critique

[labrujah]

I've started reading manuscripts for a literary agency. It's becoming a routine, lying in bed with the loose pages propped up on my knees, the fan ruffling the edges of the pile. Making notes not on the page but on a piece of scrap, trying not to get iced tea on the pages which will probably be resent to another agency where another person like me will reread them and think of some diplomatic comments.

Every time I sit down to write my reports, I have to physically weigh the pages in my hands and imagine how long it would take to dream them up in order to temper my tendency to snipe.

The last story I wrote was three years ago, for an indifferent college seminar. I'm not sure that's a bad thing -- I recognized some of my paralysis-as-meaning problems in the last manuscript I read, by a guy only two years older than me who obviously really really wants to be a writer, like Kerouac.

Writing hurts like exercising, editing feels good like trimming your hair.

Comments

[tsenft.livejournal.com]

what she said.