Regarding this blog, and writing in general, I’ve had the following conversation about a billion times:
New Acquaintance: So, what do you write about?
Me: Education, mostly.
New Acquaintance: Oh, do you teach?
Me: Uh, no. Used to, though.
New Acquaintance: Like high school?
Me: No, college level.
New Acquaintance: Where?
Me: Vanderbilt.
New Acquaintance: (making a surprised/confused/impressed face) Oh!
Me: No, look, it’s like this…(cue rant about why they don’t need to make impressed faces).
The conversation goes this way for two reasons. The first is that I really don’t like using the words “professor”, “Classics” and “Vanderbilt” all at once – I know the other person is going to make That Face. But, since it’s inevitable, I think it’s funnier to let the comic suspense build a little.
Well, this weekend I found out you can’t always play things for comedy.
I was at the Texas Writers’ League Agents’ conference, wanting to find out if anyone had any interest in hearing about higher ed from a former prof. The first night there was a cocktail party where it was accepted practice for all of the aspiring writers to pitch agents in a wolverine-like frenzy: the agents huddled like hedgehogs, fielding questions from attendees hungry for fame and glory.
So, I was waiting in line for Jenny Bent, a very nice agent who had given a really useful talk earlier in the day. Unlike the other agents, she had a second-in-command, Kevin Smokler (who runs Book Tour) and he gave those waiting in a line a free bonus consultation. This is how our conversation went:
Him: So what are you pitching?
Me: Satirical memoir.
Him: Okay, that doesn’t make any sense, what do you mean?
Me: It’s a first-person account with a point to make.
Him: Well, don’t call it that.
Me: Okay.
Him: So what’s your story.
Me: I was a professor….
Him: Where?
Me: At Vanderbilt.
Him: When?
Me: Up until last year.
Him: Make sure you include that up front. Be specific, everyone’s nervous since James Frey.
Me: Okay.
Him: And I can’t think of anyone who does personal satire.
Me: Al Franken! 1995! Rush Limbaugh Is A Big Fat Idiot!
Him: (clearly exasperated) Yeah, l he was a SNL writer. He can do that. You can’t.
I conceded the point, and his advice was spot on; for the purposes of this conversation, it was a good idea to throw “Vanderbilt professor” out there right away, and it certainly got people’s attention during the rest of the weekend.
After bothering Jenny and a couple of other agents, I also learned that memoirs needed a “narrative arc” — something about how I’d changed as a person? Huh? I really don’t think I’ve changed much. I’d always hated academia, I just decided to leave. But there was no disagreeing with these people.
As the conference progressed, I found out it was a very bad idea to try to sell collections of short essays unless you were already David Sedaris and/or a columnist in the Huffington Post. Ooops. Still, there was some interest, though much of it was couched in terms of “Well, we haven’t had a good Freedom Writers story in a while.” That put me in the awkward position of explaining why I was kinda going for the opposite effect.
All the attendees got to put an anonymous written pitch for their project in a box. At the end of the conference there was a live event where the emcee would grab a pitch and start reading it aloud while a panel of three agents listened. To make things more fun, the agents could stop the emcee — really, they should have given them buzzers — whenever they felt the author was getting off track. In other words, when they would stop reading an actual query letter, but this way they could give constructive criticism on why the pitch wasn’t working. Wow, this real-time stuff was much cooler than writing out pages of ignorable feedback!
And actually, I think higher ed and the publishing industry both need to balance art and filthy lucre. Agents love good writing, obviously, but they can’t and won’t ignore questions of whether an idea is going to sell, whether there’s a market, and if so, how big it is. Also, agents are polite but brusque. They’re not going to listen to you ramble if your idea sucks or you’re not getting it accross well — again, I kept thinking this was a better model for teaching than any of that fantasy-ridden movie crap we have to put up with. Because it’s just not just about knowing your facts and figures, it’s knowing how to present them to others. Teachers have lost the authority to just put up their hands and say, “Stop, this isn’t working at all,” when that’s exactly what the kids (and maybe the professors) need most.
I’m still processing all the information I gathered, and following up with the cool local writers I met. All in all, definitely worth going. But now I have to go, because apparently I need a “platform” for my writing and I have to figure something out.
Any ideas, readers??
As an academic who wrote, pitched and thought he’d sold the satirical novel (albeit on politics, not academe) I’ve been told (correctly) that satire’s tough because it needs to be obvious enough to be understood by a mass audience but sophisticated enough to appeal to those who think they are smart…
Good luck….
Yeah, I know novels are the accepted route but I’m not clever enough for that kind of satire. That’s why I went for first-person, true narrative…but yeah, the big question is whether it’s accessible to people who haven’t been there, right?
The advice you’re given is spot on. (I’m writing, btw, as a professional novelist and non-fiction author, who also runs a large writing conference of my own here in the UK.)
That thing about narrative arc: it doesn’t necessarily have to involve some upbeat line of personal development on your part. But even memoir has to be framed as Story. So there has to be some kind of question which emerges in chapter 1 or so of your memoir, and which is finally resolved in the very ending.
In effect, you should think of yourself as writing a novel – just a novel that happens to be true. The disciplines are very similar, though.
Hmmm, maybe the problem is that it still feels pretty damned unresolved…as does most of life. I think is why I resist stories of “an X young girl/guy facing the tough world of Y business and learning Z lesson.” I’m damned glad I got out, and much happier, but it’s not the thing makes much sense, you know? But of course I understand that’s what readers want.
I love this post, because I’m thinking how, as an academic writer, I’m bouncing back and forth between art/creative work, scholarly chops, and marketing. Book one was all about scholarly chops, but I learned something about marketing along the way — valuable stuff, now that I contemplate writing books that are *not* the standard academic monograph.
Your last paragraph was interesting to me, too. Don’t have an agent, but my acquisitions editor has a reputation for seeing very quickly what will and won’t work for his list, and telling authors “thanks, but no thanks” within two minutes. I see this as a valuable (if ego-bruising) service — if it’s not right for that press, better to know that in the first two minutes, rather than after two years. But those who have been on the receiving end of the “thanks, but no thanks” aren’t used to that kind of brusqueness.
Short version: We academics have spent our lives with people telling us how smart we are. And we are very, very smart, most of us. But if we can’t communicate with anyone other than three dozen other people, then all that smart is useless.
Exactly. Communication is now, officially, a required category in the smart Olympics! And that is one nice thing about academic presses, the not needing an agent…but then again, as I learned, wouldn’t it be awesome if you could just pay other people to worry about the publicity and pitching and all that? I never the obsessive DIY of academia that way.
Oh, but Amanda, you have a butt-kicking narrative arc. Just go back to the “about” section on Version 1 of your blog–something about making the executive decision that *you* weren’t the crazy one in academia, it was everyone else. There must have been some sort of false consciousness or delusion keeping you in there for all those grad school and junior faculty years–how did you figure out that it was all a pile of s**t?
Find yourself an epiphany moment (I’m sure there were many, but you can elevate one or two to higher narrative stature) and you’re in business.
There’s obviously a market for the “crisis in higher education” stuff (_In the Basement of the Ivory Tower_, e.g., also some interesting recent pieces by William Deresiewicz that I assume he’s trying to turn into a book–http://www.thenation.com/article/160410/faulty-towers-crisis-higher-education)–you’re just the first one to make it *funny* rather than bitter and heavy. (My understanding is that the aforesaid was denied tenure at Yale. You don’t have that problem!)
You’ll need to have the stomach to make a slew of enemies, and take on entrenched interests on PBS.
It really gets my goat that all the “experts” on higher ed spouting off in the media are all fat cat professors. Conflict of interest much???
Please be the funny and intelligent voice pointing out that complacency and perverse incentives in the academy keeps it from accomplishing its mission!
Yeah, you know, this is a real sticking point for me. It’s true that I thought I was the problem for a great deal of time, but truthfully, I can’t tell you there was single, glorious epiphany when I figured out I wasn’t – which is (I think) what everybody wants to hear because they’ve seen it in the movies. I really don’t remember when the change happened, I only remember feeling relieved when I told my chair I was leaving. But I’ll try to think of something.
And, oh, don’t you worry, my heart’s desire is to be that voice. I too am sick of the story being told only by those who benefit from the system (because of course those who don’t are too worried about making a living!)
You know that moment in The Crucible (movie) when Daniel Day-Lewis as John Proctor rips his signed confession with shaking hands, then heaves a mighty sigh of the breath he’s been holding for, what?, two or three years? Did informing your chair feel like that? If so, then IT was your epiphany moment…
No, it absolutely didn’t feel that and to make matters worse (?) my chair was a really lovely person who hadn’t done anything to contribute to the problem. It was very run-of-the-mill, I and mostly felt relieved. But it wasn’t The Devil Wears Prada, I swear!
Hmm.
Obviously, I think you’re funny, or at least interesting when you’re not being funny, but I agree with the agent guy. A longer narrative is more engaging than a bunch of short essays, even for a person who likes short essays. And a story (with some semblance of the classic fifth-grade plot structure) is easier to follow than a rambling James-Joyce-esque, uh, piece of writing. I think you do have an “arc,” though: How you went to graduate school because you were interested in ancient history, realized you were supposed to become a professor, became a professor, and finally reached the point where you realized that you absolutely could not be a professor anymore. That might not involve a huge change in YOU, but as Caitlin points out, there’s enough of a change to build a story on, especially considering you’ll obviously tell it well.
And I like that you lead with the “assistant professor of classics at Vanderbilt,” because it establishes credibility. No matter what kind of war you want to fight against credentialism, the people who complain about academia and its fakeness and crappiness are almost never the people who have full-time, tenured or tenure-track jobs at schools that the general public has heard of and thinks of as a “real” school (not that Ohio State/Michigan State/Florida State/etc. aren’t real schools, or that Stanford/Vanderbilt/Notre Dame don’t have good athletic programs, but I mean the kind of school where you picture a smart kid before you picture a football or basketball player). So as correct as they might be, they’re easy to brush off with the ol’ “Well, he couldn’t cut it, and now he’s bitter.” The proof that you could cut it is worth a lot when it comes to your being taken seriously.
Yeah, yeah, i know. I hate the prestige of the institution even while I know it gets me ahead to have been there. And to be brutally honest, I kind of assume that one thing people want is to know the dirty little secrets of prestige-mongering, big-name schools. Which I am more than happy to tell.
And to be fair, I did organize the essays thematically…and, as I’ve stated below, I just feel like telling the story in that first-person, novel-like form isn’t true the chaotic crisis of conscience that actually happened over the course of several years. I mean, it’s like the rest of history, it’s messy and frustrating, and the only way to make it bearable is to be entertaining. At least that’s my approach…
“I hate the prestige of the institution even while I know it gets me ahead to have been there.”
I think that’s how every decent person who’s ever been a part of a prestigious institution feels. But it is worth noting, because it’s just that much more powerful when someone who got to be a “have” criticizes the system. I know a lot of my friends decided not to go to graduate school because “being a professor is sweet if you can get the job, but I don’t want to be an adjunct.” The idea that full-time might not be as sweet as we all imagine, even if you do get it, is just more interesting and eye-catching. (I don’t care about dirty little secrets, but that was the part that stood out to me most about your blog when I first came across it).
And yeah, history is messy and frustrating, but the most interesting historians are able to make even the most chaotic subject into a good story (that still conveys the ridiculousness of the whole situation). Often with humor – I don’t think anyone wants you to take that out! I think you can still tell a story without sacrificing your point. Unless I’m wholly misunderstanding your point, which is completely possible.
Ha, I like that, decent people in prestigious situations — often difficult to find. And a major missing links in the discussion is how many “haves” are running education and can’t possibly understand the concerns of normal folks. I’m certainly not opposed to revising for a better story, but like I said, there’s this established narrative about hating your job and leaving, and an established narrative about teaching stories, and I definitely get the feeling that an established narrative is frankly more welcome.
The narrative arc thing: that’s a biggie. BUT: it’s not necessarily (or need not be so) about how YOU have changed as a person.
Think Aristotle. There simply needs to be a beginning, a middle, and an end. That’s the difference between non-fic w/a narrative arc and a collection of essays. And yes, agents love narrative arcs. And who can blame them? Human beings love being told a “story.” So the NA is simply … the “story.” Satirical or not.
And for what it’s worth (possibly nothing) this is what I’ve learned from my amazing amazing amazing editor. And agents want what they know they can sell to Amazing Editors.
So. Narrative arc. Story. And no, “story” definitely does NOT have to be fiction. I’m a historian. I write non-fiction. Couldn’t write a novel if my life depended on it. (Well. Okay. Put a gun to my head and I’d write a novel.) But my second and third books and the one I’m almost (REALLY!!! ALMOST) finished with have a narrative arc. And they’re history. They’re non-fiction.
So it can be done. And, no, you don’t need to be famous to sell such an animal (I knew no one from nowhere) and you don’t need a “platform.” What you need is a “story.” Non-fictional or otherwise. (Or, as Barbara Tuchman called it, “verity.”)
Perhaps I should have stated this sooner, but several agents were very specifically saying, “It’s about how YOU changed as a person.” Which it clearly isn’t, from my perspective. Story, sure, that I get and I can do. Just don’t cast me in the lead role, I’m not a good heroine. That’s why it is personal satire to me: sure, some of it might have been my problem, the but the entire game is so fucked up that I don’t how anyone isn’t going to have the same problems. Which is the most important point…but yes, there will certainly be revising, and thanks for the advice.
I love verity — maybe we could make a musical and call it “Sweet Verity, about how insisting on the truth gets you in trouble.
And I should have said: I didn’t read the other comments before I posted mine because have been in library for hours on end reading microfilm. I can barely see straight, let alone read comments.
With nonfiction, the actual book is the hardest part because you have to make it read like fiction … which is probably why so many nonfiction memorists end up fudging to force a narrative arc on their books.
But you already have an advantage with your platform. Agents looove authors with popular blogs. They are also grooving on tumblrs, but having the stats of how many people visit your blog and how many people comment on your posts will help. The number of Twitter followers helps, too. The book is important, but they also want to know how many people will actually buy the book–which is why there are so many books “by” celebrities.
Have you picked up the “Guide to Literary Agents”? That’s a huge help.
Yup, got the guide, and you’re dead on. The agents who were most interested came more from non-fiction angle, and admitted that memoir was always going to be somewhere between fiction and non-fiction. The Twitter/social media/platform thing is both heartening and depressing. Heartening because technically it allows anyone to throw their hat in the ring, depressing because the numbers necessary to be considered “popular” grow ever larger — one agent suggested you needed 30,000 Twitter followers?! I told him in all honestly there was no way I could compete with drunken texts etc.
I feel your pain. My first “real” writing job was writing satire in a Q&A format that played on historians and cultural commentators. I loved it and am still trying to break back into satire, but it’s been so long since I wrote creatively that it’s a trying process to remember. Also, I really have to stop using the formula for fiction titles. You know what I mean, how many people would have read “The Power and the Glory: A Metaphysical Novel of the Mexican Persecutions” by Graham Greene?
Yeah, I agree, the toughest part is balancing your love of what is often a very particular historical period, or writer, or whatever, with the need to communicate to a wider audience. To be honest, I feel like it’s almost necessary to get out into the world and talk to normal people first, to understand what and what doesn’t. And to be really honest, this is why I often think that well-written historical fiction is a better tool for communication than any non-fiction…I mean, why not use your subject as inspiration in the broadest sense, make your first goal communicating it in whatever way you feel is most effective? And of course jokes can be written in later…
This was a good read. The publishing world is something I’ve been wanting to learn more about, now that I am taking my dreams of becoming a writer seriously (after years of writing just literary criticism, which is not why i decided to be an English major–another story for another day). I love the idea of taking the pitches out of the box and giving them feedback. If I ever teach writing again, I’m definitely using that.
About the arc: you said you don’t want to be cast in the lead role, and I feel like this is what is causing you trouble with the whole arc thing. So food for thought: who IS in the lead role? How did THAT actor/thing change throughout the essays? Maybe looking at it from another angle will help figure out what’s the narrative your essays present. Good luck! Can’t want to hear more!
Ha, I just realized you can tell I’m a classicist from this discussion. Much of antiquity is pre-novel, so you don’t hear “narrative arc” nearly as much…and when you do, it’s epic or something. And I’d recommend conferences for sure; there’s only so much you can learn from reading about an industry, much better to just ask the people involved outright!
And I’m a total narcissist, so I don’t mind being front and center…it’s just that, in my ideal world, the main point is not for the reader to be cheering for me to leave (a la The Devil Wears Prada), it’s for them to be as pissed about the system as I am — and once again, it’s hard to offer a pat ending since the system isn’t fixed; so the happy ending is…me leaving? Sure, be happy for me, but my leaving is a single act and didn’t change the world — I’m not that important, you know? Now, writing about it, on the other hand, might fix something. Waaaah.