Writing for a living...

While writing a PhD is not the same as writing a novel, it still involves pumping out around 100,000 words and it still forces you to confront many similar issues, including the self-doubt, the isolation and the incredibly low pay.

Anyway, because of this, I really enjoyed this article in The Guardian. It is basically a collection of quotes from novelists about what they enjoy and/or hate about writing for a living.

My favourite one was from Hari Kunzru:

I get great pleasure from writing, but not always, or even usually. Writing a novel is largely an exercise in psychological discipline – trying to balance your project on your chin while negotiating a minefield of depression and freak-out. Beginning is daunting; being in the middle makes you feel like Sisyphus; ending sometimes comes with the disappointment that this finite collection of words is all that remains of your infinitely rich idea. Along the way, there are the pitfalls of self-disgust, boredom, disorientation and a lingering sense of inadequacy, occasionally alternating with episodes of hysterical self-congratulation as you fleetingly believe you've nailed that particular sentence and are surely destined to join the ranks of the immortals, only to be confronted the next morning with an appalling farrago of clichés that no sane human could read without vomiting. But when you're in the zone, spinning words like plates, there's a deep sense of satisfaction and, yes, enjoyment…

I can relate to this SO MUCH right now (except the part of about being "surely destined to join the ranks of the immortals" - I have never ever written anything that has made me think such a thought - not even for a fleeting second!). At the moment, I am even enjoying the occasional moment of being 'in the zone' and it is actually really quite fun.

[On a slight tangent: I am also currently obsessed with successful community-driven sanitation projects in large informal settlements - slums - and their potential to change so many lives and empower so many people... It is incredible how significant a toilet can be to people's quality of life.]