The marvelous Joanna Russ wrote, “Leaning her silly, beautiful, drunken head on my shoulder, she said, ‘Oh, Esther, I don't want to be a feminist. I don't enjoy it. It's no fun.’ ‘I know,’ I said. ‘I don't either. People think you decide to be a radical, for God's sake, like deciding to be a librarian or a ship's chandler. You ‘make up your mind,’ you ‘commit yourself’ (sounds like a mental hospital, doesn't it?).’ I said, ‘Don't worry, we could be buried together and have engraved on our tombstone the awful truth, which some day somebody will understand: WE WUZ PUSHED..’”
By which I mean: YOU WUZ PUSHED (to write). So write. Don’t let the delete key or the “file away forever” file be your voice. Publish here and let that internal critical editor be damned!
And if you return to what you’ve published here and edit it further, you will join the pantheon of writers who have done so forever. Do you think anyone who collects their newspaper columns, essays, articles for a book never goes back to polish and, in some cases, to “kill their darlings”? Think again, dear writer.
You have plenty to say and I know you have courage. And if I have to send my cat to beat up that internal critical editor, I will!
Glad to have discovered you when you're just getting started. Here to cheerlead if you need it. I also have too much in my head and not enough in the world. You're not terrible at all and if you were, no matter. Still just do it.
At risk of oversharing (isn't that why we do this shit) - I'm likely about to undergo a boyfriend-breakup so I guess my creative renaissance from heartbreak is imminent! Yay!
The marvelous Joanna Russ wrote, “Leaning her silly, beautiful, drunken head on my shoulder, she said, ‘Oh, Esther, I don't want to be a feminist. I don't enjoy it. It's no fun.’ ‘I know,’ I said. ‘I don't either. People think you decide to be a radical, for God's sake, like deciding to be a librarian or a ship's chandler. You ‘make up your mind,’ you ‘commit yourself’ (sounds like a mental hospital, doesn't it?).’ I said, ‘Don't worry, we could be buried together and have engraved on our tombstone the awful truth, which some day somebody will understand: WE WUZ PUSHED..’”
By which I mean: YOU WUZ PUSHED (to write). So write. Don’t let the delete key or the “file away forever” file be your voice. Publish here and let that internal critical editor be damned!
And if you return to what you’ve published here and edit it further, you will join the pantheon of writers who have done so forever. Do you think anyone who collects their newspaper columns, essays, articles for a book never goes back to polish and, in some cases, to “kill their darlings”? Think again, dear writer.
You have plenty to say and I know you have courage. And if I have to send my cat to beat up that internal critical editor, I will!
Anything but the cat.
Glad to have discovered you when you're just getting started. Here to cheerlead if you need it. I also have too much in my head and not enough in the world. You're not terrible at all and if you were, no matter. Still just do it.
At risk of oversharing (isn't that why we do this shit) - I'm likely about to undergo a boyfriend-breakup so I guess my creative renaissance from heartbreak is imminent! Yay!
I’m loving your blog-writing. I’m a terrible writer and human but I’m ok with that. Well sort of. Keep hope alive Jenn!!!