Writers: The true versus the wannabe

This is one of few surviving posts from my deleted blog in Myspace.com.....



and if anyone takes offense over this... sue me




I had a sort-of argument with a co-worker of mine about writing. He brought me this jumbled 3 pages manuscript and asked that I read it and give him my opinion. "Why do you want my opinion?" I asked. He said that since I'm well on my way to becoming a published writer he figured a few advices are will come in handy.
So I asked him, "when was it that you wrote this manuscrpit?" and his response shocked me. He wrote that manuscript over 4 years ago, while he was serving in the army. He was bored, he said, doing guardswatch, and there was nothing else he could occupy his mind with.

at this point yours truly became unruly and undiplomatically honest (contrary to my normal, diplomatic, white-lying manner) and told him the sad truth. "You're not a writer," I said, "you never were, you never will be".

the guy took it hard and that caused Modesty(a friend and coworker my blog readers heard about many times) to comment on the whole thing. And since Modesty is Modesty, I figured I'd explain to her why I made that decisive statement... ended up to be an hour long discussion. the gist of it is worth recording so here goes:


The world today is full of wannabe writers. you can buy then A dozen dozens a dime. They crawl in every publication space on the interweb, people who wrote jumbled manuscripts and have no idea what the muse is.... people who clamor on poor publishers thinking their inept and childish writing could turn them into the next J.K. Rowling.... It seems like ANYONE out there has tried their hand writing and MOST of them ended up with poems about loneliness and rain...

RAIN, FOR PETE'S SAKE!!!!


I can easily classify the reasons people write and thus sift the few real grains from the endless piles of chaff

1 - Writers who write because they one day came up with the idea and thought: "Man, this could be so cool to turn this idea into a story"

No, man. It's not cool. The story may have been cool if you actually had a muse, knew how to work with her and actually had the language to describe it to the reader.

2 - Writers who write because of inspiring Cinderrella stories like J.K. F. Rowling (F stands for Fake, Farce or F*ck as my mood changes). Figure they can be the next aweosme great writer to win gazillions.

There's only one J.K. Rowling (and thank God for that)... Such mediocre, worthless trash writers hardly ever make it through the Publishers' initial examination. J.K. Rowling has had the tremendously incredible luck to be the right person at the specific moment in time. She is to Fantasy what Britney Spears is to music)

3 - Those who write because they want to impress someone/someones - Sickeningly sweet love poems with all the literacy of a deaf and dumb 3 years old toddler.... Poems about rain and sadness and sadness and rain.... Bwee, look honey, I wrote you this... bwee

If you can't impress a person without having to write a poem of some sorts, you'll never impress them with a poem. Nuf said.


4 - The ones who write because they have nothing better to do.

Now, this kind sickens me to my bones. Write because there's nothing better to do? There's nothing better THAN writing (or creating in any other form) and if you need to be bored to write, you're a one extremely sad person


and then... finally... comes the REAL writer.

5 - Those who write because they want to write - They do not need an excuse, they may aspire for publication or to impress people but the truth is that they would write even if there is no one around to read it. The muse sings in their ear, creating worlds in their minds.... MY type of writers.

The true writer would sacrifice everything and ANYTHING for their art. They wake up in the morning and writing is their first priority. They give up on things to write, they often sacrifice relationships on the altar of the muses....

And it is hard for me, a true writer, to accept the zounds of wannabes falling into the first 4 categories I see out there. I feel like an NFL player who's surrounded by a group of amateur footballers from the Canadian Preschools Touch-football league....

Excuse me if I'm judgmental (because I normally try not to be) and rude (because honesty often comes out that way).... I can't help but feel that they are barbarians, invading my Rome... and I am one truly territorial sonofabitch

Spelling Beans...

Ummm, well, not really beans... more like wheat.... sort of


I had a nice evening of studying on the web, starting from WHY Chocolate is considered toxic for dogs (and getting an answer I could understand in studying the nature of the chemical Theobromine) then heading for Coca Cola (history of the registered-trade-marked drink, not the company) and from Coke, which may not be fully Kosher for Passover (because it contains HFCS) to the problem of what's Kosher on Passover and what's not... and got to Spelt.

and what is spelt? (you may skip the next paragraph)

well, according to Wikipedia, Spelt (Triticum spelta) is a hexaploid species of wheat. Spelt was an important staple in parts of Europe from the Bronze Age to medieval times; it now survives as a relict crop in Central Europe and has found a new market as a health food. Spelt is sometimes considered a subspecies of the closely related species common wheat (T. aestivum), in which case its botanical name is considered to be Triticum aestivum subsp. spelta.



And why does it matter?

It doesn't really... except, on the Wikipedia page of Spelt, I found something really funny....

Well, at least... I think it was extremely funny