Magazine for September 2009
A WRITER’S TALE
“Seek ye first the kingdom of God and all things else shall be added unto you.”
“After being turned down by numerous publishers, he had decided to write for posterity” – George Ade
It is a truth certainly acknowledged by the author of the above quote that many creative writers struggle for years, enduring perhaps decades in the wilderness of submissions and rejections, before their persistence finally pays off.
Most would-be authors, it has been said, “are pessimistic optimists.”* What better way to describe this novelist, who has gone where most angels would be too sensible to tread – into those realms where only agents, editors and publishers prowl.
The Bible is full of stories of people who waited or fought seemingly in vain or wandered in wilderness for many years before God’s plan for them unfolded, and their gifts were used and they prospered.
Joseph, Moses, and Elijah come to mind. Moses was 80 years old when he led the Children of Israel out of Egypt, and witnessed the parting of the Red Sea. Elijah gave way to depression before God recommissioned him. Joseph languished forgotten in jail before his gift for interpreting dreams lifted him up again.
As I await news from agents and publishers of the fate of my third novel, and work on my fourth, sometimes I wonder whether God’s sovereignty includes the publishing scene.
As we see publishers race to get the first Michael Jackson retrospective into the shops, bringing their all-time record for the publication process down to four days between the book being written and arriving on the shelves, I think: “Do these people stand outside the grace of God?”
The first rejection I received from a publisher was when I was 12 years old. The letter was from William Collins and I still have it. I had sent them some short stories. This is what the letter said: “You have plenty of imagination and a very good way of expressing yourself. Unfortunately here in London we publish books of 30-40,000 words so we cannot offer to publish these for you. I hope you will continue to write and perhaps one day have a book published.”
A couple of years after I had left university, I chanced to meet a publisher (later to become one of London’s top literary agents) who took an interest in my writing. He encouraged me to write my first novel.
Recently I attended an evening on the subject of Discernment, and an image was presented to us: “You can spend years knocking on doors. Some doors lead to broom cupboards and some to elevator shafts.”
When I met this publisher, in the early stages of my writing career, I opened a door and it led into a lift. I stepped in, and went up. But it was a faith-operated lift. It required me to have enough faith to press the button for the top floor. I only had enough faith to press the button for Floor 3. The doors opened, the demon of self-doubt stepped in, and pressed the button for the basement. And down I went again, to the very bottom of the shaft.
So, as my writing life continued beyond the outer gates, and thick brown envelopes dropped on my doormat, and I opened letters saying things like “We read this with much amusement but in the end were not sufficiently drawn to the central idea” and “We found your style fluent and assured but it is not quite for us” and “Although this is witty and well written… our fiction programme is so full that we are buying very few new titles unfortunately…. I wish you success in finding a less over-burdened publisher.” I thought, What are these people really like? Are they really Griffins and Manticores and Werewolves? Or are they, actually, reasonable human beings?
As I have now discovered, they’re in the latter category.
The Mills and Boon editor I met in the Ladies at the Savoy, at the RNA Romantic Novel of the Year Award luncheon, was very nice. And so was the Rights Director for the top agent I referred to earlier in this article, whom I met later in the dining room. I felt we could be good friends. She reminded me of one of the members of my babysitting circle. We chatted about Susan Howatch, and her visits to her mum in the Isle of Wight. (This lady still rejected my novel when I sent it to her though, and has subsequently left the agency and published a novel herself).
Occasionally, when I open another letter saying, “Due to the very strong market in this kind of literature your novel would not be viable for us to publish”, “This is too commercial for us”, “I’m afraid this doesn’t quite fit with our current list”, I think of those words Jesus spoke before Pilate: “You would have no power over me at all if it had not been given to you from on high” (perhaps one of the most poignant assertions in the New Testament, especially when you consider some of those who have been given power in this world).
Sometimes I feel lost in the middle of this submissions and rejections wilderness like the Japanese soldier who was found in the jungle 30 years after World War II had ended, still waiting for the war to end.
But there are times when the warmth of humanity shines through in an agent’s letter, such as this from a US agent: “I wish I could talk with every author who contacts us… but that is not possible so instead you can read an interview with me on the subject of career development on my website.”
But I was unimpressed by this email response from an agency which invited online submissions: “From the Submissions Robot: I did not feel enthusiastic enough.”
Then, a few days ago, I found these words in the chapter on “Crossing Places” in “Sacred Spaces” by Margaret Silf: “At this ‘burial plot’ of my experience, I am standing between two worlds – between the old, the known and understood, and the new beginning which still lies beyond the scope of my wildest imagining. I am standing in sacred space because it is on the very edge of the known that the infinite possibilities of the unknown begin to unfold.”
And she concluded with these words:
‘God stretched the rainbow across the heavens, so that we might never forget the promise that holds all creation in being. This is the promise that life and joy are the permanent reality, like the blue of the sky, and that all the roadblocks we encounter are like the clouds – black and threatening perhaps, but never the final word. Because the final word is always “Yes!” ‘
Sheila Robinson
* Writers and Artists Yearbook (Alison Baverstock)