Writing’s Purpose

Writing isn’t about making money, getting famous, getting dates, getting laid, or making friends. In the end, it’s about enriching the lives of those who read your work, and enriching your own life as well. It’s about getting up, getting well, and getting over. Getting happy, okay? Getting happy.

(Stephen King, in On Writing: A Memoir of the Craft)

One of my favorite inspirational books is Letters to a Young Poet by Rainer Maria Rilke.

However, as with anything written by the human hand, it is not perfect. Because people aren’t perfect.

In the first letter, Rilke tells the young poet

Perhaps you…are called to be an artist. Then take that destiny upon yourself, and bear it, its burden and its greatness, without ever asking yourself what reward might come from outside.

Rilke is saying essentially the same thing as King in the quote with which I began this post.

In a discussion I had with the late Jane Reichhold (who was a premier American writer and translator of haiku), I mentioned that it seemed to me the flaw in Rilke’s advice to the young poet was that Rilke himself was published and famous — and that he was telling the young unpublished poet to not worry about getting published or famous.

Jane’s answer was simply, “And there you have it.”

In other words, it’s easy for the famous and those who are wealthy to tell the rest of us — Don’t worry or concern yourself about fame or wealth.

To my mind, that touches a bit on hypocrisy.

For the record, Jane Reichhold encouraged me to pursue publishing and fame, if I could get it. And there you have it.

Mind you, I don’t disagree with Rilke or King. But I don’t wholly agree with them either. After all, Rilke is one of the most famous Twentieth century poets and King is a multi-millionaire (and he made all his money writing).

Writing is very much about enriching the lives of others. Writing is very much about getting happy. It is also a calling, and if we’re called to it I believe we must follow that calling and not look back.

But for Mr King to write, “Writing isn’t about making money” — when, I repeat, he’s a multi-millionaire — is just a wee bit hypocritical. Keep in mind, he didn’t self-publish his books and give them away. He got a contract with a publisher and made a lot of money.

Nor do I think King is in the majority among those who currently practice, or have in the past practiced, the craft of writing fiction.

I doubt Shakespeare would have agreed with him. Bill wrote for money. I don’t think Nathaniel Hawthorne, or Louisa May Alcott would agree. They wrote for money, especially Alcott — and she made no apologies for doing so.

Anthony Trollope boldly declared his whole purpose in writing was to make money.

Edgar Wallace (he created King Kong) was in the same camp. So was Rex Stout, Edgar Rice Burroughs, Murray Leinster, Ray Bradbury, Robert Heinlein, and my late friend Jack Koblas.

Robert E Howard wanted to be a writer, he told HP Lovecraft, because it gave him freedom. What he didn’t tell Lovecraft was that a large part of that freedom was not having to work 9 to 5 to make money. Because Howard very clearly wrote for a paycheck.

Salinger didn’t like the publicity success brought, but he didn’t turn down the money. He ultimately became a recluse. Writing didn’t make him happy, apparently.

I think King is on the money about enriching lives. The books and stories I remember most are those that in some manner enriched me, usually by bringing me joy. As a reader, I want my books to bring me some manner of joy and happiness. To enrich my life.

As a writer, I want to enrich the lives of others, as well as my own. Very much so.

But I also want money, and I wouldn’t mind a little bit of fame to go along with that money. I want people to read my books and I want them to smile when they see or hear my name. Like I’m an old friend who always brings them a gift.

And I don’t think there’s anything wrong in wanting that either.

Would Shakespeare have written all those plays and enriched generations — if he hadn’t made money? We’ll never know. But he did make money and he kept on writing. That we do know.

Louisa May Alcott’s father, Bronson Alcott, was a thinker and totally inept at providing for his family. Louisa wrote because the family needed to eat and pay the rent. But millions have been enriched by Little Women.

I could go on naming author after author who has enriched our lives. And virtually all of them wrote for money. And I’m glad they did.

In the end, writing is about enriching lives. I’ve enriched a few lives with my poetry. It’s a good feeling. There’s no money in poetry. But there is fame. The poets who are the most successful enrichers, the ones who have the largest readership — are also the ones who are famous to one degree or another. If you can’t be rich, you can at least be famous.

Mr King’s statement is very noble sounding. But it’s as much a fiction as are his books.

As a reader, I want writers to make money. Making money means people are buying their books. Which most likely means they will keep on writing.

Ask yourself, you readers, how many books do you read by writers who don’t sell anything?

I asked myself that question. It started me on a crusade to champion the underdog. Those writers who aren’t getting the readers they deserve.

Today I pretty much eschew bestsellers. Those authors don’t need me. Or you, for that matter. But many excellent writers, whose books aren’t selling, do need you. They need your and my support so they will keep writing and can enrich many, many lives.

Every Monday on Facebook I post the Book of the Week. Singing the praise of an undiscovered gem. Take a look at my Facebook page and discover some very good and even excellent books and authors. Let’s help some writers make money.

Comments are always welcome. And until next time, happy reading!

Talent’s Not Enough

Nothing in this world can take the place of persistence. Talent will not; nothing is more common than unsuccessful men with talent. … Persistence and determination alone are omnipotent.

—Attributed to Calvin Coolidge

Last week I wrote about creativity and the joy of being a creator.

This week I want to riff on that idea with a dose of reality. Talent is not enough to succeed.

In my years of actively writing for publication, I’ve seen many poets and fiction writers — far more talented than myself — give up.

They may have given up because of too many rejection slips. Or thrown in the towel because of a bad review or two or three. Or they may have called it quits due to lack of sales. Or they were not up to the hard work of promoting their writing. They had the misconception that just because they had talent they would not have to work. Success would instantly be theirs. As Nick Stephenson has noted, if no one knows you exist — all you are doing is writing into a black hole. And I’ll add: even if you have talent. Success comes from work. You have to work hard to get people to find you and notice you.

I could easily name a half dozen authors or more whose books are on my iPad who have disappeared. Apparently they’ve given up. They lacked persistence and determination.

It’s common knowledge that most new business ventures fail within the first three years. And writing is no different. It is a business venture, whether the author is traditionally published or self-published.

My late friend, John J. (“Jack”) Koblas, whose books were published by a regional publisher in Minnesota, used to drive his van — loaded with cases of his books — all over the country. He gave talks and went to conferences, and sold autographed copies of his books. That was hard, hard work. But he was able to earn a living from his writing by doing so. He found many, many readers because he did the work of finding them.

Jack was persistent and determined. When I first met him in the early 1970s, he was gathering rejection slips for his fiction. He eventually gave up trying to sell his fiction, and instead wrote biographies of famous writers who lived in Minnesota. He found publishers for those books. Then he wrote a fabulous book on Jesse James’s raid on the Northfield, Minnesota bank — and he found his audience in history writing.

Then, because his non-fiction was selling, his publisher brought out his fiction and poetry.

Work. Hard, hard work. But it eventually paid off.

We indie writers are in the same boat. The easy money, the easy route to readers, is gone. It ended in 2014. Now, due to tremendous competition, we have to work. We have to get creative, in order to find our readers.

Persistence and determination. That’s what we need. That has to become our mantra. Because talent is not enough. Many talented writers were and are business failures. They gave up and disappeared. Their dreams crashed and burned — because they gave up. They didn’t have the determination to push on. They didn’t persist. They didn’t get creative and find their unique path to success.

And I find that to be very sobering and very sad. I urge you, my fellow writers, not to be one of them.

The joy they could have brought to scores, hundreds, maybe thousands of readers — is gone, forever.

Talent isn’t enough to succeed. And that is repeatedly demonstrated by the mediocre writer, who is persistent and determined, and thereby succeeds. That, too, is very sobering and very sad.

Persist! Be creative! And you can hold your dream in your hands.

Comments are always welcome. And until next time, happy persisting!

The Joy of Creativity

There is nothing more satisfying than being a Creator, or being around Creators. There’s an indescribable electricity when Creatives are together. The experience is exhilarating.

Last week, my wife and I were on Madeline Island. She was enrolled in a plein air oil painting workshop. I tagged along to be pack horse, and encourager, and to do some writing.

If you don’t know, Madeline Island is the largest island in the Apostle Islands chain, off the coast of Wisconsin, in Lake Superior. The island is beautifully wooded and possesses some fabulous views of the largest of the Great Lakes.

Aside from the plein air workshop, there was a workshop for mixed media and another one for quilters.

To be with so many Creatives all in one setting was supremely stimulating. I had a blast interacting with the artists and the tag along spouses.

I got in some extensive walking, worked on a novel (part of a new series I intend to launch next year), sketched out 3 story ideas (which were provided by some of the artists) and wrote a haiku.

The advice is legendary: if you feel stuck in your writing (or any other creative endeavor), go on a trip. The change of scenery stimulates the creative juices. With last week in mind, I’d add: go on a trip with other Creatives who are not in your field of interest.

Seeing the way oil painters view and interpret the world provided me with new insights. 

Those new insights ramped up my own creative energy. Those new insights took me back to the time when I experimented with haiga, a Japanese art form that links a picture and a poem together to form a whole creative expression. Hence the haiku, the traditional poetic form used in haiga.

In addition, those new insights and the conversations I had with the artists gave me some new fiction ideas.

I came home from the island with my Creativity supercharged.

Writing is, for me, like breathing. I can’t live without it. Shoot, I love writing the grocery list! Part of the excitement is the tactile experience. Holding the pencil. The feel of the soft lead as it glides across the paper. The texture of the paper. Or the feel of the fountain pen or dip pen holder. The movement of the pen point across the paper. Watching the ink or graphite form my thoughts into words, words into sentences, sentences into paragraphs. It’s an experience that’s better than magic.

Creatives are relatively rare, which is why I think so many people want to be a Creative. Creatives, though, are gifted. They are a breed apart. They cannot ever not create.

In every culture, the deities that are worshipped are Creators. Which is an indication to me that Creators are held in high regard by all cultures. They are special. Divine, as it were.

People may emulate Creators. They may even master a creative medium. But if they are not Creators, heart and soul, they will ultimately lose interest.

Rainer Maria Rilke, in the first letter of Letters to a Young Poet, advised that the one who wants to create must first look deep within and ask the question, “Must I write, paint, sculpt, throw pots, blow glass, etc, etc.”

If the answer is yes, then Rilke says you must structure your entire life so that you can create. If the answer comes back, no, this is not a must — then go and do something else. There is no shame in this. We must all do what we were meant to do. Don’t become frustrated trying to do what was not meant for you to do.

I love writing. I loved it before going to Madeline Island, and I love it even more for having been there.

Many, many thanks to the Madeline Island School of the Arts (MISA) and the beautiful people at the workshop (my wife included!) who reconfirmed what I’ve always wanted to do with my life.

Comments are always welcome! And until next time, happy creating!

From Reader to Writer

Readers become writers when at some point they say to themselves, “I can do that.”

Or they just know the writing life is for them. An intuitive sort of thing.

With the advent of viable e-books, a new breed has risen up. I call them the gold rush writers. They see writing as a get rich quick scheme. And there are quite a few who are making significant piles of money. But as with most prospectors in the gold rush, most writers aren’t making those piles of money. In fact, it’s the middle man who is: the man who sold shovels to prospectors, and the ones selling covers, and formatting and editorial services to writers.

For myself, I cannot remember a time when I didn’t read. My mother read to me when I was young, and, even though she wasn’t a very good reader herself, she instilled in me a love for reading that has never left me.

Along with never remembering a time I wasn’t reading, I don’t remember a time when I wanted to be anything but a writer.

Unfortunately, my parents were of a practical bent and writing was just too dreamy and artsy-fartsy for their tastes. I got no encouragement from them to write.

However, a person who truly wants to write can’t be held back and I did write some during my school years, got one or two things published in the school lit mags, had a play produced in high school, a poem published in a fanzine, and that was about it.

After school, life and family responsibilities took over and the writing got pushed to the back burner.

The bug, though, had bitten and in 1989 I wrote my first novel, a mystery, Festival of Death. The book took me a year to write, but I wrote it. When finished, I sent it out, got a rejection slip, took another look at it, and decided it needed work, as most first novels do, and put it in the drawer.

I made a few more attempts at fiction. Had one or two pieces accepted in fanzines. And then switched to poetry.

Never in a million years would I have thought of myself as a poet, but it was via poetry that I found my initial writing success.

During the 1990s, and into the new century, I wrote several thousand poems, had hundreds published (mostly in e-zines), and eventually became a “name” in the small world of English language Japanese-forms (we’re talking about haiku, tanka, and renga).

The Internet is fragile and its content ephemeral. What is here today, is gone tomorrow. And most of my published poetry is no longer extant. The myriad of pixels have vanished. The e-zines are gone.

As I approached retirement age the fiction bug bit me again, but this time very hard. Poetry didn’t provide a big enough canvas anymore. I wanted the space a short story or novel provided. I wanted to create interesting characters and saddle them with impossible problems.

And so it was, I gave up poetry and returned to fiction. I had many false starts. Mostly because I thought I had to outline my novel. And I can’t outline worth a darn. When I finally learned there was such an animal as the “plotless” novel, and such a creature as the pantser — I knew I could finally write fiction. After all, I never planned my poems. I was a pantser poet. Why not a pantser novelist?

I never looked back. My first novel as a pantser was a monster of 2000+ pages. A sprawling cozy catastrophe completely un-publishable as originally written — it nevertheless broke the ice.

I’m now revising and publishing The Rocheport Saga as a series. There are currently seven volumes, with more to come.

Next was Festival of Death. I love Tina and Harry and couldn’t let them languish. I hauled the original manuscript out of the drawer, kept the first chapter and the ending, and rewrote everything else. A much, much better novel the second time around, I went ahead and self-published it. And have chronicled many more adventures of Tina and Harry, Tina being Minneapolis’s most unusual private eye.

The life of Lady Grace Hay Drummond-Hay is every feminist’s dream. I don’t understand why no one has written her biography. A fascinating woman who lived in fascinating times: the period between the two world wars. A prominent and well-known journalist in her day, it’s sad to see she is virtually unknown today.

She became the inspiration for my own Lady Dru alternative history novels. Of which I currently have two.

I’ve always loved horror and have several short stories and the Pierce Mostyn Paranormal Investigation series published.

And as long as I have breath there will be more ideas coming from my pen, and that makes me want to jump out of bed every morning and get to work.

The e-book revolution has allowed me to realize my dream. I’ve had enough rejection slips in my day to know I don’t like them — and to know they come from the subjective whim of another person, a person who just so happens to have the title “editor”. But a person who puts his or her shoes on the same way I do.

Editors aren’t infallible, nor are they omniscient. They make mistakes and their knowledge of the marketplace is limited. Most are in fact simply buyers for their publishing houses. And as such tend to be very conservative and not willing to take any chances.

Today’s e-book revolution puts the work of writers before readers — and lets us readers make the decision concerning a book’s future.

However, while writing is easy for me, marketing is a nightmare. And no writer hoping to get his or her work read can avoid marketing. Somehow we writers have to get our books before readers. And we readers will never know a book is out there unless someone tells us it is. There are just too many books for us readers to possibly know them all.

I once read that 3000 new books appear each day on Amazon. Amazon, however, only promotes those books on which it can make money. In the end, those are darn few. Most books, therefore, languish in Amazon’s dusty book basement. And many good books, sad to say, are sitting on those dusty shelves.

Why are good books not seen? Mostly because the author isn’t marketing them, or isn’t marketing them effectively.

Some authors believe in the magic wand. They say, “I’m a good writer and my friends like my book. It’ll sell.” Then they’re disappointed when it doesn’t. And it doesn’t sell because too few people even know it’s out there. One book in a sea of millions is the same as one needle in a haystack. There are no magic wands.

Marketing is difficult. It has few established rules, involves a lot of guesswork, and many years of experience. It also takes money. Maybe not a lot. But if a writer doesn’t have the money, then any amount is a lot.

I’m in that category. I don’t have a lot of disposable income. Therefore, I have to think harder and smarter about marketing. I just can’t throw money at the problem in the hopes of finding a solution. And I know there are no magic wands. I am going to have to do something to get people to find my books. And I want them to find my books. I want more readers. I think my books are good reads. Others think so, too. Those that have found them, that is.

IMO, Patty Jansen has laid out the best course for indie authors to follow if they want readers and would like to make a living from telling stories. It’s my plan to get more readers and hopefully make a few bucks while I’m at it. Art for art’s sake is fine. But it’s better if lots of people can appreciate it — and that takes marketing. And while I’m at it, you can find all my books here.

Even though I’ve moved from reader to writer I’m still a reader. Reading is my favorite form of entertainment. The number of books is endless, they’re fairly easy to find, and one can read anywhere and at anytime.

Currently, I’m reading the delightful Flaxman Low occult detective tales and Seabury Quinn’s Jules de Grandin stories.

Let me know what you’re reading. And the more obscure the book, the better! If the book is by an indie author, and I like it, I’ll give the author a little free publicity.

Comments are always welcome, and, until next time, happy reading!

Independence

Tomorrow, we in the US, celebrate our independence from Britain. The casting aside of our colonial status to take the first steps as a union of 13 sovereign states.

Almost no one thinks of the 50 states today as sovereign, nor do we think of the US as a union of sovereign states. That is, though, in theory, what the United States of America really is.

President Lincoln and the War Between the States went a long way towards setting us on the road to nationalism, where we now think of ourselves as Americans, and not Virginians, Ohioans, or Minnesotans.

In effect, the states have been reduced to quasi-province status. One of the reasons, for example, why many people want to do away with the Electoral College. These people do not see us as a union of states, merely one country.

Ironically, Canada is far more a “federal” union than is the US. Although even there the drive towards a strong central government is alive and well.

I stumbled on to writing post-apocalyptic fiction by accident. An intriguing first line (“Today I killed a man and a woman.”) popped into my head one day and 2000+ pages later I had a “novel”.

The Rocheport Saga, currently at seven volumes, is basically one long novel I’ve broken up into convenient reads. 

With the seventh book, Take to the Sky, the series is at a convenient pause point and on hiatus while I work on other things. Oh, to have a novel factory like Alexandre Dumas!

The narrator of The Rocheport Saga, Bill Arthur, is an intellectual prepper, an armchair philosopher, and a reluctant leader. As one reviewer put it (whose review Amazon has taken down for some reason — boy, oh boy, Amazon is not in my good books): Uneasy lies the head that wears a crown.

In the story, America (and the world) is a lawless ruin in the wake of the apocalyptic event. Bill’s dream is to build a new America — preserving the best of the old, and getting rid of the worst.

So what does that mean? For Bill, who is politically a libertarian, that means the promotion of the values that made America a great country: love of freedom, respect for the individual, determined self-reliance, and pride in being frugal.

What Bill Arthur sees as the great cancer that was rotting out the old America is: a sense of entitlement, the desire for security over freedom, lack of respect for the individual, the quest for money and a lavish and extravagant lifestyle, and a complete disregard for the Golden Rule.

The wonderful thing about fiction is that the author constructs his own world, and then invites the reader to share that world with him.

The world of The Rocheport Saga is a hard world, a difficult world. It is also a world of hope. Hope in those positive values that made the United States a great country. Values that have nothing to do with big government and the growing nanny state, which eviscerates freedom, self-reliance, respect for self and others, and gives in return a stultifying uniformity, constant surveillance for our “protection”, and a sense of hopelessness.

George Orwell in 1984 captured the horror that is all-powerful government. We must remember the Soviet Union regularly conducted elections in their sham democracy. And the 1936 constitution provided equal rights to all regardless of sex, race, or ethnicity. Too bad the interpretation and practice of said rights was lacking. Stalin killed far more citizens of the USSR, than Hitler killed of all countries in his concentration camps.

Big government is no guarantor of rights. Big government is only concerned about the submission of the people to the will of the state, irrespective of any promised rights.

That is what the Patriots were fighting against. The King’s trampling of the people’s rights in favor of submission to the will of the state.

All of my books, to one degree or another, promote love of freedom, respect for the individual, a determined self-reliance, and a pride in not being wasteful.

I don’t sell many books, readership is tiny (to the extent I can determine that), I don’t get many reviews, and virtually no one writes to me who has read my books.

For many writers that would be discouraging, and an indication that perhaps they should quit, and sometimes I feel that way myself. When I do, I remind myself that today I have the freedom to self-publish my work and not be thought a loser for doing so. That wasn’t the case in the publishing world for most of my life. Today I can live my dream, and no editor can say otherwise.

Ever since I can remember, I’ve wanted to make my living writing fiction. I’m not there. Yet. And I might never get there. But I do have the freedom to give it a shot. And as long as I am breathing I will.

Grandma Moses achieved fame in her twilight years for her art. Helen Hooven Santmyer was 88 when “…And Ladies of the Club” hit it big.

I don’t want to wait that long, but, as the saying goes, “Good things come to those who wait”.

The United States of America is a fabulous land. Fifty fabulous lands in actuality. I’m glad I live here and I’m glad I’m able to self-publish my books and set off on the quest to find my readers. They may not be legion, but I know they’re out there.

Comments are always welcome. And until next time, happy reading!