Poet or Pornographer?

[ana milgram]

So, come on chaps, who harbours a dream to be a writer? I've just wittered on about it on this thread, where I said "I've always been torn about whether I wanted to be an artist or a writer (or comic book writer & artist or an art band lyricist etc. etc.) I tend to make text art or art writing nowadays..."

and I just wondered if anyone else had a dream of seeing a nice, solid book with their name as the author? If so, what do you write?

oh, and if you've ever actually been properly published, how did it happen?

[Durutti]

Oh fo sho.

I scribble short satirical stories peopled by terrible, gargoyle-like characatures in a half-arsed attempt to be a 21st Century Dickens and pen a scathing yet hilarious indictment of modern Britain.

Some of its fairly pornographic too.

[ana milgram]

Durutti said:

Some of its fairly pornographic too.

yeah, I have to admit, a lot of my "art" writing just turns into weird head porn, but I think it's a valid art form

[Smileadelic]

Yeah, I do! I love writing, more than anything else - even music. Which I hadn't really appreciated until about this last year or so, but there we are.

I've been published in numerous local / uni publications as a critic. I'm hoping to into magazine journalism after I graduate. I guess my real dream is to be a screenwriter, though - my two shorts were the most enjoyable things I've ever written.

[ana milgram]

Sounds good, go for it.

I guess writing is a funny area, a lot of other artforms need an audience, but you can just sit at home writing, imagining history will realise your genius (speaking from my own experience). It's cheap to do, but there's always the suspicion that there isn't quite such a push to get it out there as there is with music, say. Plus people who just want to have other people read their stuff can now put it online.

I'm just going to keep asking new questions about this, what would make you actually approach a publisher? would just it be desperation, part of a professional plan to get into the industry, or only if you knew you'd written something fantastic?

[John Brainlove]

You could do what I do - every time I want to do something I just put a bucket on my head and then run at it as hard as I can, and if I fall over, I try again...