Walking Through the Clearing: The Thrum of a Creative Life

Maybe that’s the point of writing. Taking a walk in the dark, and showing others through it, too. An invitation into dreams, to quiet, to silence, to earth, to humanity, to rivers that go on and on.

Tonight, at a literary event at Parnassus with our author Laing Rikkers, I met up with Major and Didi Jackson. I also met a woman who told me she would like to be a poet. I asked the woman whether she had ever studied poetry, and she said no. I asked if she had read much poetry, and she said, “Robert Frost.” It’s a good start. Robert Frost is a man of letters, well-loved for a reason. But becoming a serious poet requires reading, writing, and living with poetry. Going to readings is a part of that journey. I grabbed dinner with Major and Didi after the reading, and I thought about how being in the company of great poets—having an artistic community—is also part of the building blocks of a creative life.

The building blocks of a creative life aren’t really blocks at all. I like to think that what moves you toward a creative life are nonlinear, wild spaces you wander through that might add up to a creative undertaking.

Reading what you love is the first place to wander as a writer. I love to read Carmen Maria Machado, Percival Everett, Rebeccah Makkai, Maggie Nelson, Madeline Miller, Toni Morrison. I wander through writing like I wander my backyard at night under the blood orange tree, grateful for its quiet beauty. Knowing what touches your soul is essential.

Back in the day, authors that dominated the field were Philip Roth, Saul Bellow, Norman Mailer, and Donald Barthelme; most people don’t read them now. These authors inspired Don DeLillo, David Foster Wallace, Thomas Pynchon, Cormac McCarthy, Jonathan Franzen, Dave Eggers, Jonathan Lethem. It’s been a while since I last read books from these authors, and most women do not opt to read Thomas Pynchon or David Foster Wallace or Don DeLilillo, because their storylines don’t necessarily resonate with us.

A few years back, Joyce Carol Oates said that an agent she knew wouldn’t read books by young male writers, no matter how good they are. The New York Times and British Vogue have addressed the subject of the “disappearing white male novelist.” The data doesn’t support this idea. On average, male writers make 41% more than female writers, and approximately one-third of published books are written by white men. But of the fiction being purchased in the United States, the UK, and Canada, 80% is purchased by women.

Economic disparity also makes a difference. There are a lot of well-known writers who were sent to good colleges, got a good education, received large advances, and then sailed from there. That is what I call “taking it easy.” Michael Chabon, Emma Cline, Thomas Pynchon. A massive number of unknown writers get whatever education is cheapest, or don’t get an education at all. If you’re in this category, you might think that it’s going to be impossible to get attention for your work. But it’s not impossible. It’s just a lot harder. It’s wildly implausible that people like us will ever be seen to the same degree as richer writers.

And still, you read, and you write, because your soul calls you to do it.

What you don’t want to do is carry invisible suitcases with opportunities you didn’t get. I didn’t go to a good college. I didn’t have the resources to go to Breadloaf or any other writing conference. I could take stock all day, but it doesn’t help me write my next book. I’m working on a different frame of mind when it comes to creating a life that centers on artistic work.

All the men on my list started the race way ahead of me; that’s a fact. But if I stop to complain, I’m not in the race. And it isn’t a race. For them, maybe it is. They are building a Literary Career.

I am walking out into the clearing and finding my writing self. That creative self reads, writes, dreams, arches toward sunshine, swims, stretches, trains for greatness, learns from mistakes, is crazy and afraid. In my writing life, I’m not clawing my way out of the bottom of the well. I’m walking the clearing, finding my way toward creative work, soul work, publishing work, body work, family life, dream life.

Expectation is everything. So, young woman who wants to be a writer: Read a lot. Create a writing schedule, and make it flexible enough to adapt when work and caretaking pull your attention. Send out work to literary journals and magazines at least once a quarter. Try to spend some time with other writers or literary professionals. If the people in your life don’t take your writing seriously, get some people who do.

Most importantly, don’t compare yourself to others. Writing is hard enough. You have to sit by yourself in a room for hours at a time. You have to enlist people to read your work. You have to edit, find an agent, find a publisher, and then wait years as your book moves through the pipeline before it finally comes out. When it does come out, you have to develop an entirely new skill set to promote the book. And at some point, you have to start working on the next book.

I used to think about myself, “I’m the kind of person who can’t get into the room with the fancy writers,” and even now, I can’t imagine meeting Michael Chabon or Jonathan Franzen. But I once read with the marvelous Ursula LeGuin, and that was magic. In the end, it isn’t about being in the room with some fancy writer. It’s showing up for yourself and believing in your work. At Red Hen, each year we have strong novels by women, by writers of color, by queer writers, and by men. I want to hear all the stories in the room.

At AWP, I met Khan Ha, the author of our upcoming book, The Afterlife of a Threadbare Jester, which walks readers through a reeducation camp in Vietnam after the war. It’s an exquisite book. He found his way into the dark and carried us through it. Maybe that’s the point of writing. Taking a walk in the dark, and showing others through it, too. An invitation into dreams, to quiet, to silence, to earth, to humanity, to rivers that go on and on, because truly great writing is water, is thrum, no matter who sees it.

Let Me Begin Again

Major Jackson

Let me begin again as a quiet thought
in the shape of a shell slowly examined
by a brown child on a beach at dawn
straining to see their future. Let me begin
this time knowing the drumming in my dreams
is me inheriting the earth, is morning
lighting up the rivers. Let me burn
my vanities: old music in the pines, sifters
of scotch, a day moon like a signature
of night. This time, let me circle
the island of my fears only once then
live like a raging waterfall and grow
a magnificent mustache. Let me not ever be
the birdcage or the serrated blade or
the empty season. Dear Glacier, Dear Sea
of Stars, Dear Leopards disintegrating
at the outer limits of our greed; soon we will
encounter you only in motivational tweets.
Reader, I should have married you sooner.
This time, let me not sleep like the prophet who
believes he’s seen infinity. Let me run
at break-neck speeds toward sceneries
of doubt. I have no more dress rehearsals
to attend. Look closer: I am licking my lips.