LOOK FORWARD
Rejections And Shitty First Drafts
When I was in college, I met a helpful professor who took a genuine interest in me as a writer.
I was working on a book at the time- I guess, I still am- and since this professor was a published author, this made all of us young, wannabe writers in her class ooh and aah.
I was equally enamored by the shine of her accolades, so I decided to be brave. I told her about my pet project, a fantasy YA novel I’d been diligently working on.
She was very kind, this professor, and she offered to get me in touch with her literary agent.
Get them to give my draft a once-over and provide some valuable feedback- see where I was on my writing journey.
I was, of course, delighted!
A real agent. Looking at my stuff.
Oh no, I thought.
What if they don’t like it? What if they do?
What if they hate it?
My head spun with the possibilities. Was I about to get a book deal? Critical acclaim? Fame?
I’m still writing on Medium to very little fanfare and scant few reads, accruing whatever meager following I can, so, no… I did not get any of those things.
What I did get was honest feedback from a professional publishing agent working in the field I so desperately wanted to break into.
This is what they told me, and I’ll never forget it, even after all these years:
“I like the world you’re building, the prose is there… unfortunately, the characters didn’t grip me. They felt flat, so I couldn’t get past the first few chapters.”
This was followed by a more lengthy and detailed description letting me know how much I sucked, that my mother was a whore, and I should kill myself for attempting to pass off such garbage as literature.
Or something like that, I’m sure you’ll forgive me if I don’t remember the exact wording.
It’s been some time.
I do remember that I stopped reading after those first few comments and skimmed the rest of the response rejecting my shitty first draft.
I couldn’t be objective.
I was devastated.
I’d spent years on this book. I’d been writing it since I was a teen, late at night, under the covers in my bedroom.
I was young. I was hurt and seeing red.
I never responded to the agent.
All Writers Are Minorities
When I met that professor again, being the kind woman that she was, she asked me how it went.
I gave a meek, feet-shuffling response and, valuing her time and kindness, I summarized:
“The agent said they liked it,” I told her. “But right now, it’s just not for them.”
I remember how she looked at me, empathetic, but not at all surprised. I remember resenting her and the agent by association after that.
I’m still not sure why.
Maybe it’s because of the complex relationship educators have with their flock. And how they can, sometimes, see a good deed in the sideline act that is the giving of opportunity rather than the offer of mentorship.
Or maybe it’s because I could tell that I got, incorrectly, but quite ironically, tacked onto me, the additional label of a minority writer.
It truly was unnecessary.
All writers are minorities.
I would go on to not write a single word for many years after this experience.
A Journeyman Storyteller
I look back on it now, and I’m glad I had this reaction.
It was only natural.
If honest feedback is offered before the recipient of said feedback is ready to hear it, the effect can be catastrophic to one’s sense of self.
Doubly so, if the giver is respected, or feared, or otherwise held in high regard and esteem, and often it’s all of those wrapped into one.
And we’re especially vulnerable to this when we’re just starting out, when everything makes us ooh and aah.
Fast forward a few years in the story and I am still writing a ton of shitty first drafts. I’m still receiving rejections, much like that one. More and more, as I continue to put myself out there.
And I won’t lie and tell you that the rejections don’t still sting.
They do.
They bruise and hurt my ego. They sometimes make me feel less-than.
Undeserving.
But I learned to come to grips with those feelings long ago.
I’ve gained confidence in both my purpose and in my abilities as a writer.
It’s why I think of myself as a kind of a journeyman storyteller now.
No longer am I the thin-skinned novice with a chip on his shoulder. I don’t feel as if the world owes me recognition anymore.
James Baldwin put it best in his autobiographical notes when he said:
“Any writer, I suppose, feels that the world into which he was born is nothing less than a conspiracy against the cultivation of his talent- which attitude certainly has a great deal to support it.”
I understand the sentiment, and despite a latent talent, I am not yet a master. Not even close. I don’t have anything substantial to show for my dogged persistence other than a half finished novel, a ton of shitty first drafts, and the need to be seen as a writer.
Or rather, a professional writer is the term I’m looking for. I’ve always been a writer. Trust me, I’ve had little choice.
But to do it as a profession?
I ask around, and ah mon chere, but you need this and that. Oh, but no, no, no, you must fix that shoddy grammar, that imprecise punctuation. That is not the proper use of the word flatulent.
I can’t help but laugh at how highbrow it’s all become.
No one has fun anymore.
Or maybe it’s always been this way, and I’ve just been too taken in by its shiny luster to notice or care.
Anyway, much of it is just pomp and ceremony, an arbitrary form of gatekeeping.
Bah! I hate writers.
Or at least, “professional” writers.
They can rarely see past their own very long and hooked noses — old men and women who have forgotten that writing for some is akin to living.
I don’t want to be unfair, I know not all of it is like this, but I am finding it hard to tell these days.
Forgive me if I forget to edit out some of my frustration and bitterness, I’m only human.
As such, I also feel somewhat forced to digress to reiterate the very trite and tired point that, yes, to break the rules, you must first learn how to apply them, and blah blah blah …
But I do wish we would all kick this habit of, ad nauseam, repeating the posthumous words of droning old men and women as if they were some sort of gospel truth.
Somebody open a window.
The fact of the matter is, I don’t think we do a good enough job of warning the young, of mentoring them.
Instead, it’s all, “at this time, this just isn’t for us,” or, “your story lacks that je-nais-quoi, that oomph, that structuuuuurrrreeee.”
Be Somebody
And I get it. Really, I do.
But there’s an unspoken social component there, too, right?
You want to avoid getting hit with an “unsportsmanlike conduct.”
The black mark on your membership card, if you’ll excuse the pun. Gotta play by the rules if you want to enter the ring and participate in the game.
But I, for one, am tired of playing nice within the safe confines of those who have gotten a little too used to the oohs and aahs of novices.
Young and hopeful writers, flocking to LIT classrooms and public writing forum sites like this one in droves, hat in hand, reverently acceptant to the mass rejection and finger-wagging that has become the field of publishing and literary critique.
And those who do this are, sometimes, well-intentioned, but can you all join me as we shout a very punk, very loud and resounding:
fuck ‘em.
As we go on to be ourselves.
A lesson I learned late in my writing life is: if you wanna be somebody, do your own thing.
That’s what it means to have a passion.
It’s unfakeable.
If anyone asked you why you do it, you’d be simultaneously at a loss for words and overwhelmed by the feeling of having so many of them.
Look Forward
Nowadays, I wake up, and despite everything, I look forward to writing.
I still look forward to what I will come up with next. I look forward to the new experiences that will inspire me. I look forward to the next rejection and the feedback that will help me improve and grow as a writer.
I look forward to the novel ways in which I will try to prove to the world that, yes, I am a good writer.
Just a not professional one. At least, not just yet.
And that’s okay because if I’m being honest, lest I get to make it my own, writing as a profession sounds dreadfully mundane.
Till next we write,
Signed,
Gaël,
an unprofessional writer and journeyman storyteller.
