My sainted wife, The Duchess, is an inveterate and unapologetic fan of American Idol. Me, not so much, though I admit it has a certain gonzo freakshow entertainment factor. The other night she was watching and wondered aloud how it is that people who are so obviously untalented could delude themselves into thinking they are undiscovered geniuses. I mean, its one thing to be modestly talented and think you’re better than you are; at least there’s some toehold in reality to grab hold of. But some of these people are fucking dreadful, how do they imagine they’re good?
Ah, but I understand. I’m a writer.
It does take a certain amount of arrogance to be a writer. I’d imagine it takes some arrogance to be any kind of artist. You have to push past negative criticism, rejection letters, heavy-handed editors who get angry if you resist some of their suggestions, and the mockery and disdain of your friends and the shame of admitting that you earned $12.34 last year from your writing. If you’re not 100% sure you’re hot shit, how in the world do you push past that?
A lot of people don’t, of course. I know a lot of writers who haven’t written in years, or who still write for themselves but who have given up trying to publish or sell what they’ve written. Some of them have talent, some of them suck and the world breathes a sigh of heady relief at their surrender, but I think they all lacked the sort of psychotic conviction that their work is some of the best work ever written. Like the one guy on American Idol said last night before launching into some of the craziest crazy mousic a crazy man has ever sung a-cappella in the history of crazies singing unaccompanied: “These songs need to be on the radio.”
Get it? Not “I think I’m pretty good” or “some folks at my job say I could be the next Meatloaf”. These songs need to be on the radio. Like the history of culture won’t graduate to the next level unless we hear this guy’s wacked-out stylings. That kind of arrogance I’m familiar with, because it’s what I’ve been saying about my writing since I was about twelve. Back then, everyone pelted me with trash and called me Writer Boy. Or worse things. But now? Well. . .now it’s actually kind of the same, but at least I can whip out my Amazon rankings to prove I actually have a book on sale.
That’s what it takes, I think–that sort of crazy certainty that you have talent, even in the absence of any actual evidence to that effect. That sort of arrogance is absolutely necessary for what we do. And also damned entertaining for you, considering how often the dying Pac Man sound goes off around me, signalling yet anothe rterrible failure. Enjoy!
I’ve been playing PacMan quite a lot recently. In it’s favour: it only has one screen, so you don’t have to worry about what’s going to happen next – a welcome relief from every other facet of life’s troublesome indeterminacy. The ghosts are in inviting primary colours. It’s easy to play whilst drunk, and it doesn’t take long to die (sorry, play), meaning that you’re never too long between drinks. Plus, PacMan looks like an almost-complete gestalt Dorito, hell-bent on revenge against the ghost who ate the one chip that would have made him whole again. Perhaps that’s just my version?
You know, there’s this other videogame, Wolfenstein 3D, which is a First Person Shooter, meaning the action on screen is from your POV. There was a secret level in that game that turns out to be the Pac Man maze, complete with colored ghosts chasing you (this is not immediately apparent when you find the level and start playing–at first its just this strange maze).
I can attest that the horror and banal, chilling evil of Pac Man was finally revealed to me while playing this level. When I was 9 and playing Pac Man on my Atari 2600, I thought it was a fun, goofy game. One of my friends had even memorized about 17 levels of it and could play for hours in the arcade on one quarter. But when you’re actually fleeing those silent, mouthless primary-colored ghosts (who are, when you think on the scale, much larger than you), it’s goddamn terrifying. I suddenly realized that an entire generation of kids had been playing a psychotic, evil game, and not even realized it.
To this day I have a morbid fear of huge, primary-colored ghosts who can kill you with a mere touch. It’s true.
This is so damn truthy. You are the truthmeister, Somers.
Does that come with a coat of arms and some hereditary lands? Jeff Somers, Truthmeister of Hoboken? If so, count me in.
Time for you to share your wisdom at 101 Reasons To Stop Writing. It’s time to thin the herd a bit.
Thin the herd? Jebus, those people want to be my competition–keep the herd weak. WEAK, I say.
J