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August 24, 2004
I'm sick and tired of always being sick and tired
I swear to god I'm going to write that damned book.
I think I say that to myself every single day. I even see the book, in my head, page after page. I see the characters doing what I want. I see comparisons to Kundera and Salinger. And yet I see 6 pages in a Word document taunting me.
It's a matter of discipline. It's something I'm learning but do not have mounds of. Nor do I usually end sentences with prepositions, but have been lately. I have to imagine that, were I able to force myself to sit for one hour a day at the computer, not allowed to do anything else, I would write. It might be shit with a capital S, but it would be writing. And, as every crap book about how to write says, getting that first draft done is the most important thing. You can edit, or throw it away. But you can't edit, or reject, nothing.
I think this is the hardest thing in my life. I like to bitch about women in (or not in) my life. But really, I've wanted to be an honest-to-god writer since I was ten-ish. I knew then I would study creative writing in college (and I did) and that I would write a book and be famous. Maybe the book would be a movie and I'd be rich. But I also have this problem of expectations. As in they are WAY TO HIGH. And I don't meant the rich and famous part.
I mean that when I write something, of any length, I am not happy with it. It may in fact be better than a lot of the crap out there being published and enjoyed by the masses (see "novels, trashy romance"), but it isn't good enough for me. I think this comes from having such high idols. Shakey. Salinger. Kundera. Tolkien even.
I got to meet a guy who did what I wanted to do. I mentioned The Dante Club before, and I was fortunate enough to get to have dinner with the author, Matthew Pearl. Great guy, and a great writer. And he did it. He's only a few years older than me, and he's written an interesting, well-written book that's sold. Millions. It's not only worth buying, it's worth reading. And that's saying something.
That's saying what I want to be saying about myself.
Posted by ashersky at August 24, 2004 10:19 PM
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Comments
hey jason,
not writing is part of writing. it's how you get the good stuff filtered from all the crap that goes through your head. don't get discouraged.
whit
Posted by: whitney at August 27, 2004 03:28 AM
I can't remember whose blog it was where I read this tip (she -she?- had gone to a reading or something, and one of the writers said it, and I'm paraphrasing): Don't sit down to write the book in one day. Set a reasonable goal. Then do that.
Posted by: lisa at August 27, 2004 04:59 PM
a4830396 a4830396
Posted by: a4830396 at November 24, 2005 01:02 PM