The Idea of the Author Is Facing Extinction
Are Authors facing burn out and extinction?
Jane Friedman...
The Idea of the Author Is Facing Extinction
Are Authors facing burn out and extinction?
Jane Friedman, Web Editor for the Virginia Quarterly Review, based at the University of Virginia, where she also teaches digital publishing and online writing seems to indicate the possibility.
She writes:
"Instead of composing our symphony, we create a “shadow symphony,” of which we ourselves are the orchestra, the composer and the audience. Our life becomes a shadow drama, a shadow start-up company, a shadow philanthropic venture. […] The amateur is an egotist. He takes the material of his personal pain and uses it to draw attention to himself. He creates a “life,” a “character,” a “personality.”
There is a danger in the industry’s call to authors to build relationships with readers, to be responsive and engaged, to be in “conversation.” How big of a danger, however, totally depends on the values and goals of the writer. If the goal is sales and long-term readership growth, there might not be any harm at all. But if the activities impede the writer from pursuing his primary purpose (however that may be described or quantified), then we can see the call to engagement as seriously detrimental and distracting."
You are the ones who are juggling all these plates, are theses new engagements impeding your primary purpose to write your story?
Are Authors facing burn out and extinction?
Jane Friedman, Web Editor for the Virginia Quarterly Review, based at the University of Virginia, where she also teaches digital publishing and online writing seems to indicate the possibility.
She writes:
"Instead of composing our symphony, we create a “shadow symphony,” of which we ourselves are the orchestra, the composer and the audience. Our life becomes a shadow drama, a shadow start-up company, a shadow philanthropic venture. […] The amateur is an egotist. He takes the material of his personal pain and uses it to draw attention to himself. He creates a “life,” a “character,” a “personality.”
There is a danger in the industry’s call to authors to build relationships with readers, to be responsive and engaged, to be in “conversation.” How big of a danger, however, totally depends on the values and goals of the writer. If the goal is sales and long-term readership growth, there might not be any harm at all. But if the activities impede the writer from pursuing his primary purpose (however that may be described or quantified), then we can see the call to engagement as seriously detrimental and distracting."
You are the ones who are juggling all these plates, are theses new engagements impeding your primary purpose to write your story?
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