Our discussion last class regarding publishers and books has left me with a wide vacant chasm inside. Do we, as writers, really stare into the faces of the stone-faced gorgons of the publishing companies with any shred of hope? I have worked for years in the writing center environment and found the soul of the pen slowly draining away to its LCD arch-nemesis. Dust gathers atop old books while new ones are shelved in a digital storeroom for half the price and one-tenth the royalties.
I am a writer; I am an endangered species being hunted to extinction while no child will be left behind. NO SURVIVORS! Sometimes a light shines in the darkness, and occasionally, it is not an oncoming train. I have seen one or two writers emerge each semester. Not some aspirant e.e.cummings or Tolstoy or Cyber-Shakespeare, but some fresh new mind with a new perspective and desire to create worlds in words.
During those rare jewels in existence, I fight the overwhelming urge to weep and mourn a fate that has not transpired. The end of literate learning. Try as we might, good writers, our very existence is challenged by a world of efficiency, scientific dominion, and the bigger-better-faster-upgraded-supersmart word processing program that turns our craft into a binary sequence. Rise above and write.
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