Who faces rejection more than would-be writers and others who attempt to market their creative produce? You go to work on the text, hands trembling over the cold keyboard. You criticize yourself after every keystroke: immature, trivial, repetitive, boring, banal. Then the seed germinates. It grows. Oh yeah, you’re humming now — for about 250 words — then — nothing.
Strretch. Walk to the frig. Nothing there either. You know eating and drinking are only distractions. Back to it.
If you finish something, there’s the whole agent/editor/publisher routine if we’re fortunate enough to get that far. Most writers don’t. Most labor away unnoticed, unread, unpublished. But take comfort! Fitzgerald had a stack of rejection slips a few inches high. More recently, Jasper Fforde received 76 rejection letters from publishers before his first novel, The Eyre Affair, was published by Hodder & Stoughton in 2001 J.K. Rowlings (Harry Potter) was rejected 12 times! There’s a lesson here. Maybe.
Publisher Alfred A. Knopf keeps an archive of its rejection files at the University of Texas. While the publisher has published some 47 Pulitzer winners, it has also said “No, thanks” to many that went on to fame. In a review of these files in the NYT Sunday Books page, David Oshinsky says that reader reports that he encountered were fair, that rejections were most often deserved. Wanna-be’s should keep a balanced view.
That said, George Orwell was told. “It is impossible to sell animal stories in the USA” when he submitted Animal Farm.
Discouraged about rejection? I wouldn’t mind joining the ranks of these “rejects:”
Dr. Seuss
Upton Sinclair
Vladimir Nabokov
Stephen King for Carrie — “negative utopia stuff won’t sell”
Ayn Rand
Anne Frank — 15 rejections before Doubleday took Diary of a Young Girl
Isaac Singer
Jack Kerouac
Sylvia Plath
Rudyard Kipling
H.G. Wells
Margaret Mitchell — rejected 38 times for GONE WITH THE WIND!
This site lists rejections of famous writers and some of the now-rued excerpts from publishers’ prematurely poor assessments. I like to read these. “Someday they’ll be sorry! “
http://www.writersservices.com/mag/m_rejection.htm
6 responses so far ↓
Joe // April 6, 2008 at 9:30 pm |
As I am just starting as a screenwriter, I am looking forward to my first rejection. That would be an indication that I actually finished something besides this comment.
paisleyandplaid // April 6, 2008 at 10:39 pm |
I agree. My novel is still in the works, but I did have a magazine article rejected not too long ago!
Daughter Dearest // April 6, 2008 at 11:46 pm |
My creative writing class was told that you aren’t really a writer until you get your first rejection slip.
That said, maybe the world would be a better place had no one ever accepted the adolescent angst of Harry Potter and the Morbidly Emotional. But that’s just me.
And I’m shocked that Jasper Fforde was rejected so many times…as you know, I’ve read all the books in that series. I suppose he’s very eclectic–you have to know literature to even follow the books. But that’s what makes them GREAT!
paisleyandplaid // April 7, 2008 at 9:17 am |
The lesson is keep at it. The caveat is rejection seems not to be a necessary indication of ability or quality or even marketability. On the other hand, the majority of us should probably keep a day job (or kind patron) to support our writing habit.
shannonyarbrough // April 16, 2008 at 5:12 am |
It is indeed a long hard battle, and it sure is inspiring to see what other writers made the journey! Thanks for sharing this!
More support on rejection… « Shannon Yarbrough // April 16, 2008 at 5:27 am |
[...] support on rejection… Thanks to Cliff Burns and Paisley and Plaid on their feedback. Paisley’s site gives a list of other authors who were once rejected and [...]