Last night, in the writing class that I teach, a mature student asked me why I first started to write. I was quiet for a moment and said I would have to think about it. We were talking after class and as we exited the room at Temple University, I commented that I suspected that the reason had to do with writing being a way that I was able to stay in my own little world — and that I preferred that world to the outside one.
When I was a child, I was always making up stories and writing them down. I could often be found in the rustling leaves of the apple tree in my backyard where I climbed up with a book in my back pocket. As I sat among the branches reading, that book and that tree was my rocket ship, my way of transporting myself to other places.
Once again at the end of a writing project, I find myself on the uphill climb (Sisaphysean) that often feels futile. Even though I have come to terms with rejection (realizing that it has little if anything to do with me), I still find it a mildly depressing, if necessary, part of writing. For that reason, I wanted to remind myself why I write, so here goes …
1) To learn something new –
In the writing of my book, Tea Leaves, a memoir of mothers and daughters (Bella Books, 2012), I researched the labor movement and combined my findings with conversations with my mother about her life and her mother’s life. In my novel THEY, a biblical tale of secret genders (Adelaide Books, 2018), I finally read the Bible and found the story of Tamar in Genesis as my entry point. I wrote the novel as an answer to my question of how marginalized people survived in a harsh desert culture.
2) To have fun —
and to live (for a time) in the alternate worlds that I create. This gives me an internal landscape that I seem to need, something inside me that I can hold onto.
3) To preserve memory –
After Tea Leaves was published, I found myself doing readings only from the funny parts of the book. My mother had a wicked sense of humor. Yet, years ago, I thought that I may have emotionally damaged myself by spending so much time working on Tea Leaves. But now I see that I never could have remembered the details had I not written this in the years immediately following my mother’s death. A friend once observed (at my book launch in the old Giovanni’s Room in Philadelphia) that my mother was a palpable presence as I read about her.
4) To tell my story to the world –
Only lastly do I reach the point that publishing brings me to. I want to tell stories that are meaningful to people. Perhaps it is a tall order, but I also want to change the world. When I found that my publisher Adelaide Books displayed THEY, a biblical tale of secret genders at the Frankfurt book fair (described as the most political ever) and that my novel was selected for possible publication in other languages, I was thrilled. Still, publication is the last on my list and perhaps inconsequential compared with the other reasons I write.
All of this, makes me wonder – what are the reasons that you write?
In addition to being available through you local library, THEY, a biblical tale of secret genders is available through your local bookstore or online.
To learn more about my novel THEY, a biblical tale of secret genders (published by Adelaide Books New York/Lisbon), click here.
Janet Mason, author 