Being a writer isn't what it used to be

I remember pretty clearly when I decided writing was for me. I was 15 or 16, and my English teacher set the class a creative writing assignment, and not only did I have a great time putting together the resulting short story, but when she returned it her written comments called it "a revelation". (If you've read the acknowledgements in my novel you'll know she also made a nice comment in my end-of-year report about how she wouldn't be surprised to see my name on the bestseller list one day, though alas she hasn't yet been proven right.)

Anyway, that was enough for me. I got to make shit up and also get positive reinforcement from an authority figure? Yes please. Besides, being a writer sounded great: toil away at home during the day, go to parties at night, every now and then get stopped by an adoring fan on the street, and otherwise lead a pretty normal life. At one point I definitely had a mental image of writing in a book-lined Scandi-inspired study until the end of the school day, and then wandering to pick up my kid and being a fun dad for the rest of the day. (This was long before I actually had a kid, or maybe even met my wife.)

Nowadays, though, that's not really what a writer is signing up for, is it? My original, teenage dream of a writer's life — whether it was accurate or not — was the product of a pre-social media, pre-smartphone world, one in which there weren't nearly as many things for which you could be publicly, nationally, globally shamed, and the only way anyone would know you'd said something shameworthy was if you'd been caught by a journalist or paparazzo, and nobody would care anyway unless you were famous to begin with.

This isn't meant as some sort of anti-woke rant about how I should be able to say whatever I want, whenever I want. In general I'm in favour of the sink-or-swim social media environment, where you either get called out for saying dumb shit, or you learn to think very carefully about what you're saying before you say it, or you choose not to say anything publicly at all — because really, who needs to hear what you think anyway?

Except here I am, of course, telling you what I think. And that's the thing that's changed about being a writer since my doe-eyed teenage years. Unless you're a Franzen or a Rooney or whatever, so successful that you're permitted to make your disdain for the hustle part of your brand, as a writer these days you're far more commercially attractive if you have a well-established platform or following. As a writer, you're not allowed to choose public silence; on the contrary, you're expected to say things publicly, regularly — even if, as a person, you would otherwise choose not to say anything at all.

That's where I'm at these days, which might come as something of a surprise to anyone who knows how much I used to tweet and blog. But as much as I used to love posting hot takes and lame jokes online, over the past ten years or so my position there has shifted. I no longer crave that sort of validation from a general public, nor do I think there's much chance of me getting it. On the contrary, I'm now far more terrified of condemnation from the general public if I dash off a quick joke that inadvertently offends someone. I'd much rather make my close friends laugh, both because I care about them more, and because I know I'll have a chance to apologise if I do offend them (and because I know they care about me enough to give me the benefit of the doubt to begin with, and accept my sincere apologies afterwards).

So a lot of times, now, when I actually have a piece of writing picked up for publication, alongside the sense of success and satisfaction of knowing I wrote something good enough that other people liked it — that same positive reinforcement I've been chasing since my high school English class — I'm also gripped with fear and anxiety: that I've written it with my white male privilege blinders on, that I've made a stupid factual error, that within seconds of being available online it's going to be pounced on by critics or trolls.

And again, in general, I don't have a problem with that state of affairs; if I've put my foot in my mouth or made a mistake, I'd rather hear about it so I can avoid the same mistake next time. But in practice it does suck some of the joy out of being published, and the idea now of being successful enough that someone might recognise me on the street is actively a little horrifying.

Am I saying I don't want to be a writer anymore? Absolutely not. I still enjoy writing, and big picture, once the work has been out there for a while and the world hasn't ended, I do still feel the pride at having put it out there to begin with. Probably the anxiety has also made my writing stronger, on balance. But if I were a fifteen-year-old today, looking at what it's like to be a writer now? I'm not sure I'd find it so compelling.

Maybe that's okay, for fifteen-year-olds; they've got plenty of other creative career paths now that didn't even exist in the late 90s. For the publishing industry, though, I worry a bit. If the flow of moony teenage aspiring writers dries up today, where are we going to find the novels of tomorrow?