The line about having a PhD making you feel somehow less qualified to write about something hit a nerve!
I don't think I censor myself for fear of getting criticized, but I do play the line about "does anybody really need me to say this" quite a lot. Journaling helps. Social media...does not.
I think at this point most of my fear comes from market pressures in the publishing industry, rather than social pressure in journalism--but there's still a distinct tie-in with social media. Fiction writers spend ungodly amounts of time and energy networking, providing mutual support for other authors on our feeds, and always hoping for that elusive hand-up from the greats we admire. At its best this is community-building, and on a good day it feels amazing--but on a bad one it can start to feel cynical, cliquey, even paranoid. You become deathly afraid of pissing the wrong person off and become persona non grata at the party. There are private chats unfolding behind the scenes (bad art friend style, lol) and any one of them could be the reason you don't get your next blurb. Social media also tends to reify genre distinctions that can feel oppressive--for best results, you have to be associated with a readily-grasped genre, describable in a tweet or Instagram post, and your Goodreads readers have to recognize your "readalikes."
And oh my god, Goodreads! We *ALL* read online reviews, and we are *ALL* haunted by the harshest and meanest, which are way meaner than a professional reviewer would ever allow themselves to be. There's no real reason to have a constant stream of real-time, permanently available reader responses always in our heads. The paradigmatic author horror story is getting tagged in a 2- or 3-star review on social media. It's bizarrely humiliating in a way that's hard to capture. And it's all in your head, every time you sit down to write. The fear is that no one will want a weird book, that no one needs you to write it, that people will be offended or even disgusted by it. And the antidote, as far as I know, is just to fucking write it anyway. Because there's nothing worse than watering down a book. Even if everyone in the world likes it, you'll never be totally happy with it.
I am grateful for this since you get at the perverse conundrum of writing for publication: you need to think of your audience, but also you need to write fully for yourself and not think of your audience. And I think people who aren't writers don't necessarily understand how difficult it is to square that circle, that it's not just craft work but psychological work. (Using "writers" here in very broad sense -- including academic writing, journalism, all sorts of writing done under one's own name.)
This morning I had a kind of corporate interview - my wife and I both talking about our experience of the past two years and working from home (with two small kids) for an EU institution. Your post already spoke to me a lot, but it also galvanised some thoughts and led me to talk about the fears that have come up over the Covid times and the impact on mental health - I didn't want to just focus on any positives because we've all been cut off from each other going through some version of Sartre's "hell is other people" or TS Eliot's "Hell is oneself" while trying to improvise and cope. Thank you for addressing your audience so directly - it really made me want to respond.
The "market" is the locus of veridiction. And Foucault knew that capital would control the market. Hence we all live in the fear of what the market will think of us, so we have to watch what we say, cause if you say the wrong thing, "wham" your canceled. Feels totalitariany doesn't it?
I have shared this with my writing group. I think it will help us all and provoke some good discussions. Thank you for sharing your insights.
The line about having a PhD making you feel somehow less qualified to write about something hit a nerve!
I don't think I censor myself for fear of getting criticized, but I do play the line about "does anybody really need me to say this" quite a lot. Journaling helps. Social media...does not.
I've come to think that's part of the "discipline" of graduate school in many places -- keeping the students from ever saying anything again!
I think at this point most of my fear comes from market pressures in the publishing industry, rather than social pressure in journalism--but there's still a distinct tie-in with social media. Fiction writers spend ungodly amounts of time and energy networking, providing mutual support for other authors on our feeds, and always hoping for that elusive hand-up from the greats we admire. At its best this is community-building, and on a good day it feels amazing--but on a bad one it can start to feel cynical, cliquey, even paranoid. You become deathly afraid of pissing the wrong person off and become persona non grata at the party. There are private chats unfolding behind the scenes (bad art friend style, lol) and any one of them could be the reason you don't get your next blurb. Social media also tends to reify genre distinctions that can feel oppressive--for best results, you have to be associated with a readily-grasped genre, describable in a tweet or Instagram post, and your Goodreads readers have to recognize your "readalikes."
And oh my god, Goodreads! We *ALL* read online reviews, and we are *ALL* haunted by the harshest and meanest, which are way meaner than a professional reviewer would ever allow themselves to be. There's no real reason to have a constant stream of real-time, permanently available reader responses always in our heads. The paradigmatic author horror story is getting tagged in a 2- or 3-star review on social media. It's bizarrely humiliating in a way that's hard to capture. And it's all in your head, every time you sit down to write. The fear is that no one will want a weird book, that no one needs you to write it, that people will be offended or even disgusted by it. And the antidote, as far as I know, is just to fucking write it anyway. Because there's nothing worse than watering down a book. Even if everyone in the world likes it, you'll never be totally happy with it.
I am grateful for this since you get at the perverse conundrum of writing for publication: you need to think of your audience, but also you need to write fully for yourself and not think of your audience. And I think people who aren't writers don't necessarily understand how difficult it is to square that circle, that it's not just craft work but psychological work. (Using "writers" here in very broad sense -- including academic writing, journalism, all sorts of writing done under one's own name.)
whoa monster comment--your post has me thinking deeply about this!
This morning I had a kind of corporate interview - my wife and I both talking about our experience of the past two years and working from home (with two small kids) for an EU institution. Your post already spoke to me a lot, but it also galvanised some thoughts and led me to talk about the fears that have come up over the Covid times and the impact on mental health - I didn't want to just focus on any positives because we've all been cut off from each other going through some version of Sartre's "hell is other people" or TS Eliot's "Hell is oneself" while trying to improvise and cope. Thank you for addressing your audience so directly - it really made me want to respond.
I love this Irina, thank you. I do think social media has had a huge influence on real, good journalism. I also
I think your comment got cut off, Karen!
Oops! I think I was going to add that I agreed with you about the other fears we have of writing.
The "market" is the locus of veridiction. And Foucault knew that capital would control the market. Hence we all live in the fear of what the market will think of us, so we have to watch what we say, cause if you say the wrong thing, "wham" your canceled. Feels totalitariany doesn't it?
"I'm not an expert in bravery, but I am rather experienced in the matter of fear." Love this!