A lesson from the parents

Last night I re-read a chapter from one of my favorite writer's bibles, On Becoming A Novelist by John Gardner. Gardner discusses the various day occupations that are suitable for a literary writer. Office work is draining. Journalism "may undermine the writer's prose and sensibility." High-school teaching is "draining" and burdensome, the responsibility too great. Teaching at the college workshop level, he writes, has become very popular but will make the serious writer strive to out-do his students with academic showiness and artiness. The teacher/writer may also ruin his own creativity with the kind of over-analysis and explanation that teaching often entails (and even then there aren't many of these opportunities, considering the hundreds of writers MFA programs pump out every year and the number of teaching slots available). The Guggenheim and the NEA might work, but this is only for writers of a certain level, and the judging process might be unfair. Finally, marriage or long-term commitment to a wealthy significant other is an option, but the writer in this case should be careful to find someone he/she respects and desires (as this sort of prostitution might chip away at his self-respect and affect the quality of his prose)... What I find interesting about all this is that it makes writing (and the urge to write) out to be some fragile thing which one must approach delicately, almost with superstition, as if inspiration will fly away at the slightest hint of... gasp... high school--over-analysis--college workshops!--unfairness--responsibility--office work--sex-with-someone-you-don't-respect (that last part was meant to be funny). Not that I encourage people to prostitute themselves in the name of art, but responsibility and draining work are a reality for most. Most people have never known a perfect cohesion of passion, work, and cash flow. Why should writers have it any better, especially since so many refuse to engage with the economic side of art and shy away from the business of promotion (so let me get this straight: you expect to sit in the wilderness and crank out poems and stories and magically, thousands of people should be interested in this and spend their hard-earned cash on your work when a million other things are vying for their attention?). People will disagree with me, of course, but I think writers need to be tougher about this work business. If it's real, the impulse to write should survive no matter what. And I think this toughness, this engagement with life as it really is is good for a writer's sensibility. I think that working writers (writers who have jobs across industries, not just academia) and writers who have worked (some undoubtedly no longer need to) will naturally infuse their writing with energies that engage other working people. And this should help make the literary world less stale and incestuous.