The Writer As God? Do I Want That Kind Of Responsibility?

An intellectual says a simple thing in a hard way; an artist says a hard thing in a simple way

If you’ve hung around these parts for any length of time, you probably know that my favorite Substack writer is a romance novelist and American expatriate living in Italy. I don’t remember how I first came across Stacey Eskelin; I’m just glad I did. Our minds very often drain down the same gutter. I have no idea why. For whatever reason, we’re two struggling artists who get each other from half a world away. We admire each other’s talent and sense of humor. Having lived overseas twice, I’m a wee bit jealous of her living in Italy.

As writers, we’ve compared notes on each other’s artistic processes and learned that they’re nothing alike. That makes sense, I suppose. Stacey’s a romance novelist, and her work is about telling stories. I deal in with non-fiction, so I’m trying to inform and change hearts and minds, which is perfect for someone with ADD; I can do it in bite-sized chunks without losing my focus. Or my mind.

One of Stacey’s most recent newsletters is about her writing process, which I found fascinating because it differs so much from my own. I’m pretty eclectic and have all the focus of a recalcitrant four-year-old. Stacey? Well, I’ll let her tell you:

I brood over social injustices. I brood over gloomy prognostications about the future. I brood over the way Spotify killed music, NFTs killed art, Kindle Unlimited killed books, Covid killed live performance, and streaming services are killing the movie industry….

Four days a week, I plant my butt in this chair, stare at the blinking cursor till a spot of blood appears on my forehead, and refuse to budge until I blunder across my topic and the words to go with it. Every day, I fear that the well has run dry, or I’m boring my audience, or I have nothing to say that hasn’t already been said a lot better in The Atlantic.

I brood—there’s that word again—about our collective attention deficit disorder, how no one can focus longer than thirty seconds, how people are too tired to read, how I’m out of sync with this metaverse, and how no one cares or understands what I’m saying because the written word is a mule cart in a Maserati world.

Me? My problem isn’t brooding. I can write anywhere- airports, coffee shops, train stations, malls, hospitals, and a few places I probably shouldn’t have, but, hey, life isn’t worth living if you don’t take a few risks, right? And I don’t brood, I ponder. There are always a thousand and one ideas bouncing off each other in my brain; the challenge is find one that strikes me as most interesting in the moment.

And I can ponder anywhere. My ADD means that sometimes my though processes- and my writing- can resemble a pinball game, but I somehow manage to tie it together in the end.

I wrote a book a couple of years ago, which for someone with ADD is a major accomplishment. I’d always wanted to check that box off my bucket list and I had things I wanted to say. I’ve yet to see a letter from the Pulitzer Prize committee invade my mailbox, and I’m not holding my breath on that count, but you never know. My magnum opus got some great reviews from the couple hundred people who bought and read it, but it’s a long way from making the New York Review of Books, if you know what I mean.

I’ve started another book, but now I’m not so confident that’s a road I want to travel right now. Like Stacey, I wonder if people are too tired or disillusioned (or if their give-a-fuck is broken) to read anything that long anymore. If it’s more than, say, 1500 words, is it just “TL, DR?” Or, “NW, DFC?” (No way, don’t f*****g care.)

I seldom get much feedback on my own newsletter, which is OK, because I don’t write it for the feedback. I’ve always assumed my audience is a few dozen crazy cat ladies and a boatload of recovering alcoholics who are off their meds. I may be wrong about that, of course. I HOPE I’m wrong about that, but I have no idea. Perhaps all nine Supreme Court justices are avid readers, but I doubt it.

It takes time to read an article. It takes even more time to read a book. Reading requires more active participation than any other art form—hours, in some cases….

And yet, no other art form than fiction can take you deeper inside another person’s skull. No other art form can evoke the same level of empathy. As writers, we conjure worlds with our fingertips. We create something out of nothing. The tools of our trade aren’t sable paint brushes or 1920’s saxophones. They’re tiny scribbles on a page that mean nothing unless you happen to be literate in the language of creation. We literally make word pictures out of abstractions….

In these ways, reading not only encourages imagination and empathy, it vastly improves your vocabulary, just as fiction teaches you about yourself and others. But again, it takes time to read—time that is in increasingly short supply in a world that requires us to work two and three jobs just to make ends meet.

And if it takes time and energy to read, think how much energy it takes to create something worth reading. These days, it seems everyone believes they can write. The problem is that very few can WRITE.

There’s a pronounced difference between vomiting words onto your laptop's screen and employing those words to paint a picture, draw a reader in, excite them, and make them anticipate what comes next.

Writing, like any art form, requires talent and vision. It’s like the difference between drawing stick men and producing a Jackson Pollock masterpiece. Sure, I can throw paint against a canvas, but it will look like I threw paint against a canvas without inspiration. Writing’s no different. Not everyone can create a horror novel like Steven King because no one’s brain is wired quite like his.

More than ever before, creating is an act of defiance. I write against the odds and against any expectation of being financially successful, appreciated, or even read. I write for many reasons, some quite personal, including a God-like control over the worlds I create.

I defy reality and common sense several times a week. I no longer have any expectations of financial success. I still have hope, but hope doesn’t feed the bulldog. I hope my work is appreciated and read- somewhere- but I write primarily to maintain my sanity. It’s my outlet and my therapy; if not for my ability to string complete sentences together in a reasonably interesting manner, I’d probably be in a psych ward strung out on Thorazine speedballs.

Writing keeps me off the streets and helps me feel as if I’m contributing something to society- though if you ask me what that contribution is, I’m not sure I could tell you.

I’m not a storyteller, so I don’t create worlds. That means there’s nothing to exercise God-like control over, but I’m still Lord of my domain…for whatever that’s worth. I call the shots, make the rules, and if I f**k things up, it’s on me. And, yeah, I’ve demonstrated my humanity and f****d a time or six over the years. I do the best I can, but I’m a one-person empire here.

I have never written without the tormenting presence of M.O.P.G., My Own Personal Gargoyle. It sits on my shoulder and talks trash. Not about the writing. After thirty-eight years, I probably know how to write. Instead, it tells me how pointless this is, what a waste of time, how irrelevant my life’s work has become in a world of Kardashian clickbait.

This is one of the ways that Stacy and I differ. I’m my M.O.P.G.’s M.O.P.G. There’s a meme from a few years ago that applies here- “Honey Badger don’t give a f**k.” Yeah, that’s how I am with my M.O.P.G. I sit on ITS shoulder and tell it what a f*****g waste of time it is to try and trash talk me- because I don’t care.

I do what I do, and I’m one of those fortunate few who’ve never dealt with writer’s block. My writing style is very conversational, so my writing closely matches the voice in my head. I’m not sure that’s a good thing, but it works for me.

As for Kardashian clickbait, well…Honey Badger don’t give a f**k, knowhutimean?? That sounds like a fancy Armenian fishing lure, anyway.

Drilling down beneath the surface of your own learned writing stratagems, your need for approval, your cynical belief that no one cares, your lust for industry recognition, and your own perpetual ennui is not easy. But that’s where the defiance comes in, and the compulsion to put words on paper, no matter what.

You sit your ass in the chair, and you write. It’s that hard and that simple.

You write the truth without obfuscation.

“[Y}our own cynical belief that no one cares?” Here’s the bad news:

NO ONE CARES.

OK, sure; your spouse or your significant other may be interested in what you’re doing, but you’re the only one who really cares. The sooner you have your come-to-Jesus moment with that reality, the easier all of this will be for you.

No one cares because all of us are wrapped up in our own bullshit. There isn’t any space to care about anything or anyone else. That’s not insensitive or callous; it’s just that each of us only has so much bandwidth, and our own lives suck up pretty much all of it.

So, once you get used to the idea that no one cares, it’s rather freeing. Because YOU care, which means you’re the only one to whom you must answer. Unless you’re getting paid, in which case you’re on you’re own, Sparky. I can’t help you with that.

So what does it matter if only your mother and her bridge club friends at the Whispering Pines Home For Those Facing Painful And Inevitable Death read your latest work of gripping, heartbreaking brilliance? Do you feel good about it? Are you proud to put your name on it?

What else matters, then?

You write to an audience of everyone and no one.

Above all, you remember what poet Charles Bukowski once said: “Find what you love, and let it kill you.”

Perhaps you’ll get lucky, and an audience will find you. Maybe you’ll reach someone who knows someone who knows someone who’s sitting on a pile of money and can’t wait to write a YUUUGE check to you.

And maybe monkeys will fly out of my butt. Bukowski would’ve loved that.