In the fast paced world of internet instant gratification, less than perfect work gets published all the time. My own work is an example of that. I sent the cartoon below to the Spokesman Review, Huckleberries online blog and it was published within hours of clicking send.
Monthly Archives: February 2016
“Patience you must have, my young Padawan.” –Yoda
I used to think I was a patient person, then I started writing. The first draft was a lesson in instant gratification. I sat down to write and five weeks later a 105,000 word novel lay before me. And then the work began. Every writer knows the nightmare of an idle muse while polishing a novel. Edit, revise, proof read, and then get critiques so you can edit, revise, and proof read all over again. It’s not sexy, it’s work. And, all the while the muse is whispering in your ear, “How ‘bout you and me dim the lights, open a bottle of wine, and together we can create something new.”
Book 1 is complete at 110,000 words and 21 chapters. It’s working its way through the critique process, but at a chapter every other week, that’s a 42 week process. I’m not sure I can stand 42 weeks of a pouting muse. I could find someone online and swap manuscripts to make it through the process faster, but there is no way on the god’s green earth I will send my manuscript anywhere electronically.
During graduate school a professor of mine submitted one of my term papers to a journal under his name. I didn’t know until I was searching journal articles for a subsequent project that I came across my own term paper. Anyone who has had their work plagiarized knows the gut wrenching feeling that comes from seeing another person represent your work as their own. Thankfully, I still had the graded paper in my possession. It took 3 months of mediation with the school’s ombudsman and the journal to get his name removed and replaced with mine. So, with that demon in my past, I deal exclusively in paper. And it’s slow . . . horribly . . . painfully . . . slow.