IWACA SPOTLIGHT AUTHOR
IWACA | 21
WHAT COUNTS AS GOOD WRITING, ANYWAY?
wrote for three hours a day and she never stayed out late and all her dates were with famous dead authors. She was a machine for the written word.
And all the while the critics, the wolves- her friends, her partners, her trusted advisors- said things like “Write what you feel” and “Don’t share so much of what you feel” and “Write more” and “Write a little less” and “Be different” and “Get published” and “Play the game but not the same way.” They told her what her best works were (which she already knew) and which pieces to work on (which she already didn’t care about.) She was a machine for their praise which she could never accept, could not seem to get on without.
But as much as she hated them she couldn’t stop. She couldn’t stop writing and it was all trash- mediocre, sappy, weepy, cheesy, unpublishable, unstomachable, emotional, worthless trash. They had done this to her, she knew, had somehow poisoned the well from which anything true had ever sprung and in the crevices and springs of her well-oiled machine now ran tainted, infected blood. It was in her blood to be this good at being this bad, and she wasn’t even good at that anymore.
And when they found her at the bottom of seventeen stories, the note in her clenched fist said, “What counts as good writing anyway?” and she became an overnight success.
What a powerful short story, I'm sure a few of you can connect with the emotions of the character. I know I can. Charlotte has been kind enough to share three of her poems with us. You can find them on pages 30-33.
Thank you, Charlotte for participating in the summer issue.
If you are interested in becoming a featured author or artist, then please get in touch.