This is one of those terms I hear a lot but have never fully got my head around. I fear my new project may be falling foul of it, though, so I thought I'd ask love for people's definitions, examples and/or tips for how to avoid it. Thanks in advance!
Could you be a little more specific? I can think of a few different ways, for one writing a Mary Sue style self-insertion character with (apparently) no flaws or weaknesses, who's in need of constant validation of how perfect they are. Another might be to just ignore reality and write all kinds of crazy things that could never happen in what seems to be a realistic story just because that's the way you want it, even though all your readers tell you to change it.
Thanks @Xoic! Can I ask in what sense you need me to be more specific? Do you mean in terms of my worries about my own story?
I do a lot of self-indulgent writing, and I don't think it's bad. It's just not good writing.When I write for myself, I have cringy romances, ridiculous fanficts where no one is in character, and meandering stories where nothing is accomplished for pages on end. And I need that. I need to engage self indulgence and my own pretentious thoughts. It is a great exercise in engaging my creative mind. Exploring my actual unadulterated opinion and silly fantasies is a great exercise. But it is just an exercise. When it comes to serious writing, I need to go back and keep my audience in mind. Yeah, a story where a boy climbs through his lover's window without her knowing might be cute to me, because I know my intention behind it and the intention of the character doing it. But it's not necessarily going to be taken very well by general audiences. Sure, it might be fun imagining myself as the heroine. I feel real strong when I do, but the real me isn't so confident in leadership. So, I probably will scale that self insert character back and emphasize the less flattering parts of my personality or just not do a self insert character at all. (I am not against self insert characters, you just have to be honest with them. And that requires a great deal of reflection not just on who you want to be, but who you actually are right now. What parts of you are flawed.) Writing about a depressed character might be therapeutic for me, but to an audience it might look like I'm advocating depression as an identity and even romanticizing it, but that is very dangerous territory. Having a main character who takes no guff and finally gives the bullies what they deserve is very satisfying for me to write, but let's face it: That main character is also jerk! I think the best way to get out of self indulgence is to let go. To go with it. Get it out of your system. But then go back with an honest look and think, "Is this what I want to show the world?" "Is this behavior that I really want to promote?" "Is that this really that admirable?" Clearly it isn't, otherwise you wouldn't be here.
i do self-indulgent writing all the time. it is the only writing i do. There's very little reason for me to write if I'm not enjoying it, so i write what I want and how I want to write it and it is 100% to please my taste and my enjoyment and my opinions. I cannot imagine what other reason i could have for doing it.
Wait—are you asking me to be more specific about how I want you to be more specific? I mean, there are a lot of different ways a writer could be self-indulgent. Are you wanting a list of them? Or was there some specific thing that's been talked about on the board and I'm not aware of what it is?
IMO it's a mix of multiple things: 1) Authorial wish-fulfillment that does not help the reader fulfill their wishes; 2) Preaching emptily about authorial opinions. (This list can continue.) If I wrote down a great dream I had and posted it somewhere expecting critique, that would be an example of self-indulgence.
Ah ok, if it's what those two ^ are talking about*, just general-purpose self-indulgence that would make a story fun to write but unsalable, then I don't see a problem with it assuming you're like most of us and not good enough to start getting your work published yet. To get from where we all start or are now to being in demand by traditional publishers (or even worthy of being published by them at all) takes a lot of writing. Have fun along the way! Indulge like crazy, get it all out of your system now while you still can. Malcolm Gladwell said it takes 10,000 hours to reach pro level, so we all need to be wearing out keyboards one after another (I've got about 1/4 of the letters on mine worn off now). Might as well do the self-indulgent stuff now while it's still playtime. Cause the closer you get to pro level, the less you'll be able to do that stuff. *I meant @Kallisto & @hyacinthe , @Ellen_Hall hadn't posted yet when I started mine.
Thanks @Kallisto! My problem is that right now I genuinely don't know whether this is self-indulgent. A portion of the book is the MC's autobiography. The MC has had a weird, warped kind of life, in which shitty things have happened to him but he has also done shitty selfish things, and because he's in a position of power, those things have had serious impacts on other people's lives. A big question for himself and for the reader is, does he behave like that because of the way his life has been, or is he innately like that and thst's why he's done so well in that kind of life. For example, when his mother whom he loves died, he didn't hesitate to exploit her death for his own gain. He's feeling very numb when writing the autobiography, which weirdly makes it all sound a bit like he's so deeply depressed he doesn't even care anymore. Which is what I wanted, but writing it out it just feels, well, self-indulgent. Maybe he just needs to be a little livelier, I don't know. Edit: Or maybe I'm just so terrified of writing emotion that it's making me back away, hmm.
Well, because if you want to be published, you need to write for the audience, not for your own enjoyment at the expense of theirs. Isn't that whats meant by self indulgence? I mean, here's what I wrote above: I think if the story is still salable to a trad publisher, then you wouldn't call it self indulgent. Yes, you can write what you personally enjoy, as long as it also serves the readers.
I hadn't thought of this! When you try to pose yourself as the moral authority without actually thoroughly exploring the topic, that is pretty self indulgent. It comes to everyone who agrees with the author is a good guy and those that disagree are bad.
uh, hm. I don't think that's actually true. but when I say i do self-indulgent writing all the time, I mean that I write what's fun and interesting to me. I don't think about "the audience." I find that if I do i stop having fun because then i'm just trying to please...who? exactly? who am i trying to please? an abstract concept? i can't help but think that's a bit silly. So i write what I write because i want to read a story that is 100% the things i like and is meaningful to me. and the best way to to that is to write a story that is 100% the things I like and is meaningful to me. I use the prose i want, the structure i want, the pacing I want, the worldbuilding I want, the tropes I want--everything that makes me light up. I want that, so i write that.
Perfect practice makes perfect. Writing stuff that only amuses the author won't necessarily get you to a higher level. The difference between a daydream and a short story is what the reader takes from it. (But that's enough pontification from me!) Kallisto I totally agree. Stories should not form our opinions most of the time. When I first started, I had to train my mind to see people, not ideas, when writing. The enemy in literature should be the enemy because of who they are, not their ideology, most of the time. (Same with the hero.) I am still not fully deprogrammed from this ideological thinking. A war of ideas makes usually for bad drama. The same, I think, goes for institutions and structures. For example, I may dislike police officers, but the antagonist can't be bad because he's a police officer. If the antagonist is a policeman, I have to paint a picture of the individual behind the authority; and their character composition must, ultimately, be the source of the woes the hero feels. Everything in literature is personal; nothing is personal in politics. Of course, there are a lot of exceptions. This is just my way of thinking, and I think it works pretty well.
In the beginning it will, when what you need to improve on is spelling, punctuation and grammar (SPaG) and flow of the ideas and the story. Of course I started when I was a kid, so this stuff was happening as I grew up. Then I started to improve to a point where it felt like I might have a shot at doing it for real, and now I'm trying to see if I can make it publishable. But if I wasn't writing all that pure fun stuff with no thought toward 'real' writing or story structure or any of that, I probably would have given up a long time ago. You need something to get you through those early years of practice and learning, and that something for me was fun (self indulgence). Nobody but me and my friend would have liked those stories, but they developed my basic skills and put some flow into my work.
Thanks everyone! My aim is for the story to be publishable one day. I've found this article, which has given me a lot to think about in this context: https://www.helpingwritersbecomeauthors.com/spot-avoid-self-indulgent-writing/#:~:text=Put%20simply%2C%20self%2Dindulgent%20writing,writing%20that%20doesn't%20work.&text=Self%2Dindulgent%20writing%20is%20made,stuff%2C%20you%20probably%20would%20not. Based on that I've identified that my MC was in danger of too much philosophical waxing in his autobiography, so I am making a sticky note for myself to be especially mindful of that.
Ah, but it's also important what level your writing is at now. I have yet to see any story stuff from you, but you seem to be quite competent at putting your thoughts into words. That doesn't always translate to decent story-writin' skillz though. If you're close to pro level, then it's probably best to start weeding out anything self-indulgent. If you're a greenhorn, then indulge away.
Frankly I don't know where I'm at. I'm about to start querying a novel, though, so I guess I'll count the rejections and let you know! Edit: Seriously though, I'm probably somewhere in the middle, I've written a few novels but am only ready to start seriously querying with this one. I am looking to get my work to pro level, though.
huh. that's ... not my experience. concentrating on what I like and what I want has been better for me than any other approach I've tried out.
I've heard this before, but how do you define "perfect?" Especially when there's no such thing as good writing, only good rewrites. So I might write a self indulgent first draft, but then I real nail in drafts thereafter, did I not practice perfectly? I used a technique perfectly that works for me, First I indulge myself, then I indulge my audience.
"Perfect practice makes perfect," is an excellent example of alliteration leading to imprecise language. I take it to mean "very good practice makes you very good."
I think the key is in the bolded word: Like I said above, if the readers also like what you're doing, then it isn't just self-indulgent.
