Tayari's Blog: Looking For My Mantra
Posted by TayariJones on June 25, 2007 02:26 PM
Filed under
Writing
I just listened to a podcast of the NPR show "Here and Now" featuring Paula Cole. She has been out of the music business for seven years after her big hit “Where Have All the Cowboys Gone.” She is back now with an album called “Courage”, which is produced on a small label. I can’t say that I am a big fan of Ms. Cole. I know almost nothing about her music, but I was really inspired by the interview.
Apparently Paula Cole broke up with her record label and was told that she would never make another record. (Maybe you remember her showing her unshaven armpits at the Grammys.) One of the things she said was that performing the same songs over and over and answering the same questions in the exact same way felt increasingly inauthentic to her. She then sort went underground, developing her life and her self and didn’t start making music again until she felt the music calling her, not the industry.
When asked what Courage means to Paula Cole, she says the word was her daily mantra when recording the record, making for a fitting title. Simply put Cole says, "I am searching for the truth. Somewhere, it's in the music."
I am working very hard to take a step back from all the industry talk. If I am seated at dinner and the conversation turns to agents and deals, I try to emotionally pull back, to think about something else. I know that since I am already a published author, it isn’t fair for me to urge people who don’t yet have agents to try not to think about agents. I don’t want to be like the happily married woman who urges her single sisters not to worry about finding love.
At the same time, part of the peace I am seeking here is to write for the sake of finishing the project. I want to write this book so that I can figure out, for myself, what happens at the end. I don’t want to worry about whether or not books like mine sell well. I don’t want to puzzle over my royalty statements for Leaving Atlanta and The Untelling. I want to get to a quiet and self-centered (in a good way) place and only care about putting one word next to the other.
One challenge, I think, will be changing the way we measure success. I went to dinner recently with an old friend. “How did The Untelling do?” he asked. “What do you mean by that?” I asked. “I mean the bottom line. Sales,” he said.
This incident has stuck with me for obvious reasons. I suppose I could have lied about “the bottom line.” How would he have known? I didn’t want to be in a position where I am lecturing someone who means well about how misguided it is to judge art only by “the bottom line.” Instead I said something like, “It did pretty well, thanks for asking.” The conversation left me feeling a little bit dirty.
Before I left for MacDowell, I was asked my goals for the time here. I again, I was in a position where I didn’t know how to answer. Is my goal to have a working draft of my third novel? I’d love that. But is it my goal? Is my goal to have labored 25 hours a week on the project? That would also be terrific. But I think that my real goal is to get back in touch with my work. My goal is to retrain my palate so that the act of doing the work is what feeds and satisfies me.
Paul Cole said that "Courage" was her daily mantra when working on her new album. I am still sort of looking for the one word that will sustain me. For now, I think I'll just borrow hers.
I know that we often told to be true to our art and I guess that means something different to every person. It may start sounding corny and overly simple, but I don’t think we can hear it enough; after all, we are faced with the opposite argument at almost every turn.
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There are 4 comments on "Looking For My Mantra". If you'd like to leave a comment, click here to jump down to the comments entry form.
Comment #1, by Judy ![[TypeKey Profile Page]](http://www.tayarijones.com/blog/nav-commenters.gif)
I am so happy to see this entry. I find it refreshing, not "corny." In my opinion, Lauryn Hill went through something quite similar to Paula Cole. Dave Chappell did too. Success and all the trimmings at times comes at a cost to the art and to one's sense of one's self and the reason they feel compelled to do art at all.
As always I truly enjoy your candid (reflective) posts on writing.
June 25, 2007 03:21 PM
Comment #2, by cheryl miner
I did not get in any of the retreats/workshops I applied to. Often, while reading your posts I have wondered if I had gotten in would I have had any more sucess writing at a retreat than I have at home. I truly don't know but your posts have made me think about what writing means to me. Though I am not yet published I had a stellar start at it. I was directed to the John Oliver Killens writers Guild at 15 by Eloise Greenfield. Ethelbert Miller worked in the department at Howard University along with John Killens and Sterling Brown. We usually got together with the Harlem writers Guild once a year in Brooklyn New York. We partied at John's House in Brooklyn with Ruby Dee and Ossie Davis and were Black Writers Conference hosts so we got to meet Alice Walker, Toni Cade Bambara, Audre Lorde, Ntazaki Shange, Toni Morrison, Haki Matabuti,... the list is too long to place here in the comments page. It was a wonderful time for a little black girl who dreamed of nothing but being a writer. I cannot tell you why I am not published some thirty years later. Writing is my passion. It is all I've ever wanted to do. And while I dont know what it feels like to fudge about bottom lines I do know what it feels like to run into old friends and they ask, "Whatever happened to that writing thing you were into?" I don't really know what happened. I have a husband and three grown kids that I love to death...but I loved writing before I loved any of them and it is as much a part of me as my blood and muscles are. I would love to make a living from my writing...wouldn't we all? And I guess I can ignore bottom lines that I don't have but borrowing a much overused line from Oprah....this I know for sure...if I never sale but one book to my momma, I will always write. This is the art that keeps me here, that is as much a part of me as my heart beat is. I might as well be true to it.
June 25, 2007 11:51 PM
Comment #3, by cheryl miner
I did not get in any of the retreats/workshops I applied to. Often, while reading your posts I have wondered if I had gotten in would I have had any more sucess writing at a retreat than I have at home. I truly don't know but your posts have made me think about what writing means to me. Though I am not yet published I had a stellar start at it. I was directed to the John Oliver Killens writers Guild at 15 by Eloise Greenfield. Ethelbert Miller worked in the department at Howard University along with John Killens and Sterling Brown. We usually got together with the Harlem writers Guild once a year in Brooklyn New York. We partied at John's House in Brooklyn with Ruby Dee and Ossie Davis and were Black Writers Conference hosts so we got to meet Alice Walker, Toni Cade Bambara, Audre Lorde, Ntazaki Shange, Toni Morrison, Haki Matabuti,... the list is too long to place here in the comments page. It was a wonderful time for a little black girl who dreamed of nothing but being a writer. I cannot tell you why I am not published some thirty years later. Writing is my passion. It is all I've ever wanted to do. And while I dont know what it feels like to fudge about bottom lines I do know what it feels like to run into old friends and they ask, "Whatever happened to that writing thing you were into?" I don't really know what happened. I have a husband and three grown kids that I love to death...but I loved writing before I loved any of them and it is as much a part of me as my blood and muscles are. I would love to make a living from my writing...wouldn't we all? And I guess I can ignore bottom lines that I don't have but borrowing a much overused line from Oprah....this I know for sure...if I never sale but one book to my momma, I will always write. This is the art that keeps me here, that is as much a part of me as my heart beat is. I might as well be true to it.
June 25, 2007 11:51 PM
Comment #4, by carleen
Thanks for this post! I'm a little in the same boat, though my 1st novel isn't out until February. I've decided to stop reading industry blogs until I complete my 2nd novel. All the talk about promotion and marketing and sales is overwhelming and not helpful right now. Pretty soon I'll have to pay attention to those things, but for now I need to write.
June 26, 2007 10:23 AM