The social media is awash in memes, those eye-catching images paired with pithy sayings, jokes, or political statements – those last two not always easily distinguished. For the most part, these postings are harmless, when they aren’t entirely meaningless. They are often quite amusing or even enlightening the first time you see one. Most of them definitely lose something through that endless repetition called “sharing” in the virtual world.
Some memes aren’t shared often enough, and not long ago I saw one that truly deserves to be viewed far more often. Unfortunately, it appeared only once anywhere I visit online, in this case on Facebook. I’ve not encountered it since then. It was a simple black-and-white photo depicting a ballerina in a classic pose, arms outflung, balanced on the toes of one foot. Anyone who has watched a ballet knows this pose, and realizes this is a moment of powerful, graceful movement frozen in time by the photographer. To watch someone dance in this way is an amazing experience. A ballet dancer appears to defy the laws of physics, moving as if not entirely under the influence of gravity. It always seems effortless. They make it look easy. And if you think that is indeed the case, you would be greatly mistaken.
The meme points this out by succinctly listing the sorts of things the pictured ballerina likely endured to achieve such a high level of skill and artistry. The years of hard work and practice. The pain and embarrassment that surely accompanies the inevitable stumbles and falls. To say nothing of the bruises, the muscle strains and tendinitis, and even the broken bones that sometimes result from such mishaps. It may look effortless in performance, but getting to that point was anything but. From every account I’ve ever read of how a dancer of any sort reaches some level of proficiency, it’s a long, hard road to follow.
In one way or another, this is true of any artform: music, painting, sculpture, or writing. To be sure, becoming an accomplished artist in these fields rarely involves serious physical pain or injury. (I wouldn’t have come this far as an author if writing fiction were inherently dangerous.) But no one ever enters an artistic career immediately producing a masterpiece. Some may get there so quickly as to amaze, but for all of us there is a learning curve, and that ancient trinity – practice, practice, practice.
Readers of fiction are often motivated to try their hand at this art, with only the best of intentions. They sit down to write, well-versed in a chosen genre, having read extensively in it up to that point in their life. They’ve seen enough examples to be sure of how it can be done, so why not try? How hard could it be to write a story?
How hard could it be to be a ballerina?
Reading a well-written novel reveals nothing of the stages that preceded its publication. And saying that, I’m reaching back much farther than the writing of that specific book, which may well have been a difficult task for that author. There were false starts and failed efforts before that book came into the hands of the reader. That author may have spent years learning how to work with the words and use them to shape ideas. Proficiency in plotting, world-building, and character development may come more quickly to some than to others, but the elements of writing fiction rarely come easily. And so it is that first-time writers often find themselves mired in self-doubt as they set down words that seem to be in the right order, but don’t quite do what the writer had in mind. They don’t quite feel right. It’s sometimes a hard lesson to learn, the difference between reading a story and creating one.
That writing fiction is harder than it might seem to be, from reading stories, in part explains why self-published fiction so often seems lacking in quality. Too many first-time writers complete a work, do what they can to eliminate typos and other technical flaws, and think they’re done with the job. While self-doubt can be crippling, it could be said that too much confidence is trap of a different sort. Some round up a crew of beta readers, or even more rarely, hire an editor, before seeking a route to publication. (Failing to do one or the other is a huge mistake, and one I suspect is made all too often.) Editors can be expensive, making beta readers a logical first choice. But unless these readers are carefully chosen to provide a truly critical evaluation of the work, their feedback too often amounts to nothing more than a pat on the back. Little is learned regarding the book’s readiness for general readership. The forms having supposedly been observed, the writer uploads the manuscript and hits the button labeled “publish,” unaware that their book is anything but ready for prime time. Unaware that a first effort is rarely ever ready for readers. Maybe the second effort, probably the third, but rarely ever that first try.
Practice, practice, practice. Anyone who claims there’s an easy way around the need to accumulate experience in order to succeed artistically is either a cheat or a liar – the two being anything but mutually exclusive, of course.
For many of us, the process of becoming accomplished writers has a lot in common with becoming a successful ballet dancer. There is a process to follow, mistakes will be made, and lots of practice will be necessary before writing even a work of short fiction displays anything resembling grace or elegance. If you’re new to writing, and hold fast to the dream of being a published author of professional quality work, remember that ballerina. Assume getting at all good at this artform will take time, and possibly a long time.
She didn’t learn how to stand on her toes yesterday.
Under Desert Stars 