Given a choice, would you choose controversy?
Wednesday, July 4, 2012
I may be a writer, a memoirist, a blogger, even, but I'm not keen on the spotlight. I feel more whole writing about other people's books, other people's victories, other people's big moments, than I do writing about my own. (How not to sound smug? How to make it clear just how grateful I genuinely am? How to telegraph what is always true, that I recognize the transient nature not just of glory, but of life itself?)
But sometimes I'm interviewed, and sometimes I'm asked to observe, to comment on trends, to make predictions. I love those conversations, but I don't love me afterward. I worry that I have unduly generalized. I worry that I haven't been clear. I worry that, in a small clip of a long interview, I may sound unlike myself who, in conversational real life, spills out into tangents, identifies the exceptions to the rules, and broadcasts not just tolerance but curiosity. I worry about inadvertently spiking a topic with a dash of Beth controversy. I don't wear controversy well.
Let me state for the record, in case I goof, in case I become unclear. There is never a single best kind of book, a single best category, a single perfect specimen. In every genre and every sub-sub-genre, arfulness can and does exist. Do I wish that sentences—their quality, their shape—mattered more than they sometimes do? Yes, I do. Do I wish that millions of people were reading something other than Fifty Shades of Grey? Yes. Honestly. I do. Do I wish that I saw more people reading unexpected books on the train, on the subway, at the beach, that a greater variety of authors found their audiences, that fads didn't always rule? I wish that, too. Beyond that, however, I celebrate this fact: good, even great writers are at work in every genre.
The interviewee version of myself is still a work in progress.
11 comments:
It's a sensible worry, but not because you are or would be guilty of anything, but because of a lamentable tendency -- I guess on the part of all of us -- to reduce everything to a headline or a sound bite. Those of us who love language delight in the film of it, the double takes, the dead ends, the nuance, the fun of it. What we often get in a snapshot is the piece of a conversation when our eyes are closed or we're, maybe, drooling.
Yes, yes, yes! I think that's why I love working with an editor -- not to be corrected, but to engage in conversation that hones and clarifies. And I especially need my friends--that means you!--to question my own point of view.
I love this post because it's so much of why I love you. :)
Can I just duplicate what Amy said. This is so much you, and it's wonderful. Your thoughtfulness, I love it so so much. <3
I think interviews are different because you can't control how someone else will contextualize your words.
I must say, I wish something other than Fifty Shades of Grey was selling so well, but I do appreciate that it will provide Vintage/Anchor with the money to support more artistic and less commercially viable books.
Excellent post.
I wish that all these things too.
beautiful post
let me go on the record...I have not and will not read the 50 Shade trilogy
I think this is so true, and so relatable. The wonderful thing about it - the only consolation - is that you're not alone by any means, considering the millions of people who give interviews every day. :)
It's hard to please everybody and always say the right thing, and I don't think it ever gets easy. The only thing we can do is keep trying.
My great thanks to all of you, and your kind comments. Whew. We just keep being given more opportunities to get better in this life, methinks.
I wonder about these things all of the time. I'm a much more thoughtful writer than I am a speaker...I'm always sticking my foot in my mouth.
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