'supporting' doesn't mean misleading beginners by lying and painting a rosy picture, when the reality is that so few new writers will ever make a living at it... you seem to be overlooking the fact that most of us do 'encourage' beginners, but simply won't lie to them about their chances of 'making it'... as it should be... giving false hope is not doing a good deed...
@evelon: sometimes people who think they can't succeed or who failed to succeed themselves might have a rather pessimistic view. I just make sure I keep reminding myself of the reality of the situation, viewed through eyes of logic rather than emotion. And the fact is, there is so much bad writing out there, half the stuff that's published is bad also. It stands to reason that if you have a well written and interesting manuscript, the experienced readers such as the ones employed by publishers will recognise it eventually. If it's bad to begin with,then yeah, the chances are very small. But in writing not a lot is left to pure luck, most of it is in the ability and determination and I feel that we should focus on that
@maia: and how is averaging everyone, regardless of the ability, exactly "honest and supportive". Treating people like means and averages, as numbers, means nothing to the individual. You would be much more supportive and honest if you explained that it all depends on ability and determination, and somebody, because of their unique qualities and circumstances, will have a good chance of being published while somebody else will have less or no chance.
Well, your comments make me think that. Maybe you are just not saying it very often (the ability and determination part), even though you are thinking it, but I won't speculate. In any case, you know best what you are writing, I didn't say what I said hoping to change your mind.
I just have to say that I believe at least one mental condition is mandatory to good writing. I mean, really, it is acceptable for writers to acknowledge and even converse with the voices in our heads, so... I said this in another post recently, but I will say it once more because it is relevant here too: If you expect someone to spend a heap of time doing work for you, as with any job, you must expect to compensate them. I have ghostwritten for people in the past, and have been commissioned to "help" other writers who are experiencing difficulty, but I would never consider doing it for free. It's sad, but everyone must worry about their livelihood, and while it would be really nice to be able to offer services for free, that simply doesn't get the bills paid, if you now what I mean. There are people who will help you do this for a fee, but it is risky. As others have already said, publishing is very difficult, although not impossible. You could always hire help to get the thing written, then self-publish the results if it is your goal to see your name on the cover of a book, but consider your finances carefully first. It is possible to turn a profit, however, it is also possible to sink and die.
And the answer is that getting published is very unlikely (not impossible). It's just a reality that writers have to deal with, despite what reality most writers want to create in order to feel good about themselves. But if you love writing then it really shouldn't make a lick of difference if you get published. It's nice, and you should try, but you shouldn't make getting published the sole reason to write. If you just want to become rich or famous, then you're on the wrong path.
Obviously, new writers do enter the market. But there's no upside to spreading rainbows and cotton candy. For new writers who have resolved to be published and earning a living wage as a writer in a year;s time, a good dose of reality can help them decide if they're really committed to the long haul. Basically, if you're scared off by the rather daunting odds against success, fine. That dose of reality probably saved that person a lot of wasted effort. Those who are so driven to write that they will keep slamming their head against the wall until either the wall or their skull turns to powder won't be scared off. Among those will be tomorrows great writers, along with others who never succeed despite heroic efforts. I won't fart sunshine to spread a golden light on dreamers with no patience and no commitment. It;s a waste of my time and theirs.
I have to disagree with this. Good ideas are common. Brilliant ideas are pretty common - much more common, at least, than well-written stories. The rarity is found in writing ability. Boneheads (I'm not saying you are one) get great ideas every once in a while, but they don't turn them into readable stories. On the other hand, a terrific writer can take almost any idea and turn it into literature. I think you can almost completely put away the notion that ideas can be classified as good or bad or somewhere in between. Probably the only really bad ideas are the ones that are obviously odious because of some political agenda wrapped up in them ("Here's a good idea - a story that extols the virtues of white supremacy!"). For a good writer, almost anything can be a good idea.
This kind of comment makes the assumption that all unpublished writers have equal ability, and produce manuscripts of equal quality. We all know that this is not true. There are many writers out there who will never get published, mostly because they can't write a proper sentence or a coherent paragraph, and there are a few writers out there, still unpublished, whose first novels are the equivalent of Hemingway's The Sun Also Rises, Fitzgerald's This Side of Paradise, Margaret Atwood's The Edible Woman, or Thomas Mann's Buddenbrooks. Those writers will almost certainly find publishers if they try.
I had a brilliant idea once (just once ). I wrote the script. People liked it. Funding got close. I made a short film version and entered it into competitions. I pushed the script around and was getting some really good traction. Then 127 Hours came out and my project sunk faster than the Titanic. My original idea was no longer original. Now people see me as a copycat and won't touch it. Ideas do have some value. It's a generalization. Of coarse great books are more likely to get published. That's still no guarantee.
This is all nice and well, not wanting to spread rainbows and cotton candy to everyone who says they want to be a writer, because you simply don't know whether they are talented and committed or not. But it is equally useless to keep discouraging everyone as if everyone is lacking in talent and commitment. I believe that answering the question "what are my chances to ever be pulished" should be more than copy/pasting the same answer to everyone. We get clues about a writer's ablity from the question itself. Grammar, spelling, syntax and content all give us a clue which group the writer is likely to be in. But to be sure, we not only have to see a reasonable amount of that person's writing, but their response to criticism as well as determination to improve and not give up. All these take time. However, we can still answer their question in a more helpful way, even if we know nothing about their abilities. All it takes is one paragraph of explaining what is needed to succeed, rather than a paragraph that will discourage and dampen enthusiasm. Writing is about dreaming. For all we know, the next JK Rowling is sitting among us, asking for advice right now, and we might not even recognise her yet. But if we care about our art, we should commit to nurture talent, even if it's in its rudimentary stages.
Well, that really sucks. This is why I too don't believe ideas needn't be closely guarded. In your case it was more, you bounced the script around, the finished product, which can be ripped off much more than the idea itself, but still, it's a clue there are some really unscrupulous people around, especially in the movie industry. It reminded me of a Woody Allen movie where one writer who was critiquing another writer's manuscript (which was incredibly good) when the first guy went into a coma following an accident. The other guy basically stole it and passed as his own, sold it and became really famous. But he couldn't follow it up with anything remotely good, and he was going through hell because of it, as well as the guilt. But then, the other guy wakes up from coma. Ouch.
Wait...JK Rowling is a chick? Chicks don't know anything about being a wizard! JK...err just kidding.
It wasn't copied or stolen. Someone just beat me to a very similar story (127 Hours is about a well known true story) so any similar film will be compaired to it. For projects where a unique concept is part of the appeal that's a killer. Hollywood is rather safe in regards to idea theft. If my script was less unique it wouldnt be an issue, but a guy getting trapped and cutting off a limb has now been done.
You could always do the XXX version where a guy gets his winky stuck in a chastity belt and is forced to cut it off to escape because the husband just got home. Damn, I just gave away my idea...
See, I was thinking that, but 'inches' compaires better with 'hours'. I also thought of a decimal, but 127 Inches is so absurd I found it funny.
One of the best antidotes for depression is activity and progress. If you've got it all written out in your head, get voice-recognition software and start talking.
I actually tried that, years ago. But strangely enough, there seems to be a disconnect between speaking and writing. Probably a different part of the brain or something. Regardless, it didn't work. A lot of these stories have been hashed out in conversations with a friend as well. I keep thinking that I should record those conversations but at the same time, I also seem able to recall all the details of them anyway. It's really the act of just getting it all out in a story format that is the issue. Anyway, I've recently committed to writing at least a page a day and so far I've been writing more like 10-15. So maybe it's just about pushing through the barriers and forming new habits. Then again, depression has ups and downs and currently I feel I'm on an up, so it could all turn to shit by the end of the week
