How much is my writing tied to me? Each time The Burden of Foreknowledge (BoF) gets rejected (close to two dozen and counting) in the US, I feel as if the editor in question has taken a look at me, curled her lip and declared me wanting. My agent tells me none of them have given any concrete reasons.
One editor at a major house liked it...loved it...and was ready to make an offer. Then it was decided that they had already signed their Indian woman author for the year. The editor called my agent, disappointed. Was that supposed to make me feel better? It doesn't. It does tell me of the capriciousness of the publishing industry. And yet there is the tiny (or not so tiny) part of me that tells me it's me. It's the crappiness of my writing. But when did writing, an intensely private and personal activity, become an almost completely commercial activity? When did the rejection of my writing become a rejection of my self worth...a rejection of me?
At least I can still take pleasure in my own writing, in the process, in that magical time between worlds. And I can wait. I am getting good at that.
2 comments:
in the end it is karma
you will write
and write
because you don't know any better:)
the magic and the pleasure is all yours
as is waiting
karma!
t
I hear you. You have to be like a Rottweiler when it comes to trying to get published... sink in with your teeth and don't let go til they kill you and have to cut you off your victim's body!!!
Post a Comment