While reading this post, you may enjoy listening to Heart’s A Mess by Gotye.
a. By far the most interesting thing about LitCamp was that elephant sitting at the end of the table, the internet. Keith Ridgway was the provocateur on a panel discussion about what the future of publishing will be in the “Digital Age”. General conclusion: nobody knows.
b. Personally I think that publishing as an industry will die the death of a thousand digital cuts, now that the barrier to entry for writers has been lowered to zero by the internet. The only way that writers will be able to make a living is through a) selling rights for viable media such as television, and b) setting up alternative revenue streams on their own terms.
c. More on that later. Let’s not think about the publishing, but about the writing. Writing is a solitary activity. which means that the Web sets up an interesting creative tension between the character of the writer and the requirements of the audience. When I sit down to write, I’m writing for myself, an audience of one who can read back instantly and tell me if he likes it. (Usually he doesn’t.)
d. Contrast this with blogs. Some bloggers might claim to be writing for themselves, but they’re not. If they were writing for themselves, they’d keep a journal, or a text file on their computer. When I write a blog post, I’m superbly conscious that I’m not writing for myself – I’m writing for somebody out there. Guaranteed publication = guaranteed self-censorship for anybody with any sense of dignity.
e. So this process of writing is profoundly different to that first type of writing, because when you’re writing online there’s the expectation of interaction. If you blog, you’re looking for comments; or for links from other blogs citing you; or at least people whispering behind your back.1
f. Either way – interaction or validation – neither of those are true of “creative” (ahem) writing, the sort of writing where you try to push out 2000 words of a novel per day for 60 days. How could it be? I second-guess myself all the time as it is, continually criticising and cajoling and confusing myself about my own writing – imagine if I had other people reading my stuff in real time! I’d never get anything done!2
g. Yet the tension is there. Why did I post that first draft of a poem? Why am I thinking about posting my latest short story in its entirety? I can’t honestly say I’m looking for interaction – once I write the final version of something, I consider it “out there”, like a child that grew up and left home. Comments are nice, feedback is nice, but it’s not really interaction. Is it?
h. So what’s the future of writing in a Digital Age? Where are the new forms of writing, O Future Of The Book? Where can I find innovation in storytelling, Penguin Avatar? Is it all just stale downloads and rubbish websites? Why does nobody hail Geoff Ryman as the first writer to really try something really exciting?
i. I don’t have the answers. Writers with blogs? Try Belinda Webb. Poets with blogs? Try Jay Bernard. Publishers with blogs? Try Michael Bhasker. Nobody has the answers, but we keep on writing anyway.
- More specifically I have a sneaking suspicion that the real motive behind blogging is the expectation of validation – that other people will read what you’ve written and think or say or write “Hey, I agree with you!” [↩]
- Of course, I don’t get much done as it is, but that’s another story. [↩]
Tags: Litcamp
Hey, I agree with you!
I’m either doing something very very right or very very wrong.
Surely you don’t agree with the whole thing? Come on curmudgeon!
Oh, I haven’t read it. Just fulfilling your expectation of validation.
That’s no kind of validation. I wasn’t fooled for a moment. You need to learn to fake sincerity. Then I can accept your support (including financial, I’ll email you the PayPal details).