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April 4, 2007 9:03 AM
The Writing Process and Publication
Springtime is generally when I turn to personal writing, and what that means is I turn to writing poetry. It is that time of year that I find myself more prolific than other times of the year. I've been following a certain cycle for about the past fifteen to twenty years.
I tend to submit work to various periodicals in the fall, read in the winter and write in the spring. The reading is the key to the writing, and it takes several months of probing reading to write anything of linguistic interest, for me anyway.
I tend to submit work to various periodicals in the fall, read in the winter and write in the spring. The reading is the key to the writing, and it takes several months of probing reading to write anything of linguistic interest, for me anyway.
I think it was Henry James that said it takes reading 100 books to write one. It takes an awful lot of reading to write anything--Most of what I write is, in essence, a response to other literature. Form responding to form. Phrase responding to phrase. Diction troping diction, etc. Sometimes, as much reading as I might do, I simply haven't got enough material to write with, but by spring, usually, I am ready to write some poetry.
I work on poems from March or April through to August. Most of this is revision of usually about a dozen of the same poems that are spawned early in the cycle. With each passing year, my hope is that I am growing as a poet, but that is not always or necessarily the case. The results, as far as my sense of success, come during the academic year, after I've mailed off some 30 or 40 packets of poems.
Starting in September, then week by week through the year, I slowly hear from the literary magazines and reviews to which I've submitted work. There are many rejections of my work, but, and this is what keeps me going, a few acceptances. One by one, poems are picked up for publication. The work from the previous spring is, one way or another in one review or another, endorsed as having literary merit.
Some years are better than others, and I publish more work in those years. Some years are better than others in that I write more. The best years are those years that I write a lot and publish a lot. Those happen to be the years I read a lot during the winter preceding the writing time in spring.
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I work on poems from March or April through to August. Most of this is revision of usually about a dozen of the same poems that are spawned early in the cycle. With each passing year, my hope is that I am growing as a poet, but that is not always or necessarily the case. The results, as far as my sense of success, come during the academic year, after I've mailed off some 30 or 40 packets of poems.
Starting in September, then week by week through the year, I slowly hear from the literary magazines and reviews to which I've submitted work. There are many rejections of my work, but, and this is what keeps me going, a few acceptances. One by one, poems are picked up for publication. The work from the previous spring is, one way or another in one review or another, endorsed as having literary merit.
Some years are better than others, and I publish more work in those years. Some years are better than others in that I write more. The best years are those years that I write a lot and publish a lot. Those happen to be the years I read a lot during the winter preceding the writing time in spring.
I think what is essential is that I have this thing I do that I love, that I'm willing to risk my ego over--to the extent that I'm willing to have my work rejected--and that I get some reward for--when I do get affirmation. I would urge anyone who writes to begin submitting work as early on as possible, so he or she can find that keel of confirmation.
It is by no means an easy process but it can be very gratifying. I've always told students that writing is a struggle, and that if it is not truly a struggle then it is not truly writing. Publication is a struggle too, but a struggle one has much less control over. Force of will will not get somebody published. Perseverance and patience and the willingness to face rejection again and again are all requisites. The ability to hold onto the affirmation of success to continue on is equally important. Writing, the way I always like to think about it, begins to sound a lot like life.
It is by no means an easy process but it can be very gratifying. I've always told students that writing is a struggle, and that if it is not truly a struggle then it is not truly writing. Publication is a struggle too, but a struggle one has much less control over. Force of will will not get somebody published. Perseverance and patience and the willingness to face rejection again and again are all requisites. The ability to hold onto the affirmation of success to continue on is equally important. Writing, the way I always like to think about it, begins to sound a lot like life.
Posted by Matthew Kearney at April 4, 2007 9:03 AM
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