The Write Advice 211: BETSY LERNER

 

Chances are you want to write because you are a haunted individual, or a bothered individual, because the world does not sit right with you, or you in it.  Chances are you have a deep connection to books because at some point you discovered that they were the one truly safe place to discover and explore feelings that are banished from the dinner table, the cocktail party, the golf foursome, the bridge game.  Because the writers who mattered to you have dared to say I am a sick man.  And because within the world of books there is no censure.  In discovering books, you became free to explore the full range of human motives, desires, secrets, and lies.  All my life, people have scolded me for having an excess of feeling, saying that I was too sensitive — as if one could be in danger from feeling too much instead of too little… I am not suggesting a writer let it bleed so much as I am suggesting that he understand his motivation.

      The more popular culture and the media fail to present the real pathos of our human struggle, the more opportunity there is for writers who are unafraid to present stories that speak emotional truth, or that make such an intimate connection that briefly we become children again, listening with rapt attention… At a time when people are encouraged to follow their bliss, to pursue whatever makes them feel good, I suggest you stalk your demons.  Embrace them.  If you are a writer, especially one who has been unable to make your work count or stick, you must grab your demons by the neck and face them down.  And whatever you do, don't censor yourself.  There's time and editors for that.

 

The Forest for the Trees: An Editor's Advice to Writers (Revised edition 2010)

 

 

 

 

Use the link below to visit the website of North American writer, poet, editor and literary agent BETSY LERNER:

 

https://betsylerner.com/

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

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The Write Advice 197: BETSY LERNER

 

…The writer's psychology is by its very nature one of extreme duality.  The writer labors in isolation, yet all that intensive, lonely work is in the service of communicating, is an attempt to reach another person.  It isn't surprising, then, that many writers are ambivalent, if not altogether neurotic, about bringing their work forward.  For in so doing, a writer must face down that which he most fears: rejection.  There is no stage of the writing process that doesn't challenge every aspect of a writer's personality.  How well writers deal with those challenges can be critical to their survival.

 

The Forest for the Trees: An Editor's Advice to Writers (revised edition 2010)

 

 

 

 

Use the link below to visit the website of North American writer, poet, editor and literary agent BETSY LERNER:

https://betsylerner.com/

 

 

 

 

You might also enjoy:

 

 

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The Write Advice 184: BETSY LERNER

 

I can't think of a riskier business than writing.  Not only because so few succeed in conventional terms, with publication and some payment, but because it almost certainly requires banishment.  First, there is the literal act of removing oneself, of choosing solitude.  Then there is the psychological separation, holding oneself apart.  And finally, the potential rejection of friends and family, critics and publishers… But you cannot censor yourself; successful writing never comes about through half-measures.  For most people the first book is about the family, if only metaphorically, and it must be conquered as surely as the walls of Jericho.

 

The Forest for the Trees: An Editor's Advice to Writers (revised edition 2010)

 

 

 

Use the link below to visit the website of North American writer, poet, editor and agent BETSY LERNER:

https://betsylerner.com/

 

 

 

You might also enjoy:

 

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Think About It 073: BRAD BIGELOW

 

But the most common and by far most effective way things get forgotten is inertia.  Forgetting is the human condition.  Dementia is only noticeable because it’s such an aggressive form of forgetting.  Remembering takes effort, and if no one makes the effort, the inevitable result is that people and what they accomplished in their lives are forgotten.

 

'The Laughing Cavalier,' by Allan Turpin (1969)

[Neglected Books, 20 July 2020]

 

 

Use the link below to visit Neglected Books, the consistently interesting 'forgotten literature' website operated by North American blogger and editor BRAD BIGELOW:

 

 

https://neglectedbooks.com/?p=6944

 

 

 

 

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