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galen  ·  2498 days ago  ·  link  ·    ·  parent  ·  post: Regretfully, I Found My Voice

Fucking BN.

    Every young writer dreams of finding his or her true voice. What nobody tells him or her is that his or her true voice could be bad, which is what happened to me. Frankly speaking, ever since my ever-so-sought-after discovery of my own true voice, frankly, reading me has been torture of the utmost. And I have taken it upon myself to crucify myself in this article as a cautionary tale to any aspiring young novice of the pen and page who is trying to find his or her own voice for themselves. Which, for some people, basically, you shouldn’t.

    Really, I regret finding out that I write like this and sorry you have to read the whole verbiage of this article but I digress. I remember the sultry summer afternoon in late August on which the first intimations of my voice hit me full force like a literary car crash or punch. It was a sweltering August afternoon, the atmosphere was like honey and the sun was going through my window a lot. In irony to the sunlight, I was grievously writing-up my friend a condolence card, given that, his mother had passed out —recently— of life. That’s right, it was a heart-breaker scenario.

    The scenario stumped me. “What to write?” was the question of the day, 
looming around like a question mark. After what seemed like an eternity, I was still stumped. But then, suddenly, after what seemed like an eternity, I literally remembered the quote of “Write what you know.” The stumped part of me packed his bags and hit the road, because I knew about the scenario and I didn’t have the pressure to write more than what came out of me free like the wind blows, and so I jolted-up to write. I was really attacked by the muse.

    So I put pen to condolence-letter and I wrote down what I knew—drumroll:

    What can I say: It’s a heart-breaker scenario. (re: your mom dead.) I basically wish, dear reader, you luck with —drumroll— your grief.

    Reading it over, it was unlike anything I had ever read. I realized that this writing must have chosen me. Because I would have never chosen this writing. And suddenly it hit me, like a speedy car crash or punch: “dang, this is must be my voice.”
Chagrinned, I began to discover more about my inner creativity: my voice is floral yet at the same time poor quality, preoccupied with parallel constructions yet at the same time difficult to make them. It is also pretty inconsistent: turns out, that my voice is like a trashy loft: at the same time lofty and trashy. Zing!

    Furthermore, am I charmingly, or simply misusing syntax? And the word “syntax,” is this really le mot just? But, dear reader, as mannered as this style may be, I am “to this manner born,” as the great Bard would have it said, William Shakespeare, author. And so to mine own voice I must stay true.

    Reading this over, I hate it. Wow! I hang my head like an awful dog, to know that this is the honest expression of my artistic self. It especially hangs my head to know what could have been, had I not, on that fateful day which was sweltering, discovered my voice — for, actually speaking, before I had discovered my own voice, I had even been writing in exactly the same voice as Cormac McCarthy! And despite it not being original, it was good. It was like there was another extra Cormac McCarthy which was great, because he’s par excellence.

    But rue! —as a warning to you striving young dreamsters seeking out their own serious style— though I could have accumulated a National Book Prize with great accolade had I only continued in McCarthy’s style, my integrity compelled me to stick to my true voice of bona fide my own. Now I can only get published in humor sections, and so you will not take seriously this sincere warning to you — I am like some kind of Cassandra which was a Greek lady nobody believed. And remember my dead-mom friend? He says my consolation-letter made him laugh so hard it gave him closure. I did not intend like that!

    In conclusion, let’s wrap things up. Ultimately, avoid your own voice. Copy a nice author, someone who has published. Copy Cormac McCarthy which is the author of The Road! Copy Joyce Carol Oates — her nice new book that is called The Sacrifice is about important issues facing our culture like social injustice, which is germane. And if you want to get into humor writing you should copy and paste this article.