Join the Neopoet online poetry workshop and community to improve as a writer, meet fellow poets, and showcase your work. Sign up, submit your poetry, and get started.
Dickens Wrote to Pay the Rent
I use the phrase "Dickens wrote to pay the rent" to try and illustrate to writers who want to be taken seriously that serious writers write to communicate ideas and entertain, not to make an important statement.
So what does that mean?
Simply put it means none of us can write important work. All we can do is write and try to communicate and present our idea as best we can and let it free where the world of readers will judge its worth and let us know if it was important or otherwise. The sad truth is that most of what we write falls into the "otherwise" category.
I don't state this to discourage people. Rather I state it to indicate that we do not need to try to write what we are sure is important and ground breaking work. What we need to do is conceive an idea and communicate it as effectively as possible, be this an image in our mind, an emotion in our soul, or a story we have longed to tell.
It also means that we have to be open to revisions, to realise that our work is not perfect, to understand we are all amateurs at this until the world of readers decides otherwise. Words are only words, after all, and there is no shame to admit you can find more effective words to communicate the object or theme of your inspiration than those that first spilled out.
After all, what is actually important, the individual word or the idea?
If we cannot do this simple step, this relinquishing of ego, then we are doomed to be the toast of the people who like us and forgotten by everyone else. And if that's enough for you, have at it, just don't confuse your level of effort, your hobby approach as has been said by another member of this site, with those of us who want to do more than earn the praise of other hobbyists.
This is not a judgement of talent, it is a judgement of intent.
There are people who will take this blog entry as a personal attack. These people are idiots.
So what does that mean?
Simply put it means none of us can write important work. All we can do is write and try to communicate and present our idea as best we can and let it free where the world of readers will judge its worth and let us know if it was important or otherwise. The sad truth is that most of what we write falls into the "otherwise" category.
I don't state this to discourage people. Rather I state it to indicate that we do not need to try to write what we are sure is important and ground breaking work. What we need to do is conceive an idea and communicate it as effectively as possible, be this an image in our mind, an emotion in our soul, or a story we have longed to tell.
It also means that we have to be open to revisions, to realise that our work is not perfect, to understand we are all amateurs at this until the world of readers decides otherwise. Words are only words, after all, and there is no shame to admit you can find more effective words to communicate the object or theme of your inspiration than those that first spilled out.
After all, what is actually important, the individual word or the idea?
If we cannot do this simple step, this relinquishing of ego, then we are doomed to be the toast of the people who like us and forgotten by everyone else. And if that's enough for you, have at it, just don't confuse your level of effort, your hobby approach as has been said by another member of this site, with those of us who want to do more than earn the praise of other hobbyists.
This is not a judgement of talent, it is a judgement of intent.
There are people who will take this blog entry as a personal attack. These people are idiots.