Your confession reminds me of one from long ago: "For I do not understand my own actions. For I do not do what I want, but I do the very thing I hate. ... For I know that nothing good dwells in me, that is, in my flesh. For I have the desire to do what is right, but not the ability to carry it out. For I do not do the good I want, but the evil I do not want is what I keep on doing. ... So I find it to be a law that when I want to do right, evil lies close at hand. For I delight in the law of God, in my inner being, but I see in my members another law waging war against the law of my mind and making me captive to the law of sin that dwells in my members." - The Apostle Paul, Romans 7:15-23
Couldn't call yourself sincere if you weren't straight, as in this post. Simple as that. While literature's primary goal is to tell a story - whether one writes minimalistically or has a more ornate style is a secondary matter that ultimately doesn't matter as long as that prose is organic and honest - there are stories and there are stories. Literature's fire has been mismanaged for way too long by tameness and intellectual cowardice, among other things. If the fire is to be rekindled, we need writing to be courageous; nothing less. (Of course there are issues with the confession as a form of expression, but we can discuss that another time) Not all of that courage has to be autobiographical; in fact, pure fiction (as I call it) is as desperate for courage as its more nonfiction-dependent counterparts. But it's definitely a part of the solution.
The only thing I'd address is this part: "All writers want to be praised, respected and read, do they not?" If we're talking about the great authors, yes and no. (It's probably true for today's creative writing program automatons and pharmaceuticalists who create anti-depressants in book form; but I don't think you desire to be these kinds of authors, which is what's fantastic about your literary journey)
Read, absolutely; though being read by millions is different than being read by a few thousand, and not all have had the same readership goals. (Many, for instance, gave no thought to their books in translation; Kundera was the opposite, and that was a huge factor in his success)
Respected: it depends. It seems authors wanted it more for themselves than for their books, when great authors met in the past they rarely talked about their own work. (Unlike that "Gertrude Stein discusses it always" interpretation from Midnight in Paris) Many great authors had a weird, paradoxical mix of ego and humility depending on the situation.
Praised: Papa certainly enjoyed the praise, but I'm not convinced most authors (including many American authors) sought that. Many, surprisingly - from Kipling and Twain to D.H. Lawrence and, later, Anthony Burgess - wrote for work purposes, simple as that. Literature wouldn't have had as many recluses if popularity was the primary goal. In any case, the reasons are legion. It's a fascinating field of study in and of itself.
I don't know how familiar you are with Samuel Beckett's story. But I find his story a nice counterpoint to all the corporate and market-driven stories. Beckett, after all, changed his literary language for purely artistic reasons; his native English prose, he felt, couldn't escape Joycean characteristics and therefore couldn't be original. So he wrote in French, even as French was on its way out as a lingua franca. Never listen to anyone who tells you that authors shouldn't read biographies of authors. They are our people, and reading about their ordinary side only helps to bridge their extraordinary side with our own goals. If we don't understand them, celebrate them and defend them, who will? (I think we both agree on that already)
As for promotion, much as everyone tells us that we ourselves are to blame for everything bad in our lives and blaming external circumstances is nothing but facile excuse-making to avoid making real changes and yada yada (that good old, American, "one size fits everyone" mentality) it doesn't change the fact that conditions are such to where authorial promotion isn't easy unless you're rich. Sure, we must not be dishonest about our faults; but that doesn't mean we should never criticize external factors that directly (and/or unfairly) hinder personal success. (In any case I don't take Americans seriously with this kind of thing because on one hand, it's all you and nothing else; but on the other hand Black people are only affected by external factors, have no agency and are like children, etc. It's not only Woke ideologues who believe this nationally celebrated quack hypocrisy)
There's all the examples you've given, but I've heard many stories of people whose own local bookshops won't stock them, for reasons that were maybe understandable but that represented a total and tragic indifference to local talent. Bookshops failed hard by not accepting these risks; now these authors are all on Amazon, the primary reason bookshops go out of business. (Things like this are why I take no side in these greater industry-grounded feuds; we are right to be suspicious of Amazon, but everyone's guilty of egregiously screwing up somewhere) Goodreads at least should be receptive to authors promoting their books. It's sad that they aren't. But Goodreads is a problematic place in and of itself for a lot of reasons. (Most notably, how it concretizes the initial reaction to a book's publication and hinders the possibility of a future rediscovery)
The most I can say is: keep up the effort! And if you looked like an ass...well, I suspect that it won't be the last time in this era an author somewhere looks like an ass in public. At least you didn't try to assassinate the Prime Minister of Slovakia after being part of a pro-Russia biker gang. (The assassin was a poet) At the end of the day it's a question of temperamental balance. You'll find it. And those who truly value your work won't mind a few speed bumps along the way.
By the way, just got your covid memoir. Looking forward to reading it!
Love this comment!! Haha. Hilarious and wise all in one. I agree, man. In the end we have to do it because we have to do it. Art for art's sake. But yes, there are surely examples of writers who sided more with art than with myth or money. Many were pretty ambitious though. (Certainly Papa.) But yes: We're human. I appreciate the support, and thank you for buying the book. I hope you like it and please review on Amazon!
What I see is that you have a holy longing and sacred purpose. You have had it ever since we met in high school. The identity of writer was the first identity that I saw make sense to you. It gave you purpose and it also gave you a way to better know and understand yourself. Much of your writing I see as processing and letters to yourself. Expressions of your internal world as you move in the external.
The question I would like to ask and hear your reflection on is…Is your holy longing to be a writer? Or…to be seen and acknowledged for being a writer? Because those are two different things. The need to be seen, in my experience, comes from a lack of us being able to see ourselves and love ourselves fully - there is a not enoughness that drives us. A void we are seeking to fill. An attachment to a label , an identity, a purpose. I know this because as you know-this has been my inner work for many years. So hello another myself :)
I think a journey worth exploring is who are you besides a writer? Who are you besides your past? And are you afraid to explore yourself past your stories? Your story is very important to you-as it should be- but when the stories we have about ourselves are relived over and over or we are so attached to them as an identity- it doesnt leave a lot of room for growth, transformation and change. It doesn’t leave a love of room to expand outside of everything you know about yourself to discover that which you do not know.
I think you are more than a writer. I think that sometimes pivoting and exploring ourselves in a new way helps us understand ourselves better. Point being AA.
Do you write for you?
Do you write for the world?
Both?
If you write to be seen. We see only what you are letting us see. And I see a lot of attachment to the past and making sure people understand you. (Raising my hand here because me too) And yes it is deep and honest BUT
If you want to go viral I believe you will have to see yourself first. You will have to come to deeply explore yourself and show us WHO you are. Not who you were and where you came from. And while I believe you know every nook and cranny of who you believe you are- there is more to you that hasn’t had a chance to live yet.
I would love to see you go on a journey for a period of time without writing. Just experiencing yourself and the present outside of that role. With your head up instead of down. Living instead of reflecting on living. An experiment to see how what you have to share with the world would change. How much could you discover about yourself? It would be scary. Insane. No way. Maybe even seem counter productive to your goals and dreams.
But a writer is not all that you are.
And ambitious you may be but I believe what you are seeking is to deeply love yourself. You know yourself from the head. But do you know yourself from the heart?
Admission of our faults, edges, shadows- that’s the first step. Then what? You love to go deep Michael. Challenge yourself. Get uncomfortable.
I really think that is what is relatable and what people seek to read, know and understand.
I would love to see you go on a different kind of adventure and then come back and tell us about it.
Michael, I admire your willingness to be open about your shortcomings. You were one of the first people I subscribed to and one of the first people I wrote a guest post for when I joined this crazy community. I don't know you personally but I have read a lot of your writing and I have read your book. From my perspective you are a good man. The crazy part about being a man is that you are human and we all have our issues brother. I will be honest there were times when I thought you were pushing your product too much. But that is also because I am so introverted that it is hard for me to do. I honestly thought I would fail here because I didn't know how to market myself. I just decided to focus on the community building aspect and hope the rest would fall into place. I have made my own mistakes and I think it is important to reflect on what we have done or could do differently. I don't know anything about the publishing industry as I have never tried to write a book. But I do know that if you put all that energy and enthusiasm into writing authentically, it really comes through. I like The Crew a lot and I think you are at your best, not when doing the self-promotion piece, but when you let the writing promote you because of its quality. All the best.
Your Everyman confession is beautiful. Of course we all see aspects of ourselves in the behavior you describe. Your willingness to share is a potent reminder that we can all do better.
I find it so interesting how the literary world has quite strict rules, whereas other professional environments tend to reward being bold and different so you stick out from the pack. I suppose there’s some wisdom in that approach since in theory it doesn’t favor anyone in particular. But man, it’s super frustrating
Thanks, Michael. With your confession, you've saved me the trouble of doing it myself. I can almost say "ditto" - except for some of your bolder, multiple submission and DM stuff you have done. I admire your gusto, though, and I hope it can rub off on me - even if it's only in this cyberspace, telepathy medium we share.
Quit yer whingin' 😁
You and I sound a lot alike. White American male who wants to make it in this "business". So I get it.
Gotta say though I'd sacrifice notoriety for a decent living. No one has to know who I am 😀
Sounds like you're learning a lot along the way which is probably most important. Keep doing what you're doing...writing.
Thanks, Scott!
Your confession reminds me of one from long ago: "For I do not understand my own actions. For I do not do what I want, but I do the very thing I hate. ... For I know that nothing good dwells in me, that is, in my flesh. For I have the desire to do what is right, but not the ability to carry it out. For I do not do the good I want, but the evil I do not want is what I keep on doing. ... So I find it to be a law that when I want to do right, evil lies close at hand. For I delight in the law of God, in my inner being, but I see in my members another law waging war against the law of my mind and making me captive to the law of sin that dwells in my members." - The Apostle Paul, Romans 7:15-23
I wouldn't go nearly that far. It's a matter of degree, I think. There's no evil here, just messy humanness.
Couldn't call yourself sincere if you weren't straight, as in this post. Simple as that. While literature's primary goal is to tell a story - whether one writes minimalistically or has a more ornate style is a secondary matter that ultimately doesn't matter as long as that prose is organic and honest - there are stories and there are stories. Literature's fire has been mismanaged for way too long by tameness and intellectual cowardice, among other things. If the fire is to be rekindled, we need writing to be courageous; nothing less. (Of course there are issues with the confession as a form of expression, but we can discuss that another time) Not all of that courage has to be autobiographical; in fact, pure fiction (as I call it) is as desperate for courage as its more nonfiction-dependent counterparts. But it's definitely a part of the solution.
The only thing I'd address is this part: "All writers want to be praised, respected and read, do they not?" If we're talking about the great authors, yes and no. (It's probably true for today's creative writing program automatons and pharmaceuticalists who create anti-depressants in book form; but I don't think you desire to be these kinds of authors, which is what's fantastic about your literary journey)
Read, absolutely; though being read by millions is different than being read by a few thousand, and not all have had the same readership goals. (Many, for instance, gave no thought to their books in translation; Kundera was the opposite, and that was a huge factor in his success)
Respected: it depends. It seems authors wanted it more for themselves than for their books, when great authors met in the past they rarely talked about their own work. (Unlike that "Gertrude Stein discusses it always" interpretation from Midnight in Paris) Many great authors had a weird, paradoxical mix of ego and humility depending on the situation.
Praised: Papa certainly enjoyed the praise, but I'm not convinced most authors (including many American authors) sought that. Many, surprisingly - from Kipling and Twain to D.H. Lawrence and, later, Anthony Burgess - wrote for work purposes, simple as that. Literature wouldn't have had as many recluses if popularity was the primary goal. In any case, the reasons are legion. It's a fascinating field of study in and of itself.
I don't know how familiar you are with Samuel Beckett's story. But I find his story a nice counterpoint to all the corporate and market-driven stories. Beckett, after all, changed his literary language for purely artistic reasons; his native English prose, he felt, couldn't escape Joycean characteristics and therefore couldn't be original. So he wrote in French, even as French was on its way out as a lingua franca. Never listen to anyone who tells you that authors shouldn't read biographies of authors. They are our people, and reading about their ordinary side only helps to bridge their extraordinary side with our own goals. If we don't understand them, celebrate them and defend them, who will? (I think we both agree on that already)
As for promotion, much as everyone tells us that we ourselves are to blame for everything bad in our lives and blaming external circumstances is nothing but facile excuse-making to avoid making real changes and yada yada (that good old, American, "one size fits everyone" mentality) it doesn't change the fact that conditions are such to where authorial promotion isn't easy unless you're rich. Sure, we must not be dishonest about our faults; but that doesn't mean we should never criticize external factors that directly (and/or unfairly) hinder personal success. (In any case I don't take Americans seriously with this kind of thing because on one hand, it's all you and nothing else; but on the other hand Black people are only affected by external factors, have no agency and are like children, etc. It's not only Woke ideologues who believe this nationally celebrated quack hypocrisy)
There's all the examples you've given, but I've heard many stories of people whose own local bookshops won't stock them, for reasons that were maybe understandable but that represented a total and tragic indifference to local talent. Bookshops failed hard by not accepting these risks; now these authors are all on Amazon, the primary reason bookshops go out of business. (Things like this are why I take no side in these greater industry-grounded feuds; we are right to be suspicious of Amazon, but everyone's guilty of egregiously screwing up somewhere) Goodreads at least should be receptive to authors promoting their books. It's sad that they aren't. But Goodreads is a problematic place in and of itself for a lot of reasons. (Most notably, how it concretizes the initial reaction to a book's publication and hinders the possibility of a future rediscovery)
The most I can say is: keep up the effort! And if you looked like an ass...well, I suspect that it won't be the last time in this era an author somewhere looks like an ass in public. At least you didn't try to assassinate the Prime Minister of Slovakia after being part of a pro-Russia biker gang. (The assassin was a poet) At the end of the day it's a question of temperamental balance. You'll find it. And those who truly value your work won't mind a few speed bumps along the way.
By the way, just got your covid memoir. Looking forward to reading it!
Love this comment!! Haha. Hilarious and wise all in one. I agree, man. In the end we have to do it because we have to do it. Art for art's sake. But yes, there are surely examples of writers who sided more with art than with myth or money. Many were pretty ambitious though. (Certainly Papa.) But yes: We're human. I appreciate the support, and thank you for buying the book. I hope you like it and please review on Amazon!
Very real post. I can relate to your ambition, for I have it too. A lot of us do.
Thanks, man.
What I see is that you have a holy longing and sacred purpose. You have had it ever since we met in high school. The identity of writer was the first identity that I saw make sense to you. It gave you purpose and it also gave you a way to better know and understand yourself. Much of your writing I see as processing and letters to yourself. Expressions of your internal world as you move in the external.
The question I would like to ask and hear your reflection on is…Is your holy longing to be a writer? Or…to be seen and acknowledged for being a writer? Because those are two different things. The need to be seen, in my experience, comes from a lack of us being able to see ourselves and love ourselves fully - there is a not enoughness that drives us. A void we are seeking to fill. An attachment to a label , an identity, a purpose. I know this because as you know-this has been my inner work for many years. So hello another myself :)
I think a journey worth exploring is who are you besides a writer? Who are you besides your past? And are you afraid to explore yourself past your stories? Your story is very important to you-as it should be- but when the stories we have about ourselves are relived over and over or we are so attached to them as an identity- it doesnt leave a lot of room for growth, transformation and change. It doesn’t leave a love of room to expand outside of everything you know about yourself to discover that which you do not know.
I think you are more than a writer. I think that sometimes pivoting and exploring ourselves in a new way helps us understand ourselves better. Point being AA.
Do you write for you?
Do you write for the world?
Both?
If you write to be seen. We see only what you are letting us see. And I see a lot of attachment to the past and making sure people understand you. (Raising my hand here because me too) And yes it is deep and honest BUT
If you want to go viral I believe you will have to see yourself first. You will have to come to deeply explore yourself and show us WHO you are. Not who you were and where you came from. And while I believe you know every nook and cranny of who you believe you are- there is more to you that hasn’t had a chance to live yet.
I would love to see you go on a journey for a period of time without writing. Just experiencing yourself and the present outside of that role. With your head up instead of down. Living instead of reflecting on living. An experiment to see how what you have to share with the world would change. How much could you discover about yourself? It would be scary. Insane. No way. Maybe even seem counter productive to your goals and dreams.
But a writer is not all that you are.
And ambitious you may be but I believe what you are seeking is to deeply love yourself. You know yourself from the head. But do you know yourself from the heart?
Admission of our faults, edges, shadows- that’s the first step. Then what? You love to go deep Michael. Challenge yourself. Get uncomfortable.
I really think that is what is relatable and what people seek to read, know and understand.
I would love to see you go on a different kind of adventure and then come back and tell us about it.
All my love and respect,
-M
Michael, I admire your willingness to be open about your shortcomings. You were one of the first people I subscribed to and one of the first people I wrote a guest post for when I joined this crazy community. I don't know you personally but I have read a lot of your writing and I have read your book. From my perspective you are a good man. The crazy part about being a man is that you are human and we all have our issues brother. I will be honest there were times when I thought you were pushing your product too much. But that is also because I am so introverted that it is hard for me to do. I honestly thought I would fail here because I didn't know how to market myself. I just decided to focus on the community building aspect and hope the rest would fall into place. I have made my own mistakes and I think it is important to reflect on what we have done or could do differently. I don't know anything about the publishing industry as I have never tried to write a book. But I do know that if you put all that energy and enthusiasm into writing authentically, it really comes through. I like The Crew a lot and I think you are at your best, not when doing the self-promotion piece, but when you let the writing promote you because of its quality. All the best.
Thanks, Matthew. Appreciate the words. I think you're right on all of that.
Your Everyman confession is beautiful. Of course we all see aspects of ourselves in the behavior you describe. Your willingness to share is a potent reminder that we can all do better.
I find it so interesting how the literary world has quite strict rules, whereas other professional environments tend to reward being bold and different so you stick out from the pack. I suppose there’s some wisdom in that approach since in theory it doesn’t favor anyone in particular. But man, it’s super frustrating
I always like that you remind us you grew up in a great environment. Ups and downs come to everyone, regardless of the height from which you started.
Exactly. So true. And it gets complicated.
Absolutely!
Thanks, Michael. With your confession, you've saved me the trouble of doing it myself. I can almost say "ditto" - except for some of your bolder, multiple submission and DM stuff you have done. I admire your gusto, though, and I hope it can rub off on me - even if it's only in this cyberspace, telepathy medium we share.
Right on, Chris! Thanks for reading and commenting. Appreciate you.
I just purchased The Crew - paperback. It should be delivered in a few days.
You, my friend, rock. Thank you :) Please review on Amazon when you finish! Cheers!