No writing lately. I gave up and decided not to worry about it for a few days. Same with working out; I'm taking a few days off. The well needs to refill.

I started to get p.o.'d about this Dilbert strip:


http://dilbert.com/strips/comic/2009-12-21


but then I thought maybe it was being ironic. Is it? I honestly don't know whether it's meant to be taken at face value or not. Either way, just seeing it stated so baldly makes me wince. Probably because I've heard versions of it all my writing life.

I think maybe the second you dare to call yourself a writer out loud, somebody outside the biz (family, friend, stranger) is going to let you know that you're not really a writer in the eyes of the world until you're J.K. Rowling or Stephenie Meyer. If you're not like them, then you're just not that good.

Come to think of it, maybe this is why some writers get so rabid about tearing down SM. She has the recognition and acceptance they should have had--and they feel that they write better than she does.* And maybe because she's so famous that she doesn't seem human or accessible, it feels okay to rake her over the coals. I can't get into that state of mind, because I met SM as the Twilight thing was really taking off (around the second book, I think? Or maybe between the second and the third? I forget.), and I was impressed by how unimpressed she was with herself. I mean like utterly unimpressed. Even my judgmental over-analytical raking-over-the-coals nose detected no scent of self-congratulation. No underlying oneupmanship. And no complacency. Not even a whiff. And when I think back to how I was with my first few books, even without being an instant raging success, I have to say that Stephenie Meyer's a better man than I am. So to speak.


*To me the question is always: What is the purpose of this ms? What does it want to be? A Stephenie Meyer book has a place and a purpose, and it needs to be well-written in the context of that place and purpose. Another writer's book will have a different place and purpose, and the standard that makes it a "good book" will be different. The money/fame part of it all seems to be randomly bestowed...unless you buy into what the Dilbert strip is saying...