Write For Yourself

“Better to write for yourself and have no public, than to write for the public and have no self.”

— Cyril Connolly

Yes! I couldn’t have said that any better myself. In my new podcast episode, Write For Yourself Episode 21, among other things, I address an interesting notion many marketers have. That notion is: find out what your readers want and give it to them.

I consider that approach somewhat unartistic. But, hey, that’s just my opinion as an artist. True, I am looking at it from a simplistic viewpoint. That viewpoint is this: as an artist, my job is to be innovative, it’s not to follow the crowd. It’s not to mass produce, but to make original art.

Bills Must Be Paid

On the other hand, one does need to pay the bills. Sure, there’s a compelling argument that by giving the buyers what they want you will make piles of money and live happily ever after. But as Cyril Connolly so aptly concluded, you may sacrifice your “self” in the process.

While I agree that if you write for yourself you may not find your public, it’s not an absolute certainty that you won’t. In fact, I would propose the more original you are (writing for yourself), the more likely you will have a public. For now, in these times, we authors are competing with 45,000,000 books all searching for a public (readers). That’s forty-five and six zeros! That is a sea of books, my friends; and sadly, it’s a sea of mostly unread books.

If you choose to give the readers exactly what they want, but it’s not what you want, is that still art? I see art as a type of love, and when you’re performing on demand, is that love or… is that something entirely different? Just something to think about.

Thank you!

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