Letters to the Editor
-
Write in a public venue
If you want others' opinions, ask for opinions and comments. Put your writing out there where others can find it. For instance, start a blog or online journal and actively solicit comments and feedback. Track your readers and see what sticks and what doesn't. You'll write differently in that format, but you'll get some sort of idea of what people think of what you have to say.
-
Suggestion: Writing they cannot refuse...
One must imagine that there are places to publish where decent writing cannot be refused. Write unpaid: a story for a small local newspaper on a community meeting, a blurb in a local arts & culture newsweekly, and of course, get a blog idea and watch your "hit" counter. The "Stuff White People Like" blog writers just got a book deal; we all know of "Juno" writer Diablo Cody. I write letters to the editor -- albeit forgettable, as all letters to the editor are, but my name's in Lexis-Nexis at least.
Publish for free to create a writing practice, do the work, and whether this can be your living should work itself out. LW, you've already got a start -- Cary Tennis published you in Salon.com.
-
a curdled soul is an option
Some time ago a person that I know told me that I write well. I was writing short stories at the time. Unfortunately, I decided that I have little to say about the important issues of our time. So, about a year ago, I decided to become a troll in the letters section at Salon.
If you go to the supermarket and pick up a novel you will discover that lack of talent is no great barrier to getting published. Ultimately, it's all about believing in yourself.
-
Turn the question around
Everyone thinks they can write. We are all taught to do it in school from our earliest years. We write shopping lists, essays, thank you notes to Grandma, love letters, letters home from war, term papers, Christmas letters. We all write.
A few people dream of transcending all that ordinary writing into art, and even fewer achieve that.
But turn the question around into any of the other arts. Theater. Ceramics. Oil painting. Wood carving. Music. Singing. Composing. Pen and ink drawing. Ask the question, "How can I tell if my (ceramics, paintings, compositions) are any good?"
There is a huge, tangible difference between Uncle Pete who plays the fiddle now and then, and any musician who actually makes a living at their craft. And I'm not even talking Itzak Perlman, just anyone good enough to pay the bills and not starve. They're not just good, they're damn good. You and I know they're a world away from Uncle Pete. They have poured every ounce of their lives into that craft, practiced, taken lessons, played alone and in groups, for most of their lives before they get good enough to make money.
Somehow, many writers, perhaps this LW, think they can skip all that. They write some essays, they fill up a journal, then ask the equivalent question of "Why can't I play in Carnegie Hall?" A much more appropriate question to ask is, "Is my writing good enough that anyone, anywhere, would pay for it?"
If it's not, you start that slow progress that any musician would do. Lessons. Scales. Etudes. Years and years of practice. Reams, reams, and reams of words that no one will see. Get a copy of Stephen King's "On Writing," better yet, get the book on CD (King narrates it himself), and listen to the first half. He describes his own development as a writer, where he essentially spent decades teaching himself to write before he published anything. I'm not a King fan, but his "On Writing" is excellent.
Hire an editor if you can afford one. Join a critique group. Take cheap writing classes at your local community college. Read, read, and read. Turn off the TV. Immerse yourself in the world of writers and writing, like a pianist would immerse him or herself into the world of music.
If you want it that bad, you will learn the craft.
-
You want to be famous -- not a writer
I second the opinion of the first post, which said the LW wanted to be published, and not necessarily to be a writer. LW is ALREADY a writer -- to be a writer, you need only to write, and he/she is clearly doing just that (the rejection letters, contests, etc.).
The problem is, in our money-and-success-oriented culture, we equate good writing with being published and making loads of money. By that standard, admitted liar James Frey is a "good writer". So are writers who churn out volumes of tired, predictable mysteries, romances, suspence novels, fantasies derivative of LOTR, and so on. You can go to any bookstore or library and see this stuff by the thousands. Most of it is utter garbage. (One positive: when the oil runs out and you get cold, you can burn them! I understand books burn at 451 degrees fahrenheit.)
The LW wants to win contests and get full-ride scholarships to writing workshops, and get published (paid) for his/her writing, probably leading to a lucrative book contract with a major publishing house for a multi-book trilogy -- which will sell to the movies for six figures. That's the LW's definition of "writing".
I have a better suggestion, LW: why don't you start an online advice column, where you can dispense long-winded, artsy meanderings on topics mostly related to yourself, which never address the advice-seeker's issues? I understand there are online magazines in San Francisco that pay BIG bucks for this! Also I recommend you use part of your lavishly remodeled home to give writing seminars: as we all know, those who can do and those who CAN'T....teach.
-
Workshop workshop workshop
Writers don't "have" talent -- they develop skills. They hone those skills by using other writers as a sounding board.
But the first skills they have to develop are the skills of accepting and parsing the feedback of other writers.
That's where the writing workshop comes in.
In a good workshop, you won't learn whether you "have" talent. You'll learn what skills you've developed well and what skills you still need to work on to get where you're trying to go as a writer.