“Any life when viewed from the inside is simply a series of defeats.” — George Orwell.
Writing is a never-ending struggle; to say otherwise is dishonest. There are challenges to deal with: subject matter to write, a catchy title, clear and appropriate words that will form a sentence, convincing argument, structure and content, writer’s block, ideal time to write, deadlines, and doing research.
But why bother to write?
In his thin book, On Writing and Failure, Stephen Marche wrote: “Failure is the body of a writer’s life. Success is only ever an attire. A paradox defines this business: The public only sees writers in their victories but their real lives are mostly in defeat.”
Stephen Marche makes his living as a writer. He has authored several books and contributed opinion pieces to well-known magazines and newspapers such as The New York Times, The New Yorker, The Atlantic, The Walrus, and The Guardian. Yet he finds the idea that writers are doomed in life interesting, thus compelling him to write a book about it.
He backs his argument with the following points:
- In spite of their success, writers will inevitably be forgotten. Marche mentions the American poet Fitz-Greene Halleck. He has a statue in Central Park and Edgar Allan Poe wrote in 1843 that “No name is the American poetical world is more firmly established than that of Fitz-Greene Halleck.” Now he is nothing but a literary celebrity in the past.
- The pain of rejections. Marche has several examples: Twilight was rejected 14 times, Diary of Anne Frank 15 times, A Wrinkle in Times 26 times, and Gone with the Wind 38 times. Marche also mentions that it took Agatha Christie 5 years before she got her stories published, and that Marcel Proust and Beatrix Potter had to rely on self-publishing.
- Poverty looms large in a writer’s life. Excellent writing does not automatically guarantee financial security. Take for example the life of James Joyce regarded as one of the most influential and important writers of the 20th century. While living in a self-imposed exile in Italy with wife and couple of kids at age 30 and already had written Dubliners and A Portrait of the Artist as a Young Man, he was forced to apply for a job as an English teacher at a local technical college because of a looming eviction. Still he didn’t get it. Marche can’t believe it, “Anyone with the desire to make art with words should be aware that James Joyce—James fucking Joyce—couldn’t make a living at it. Deserving has nothing to do with it.”
- Success can be hazardous to your well-being. Everybody knows Ernest Hemingway and F. Scott Fitzgerald, both famous American writers. Marche writes that Hemingway was always confident of his success as a writer while Fitzgerald was frequently insecure. At the end, their contrasting posture as a writer didn’t matter. Both wrote masterpieces and committed suicide. Hemingway killed himself with a shotgun while Fitzgerald drank himself to death with booze.
- Writers are always subject to persecution, especially in their own countries. Marche referenced the case of Ovid, the greatest poet of ancient Rome. His sin apparently was to write poems in Getic, the language of the barbarians. For that he was exiled to Tomis, far from friends and civilization. The cruelty was to consign him into irrelevance. Another cruel example was the treatment of Fyodor Dostoevsky, author of most acclaimed novels such as the Crime and Punishment (1866) and The Brothers Karamazov (1880). The Russian authorities arrested him for being a member of the Petrashevsky Circle, a literary discussion group of progressive intellectuals in the 1840s. He was sentenced to death before a firing squad. It turned out it was just a mock execution ordered by the Czar to have the last laugh.
- Writing requires perseverance. How long does it take before the reading public acknowledges your worthiness as a writer? Simple question yet it is the heart of the matter that plagues every writer, successful or not. The length of time to produce a masterpiece can wear you down mentally, spiritually and financially. Writers don’t need to suffer yet its presence can be an awful deterrence. No matter what the motivation to write, perseverance is a must. “So anyone who tells you that you have to be a certain way to be a writer,” Marche writes, “that you have to live a certain life, that you have to see the world or that you have to lock yourself away, that you have to abandon your people or that you have to love your people, that you have to suffer or that you have to forget your suffering, whatever, it’s all bullshit. You have to write. You have to submit. You have to persevere. You have to throw yourself against the door. That’s it.”
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Money is a strong motivation to write; the fame, the acclamation, the high-status are additional perks to being a successful writer. So to write in spite of the absence of monetary reward is foolhardy indeed. It might just be a vanity disguised as a fulfillment. “Trying to find fulfillment through writing,” Marche admonishes, “is like trying to fly by jumping off a cliff.” A preacher in Ecclesiastes says “My son, be admonished: of making many books there is no end, and much study is a weariness of flesh.” When I google how many books are being published every year, it is estimated it is around 4 million. Aside from books, we have newspapers and magazines vying for the readers’ attention. Make note that people pay for the enjoyment of reading the works of writers who know how to write. So again, why bother to write when you are not being paid?
I had spelled my reasons for writing in my article entitled Why Do I Write which was published in the October 16-31, 2021 issue of the Balita. To reiterate, my first reason is as a form of therapy, the same feeling I get when I do my gardening. The last reason is to enhance my understanding of issues. Just as reading is a matter of comprehension, writing your thoughts complements or clarifies your initial understanding of so many perspectives surrounding our lives. But behind these two reasons is a hopeful belief that I may turn into a real writer. But upon reading Marche’s book, I am no longer sure, especially if I adhere to his warning when he says: “If you are writing because you want to be a writer, I would very much like to dissuade you from that ambition.”
I started sending my articles to Balita beginning with the January 16-31, 2020 issue. At first, I had not struggled in committing two articles a month. I was brimming with ideas and could sit down hours after hours, putting them down on paper. They were flowing. I just couldn’t believe I had them locked up for so many years. I chose topics that I felt would resonate: the abuse of women, the fragile relationship of family, racial injustice and discrimination, the war in Ukraine, aging, religious indifference and absurdity, profiles of lives lived to the full, Trumpism, Philippine politics, corruption, abuse of power, mercy killing, and many, many more. I have no measure whatsoever if I am getting through. I haven’t got any feedback to date. But at the end of each article, I felt I had accomplished something, that my time was not wasted. You may call it fulfillment. As Margaret Atwood used to say, “It wasn’t the result but the experience that had hooked me: It was the electricity.”
After five years that “electricity” seems to lose its power. The commitment to write two articles a month is turning into a very taxing project. I have to do more reading, researching and thinking what to write next. The question “What for?” plays like a devil’s advocate in my mind. Furthermore, the well is getting dry. Ideas no longer come easily. Words start to be elusive. The joy of writing is reduced by the feeling of unrewarded effort. Yet I try to persevere; but for how long, I don’t know. If you may have noticed (or not), I am just submitting one article a month at the beginning of 2024. It cuts down in the amount of time and energy I have to expend for a voluntary work. After all, I am retired and life is getting shorter each day. Yet, this creative activity beats the hell of doing nothing.
I give the last words to Stephen Marche:
“No whining. It is a peculiar ambition to write. Most of the people you emulate died in the gutter and many, at the end, weren’t worthy of the gutter. The desire to make meaning, indistinguishable from the possession of a soul, is a valid desire despite the inevitability of defeat. The loneliness of this business can be delicious, the cached privacies, the dark corners of words, verbs and their foibles, nouns and their stubbornness, the weird rhythms they take on together, the sudden gusts of sentiments, the crashes of insight. The loneliness of this business can be abyssal, holes were all you can hear is your heartbeat, your own dumb blood. There are failures right now, all over, rendering meanings, and some will be born, some will miscarry, some will be aborted, and behind them all lies that persistent urge: To be with you somehow when nobody is with you. Writers are peculiar beings with their successful failures and their failed successes. Their skins are so thin you can hold them up to the light.”
[Writer’s note: So far I have contributed 57 essays, 34 short stories, 10 poems, and a three-act play.]
20 February 2025