The Pen and the Sword

Surely, the worst profession in the world is a writer.
That's a statement of fact; don't argue with me. And just in case you were thinking to disagree, let me blindside you for a bit with a bum rush of useless knowledge:

When you are as astute in measuring up potential literary rivals as I am, you get around to utterly despising everyone and anyone who thinks that just because they can put a pen to paper, they are automatically credited with undisputed writing skill. It pains me to say so-no, really it does-but a lot of people out there are living a lie. They could be better off as a herdsman of some kind-perhaps in the great vermilion pastures of Scotland, tending to the wooly sheep of yore, or maybe sketching up a brand new advertisement campaign that shall soon grace public buses everywhere. Sadly, such things are never to be. We will never gaze upon the adorned work of one such person stranded in a fool's paradisio; they are blind, and I hold their position in bitter contempt, because it would be better served for myself (and the person in question) if I swiftly annihilated their existence and took over their privileged avatar as if nothing were amiss. Some people just can't write, and yet they continue to make a mockery of the oldest profession in the world.

This is one of the many vices of being a professional writer: you have to think like a writer and start learning to hate your competition. There's no crying in baseball, and there's no friendly banter in literature. Hell, James Joyce and Gertrude Stein wanted to rip each other's guts out. They were both fighting for the title of greatest novelist of their "lost generation." Personally, I think that Joyce wipes the floor with every single one of us, Stein included. No one is ever going to surpass that man. Ever. And no good can come of reading his books, and I'll tell you why right now: once you've sampled his writing, you're going to feel joy-then, pain. Pain that you'll never hope to match his utterly incredible verbiage and imagination. Pain that now you know that you'll always be second best to that wonderfully insane Irishman.

So, the only way to remedy this is to shirk the literary world and become reclusive. What you don't know and what you don't read can't hurt you, right? Bliss through ignorance, as it were.

Now that I've bloodied you up a bit, let's get back to the matter at hand. I know that most crackhead historians consider prostitution the oldest profession of all time, but that just isn't so. A profession can be any right of passage that a human feels obligated in doing-whether it results in profit or not. Therefore, the recording of history is constituted as solid, factual writing. It was a duty that once had profound meaning-a sense of tickling honor came each time the writer jotted down the importance of his era. That is all history really is, in essence-a man trying to make his time period more interesting and significant than it already is. If the years that went by were truly worthy of remembrance, why would the ink need to dry? Why need be for such reminding of the past?

Historical writing is fine-it has always been admirably undertaken with a fiery passion that need not be rekindled. However, the penned atrocities I speak of are found in the sector of fiction-of so-called "creative genius".

Real talent lies in creating original thought, and blending it in and out of fact and fiction, directing your creative hand of genius to make bold withal the clutter. I'm not saying you have to be a regular Tolkien or anything-but a fair amount of your writing should be spawned from pure originality. I know, I know-the old adage "Everything has already been done"-but that is, quite simply, a farce. Nobody has ever imagined a story concerning a pink elephant that grants people wishes, only to mess the wishes up and instead create hellish monsters. Well, perhaps no one has ever imagined such a thing because it is a terrible idea. If I suddenly came up with that, I would immediately banish it from the realms of my conscious mind, casting it into the unplumbed abyss of lost and forgotten stories. You see, a true writer knows when to quit when he is ahead. Those sub-par numbskulls-those disgraceful shams to the inkling blade-do not know the difference between the divine inspiration for ideas, and impulsive thoughts that nearly everyone receives on a daily basis anyway.

A writer can become successful in a vast number of ways, all of the following options branching out to eventually form a single derived truth about what makes one person succumb to the kingship that is literature, and to be considered an embodiment of the world view at large. A quality that some writers sorely lack is the ability to convey the art of true humanity to their work. A character's personality is determined by the possessed knowledge of the writer; what the writer thinks and feels about himself and others in relation to his own view. A truly dank and cluttered existence yields nothing but heroes with wooden faces and hearts of copper. And as we all know, wood rots and copper will rust over. A hero of conviction-of utmost gumption-cannot possibly hold fast to such a falsehood. For with each passing second, the unfortunate protagonist will face each fear alone-but as a result, his will to live becomes like a throbbing pride, a grand desire to somehow make everything worth his while.

In most stories, there is a hero. The hero could be a slum lord or a war prince, a drugstore poorboy or a vice president. His occupation of mortal standard needs not apply to his true quest at hand-the true purpose of his existence is yet to be defined, only unraveled by the misfortunes and windfalls soon to follow. That is all a story really is, by definition-looking into the life of someone or something that will soon experience a rapid metamorphosis. Even if, by the end of the tale, the hero is unscathed and unchanged by the abysmal road taken, there is still a lesson to be learned: That one in spite of all his journeys still has not learned anything new at all, and that is a lesson in itself. How can a man witness a thunderbolt rip through the heavens and not become visibly shaken? Wouldst thou not tremble as the demonic hellspawn tore through the netherworld and emerged to claim your soul?

In this writing of heroes and struggles lies a truth about the writer-all writing is a reflection of the writer, what he or she has experienced, or wants to experience, or wishes to ever experience such things.

Moving onto more pressing matter, I apologize for rambling. My real purpose at hand was to convince you why there are such frauds that walk amongst the noble few. A lack of character-lack of conviction, lack of real energy, or spirit, whatever entity inspires thee to do so-is a sin to be forced upon a sheet of papyrus.

I have seen many books of bad taste and equally bad quality-most of which were so because of bad character development. Within fiction, the core of the whole lies in the characters introduced. Real, living and breathing dynamic people that would be believed to have once walked the grounds of earth-that is what comes to mind when speaking of true influence. Without character, the story is nothing. Would Kafka's work be just as powerful had he been born in an uppercrust, well-to-do clan with nothing on his mind but his tea and crumpets? Would Poe have penned such groaning and clanking machines-the heavy, almost metallic dying breath of our faulty hearts-if Virginia Clemm had lived? Or maybe-just maybe-if Dickinson was more of a social butterfly, she would have become more successful?

Not a chance.

Biographical characterization is an important factor; but that doesn't mean you have to go through some kind of immeasurable tragedy. Human life is a tragedy everyday; you need not go looking for trouble. But still, tragedy doesn't exactly create such great prowess, either. I'm just making a point about true-to-life experience. My own best work is inspired by real feelings and events, as opposed to whimsical fiction born out of dreamy imagination. The real then may be successfully transferred into the surreal, and therein lies a gift.

Now that we've covered the basis for character creation, what about putting that vocabulary of yours to some use?

Many times I've shaken my head at the sight of a pretentious and utterly disgusting use of words-half the time those so-called scholars don't even know what half their words mean. They just throw any smart-sounding text onto the page, and believe me; it falls onto the paper with a sickening splat.

"I'm just genuinely curious to what draws forth the kind of ire and inflammatory reactions we have seen all too often with this sort of thing. You know, the kind of post-realist reality that drolls onward, not unlike absurdity."

That can make sense-but if you're using this as a clever ruse to cover up your false knowledge, it just comes out sounding horrible. I suppose that you would become outraged if I spoke out of such brash conviction-you wouldn't know what the hell I was prattling on about. I find a good textbook mindset of words a useful tool, but even so, please moderate yourself.

Please, do not incorporate the ideas of others in your writing-you know, the sort of thing those young people are doing nowadays. Taking someone's handcrafted characters and inserting them like a viral strain into your own horrible plotline is a sin; it is a crime against nature. It is a sign that you lack the discipline to relate realistic people into the astral plane you developed, and so you play "mix and match" with a bunch of characters that mean nothing to you. The writer obviously created every character for a reason-every one of them reflected an element, a thought, a desire, a grudge, a sorrow, or a joy.

I have just remembered some interesting information-how many people consider common fools to be the "greatest writers of all time." That phrase is just an earwig in the literary ear of one who has read many, many works of writing, as opposed to the stupid simpleton who makes this statement. I cannot believe how many people consider a songwriter or a children's book author a "greatest writer of all time." I don't care how good the lyrics of the song was, I do not give thought to pointless child's dribble, and I certainly will not consider a fantasy genre author who wrote little of anything and much of nothing. Just writing a clever little bit of fantastical fiction and retiring is hardly the work of a great writer. The true writer shant never quit, never cease working and toiling. It is his lifeblood: If you cut him, he bleeds ink.

The true writer does more than write books-they become testaments. No matter how whimsical and shanty they are, as long as there can be serious discussion-of the surreal, of the absurd, of the reality torn, of the boundaries that were shaken or perhaps eve rattled-maybe broken, I should hope. A tale of a great red-skinned giant who goes off gallivanting the country and killing everyone serves no purpose. But what if we could relate to him?

Ah, relate to him! Get inside his head.

And create new ideas, new perspectives on how the giant lives with his daily routine of murder. Perhaps it satiates a long-forgotten desire; perhaps it will cave in and make him cry like bleating lamb-or perhaps not. Maybe, after all, he is just a mindless killing machine. But what if one person-just one, mind you-perceived him as innocent?

And above all, the true writer hates his past work-he won't throw it into the fire, but he frowns with disappointment, and says with a wry smile, "I can do better-This will be only a dream when I wake up." He shall make go beyond the notion of just "writing a book"-there needn't be a plot to fill pages up with ideas. The character can be the writer himself, and that is all that is needed. In the back end, there will be know preface, no epilogue, no closing statements. Just the man and his worthless dreams, seemingly being chased by themselves and a dark shadow that doesn't take pity on either one.

Tis a grisly fate, I know-but to many, it is all that is left. We cannot depend on such luxuries as "trades" and "occupations". To consider submission is a sin. Why bind thyself when thoust holds the key? I don't resign myself to a shackle-but I won't open the door just yet either, so to speak. This little parlor game can amuse me for only so long before I wind up insane.

The ideas contained within are noticeable, by the least. To be a success for yourself, all that need be is to find yourself. I don't care about your stupid little escapades, and neither does anyone else-but if you skew the world's axis long enough, you can find that many people will lose their balance and begin to fall. Taking the lever and pushing as much as one human possibly can-translation of whatever it is that cannot be closed within a bottle, or imprisoned behind a ghastly cell-that is what you want to grab hold of. As a writer, you either want to express repressions, or make note of the expression and repression of others. That is all-those are the only two choices the writer will make (in a subconscious brain, of course.)

I might as well quit while I am ahead-I have expressed all that is needed.

It's a grim thing, coming to the end of a story. I suppose that is why terrible things befall the greatest of us-so there would never be lack of repression. All the emotion in the world has to be locked up somewhere-

So I'm telling you now: write it down.