Wednesday, July 30, 2014

No One's Bitches.

This is something that's been bugging me for a while: why do people feel like it's okay to tell authors to not do anything but write?

I had dinner with family last night, and I explained to them a concept that we should all be familiar with: George R. R. Martin is not your bitch.  (If you haven't read that, please do so.  I won't mind; you're better off reading Neil Gaiman than me anyway.  :P )  To my aunt's and uncle's and distant-relation-by-their-marriage's credit, they also thought there was something pretty wrong with a person's "fan" demanding they get back to work on what that "fan" wants them to work on.

So now I'm wondering: why do people do that?  And why only to authors?

Granted, I don't read everything on the internet; I lack the time and brain capacity and spare sanity for that.  But I've never seen someone tell an actor to stop tweeting and get back on stage or set.  I've never seen someone tell an artist to put their phone down and pick up their pencil or brush or stylus.  I've never seen someone ask a director or a photographer why they're not behind the camera, or a model why they're not in front of it.

But I've seen people respond to writers' tweets with the oh-so-cute "Shouldn't you be writing?"  I've seen people rage at authors for doing interviews or other press instead of writing.  And clearly not everyone got Mr. Gaiman's message, as shown by the jackass who responded to Mr. Martin's SDCC tweet with "GET BACK TO WORK!!!!"

And that was only one of three different responses that amounted to "You're doing something that's not writing, you shouldn't be."  One was supposedly from an editor, who should know better.

Writing is a job like any other.  And expecting someone to do their job every waking hour of their day is not only selfish, it's damn stupid.  People who ask authors why they're not writing clearly don't understand that downtime is necessary - for a lot of us, the best parts of creating come when we're out and about, when we're not staring at the screen or notebook, when we're doing something other than writing.  Why so many people seem incapable of realizing this, I don't know.

For the record, I still get some of my best ideas in the shower.  And I don't care how successful I might someday become, I'm not giving up showering.

I've written before about how the only thing the writer owes the reader is the best damn story they can tell.  I linked to Mr. Gaiman's phrase in that entry too, and I'll keep bringing it up until people get the idea.  If you want your favorite writers to do the best they can do, you don't tell them what to do.  You encourage them, you appreciate them, you tell others about them.  But you damn sure don't act like they're doing something wrong because they're not doing what you want.

We are, collectively, no one's bitches.  Deal with it.

14 comments:

  1. I enjoyed this post and totally agree with you. I think that for some readers, they are so emotionally invested in the characters in the story all they can think about is that next book. I know someone who is waiting on a third book in a series, and recently she said, "It's been 9 months! What's taking the author so long?" I'm thinking 9 months? It took me four years just to iron out the plot for one of my WIPs! I asked her, "Do you know what it's like to write a book?" And she just gave me this blank stare. I think that people who don't understand what it's like to write a novel sort of just assume that you can sit at the computer and crank out gold every time. I mean, it may be easy for some writers, and maybe easier for the ones who are writing full time, but for the most of us, writing a novel takes a lot of damn time, energy, and effort, especially if we want the thing to be good. I really loved that Neil Gaiman post. Nobody's bitch. Indeed!

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    1. I definitely think that's where a lot of it comes from. People can pick up what's generally involved in, say, making a movie or TV show from media in general, but the reality of the writing process is rarely covered.
      And people tend to think it's easy. Gods know I once did. O_o

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  2. Good point. Although I have told a couple of the guys on my favorite teams to stop screwing around during the off season and practice. Or my favorite bands to get their butts back in the studio and record another album. (Even though as a musician I know how hard that is to do.) But for the most part, we don't tell other creative types to get back to work.

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    1. I think if it's clearly meant as a joke, then no worries. ^_^ But the yelling and demanding I was talking about? Not cool.

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  3. I totally found your blog! also totally subscribed :P also feel totally awful for not having emailed you recently! *-* sorry!! I have a blog on here too but it's pretty terrible and only for myself really. I totally agree on the nagging writers, I've heard the tired old "its our money making them famous" routine and all I can say to that is "that money bought you the previous books, it was not a pre-order on the next". So sheesh. That said I totally still nag mah brother coz he never freakn writes any dang thing these days. Then again neither do I :(

    So anyway I shall be a stalkin you some more now I guess haha. Also I got my license! yay! How goes things for you?

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    1. Heh! If someone said "It's my money making you famous", I'd point out that it's my writing that made the books that they paid money for to make me famous, so clearly this process starts earlier than they thought. :P

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  4. you've had this blog for like 2 years *flail* how has it taken me this long to subscribe to it damned i'm thick!

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    1. No worries, it's mostly about writing here. I'll e-mail you.

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  5. Good point. I don't plan to give up showering anytime soon either -- or biking, or surfing, or swimming. Writers need time to process our thoughts before we get them down. We need to get out and live so we have something to write about. Tweeting? Probably not so much.

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    1. And now I'm picturing writing a sci-fi novel that's entirely about tweeting.

      Eh, never mind, I think it'd be too short.

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    1. And sadly, some people think the things I've talked about here *are* encouragement. -_-

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  7. I was getting regular "encouragement" until the announcement for book 2 came out. Now I've just got anxious little comments here and there. I imagine there will be more "encouragement" after this book's release for the next one. I've come to the conclusion it goes with the territory.

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    1. Maybe, but that doesn't make it okay. I'm already mentally preparing snarky comments for people who get on my case too much.

      ...which is probably a sign of some deeper issue, I really should look into that.

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