Read a lovely essay by Stacey D’Erasmo at Literary Hub about the freedom of writing with no byline, no fear, no ego. I love this bit:
Again and again, I found that when students wrote without their names, much that was awkward, dull, strained, and frankly boring fell away. It was like watching people who thought they couldn’t dance dancing beautifully in the dark.
I get that, but my ego is too big. Plus, if the fear of failure or people taking issue with what I say is not there, it takes some of the thrill away for me. As much as I like to succeed, the excitement for me comes from the possibility of the crash and burn… and maybe I’m just too used to crashing and burning. Although with dancing I’ll definitely stick to the dark – that is my gift to those around me. Of course, I wrote this before I read the article it’s linked to so let me publish it and then go and read the article so that I can realize that I’m full of s— and not able to delete the comment.
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