While I retain my exceptionally bleak views about writing and publication, that in no way alters the platinum-plated, uranium-cored fact I’m lucky to have so many helpful friends who have been kind enough to volunteer their time in wading through the perversions of the written word which I pass off as ‘writing’ :)
I just spent the last couple of hours collating and re-reviewing the feedback I’ve received to date, and while I'm still severely lacking in numbers when it comes to beta readers, I’m grateful to everyone who’s been willing to take the time to read my writings and provide feedback (whether written down or via phone while I take notes), and it’s nice to see both positive AND negative critiques -- even knowing 'friend bias' is ineradicable, it's nice to see people can still be objective enough to serve up negatives as well (and cogent ones, no less :D )
So: to everyone who has assisted, here’s the first of many public thank-yous :)
~J
[N.B.: I’m not listing people here by name, and won’t be doing so anywhere publicly without their express permission, though as promised, everyone who has provided feedback will be credited in the acknowledgments at the VERY least (and in whatever fashion/under whatever name they’d prefer).]
Showing posts with label Cynicism. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Cynicism. Show all posts
Sunday, March 22, 2015
Thursday, October 30, 2014
Some thoughts about my motivations regarding my new-found willingness to deal with writing
Finally decided to actually to engage in some blogging. I am of mixed feelings about doing it, admittedly, having been one who has, for the majority of their life, stuck to the shadows; however, if I am truly going to move forward with actually letting other people into the worlds I've created, the inescapable truth is I'm going to have to engage in self-promotion...To say nothing about taking my first steps out into the light at all.
I'm a writer. I have been my entire life. Not professionally, unless one counts technical documentation done for systems I've designed (which I don't), and while there was even a time I bothered submitting things to publishers, and even had some things published, for the most part, I've written entirely without much thought to sharing the majority of it with anyone else.
Kindly note that when I say I have written literally thousands of pages in my life, this is no exaggeration; nor am I including technical documentation, non-fiction articles, or even my overly verbose email correspondences with friends. That the majority of what I've written never saw the light of day was not because it was explicitly rejected (id est, not because I submitted it to others who rejected it, or that I was rejected so often it made me not care to write -- I assure you this is not the case) but because I simply didn't care to share it...with anybody.
Harlan Ellison once said that "writing for the trunk is masturbation" -- implying that 'real' writers have to be egotistical exhibitionists. I both agree and disagree with him there, on a number of points, though this is hardly the place to cover that topic in detail.
What I am taking away from that idea (which implies stripping everything he said on the matter down to the merest shreds) is that, given I've written a lot of stuff, provided it doesn't damage my lifestyle by sharing it, there's no reason not to do so. While I don't feel very strongly about much of what I've written, there are a few bits and pieces which I suspect others might find of use, or at the very least, as a pleasant distraction from the horrors of unabridged consciousness (that's certainly one of the reasons I read).
Having reached a point in my life where the amount of harm which can come to me by sharing some of the wonders, horrors, the beauty, tragedy, ugliness, pain, and far too many other things to condense into a single blog post with other people is, I'd wager, increasingly limited, so here I am: finally ready to share. Having created entire worlds within my head and on paper, some as fantastic and uniquely beautiful as some others are mundane, I've decided to purge the last of them from my aging and tired brain. My mind is so terribly overfull, like a desk with papers heaped precariously atop it, each stack seeming closer to reaching the ceiling than the last...And, like the periodic cleanings one must undertake to clear off one's workspace to free it of clutter, so, too, is my mind in such a state: long over-due to be emptied. (Yes, I know the Zen tea-cup reference is hackneyed...which is why I wasn't originally going to make it, but hey, this is purely stream-of-thought writing for me).
As quantity is by no means a measure of quality, the question then becomes, "Is what I've written worth reading?"
I am aware I am an excellent writer; at times, I've even been an exceptionally good writer. Whether or not any of what I've written is actually any good from the standpoint of other people is something which I am, regrettably, utterly incapable of accurately judging.
As with any flaw which I am unable to remedy, I acknowledge it openly, not being one for pretense. I therefore leave judgments of 'quality', and whether any given thing I've created is 'good' or 'bad' entirely within the hands of you, the others, the not-I who might happen to read my words.
~JMB
I'm a writer. I have been my entire life. Not professionally, unless one counts technical documentation done for systems I've designed (which I don't), and while there was even a time I bothered submitting things to publishers, and even had some things published, for the most part, I've written entirely without much thought to sharing the majority of it with anyone else.
Kindly note that when I say I have written literally thousands of pages in my life, this is no exaggeration; nor am I including technical documentation, non-fiction articles, or even my overly verbose email correspondences with friends. That the majority of what I've written never saw the light of day was not because it was explicitly rejected (id est, not because I submitted it to others who rejected it, or that I was rejected so often it made me not care to write -- I assure you this is not the case) but because I simply didn't care to share it...with anybody.
Harlan Ellison once said that "writing for the trunk is masturbation" -- implying that 'real' writers have to be egotistical exhibitionists. I both agree and disagree with him there, on a number of points, though this is hardly the place to cover that topic in detail.
What I am taking away from that idea (which implies stripping everything he said on the matter down to the merest shreds) is that, given I've written a lot of stuff, provided it doesn't damage my lifestyle by sharing it, there's no reason not to do so. While I don't feel very strongly about much of what I've written, there are a few bits and pieces which I suspect others might find of use, or at the very least, as a pleasant distraction from the horrors of unabridged consciousness (that's certainly one of the reasons I read).
Having reached a point in my life where the amount of harm which can come to me by sharing some of the wonders, horrors, the beauty, tragedy, ugliness, pain, and far too many other things to condense into a single blog post with other people is, I'd wager, increasingly limited, so here I am: finally ready to share. Having created entire worlds within my head and on paper, some as fantastic and uniquely beautiful as some others are mundane, I've decided to purge the last of them from my aging and tired brain. My mind is so terribly overfull, like a desk with papers heaped precariously atop it, each stack seeming closer to reaching the ceiling than the last...And, like the periodic cleanings one must undertake to clear off one's workspace to free it of clutter, so, too, is my mind in such a state: long over-due to be emptied. (Yes, I know the Zen tea-cup reference is hackneyed...which is why I wasn't originally going to make it, but hey, this is purely stream-of-thought writing for me).
As quantity is by no means a measure of quality, the question then becomes, "Is what I've written worth reading?"
I am aware I am an excellent writer; at times, I've even been an exceptionally good writer. Whether or not any of what I've written is actually any good from the standpoint of other people is something which I am, regrettably, utterly incapable of accurately judging.
As with any flaw which I am unable to remedy, I acknowledge it openly, not being one for pretense. I therefore leave judgments of 'quality', and whether any given thing I've created is 'good' or 'bad' entirely within the hands of you, the others, the not-I who might happen to read my words.
~JMB
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