When I was in an MFA program, nobody spoke much about the “writing community” as a particular body of people, an idea, a resource or mechanism. We had other and very specific ways of identifying ourselves, in our tiny cluster of roving writerly anxiety. We learned who we were as defined by year and focus, and sometimes by publications. “Poetry? Fiction? Nonfiction?” somebody would ask, gesturing, spilling red wine from a jostled plastic cup, before or after a reading, or after workshop, or after rejection, after success. Then another would ask the same, and another, at every small mixer, each one of us nervously trying to connect while also vying for any one of the few institutional awards…
But in the larger swim of the writing world outside of academia, there are continual references to the community, the writing community, the larger community.
The community in question sometimes tightens down to the confines of a single workshop or expands to encompass a city of writers, readers, literary events, and then perhaps expands again, on-line, to a nearly infinite reach.
Wherever you find people who inspire you to keep putting words on a page, aiming for self-expression—maybe inspire you to push beyond your comfort level, get up at an open mic or a reading series, share your words, your ideas and your fragile, crucial heart—to me, that’s your writing community. I’m all for it.
You, all of you, are part of my writing community, now.
Thank you!
I have a stack of essays that I’ve written over recent years.
I haven’t been sending out a lot of work recently, as I move pieces around, consider my own ideas, tinker and revise. I’ve been writing primarily for myself, perhaps. Sometimes that’s enough. Now, larger projects are starting to come together.
This round, I’m going to tuck one unpublished essay behind the paywall.
This is an essay about a time when Lidia Yuknavitch, author and friend, stood up on my behalf in court. Could there be any more solid writing community than that? Yowza!
This essay is still a draft. I’m taking a risk and sharing it all the same. The essay is what I want it to be, in the moment, though over time I’ll likely revise.
There are so many ways to write an essay.
An essay is an effort, and this one takes the form of one approach among many possibilities.
Lidia Y. looms large in my world, though the world is full of people who don’t know who she is! Ha! I don’t think I’ve built that information into this essay, and perhaps I will go back and expand on the explanation, the celebration, of her work.
The central material—showing up in court on behalf of a woman’s words?—well, that could obviously resonate against current events…(yes, the Depp/Heard trial is a First Amendment situation, a defamation case Depp brought against a very mild 800 word op-ed…a woman’s words, and Depp stomped it down, shutting down that voice…) I’ve left my essay without mention of that nightmare.
I could rewrite this a dozen ways, and maybe I will, but for now, I’m sending it along to subscribers.
I hope some of you might consider a paid subscription, if you’re interested in the work!
It’s literary gossip! Ha! It’s a portrait of writing community. It’s a courtroom drama and a bit of what it means at times to be a writer at all.
I’m putting it behind the paywall because I would love a bit of support as I carry on!
With gratitude,
Monica