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Showing Your Writing to Others
Here's a question: why do you write? And here's another one: who reads it? When I was seventeen, I wrote a poem, my first poem that was not set as part of the school curriculum. I'd been reading something by Lewis Carroll and I'd also just finished "Waiting for Godot" by Samuel Beckett and I felt compelled to write a poem where every line contradicted itself. It was a challenge that I set myself - just for fun. The poem began:
I completed the poem a few days later, during an English lesson, and was so thrilled with it that I immediately jumped up from my chair and thrust it under the nose of my teacher. I stood beside him, trembling as he read and when he finished, he handed it back to me and said dismissively, "I wrote something very similar when I was in love." I was reminded of this incident while answering a questionnaire recently. The question I was asked was: "Do you remember the first time you showed your writing to someone? Did their reaction have an impact on you?" My answer was, yes I do remember and yes his reaction did have an impact on me. I didn't show my writing to anyone else for seventeen years. Since answering that question though, a million more have flowed. Why was I affected so adversely? Why did I need his approval? Who did I write it for anyway? And here's what I've discovered. "Consequence", the title of the poem, began as a personal challenge and I loved every minute that I worked on it. I was present in the moment - I was truly living. But it wasn't enough. I needed to share. Let me explain - with an analogy, 'cause I like analogies. Writing is a bit like giving birth only more painful! You grow your story or your poem or your rant inside you, and eventually it has to come out. You have a birth - day and you celebrate. You are thrilled with your creation - your baby - no matter how ugly it is. But here's where the similarities end. In the world of writing, everyone's a critic and to survive you need to grow, borrow or steal a very thick skin. It took me seventeen years to grow mine but eventually after actually giving birth three times, I had the guts to show someone else what I'd written. His reaction was quite different and that's why you're reading about it today. So who reads your writing? Have you taken the plunge and submitted your work to a competition or a magazine or your local newspaper? Have you been rejected? Rejected. Now there's a word. Let's look at some of the words that are tossed around the writing world shall we? From The Concise Oxford Dictionary
The thing is, as writers, we set ourselves apart and yet we desperately seek acceptance, so to write and not submit, in my opinion, is to live only half a writer's life. So I ask again. Who is reading your writing? I'll bet you've guessed by now what your homework is. Go on. Don't be afraid. You have absolutely nothing to lose. What's the worst than can happen? Your work is rejected? So what! Think of it this way. Rejected or not it has been caressed by another's eyes. You wouldn't hide a real baby from the world so don't deny yourself. Last year I was asked to participate in The Overload Poetry Festival. I was invited to read my poetry alongside real poets such as Graeme Kinross-Smith, Matt Hetherington and Kerry Scuffins. How I got to be invited is another story; suffice to say, I was extremely flattered not to mention extremely petrified. But I did it, not because I think my work is brilliant but because I didn't want to deny myself the experience and isn't that what life is all about - experience? So take the plunge. Deny yourself no longer! Okay, before I go, I'd like to share with you the rest of my first rejected poem - "Consequence"
Now be gentle with me - I was only seventeen…
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