Veeky Forums I need some advice and I'm not joking.
I just won a short story competition with a story I wrote in one day. It's 2,000 words about an older working class guy full of regret who retires and decides to fulfill his lifelong ambition of conducting an orchestra, only to form one and to have the debut performance ruined due to bad weather. It's "humorous" and I suppose "cute" and there is a $1500 prize, which is something.
However, I fear that by having my name (and image) associated with said story I am condemning myself to a "style" of writing which is kinda low-brow and superficially interesting at best, and admitting, in a sense, that I'm capable of no more. I fear that finally making my "debut" in a literary sense in this manner I am just letting myself down by going from saying nothing and being considered to be "full of potential" to saying something (at last!) only for that that to be retarded.
Am I overthinking things here?
My instincts (autistic and exhausted due to working full-time) are telling me to pull out, demand my name be scrubbed from the site, quit my job, and then write what I feel is the most sincere and passionate thing I am capable of, and the ultimate End, which is a lengthy memoir-manifesto which I have for a long time intended to write, before posting this online for free in pdf form and ending my life immediately afterwards.
Am I going insane? Please respond. Please.
I don't want to be just another mediocre jerk off entertainer. But I also don't want to look back and think "goddamn, that could have been a good place to start!"
Do not remove your name from the work. Use it as name recognition so that people actually give a fuck about what you write next and are willing to read it.
Leo Wilson
But what's your advice? I read over Kafka's first published stories today, which he published at my age (25), and although they aren't popular or well-remembered ("Preparations for a Wedding in the Country") they are at least early represenations of a style he would go on to master.
My own current "style" in these stories is sort of over-excited and cutesy, sort of like George Saunders I suppose. I read Saunders's first story also (age 28: something something floating room) and even though it's sort of lame and not that noteworthy there's stuff there that tells you it's a Saunders story.
I feel like I'm selling-out here by adapting myself entirely for the sake of a wider audience, rather than doing something like Lovecraft did which is focus on your own distinct but unpopular style, mastering it, and suffering obscurity but remaining pure. There are so many jerk offs and cutesy fags around and I fear above all that I'm becoming one of them by allowing my story to be published.
I've already emailed the organizers several times with lists of minor, really tiny corrections and alterations for my story and I think they are pretty pissed off by how pedantic I'm being (I mean it's 2,000 words). I feel like a spook is making me want to "express" myself or put myself on display like this, and that a True Artist would do something like Pessoa (suffer unknown and die with pure manuscript in hand) or Houellebecq (refuse to gloss over own suffering and squalid world view) or Knausgaard (refuse to bow to demands to be consistently snappy and entertaining) etc. Mediocrity terrifies me, and I would rather be delusional and aspire to something more than to accept that mediocrity is all that I am capable of.
James Nelson
oh it's memoiranon/cabinanons latest persona
this one is kinda boring you should abandon it desu
Accept this chance retard, you may never get another one.
Charles Morgan
Don't be an idiot. You aren't locked in, writers can change drastically over time just like musicians or painters or any other artist. Put your name on it and use it to further your career.
Kevin Williams
>Am I overthinking things here? yes. >My instincts its anxiety and you will feel it everytime until you get over it/master it. I felt that to such level that I edited my 5 year old forum posts, don't be like me
Oliver Cook
My advice is just go ahead and do it, you don't have to stick with the style later even if you do somehow win. What contest is it?
>Submit your story online by February 5, 2017 >Deadline: May 18, 2017 >Our 2017 William Van Dyke Short Story Prize is closed
Xavier Reed
>I read over Kafka's first published stories today, which he published at my age (25), and although they aren't popular or well-remembered ("Preparations for a Wedding in the Country") they are at least early represenations of a style he would go on to master.
Yeah, because that's his writing style.The early stories are like that because he wrote like that.
There's no difference between publishing or not publishing this story. You already wrote it - it will either have bearing on your future style or it won't. If its published, its not like you're any more destined to write this crap in the future.
So you might as well publish it, because you'll make $1500 and have an easier time getting your next piece published.
Dylan Moore
>accept this chance
Would you say that to slam poets? Personally I would tell them to go home, remain obscure and only say something when they are sure that thing represents them in a way that makes them proud to be represented by it, rather than just shitting on stage and rubbing it in their face and shouting "FUCK. WHITE. PEOPLE" for three and a half hours to rapturous applause but having hundreds of articles written about them online criticizing how fucking retarded they are and how irredeemable their retarded existence is.
Jose Bennett
Stop being autistic and take the prize. You think every good author writes some amazing, sublime piece of literature their first time? no. Writing in contests is expected to be low-brow. Writing to win a prize is a low-brow activity to begin with. Nobody cares but you, and it will only help you publish a book later.
I'm now tempted to write for a few contests if autists like this can win, but I somehow feel like this is very subtle bait.
Jason Rogers
well for one you are not going to be Kafka. The key is to leave yourself open (like in case you will be prez you don't want dumb shit on the web about you but you still got to live your life) >My own current "style" When you eventually move on from it or try new things you can market them as experimenting or evolving,etc. on trick pony writers need to be ultra good at their trick to make a living of it or even be remember for it >selling-out concept of selling out is bullshit made up by entitled fans and good for nothings who contribute nothing.
Caleb Gutierrez
It's not bait, but I am so cautious and reluctant to speak in general that I feel by writing this and publishing it I am essentially the autistic kid in class who people think may be intelligent or whatever who finally starts sperging out and smothering himself in shit until people leave and call a teacher to come remove him from school.
Adrian James
For one, no one knows who the fuck you are so "selling out" is not a concept that applies to you. Don't delude yourself. Second, this is a small writing contest, you're not winning the man booker or something. Even if your story is about as significant as a piss in a hurricane it will boost your resume and you make 1500 for a days work.
Jacob Carter
OP here. I sincerely believe that "selling out" is not only a thing but a major thing that has some kind of pseudo-spiritual and karma-like influence on an artist. For example, no writer will ever write something worthwhile while also being a happy, contented guy with a family and a 8-6 job etc. Why? Because it isn't fair. He has to suffer. I feel like I need to crush myself, humiliate myself entirely, reduce myself to absolutely nothing and then write from that position of absolutely dejection, rather than where I am now, which is working full-time and writing this shit on the side. Look at Elliot Rodgers's novel. It's very entertaining, intense, passionate and hilarious. If he had published it on Veeky Forums without killing folks he would have been something of a cult writer here.
Ryan Hill
Hi 100-posts guy. I thought that might be you again. I look forward to reading the anthology of these threads that you'll eventually self-publish.
Hudson Lee
Yeah, I understand where you're coming from. I've been called a genius my whole life and i'm absolutely terrified everyday that I won't live up to the expectations of other people and myself. I even thought about killing myself after my fiance left me and I felt like I wasn't good enough for anyone or anything. But you just need to do this and get over that fear you have. If your short story was selected to win a contest, even if you don't think it's very good, there is something there that other people appreciated. And honestly, by the summary you provided of the story it sounded like something that I would enjoy, if just for the sentiment. Chances are that most people will forget about the first short story you published anyways. Just strive to improve your writing and be better and nobody will hold your growing stages against you.
Levi Hernandez
Consider that I, the OP, may be being entirely sincere right now, looking for sincere advice while my instincts, aggressive and stubborn, run around my brain screaming that I know what I need to do (withdrawn > resign > destitution > memoir-manifesto > suicide) while I, reliable adult male, attempt to placate the raging autist running shirtless through my thoughts, with a sort of compromise (publish mediocre short story > realize nobody cares > publish one or two more things > resign myself to obscurity and life of mundane contentment)
Hudson Russell
...
Ethan Anderson
> And honestly, by the summary you provided of the story it sounded like something that I would enjoy
That's reassuring, but still I feel like I am about to stand on stage (delusional) and stand there smiling a big broad white smile and clutching a bouquet of flowers until a big thick red velvet curtain is pulled aside to reveal an audience of Lynchian grotesques laughing with red bulging eyes, spitting, gripping their seats, some barely able to sit, pointing, laughing, howling, viciously howling about how pathetic a thing I turned out to be, how retarded I was to fall into the trap like this, only to leave the studio and return to my lonely single room without even the relief that here at least I am secure, un-thought-about, still brimming with potential, still able to invest in delusional but enjoyable daydreams of presumed greatness while outside scores of people distribute leaflets with my name and face on them proving my failure, pasting billboards rejoicing in my stupidity, entire populations turning their backs on me from then on because they are repulsed by how pathetic I have turned out to be.
Jeremiah Martinez
All things considered, that is somewhat of an unlikely scenario.
