Self-Unhelpful

As a fledgling author, there is no place more depressing than a used bookstore. I move through the high-walled labyrinth trying not to look at the creased and flaking spines of a thousand authors more accomplished, more talented that I who have come to rest here – piled on the shelves like forgotten memories.  

All I wanted was a book on how to sue a major corporation for copyright infringement and I acquire a mental afflicting. Even the psychology books on aisle 6B were as uplifting as a concrete umbrella thanks to their fading covers, outdated art, and being outnumbered 4-1 by the self-help titles on aisle 4A, 4B and part of 5A.

Naturally with all those books I began to wonder why do we write? I know why I write – for the copious amount of sex in this lifestyle. But what about us as a species, as a sentient species with countless ambitions and boundless imagination. What makes so many of us want to construct interest in a 200-500 page story about people who may or may not have existed? 

So many, like myself, struggle to even reach the mild success of actually being published. Once that major obstacle is crossed one in far-too-many may manage to achieve a successful title. That may sustain those involved for a little while longer, but hardly enough to motivate so many.

Perhaps it is that every so often, some genius or machine/author like Michael Chabon, Janet Evanovich, or Stephen King rolls across the literary landscape leaving treadmarks deep enough to remain behind, to fill with rain, and to grow imitators until the next earth-shaping event. Those instances certainly inspire some dreams, but even they are building on millenia of storytelling.

Most of those stories are lost, and disappeared shortly after the tellers. Even now, the vast majority of authors barely make a dent in the surface of our existence. If anything, their tales end up compressed by the weight of those piled on top of them; compost for those that will come after. There is a mild nobility in one’s story providing a platform for those who follow. That doesn’t feel exactly inspirational, though. If anything, the sheer volume and variety of novels actually inspires me to join the paper industry.   

So why do we do this? What makes us write? If I go outside, there are no squirrels writing novels, there are no deer composing poetry. They seem content to eat and avoid being eaten. Do we create stories of adventure, growth, and danger because the challenge of remaining alive has become too easy? Or is literary expression a culmination of our evolution and the evidence of that happening again lies in the dance of bees, the art of elephants, and the songs of birds? 

We, of course, slaughter and kill these other creatures on our big ball, directly or indirectly, just like we do ourselves. We sit on our metaphorical porches, watching the toil of the natural world, the struggle to survive taking place around our grand homes with the unaffected interest of the manor class. The struggles of the creatures around us bear no resemblance to our own – so maybe we look for similarity in those who live elsewhere, or are imagined, or both.

It is arguable that we read stories to feel less alone. And those who don’t apparently begin to see differences between themselves and the others on the porch, start debating their place there until that debate turns violent.  

Perhaps this is why we write stories, then: as an act of self-preservation, self-help. By writing stories of others we try to hold ourselves together, to prevent our species from destroying itself out of boredom. It may be imperative that we find someone to play with out in the universe or another dimension or by learning to speak dolphin. If we don’t, we may be destined to run both out of stories and out of patience for our own condition.

Maybe by writing we also seek to discover an idea that will expedite the process of finding friends we can relate to or rivals to compete with. Someone others who can occupy our time until we mature into beings who are a bit more self-reflective and less self-destructive.

Regardless, we had better hurry. Eventually bees are going to start asserting themselves. And although they may go the route of Chinua Ache-bee, with a little vicious disco-dancing here and there it will be honey mines for the lot of us.