The other day, I was speaking to a multi-published author and we were commiserating about how stressful and busy our lives have become since we’ve been contracted. Deadlines. Medical issues. Time management. Family management. Platform building. Marketing. Social media. And, oh, your next book.
“Are we having fun yet?” I asked. We both laughed.
Somewhere along the way, contracted writers usually transition from writing as a therapeutic, inspirational venture, to writing as a job, a chore, a burden, even a drudgery.
Despite this, aspiring authors seem to maintain a gauzy, idealistic view of professional authorship.
Several years back, The Guardian posed this question to several professional writers: Is writing for a living a joy or a chore? Joyce Carol Oates responded,
To me, who has written for most of her adult life, in a number of genres and with wildly varying degrees of “enjoyment” and/or “misery”, it’s likely that writing is a conscious variant of a deep-motivated unconscious activity, like dreaming. Why do we dream? No one seems to really know, just as no one seems to really know why we crave stories, even or especially stories we know to be fiction. My experience of writing – of writing these very sentences, for instance – is invariably a blend of the initially “inspired” and the more exacting, or plodding, execution of inspiration.
Most writers find first drafts painfully difficult, like climbing a steep stairs, the end of which isn’t in sight. Only just persevere! Eventually, you will get where you are going, or so you hope. And when you get there, you will not ask why? – the relief you feel is but a brief breathing spell, before beginning again with another inspiration, another draft, another steep climb… (emphasis mine)
I’m not sure what’s more interesting: That non-writers often view novelists as feckless and lazy, lounging on seaside balconies in their slippers cajoling inspiration from an ever-evaporating fifth of gin, or that professional writers see their business as really hard work. And that’s what the majority of the authors interviewed in the Guardian piece suggest: Writing is not that fun. Or as Ronan Bennet put it, “I’m not sure I would describe as pleasurable the actual process of writing, even when it’s going well…”
You have to wonder why people aspire to become professional writers, huh?
Perhaps, as Oates suggests, they don’t have a choice. Maybe writing correlates to a “deep-motivated unconscious activity, like dreaming.” And who chooses their dreams? Either way, I find these writers’ answers rather encouraging. Especially Ms. Oates’ description of writing as a blend of inspiration and plodding execution.
But how someone can find enjoyment in “plodding execution” is another story.
So how do you see it: Is writing for a living more of a joy or a chore?
*psst* It’s Joyce Carol Oates, not Carol Joyce Oates. *wink* And I think you meant to say “Writing is not that fun.”
“Is writing for a living more of a joy or a chore?”
It depends. Sometimes it’s fun, and sometimes it’s not—and not due to any simple divides like “fiction’s fun; for-hire work isn’t.” I’ve had a blast writing for-hire in an article that had to explain what the so-called “superbugs” actually are to the average reader. I’ve struggled to finish a story that I really wanted to finish and re-read.
I can’t say if it’s more of a joy or a chore, because it seems to go in cycles. Still trying to figure out what makes it one of the other.
Oops! Thanks for the corrections.
For me, it’s like being stalked by an injured tiger. Moving forward on this career path doesn’t necessarily equate to joy, but not doing it would kill me.
Great comparison!
Well I haven’t entered the “for a living” part yet so don’t have direct experience. But what I can say is that writing is usually fun. The “for a living” part however means lots of non-writing things, like tedious marketing of all sorts. That is torment.
But then my real life day job is torment. So what have I got to lose by chasing the goal?
I agree. It’s very hard. I don’t have a novel yet published, but I run a blog, review books, social network, and also write short stories. I just finished my first novel and pretended with it that I had a deadline. I was stressed and some weeks frustrated because whatever happened disrupted my word count plan and I had to catch up. This past week I was stressed because three critiquers needed my finished novel and I worked on a deadline. I do interviews and recently managed to get approved to post my blogs on a newspaper site.
So yes, I don’t have any fluffy dreams of being a writer. I agree with Oates. It’s something we do and it is fun, but it’s a lot of work. It’s like dreaming. Right now I am on vacation from major writing projects, and yet I wondered what I am going to do with myself if not write?
Nikole,
Sounds like you are very busy! Congrats on the the newspaper site posting your blog, that’s great!
I day dream of actually earning a living by writing, but I trust God to supply all my needs, so if I don’t make any money that’s okay. I write because to not do it feels like I am not being true to who I am. I love to write. It has only been in the last few years that I have dared to dream that someone might actually want to read it (or that God wants someone to read it). I am being faithful to what I feel God directing me to do and leaving the rest up to him.
“Despite this, aspiring authors seem to maintain a gauzy, idealistic view of professional authorship.” There is something not quite generous in this statement. Writing is difficult whether you’re paid or otherwise. I’ve personally never enjoyed it, and I’ve received little to no payment for anything I’ve written. What you may view as gauzy idealism may simply be an unpaid writer’s dream of having a reward or payment for all their hours and hours of hard work and suffering. After all, writing is just a job–a job you have to show up to in order to crank out all those words. Work for no pay kinda sucks. But then I’ve never looked at writing as a kind of therapy or as an inspirational hobby. Prayer, meditation, relaxation exercise–yeah, those are therapeutic.
I see my work as a full-time freelance writer as the equivalent to basic training, SEER school, Hell Week, and refusing to ring the bell for a Navy Seal. Before this period of my life I never much though about the pressures of writing. Just the “fun” stuff. Hopefully, facing deadlines nearly every day of my life and trying to write something creative and fresh about topics that have already been written about a thousand times already has prepared me for what lies ahead.
Earlier you wrote a post about whether or not a non-published writer could call themselves A Writer.
This is exactly why I maintain that–with plenty of non-fiction but no fiction published by me–I can and do with pride call myself a writer.
It (specifically fiction writing) is the hardest work I’ve ever done. It is the most emotionally draining and intensive work a person can set for themselves. There are moments of fun, but most of it is digging ditches into your mind and soul for ideas, characters and moments. It’s giving birth every day on an intellectual level.
I had initially planned to sell one of my books as a first-in-series, but after talking with a couple of agents and more than a few writers I realised that I had no desire at all to embrace the kind of schedule that a series writer is required to keep. Oh bother. I could go on and on but probably better stop as my mind is leapfrogging from one end of the question to the other.
My simple answer is that writing (for me) is a compulsion, a drive, a fuel and a release. But it’s not Fun in the way that vacations and reading and eating tacos are Fun.
I did write about this in a better, more concise way nearly a full year ago.
http://mycropht.wordpress.com/2010/12/28/its-not-digging-ditches/
Writing is a challenge yes, but working at McDonalds and Meijer were much harder. I do not watch the clock when I am writing hoping for the time to go by. Slow ticking minutes are the worst drudgery. Far more so than dreaming up stories. It’s all relative.
For me, I feel like writing is an inner driving force – a compulsion. I guess that would be the ‘inspiration’ part, but there is definitely a fair bit of ‘plodding’ as well. Not that I’m complaining. Since I don’t actually ‘male my living’ at it, I guess i can’t really answer the question with too much authority.
It’s work.
And like all work, it has a percentage of drudgery. But it has a heck of a lot less than say, stocking shelves at Walmart, data-entry, or pouring concrete. Some days you “feel” like it and some days you don’t. Either way, you press on, and oddly enough, the “feeling” catches up eventually.
I agree with JCO: initial inspiration then the execution of said inspiration.
Well, I could not begin to live on my writing income, to date, but I do feel the stress… writing, social media, promotion, etc.
Some writers embrace the creativity aspects of writing; others, the revising/editing (I’m definitely not one of those!). I’ve finally come to the point in life where I can look back and realize that writing is part of who I am, and it always has been. Words thrill me, I love to get to know the characters in my head, so it’s definitely a satisfying thing to get a novel finished.
The chore part for me definitely comes in when I’m working night and day for weeks, to edit/revise/query. The chore part is when I have to tell myself not to give up, AGAIN, because writing is part of who I am, and sooner or later, persistence will pay off. But even then, it’s like the effort you put into nursing your kids in the middle of the night, when they’re vomiting incessantly. You might not sleep at all, it might not be appealing to you, but it’s worth every bit of your time, to see them healthy again. I’ll put any amount of chore-work into my novels to get them to the place where they can be “healthy” enough to be shared with others, so I could possibly make money off them (though I don’t delude myself that it’ll be a “living!”).
it may depend on the writer, but i think if someone feels called to write then hopefully they will experience a little of God’s joy. I think of Eric Liddell in Chariots of Fire.
“I believe that God made me for a purpose. But He also made me fast, and when I run, I feel His pleasure. To give it up would be to hold him in contempt. You were right; it’s not just fun. To win is to honor Him”
To do be paid to do what you enjoy is a dream come true. About as close to heaven as you can get on this side.