Beyond the Crossroads: Thoughts on the Daunting Nature of Literary Pursuits

I’ve been out walking today, for a little longer than usual. It is late autumn, 2024. I am 40 years old, and uncertain of the road ahead. Not just for my own life, but where the world as a whole is heading. I’m worried about it. I feel like the photo of my dog, halted by the unknown figure at the top of the lane, signifies this, but I don’t know if that’s just a corny thought or not. Or cringey. Or overly pretentious. This is how I have been my whole life. Full of self-doubt, second-guessing myself. I am 40 years old, a PhD student in Creative Writing, awaiting my viva. My PhD consists of a short story collection entitled Young Mancunians, accompanied by a reflective and critical exegesis focused on sense of place and alienation in short fiction. Now that it’s coming to an end, I feel that I’ve come to a crossroads, unsure of where to go next, of how to establish myself and get my work out there.

I know a lot of aspiring writers have the same insecurities and that sense of imposter syndrome. After 11 years of studying Creative Writing and developing my skills, I’m only now just about confident enough to define myself as a writer, ready to go all in, to give it my best shot, because I know I will regret it if I don’t at least try. The problem is, though, where do I begin?

This website is my starting point, I suppose. On here I can share work that will hopefully help me to make connections on social media, something that I don’t do without any fear or anxiety. I’m unsure if this approach is the most conventional one to take, but it feels right. I like the kind of punk, DIY ethos of self-publishing my own work on my own platform. Of course, I still intend to send my larger projects, or selected short stories and poems, out to literary magazines and publishers, with the ultimate goal of seeing my work in print. That’s the dream. And the means by which I can pay my bills and stuff, because obviously there’s capitalism to abide by. But that’s another thing altogether.

I cannot overstate, however, the level of uncertainty I’m having in how to share my work. I’m kind of over the anxiety around whether the work is good or bad, which could be an age thing or something. The older you get, I’ve realised, the less important other people’s perceptions of you are. I suppose it’s all to do with getting to know yourself. And besides, what a person likes and doesn’t like is down to the person. Everything is subjective at the end of the day. There’s about 8 billion people in the world, not everyone is into the same stuff. But still, the uncertainty of what approach to take, and how to pursue this literary ambition, persists.

I’m not one to consider myself a ‘brand’. Far from it. I hate the term. It’s too ‘capitalist realism’ for me. Like everything touched by capitalism, however, the literary world has been contaminated by the idea of selling ourselves, with an emphasis on marketing a product, as opposed to sharing a book. Everyone is in competition with each other, that’s how it feels sometimes, and it shouldn’t. Thankfully, from my own experience, at least, writers are very supportive of each other. There’s an understanding that the more writers being published the better. Everyone has their own stories to tell, and ways of telling them. Everyone has their own style, and themes of interest. More significantly, everyone experiences the world in their own way. Sharing those experiences in words and art is a beautiful thing and shouldn’t be reduced to a product. I’m not naïve, we all need to make money out of our work, but it is to our detriment. I suppose I’m just hoping to avoid the 9-5, to do what I want to do, without pressure or fear, connecting with like minded people, trying to make sense of this ridiculous world.