In Helene Cixous' article "The Laugh of the Medusa", she writes some encouraging words to would-be writers who are yet to jot down a single idea of theirs:
"And why don't you write? Write! Writing is for you, you are for you; your body is yours, take it. I know why you haven't written. (And why I didn't write before the age of twenty-seven.) Because writing is at once too high, too great for you, it's reserved for the great-that is, for "great men"; and it's "silly." Besides, you've written a little, but in secret. And it wasn't good, because it was in secret, and because you punished yourself for writing, because you didn't go all the way; or because you wrote, irresistibly, as when we would masturbate in secret, not to go further, but to attenuate the tension a bit, just enough to take the edge off. And then as soon as we come, we go and make ourselves feel guilty-so as to be forgiven; or to forget, to bury it until the next time. Write, let no one hold you back, let nothing stop you: not man; not the imbecilic capitalist machinery, in which publishing houses are the crafty, obsequious relayers of imperatives handed down by an economy that works against us and off our backs; and not yourself."
"And why don't you write? Write! Writing is for you, you are for you; your body is yours, take it. I know why you haven't written. (And why I didn't write before the age of twenty-seven.) Because writing is at once too high, too great for you, it's reserved for the great-that is, for "great men"; and it's "silly." Besides, you've written a little, but in secret. And it wasn't good, because it was in secret, and because you punished yourself for writing, because you didn't go all the way; or because you wrote, irresistibly, as when we would masturbate in secret, not to go further, but to attenuate the tension a bit, just enough to take the edge off. And then as soon as we come, we go and make ourselves feel guilty-so as to be forgiven; or to forget, to bury it until the next time. Write, let no one hold you back, let nothing stop you: not man; not the imbecilic capitalist machinery, in which publishing houses are the crafty, obsequious relayers of imperatives handed down by an economy that works against us and off our backs; and not yourself."I noticed how Cixous emphasized that we have control over our bodies, yet we let outside forces prevent us from taking that control. In my editing class this semester a student gave a presentation on publishing companies and told us that most of them do not encourage submissions of manuscripts. I believe the primary reasons most people who aspire to write choose not to, or start later, is because they do not have any support. Writer's block is probably caused by the fear of our writing being ignored or rejected. If we think about all the times we wanted to write something and didn't take the time to sit down and do it, I'm pretty sure there is a direct correlation between our circumstances and the writer's block. It might be we don't have enough time because we're working often, but doesn't that mean our jobs are placed at a higher value than our personal ambitions, thus discouraging us from pursuing our dreams. Many aspects of society are structured in ways that slowly, but surely dissolve our desires or willpower to achieve our goals; writing for a living and even for fun, happens to be one of its main victims.
Do you feel discouraged from writing because it's difficult to find an audience for your work or to achieve financial and critical success for it?
Interesting post, I think this is something we can all relate to. Feeling confident enough to put my writing out there, even through a blog, has been really tough for me. There is just something very vulnerable and scary about having someone judge your inner thoughts and opinions. Before grad school, I mostly kept all my writing to myself. Then all of a sudden I was being forced to hand out 14 copies of my writing to my classmates so that the class could analyze and discuss it-it is probably one of the scariest things I've ever done. If a teacher or student did not connect with my writing the way I had hoped, it was incredibly discouraging. There have been many times when I doubt my writing skills and think, "What am I doing, am I even good at this?" Most writer's just want to reach an audience-even of it is just one person-and it really feels like a loss when we don't. But overall, I think the feedback-good and bad-makes us stronger writers and inspires us to keep on going. If our writing was perfect, we would have no room to grow and improve.
ReplyDeleteAs for the financial aspect of writing, well it sucks. Many people view writing as a hobby because realistically it cannot pay the bills, unless you get lucky and make it big. When I tell people what I am going to school for they often respond by saying things like, "Oh, well that's nice, so you can blog on the side, what do you think you'll do for actual work?" It's sad, especially since I really think writing is so much more important than people think. Just as we've discussed in class, it's everywhere! Exposition is all around, if we didn't have writers, what would our classrooms be like? How would we carry on discussions without an exposition to base our opinions/ideas/theories from? I wish more people would realize this. Until then, I guess us writers will just have to stick together and 'Write! as Cixous puts it, even it means eating mac and cheese for the rest of our lives :)
In my case that would be Ramen Noodles, but it's not much of a sacrifice if you're doing what you love :)
ReplyDeleteI also want to add that the experience we had in Creative non-fiction was very nerve-wrecking, but I believe most of us learned what it is like to take constructive criticism from our reading audience, and I also learned how to be more aware of myself as a reader and what questions I have for the writer.
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