I noticed today that the one of the judges of the short-story contest that I submitted to is noneother than Abe, an acquaintance of mine from the ladycollege. I like her. She is extremely talented and while she is a successful writer, I can't be jealous of her because she's a poet and I'm not, and I'm a comedian and she's not. So she ain't competition. She also works with children and the poor, and I say mean shit and work with paper. So clearly she's a better person than me.
However, with her as a judge, I don't think that my story would really appeal to her. Maybe it would. Can't speak for her. But she and her contemporaries seem to be more into the "flowy" writing that I can't get with. I feel like a failure unless I'm being funny/cheeky/witty/bitchy, but her writing (very good, btw) is very flowy, earnest, descriptive, and what you would find in those literary mags that reject my work.
Speaking of, I usually don't like other people's short stories. When I read the winners of this contest from past years, I am not all that impressed. A lot of writers just like to shoot up their work with STYLE! and not really tell a story. I think my story tells a story: an infertile couple become the parents of a laboratory-made baby who is defective and they have to decide whether or not to return her for a replacement model. Hey! I have a log line. In the end, the mother wants to keep the defective baby, the father does not, so the mother drives off into the sunset with her defective baby. Why? Because that's her kid and she loves it. We can all believe that ending even if we can't believe the story.
I have a borderline narcissistic attitude towards my writing, but I guess that's how I cope with the fear of sucking. I've really invested a lot of time and energy and EGO into the novel, so if it is a resounding failure, then I will hate myself. It's a gamble, but one I can't imagine not taking.
MEMEMEMEMEMEMEME.
Posted by Zerd at January 27, 2007 01:49 PM