Recently, I saw in my Facebook feed one of those memes that people insist on putting up asserting to describe the world, this one contending that if you are not where you want to be in life, it’s solely and completely your own fault for making bad choices. Although I usually ignore such things on the basis that it’s not worth fighting over someone else’s unsubstantiated opinion, this time I had to make a comment to the effect that only people who’ve actually managed to succeed ever make pronouncements about how everyone else’s failure is his own fault. Why was I so moved, you ask? Because I’m a writer, and writers have a nearly unique point of view on this question.
The truth is, the “you made your choices” argument is garbage. You are not defined solely by your choices; there are 7 billion other human beings on this planet and their choices affect you every minute, not to mention the sheer randomness of nature and the entropy of the universe. People can and do work all of their lives, make the best choices they are capable of making, and still get nowhere. It’s sad, but it’s true. Read a modern novel some time.
A novel, you ask? Yes, because as I said, writers have a POV that most people don’t, for two reasons:
First, writers spend most of their lives absolutely at the mercy of others. From the time we submit our manuscripts to the day our books are declared out of print (or we are), we don’t control our own fates. Editors accept or reject, and on their own schedule. Publishers pick marketing plans, covers, blurbs, prices… The public decides to buy or not to buy. Will my book become a movie? Don’t ask me, it isn’t my call to make. We don’t even choose to write; we have to. The only thing we control is whether to submit our work for publication.
Second, because we write, we understand power. No one will argue that power doesn’t run the world, and in a writer’s world, he is the only power. Characters are born, live, and die by our whim. (I still recall the first time I decided to resurrect a character in a subsequent draft.) Every book is a universe and we are its creator, imbued with absolute authority. If you think that doesn’t give you an understanding of power, try it sometime and see.
And yet, even we are subject to higher powers; in the end, it is the public (assuming the story gets that far) that decides if we have made the right choices. (Ironically, there is never a consensus.) So if I, who have absolute control over my characters’ thoughts, emotions, actions, and lives, am ultimately at the mercy of others to determine if I acted correctly, how can I believe that everyone else is ultimately responsible for his own life when it is not even his to control?
John Lennon said, “Life is what happens to you while you’re busy making other plans.” In my place, I might reply, “A book is what you write while you’re trying to make an outline.”
But if you think that isn’t so, if you choose to think that you are the only person responsible for your success–and more importantly, that other people are solely to blame for their own lack of success–well, I choose to believe otherwise. And while my way may not be so rational, it’s also a lot less judgmental.
#SFWApro
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