Writing and well-being

I had lunch this week with a writer friend. We talked about our current projects. She mentioned that she was having trouble staying connected with the revising of her novel, even though she was spending many hours a day. When she mentioned that she'd given up her exercise program, both through inertia and time constraints, I had to bite my tongue.

Writing of all sorts is hard work. It's not just mentally hard, working your right and left brains in coordinated fashion, but also physically hard, as most writing occurs sitting down. And often sitting for long periods. This is hard on us human creatures, who were intended to move and stretch and reach and bend and be active.

So let me put in a plug for regular exercise as part of your writing/creative life. Some early advocates of writing like Brenda Ueland and Dorothea Brande believed that any plot difficulty could be worked out in the writer's daily walk of 5 or 6 miles. Even at a good clip, that's more than an hour of fresh air, natural stimulation, movement, deep breathing, and reverence, if you're so inclined.

I've been going to the gym four or five times a week for many years. I do the treadmill, back and abdominal exercises, life weights for arms and back and shoulders. I have a buddy and we go. Do I enjoy it? No. But I always feel better for going. When I'm away on writing retreats, I talk a walk or two on the beach or through the country nearly every day. There's something "sortative" about walking. It's a chance to think and resolve issues, to sort things out. And it makes sitting easier to handle. I always come back with a renewed spirit.

So whether you write (or paint or sculpt or pot or weave) for long periods of time or briefly each day, I recommend paying attention to the body's needs for food, rest, and exercise.

Wallace Stegner and the reality of publishing serious literature

I’m continuing my reading of Wallace Stegner’s book on writing. One of the most poignant pieces is an essay entitled “To a Young Writer.” I’m unsure of the date of the piece, but Stegner died in 1993 so it’s at least nearly 20 years old.

The young writer in question is a woman, and gifted at the craft. He makes it very clear to her that her chance of earning a living, gaining fame, and being successful in any traditional way through her writing are minimal even though her work is brilliant and sensitive and powerful. It will not speak to the masses, he says.

Should she write anyway, he asks? Perhaps. But only perhaps. Will she write and publish if she marries and has children? Probably not, for the kind of thoughtful writing she does takes everything from a person. But if she is called to do it, she must do it.

There are many readers out there who treasure the beautiful, the sensitive, the meaningful. But as every aspect of American culture becomes “busnified” (in my years as a college professor, I watched the transformation of higher education from an education model to a business model, where students were clients and the customer was always right), so too is publishing less and less about talent and beautiful writing and more and more about the bucks to be made.

Is it still worth writing great literature? Of course, but it is not worth pinning your life or your livelihood on. That is what Stegner is saying, I think, and it is worth considering.