Who's Writing This?: Fifty-five Writers on Humor, Courage, Self-Loathing, and the Creative Process – Essays on the Alter Ego and Soul of Literary Expression

by Daniel Halpern

After seeing a new translation of Jorge Luis Borges′s mini-essay "Borges and I" (included here), Halpern asked numerous writers to muse briefly on "the fictional persona ′behind the scenes,′" the alter(ed) ego that accompanies creation. He asked some 50 well-known authors-such as Margaret Atwood, Pat Conroy, William Gass, Czeslaw Milosz, James Michener, Joyce Carol Oates, and Cynthia Ozick-to write pieces on this idea. The essays are mostly one- to two-page snapshots and vary widely as to approach. Some are touching, others delightfully silly. Edward Gorey anagrams his name into those of characters including Ogdred Weary. Others, such as Cecil Brown, posit earthier "He is the proper Negro who is ashamed of me, the nigger." And still others are Susan Sontag recalls her longtime disavowal of her work and finally comes to feel that "the writer is not my double" and thus she is "both Dr. Frankenstein and the monster." Each contributor also submitted a whimsical self-portrait.

Genres: Writing, Nonfiction, Anthologies

208 pages, Paperback

First published October 1, 1994

Reviews

[Tim · Rating 5 out of 5]

Some years ago, I had occasion to attend the National Booksellers Convention in Las Vegas. Got lots of books, met the likes of Jonathan Kellerman and Dom Deluise, and also attended a seminar hosted by John Updike and Amy Tan. They spoke of the difference between a writer and a published author, the former being one needing solitude, introspection and self-discipline and the latter being one going on book tours touting their latest efforts and being quite social. Sort of a dichotomy within oneself (for a humorous perspective on the grueling trek of a book tour, read Cynthia Ozick’s “Lighting Out for the Territory,” from the “New York Times Review of Books,” January 2, 2005). In this same vein, one looks to the “inner writer” and its relationship to the person who has to go about his/her business. This relationship can become quite complex (see Stephen King’s “The Dark Half,” which I have recently finished, and his “Secret Window, Secret Garden.”)

I got this book through an obscenely-low-priced Kindle version through BookBub, being an examination of just this relationship. It consists of brief essays by some fifty authors, with remarkably similar issues counterbalancing the creative with the mundane aspects of their lives. To be sure, some of the “inner selves” have the same name as the “outer selves,” and sometimes not; sometimes, it’s a pseudonym. As the Editor, Daniel Halpern, puts it, “These pieces have been assembled to introduce an internalized persona – and the pursuant lifelong comrade, the significant other - capable of expressing the honest lie, the fictive truth.”

So let me give you a few snippets: Rosellen Brown, author of “Tender Mercies” (in my top ten of movies, but I digress) addresses this dichotomy thus: “You write for yourself,…and you are the ultimate judge of what is pleasing, fit, necessary. But now I know it is only when you catch a crowd listening that you discover how lonely you love to be, sitting protectively on those words like a bird on a nest.” And from John Hawkes: “Even in my earliest youth, I knew, if only by intuition that the writer and the person in whom the writer existed were not at all one and the same.” Even the afore-mentioned John Updike speaks of “the Updike I created” as opposed to the Updike others see.

Underlying these metaphorical conflicts is a struggle with the creative process; for example, per Paula Fox (award-winning author of children’s books, also known for being the grandmother of actress Courtney Love): “When I begin a story at my desk, the window at my back, the path is not there. As I start to walk, I make the path.”

There are other, more varied descriptions, such as Pat Conroy’s “writer self” being angry at Mr. Conroy himself for giving up his four-pack-a-day cigarette habit because it is part of “his” creative process. Or Elmore Leonard’s characters griping because of all the things Mr. Leonard makes them do. I found this short book thoroughly delightful, with surprisingly similar insights into this inherent dichotomy from the contributors. I would recommend this book very highly, especially all you creative types of all ilks out there.

[Debi Helgren · Rating 1 out of 5]

Not for me

I read approximately 1/3 of the book, and decided this book wasn't my cup of tea, and stopped reading it.

[Samantha Adkins · Rating 1 out of 5]

I meant to read all of these, but I found the tone and topic off-putting and only read a few of the author's whose names I recognized.