of my favorites in the writerly conversation; will you please keep it on rotation? I love the distinctions you so sagely made, about how getting your story rejected is not the whole answer, just a part of it. I think in the end, yes, we must keep writing regardless of how it may be received...and at the same time receive the feedback. Like so many other things, it's a dance. Didn't you say once in a post that you would almost advise a young person NOT to take this path because there's so little likelihood of success? So few of us actually get published. But isn't that kind of exciting? Doesn't it make you want to write something truly fantastic? What fun, if nothing else.
I think I was recycling that old line about “if a person can conceive of doing anything but writing, they should” - which I always understood to be about the level of commitment that writing takes. But yes: no one can predict who or what will get published - what an adventure, either way.
What a beautifully kind response.
Ah thank you Richard and others. I hope my novel will find a home in the hearts of good people. Writing a book is such a massive undertaking. I'm now on my next and it has been hard turning back for last edits before publication, for me the pages are closed and this book, The Seasonwife will now have a different life, one I cannot control.
Oh yes! Eleanor Catton is a great writer and part of the backlash against her was her criticism of the lit scene in her country, and the narrow-minded power base that exists here. It is as though a writer is supposed to play the game of supporting their country, as though a writer must play the game sportspeople play - no wonder so many sportspeople wind up depressed! Catton's greatest revenge will be to keep being great.
Another aside, I like George and this substack so much. I have have been passionate about George's work, his voice in writing, ever since reading 'Mother's Day' a short fiction I have read so many times since it first appeared in the New Yorker. I am constantly astonished by the way he imbeds the reader in the character. The reader cannot help are pulled through the tide of story with characters swimming them along. Afterwards I feel refreshed and amazed at life. And as I do after reading Russian greats, that I lived other lives.
Thank you, George, once again, for your time-tested wisdom.
I spent 35 years as an advertising copywriter & creative director (where rejection comes with the territory like stinky cow patties come with the Texas Panhandle). It took me many years—and with lots of coaching/encouragement—to separate "myself" from the "work " as it began to run the gauntlet of sometimes cruel and thoughtless commentary by the clients (the primary "rejectors"). Reactions could be in-your-face (literally, across a conference room table) "Why were you even born?" BRUTAL.
Today, I'm a 66-year-old geezer having the time of his life writing fiction with feverish urgency/honesty, hoping to to keep the separation of church/state, trying not take things so personally. Especially when 40 queries go out, five are answered with a two-line form reply, or I post a new story and think my handful of followers will like it but, you know, crickets on the stats page. (As I write that, I think about the possible difference between the ad work and fiction writing: the former seems more contrived with elements from the cultural landfill but the latter seems more inspired by one's undigested emotional garbage of a lifetime. More personal exposure in the latter, which is why it might possibly sting more when somebody says "nope" to whatever squirts out of our creative birth canals).
Rejection, as I'm sure everyone knows, is just a part of living a creative life. But I think the trade off is worth it. If we keep out butts in the chair, we get to experience magic, don't we? And every now and then, something that truly pleases us will indeed please someone else—and maybe a few hundred or thousand or million someone else's - as George you stated in your thoughtful response to Mr. Novel #4.
I LOVE Story Club.
I've been reading, sporadically, a pamphlet called Writing and Failure, by Stephen Marche. I recently heard it reviewed by Maureen Corrigan on NPR, a source I trust. I'm reading it sporadically for the simple reason that it is depressing in the extreme, and demotivating. Essentially, Marche says a writer needs to throw him/herself against the door, tirelessly, although the door rarely opens. It's incredibly defeatist. Writers are idiots, masochistic, crazy. Writing is a fool's errand.
My take away, half way through it, is that we need to write for ourselves, and writing well, if only in our own view, is its own reward. Visions of greatness - forget about it and just write. Apparently James Baldwin said the same thing, as have countless others. Damn the torpedos, full steam ahead, and enjoy your own talent even if others probably won't. From an editor's point of view, Marche didn't need a pamphlet to convey this message. It could be severely condensed and written on his headstone.
I love that the review begins by paraphrasing Marche thusly "No whining." "No illusions about the certainty of failure." Amen. Good stuff.
I briefly studied an Indonesian martial art known as "Silat" when in school. It is much like Kung Fu and has movements based on different jungle animals like the tiger. We practiced movements solely based on the crane. We were told the following story.
One day two instructors decided to leave their students who were practicing holding a stance to walk to the village. In the village, they decided to catch a movie. When the movie ended over two hours later, they walked back to the training hut and expressed surprise to find their students still in their stances just as they had left them.
"Oh, they said, are you still doing that?"
Thanks for mentioning this NPR podcast, Toby. Just as you say, writing does sometimes seem to be a fool's errand. This reminds me that I do write for myself, that it is rewarding and fun, and that I can't really control what others think about it.
"Visions of greatness--forget about it and just write." Yes, that's where I am. No illusions about agents, editors, publishing, etc. All I can do is write from this place on the spectrum where I fall in terms of talent and craft. I'm still a beginner. I'm not even thinking that much about getting published right now. I'm just thinking more about how to tell the story I'm working on and get it finished.
"We need to write for ourselves" -- yes! And perhaps cultivate other passions in addition to writing, so that we are, in theory, happy/satisfied/fulfilled whether we succeed at the writing or not?
To me the idea that all writers deal with failure is comforting, not depressing or demotivating. That is, having received rejection after rejection, it's nice to know I have company in my misery.
At some point we have to ask why we write--not why we try to get published, but why we write in the first place--and if it's not to please ourselves we should probably be doing something else with our lives.
Big caveat: I have a day job, so I don't need to make money from writing. I can only imagine the misery of rejection for people who depend on writing for their livelihood.
Hi, David. I react and have reacted the same way as you describe. Rejection is legitimizing! I have now reached the perverse attitude where this happens: "I send something out, have misgivings, look forward (or actually start hoping for) the rejection, so I can use the spur of rejection to write something better, which is inevitably the result. So I am eager to have my stories in circulation but not necessarily accepted. Does that make sense? John
Sounds like a great attitude to have, John! I have to admit that I'm not quite there. I feel a fresh sting with every rejection. It's this damned hope I can't seem to crush.
But there is some value just in getting your stories in circulation. It reminds me of something I read by Erika Krouse.
"Remember that rejections are more than rejections. Editors are reading your work, and you may be making friends without realizing it. You'll get a form letter 5 times, but maybe an editor has been secretly enjoying your work, fighting for it, getting shot down, etc. Putting your work out there is the best exposure."
http://www.erikakrousewriter.com/submission-strategies
Oh, yeah. It surprised me when it all turned around and I started feeling this way. Probably Story Club helps a lot because by the time I get a story back I have one if not several ideas I've picked up from the club I'd like to try on it. Rejection also makes me more ruthless since a series of rejections makes you eager to change it. I have pieces that have been circulation for years but I still believe in them and am often surprised that I can still find ways to make them better.
I agree -- the company of the rejected is so comforting. Mitzi Rapkin, on her blog, First Draft, asks every writer-guest, "How have you handled rejection?" It's always my favorite part of the show. Apparently, F. Scott Fitzgerald at one point had 122 rejection slips pinned around his bachelor bedroom. I'm only at 11!
I really like First Draft, too. Mitzi Rapkin is a good interviewer.
Toby, Stephen Marche had a piece in the NYT recently, the link to which I posted here. "A Writer's Lament: The Better You Write, the More You Will Fail" appeared Feb 11 in the Books section. As Marche writes: "Writers' abilities and their careers simple do not correlate; they never have." He goes on from there with some wonderfully funny examples, including Jesus himself, who he describes as a "spectacular failure" to the point of crucifixion, and not in the bad review sense. After his death, his disciples "gathered a bunch of his speeches into a handful of biographies that contradict one another", their readers using these to, among other things, "justify brutal empires." Two thousand years later and Jesus's "fans" get together weekly to "read his stuff out loud." A career, as Marche has it, "could not have gone much worse or better." Ha!
Hahahaha! This is great stuff.
Thanks, Chuck! Loved Aunt Agatha’s, now gone, alas. Bleak Harbor also collected 26 rejections before someone bit. Very different book than the SL trilogy.