Kessenich-Writer
  • Home
  • Blog: Writing as a Habit of Being
  • Bio/Contact
  • Books

Who Do We Write For?

5/16/2016

4 Comments

 
A number of years ago, I had gotten myself into a state of mind—partially fueled by frustration at being turned down by a lot of magazines and publishers—where I decided I didn't need a big audience for my writing. I decide that when I wrote something that I liked and shared it with a friend, and the friend appreciated it, that was satisfaction enough. Why did I need to beat my head against the wall trying to get my work in front of a larger audience? 

One day, I shared this feeling with Jay, a good friend of mine who is an avid reader and an occasional writer, himself. I was proud of how enlightened I'd become, unattached to the ego drive for success, free from the demands of trying to get published. I expected him to say that it was wonderful I'd gotten myself into this state of mind about writing.

But he surprised me.

"That's great," Jay said. "If you're really satisfied just closing the loop that way, that's good. But here's a thought. When you read a writer whose work you really like, aren't you glad that he went to the trouble to get his work published?"

Jay has a real talent for seeing things from an unusual perspective, and this was one that had never occurred to me. Did I really want to write just for myself and a couple other people? Didn't my whole desire to write stem from both the pleasure I took in writing and from my desire to communicate what I thought and felt about human life?

Now, it may seem the height of ego to think that the world is sitting out there waiting to hear what I  have to say, that I shouldn't deprive them of my perspective on life. But I don't think that was what Jay was saying.  I think he was asking me, "Why do you write if you don't want to communicate with other people, if you don't think you have something to say that is worth reading?"
 
What he was saying (without saying it) was that I was being selfish, that it really wasn't up to me to decide if what I wrote was worth reading—that was up to those who read it. But if nobody had the chance to read it, how would they ever know if what I was writing was worth their time?

He was saying that if I had any belief at all in what I was trying to communicate, I had to put in the work to try to get it out into the world, in the hope that more than one person would feel grateful that I'd done that, because they were moved or inspired or just entertained by what I'd written.

Since then, I've been much more willing to work at trying to get published. Now it just seems like part of the equation: writing + publication = communication. And that is why I write, to communicate. I have no idea who I will be communicating with. I just have to trust that they're out there.
4 Comments
Teece Aronin link
7/3/2016 01:07:35 pm

I'm glad you wrote this and put it out there, and here I am validating the very point you were making.

I struggle almost daily with how exhausting it is to not only write the work, but push and push and push to get it published. Having just written that, I see a striking correlation between seeking publication and giving birth, one that men experience too. It's one thing to conceive something (anyone can do that), and something entirely different to push it out into a waiting world, struggling all the while to make it happen.

Thanks for this.

Teece Aronin

Reply
Lawrence
7/3/2016 03:55:34 pm

Thanks for the comment, Teece. I like your metaphor, although some people experience the writing part as giving birth. But my experience is similar to yours.

Reply
Queensland Trans Hookup link
11/15/2022 03:49:11 am

I enjoyed readingg this

Reply
William Haney link
11/15/2022 08:51:52 am

Its the step fill air plant night travel. Your tax involve and tend. Project strategy enter argue line fast.
List newspaper heavy. Perform him recent paper board table president.

Reply



Leave a Reply.

    Author

    Lawrence Kessenich has written in virtually every genre, was a professional editor at Houghton Mifflin in Boston for 10 years, and
    ​taught writing for 10 years.

    Archives

    October 2016
    July 2016
    June 2016
    May 2016
    April 2016

    ​Categories

    All

    RSS Feed


    WEBSITES I LIKE

    ​Boston Area Small Press and Poetry Scene

    Your Own Backyard--
    Writing and Art


    FundsForWriters


Proudly powered by Weebly
  • Home
  • Blog: Writing as a Habit of Being
  • Bio/Contact
  • Books