Gay Said to Say This Outloud
You know, lately I'm sick to death of literary magazines.
I used to aspire to wrap up all my thoughts into obscure, pretty words that drew upon the classics, the form, the intent, the fragility and diamond-strength of language structure--I wanted to say something real, and touching.
THEN I realized that I also want to make money while I do that. Since I'd rather spend my days writing than working for some asshole company, and I wasn't born into an idly wealthy family, I have to write things that make money. I can still be real and touching, but include EVERYONE who can read, not cater to a gob of intellectuals who wouldn't know life if it lived through them.
I realized that I like to tell stories that anyone can read. Not just someone who's attended the correct classes, schools, or writing workshops.
I can write literary fiction. It's just ridiculous to do it unless you don't give a whit about making a living. (Or garnering a public voice that is heard beyond universities, literary magazines and coffee shops.)
Literary writing is exclusive.
I aspire to be a best-selling author. That means my stories sell the best. It doesn't mean that they mean more or less than something about James Joyce's real meaning behind a bowl of oatmeal and a girl hanging upside down on a swing in that familiar, soft-focus, backyard where something wonderful hides something horrible, and everything means something more than is said, but you wouldn't understand unless you've studied Joyce at Emery with professor So-and-Such.
Pretention does not a story make.
That's my ten cents.
Remember, I'm at two hours and ten minutes of not smoking. I'm a little testy.
And I don't run some fancy-shmancy literary magazine.
I used to aspire to wrap up all my thoughts into obscure, pretty words that drew upon the classics, the form, the intent, the fragility and diamond-strength of language structure--I wanted to say something real, and touching.
THEN I realized that I also want to make money while I do that. Since I'd rather spend my days writing than working for some asshole company, and I wasn't born into an idly wealthy family, I have to write things that make money. I can still be real and touching, but include EVERYONE who can read, not cater to a gob of intellectuals who wouldn't know life if it lived through them.
I realized that I like to tell stories that anyone can read. Not just someone who's attended the correct classes, schools, or writing workshops.
I can write literary fiction. It's just ridiculous to do it unless you don't give a whit about making a living. (Or garnering a public voice that is heard beyond universities, literary magazines and coffee shops.)
Literary writing is exclusive.
I aspire to be a best-selling author. That means my stories sell the best. It doesn't mean that they mean more or less than something about James Joyce's real meaning behind a bowl of oatmeal and a girl hanging upside down on a swing in that familiar, soft-focus, backyard where something wonderful hides something horrible, and everything means something more than is said, but you wouldn't understand unless you've studied Joyce at Emery with professor So-and-Such.
Pretention does not a story make.
That's my ten cents.
Remember, I'm at two hours and ten minutes of not smoking. I'm a little testy.
And I don't run some fancy-shmancy literary magazine.
posted by Kevin Shamel at 9:46 AM
3 Comments:
I am right there with you, Kevin.
I got put down, in a back-hand, over-the-shoulder sort of way, in the EDF daily comments yesterday because I said I wasn't always sure where the story was in literary fiction.
I think the words that were used were "insular" and "two-dimensional reading."
I didn't bother to respond because there already was a donnybrook going on. I didn't bother to say that I appreciated the way the author used the language, and the complex play of emotions being presented. I just didn't see a story there.
Maybe that's why I like genre writing so much. If you don't have a beginning, middle and end, if you don't show some sort of character development or deliver a punch at the end, it is really obvious that you blew it.
That's my ten cents.
Oh, and my poem, that Oonah, et.al., accepted for Every Day Poets, rhymes; so I guess I am beyond hope.
Nice! I subbed five poems there, and I shall sub no more! I am not a poet, NOR a literary writer.
I stayed out of the EDF battle between literary writing vs. stuff that actually tells a story, and "insular" "two-dimensional" reading vs. being a poof.
(I'm not on the poofy side...)
Thanks, K.C.
hehe you said testy....
that sounds like teste....hehehe
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