When I was sending out the manuscript for my first book in the 1990s, I had to print and mail all 230 pages, then wait for a response. (Publishers didn’t yet do business by email). More than 30 times, the manuscript came back in the self-addressed stamped envelope that I had enclosed, along with a rejection letter. One day, I walked down the street to pick up my two children at their elementary school, and returned to find a fat envelope on the front porch yet again. Without even opening it, I burst into tears.
“Mommy, what’s wrong?” my son, age 10 at the time, asked.
“No one wants my book,” I answered.
He shook his head and gave me a puzzled look. “If something you do makes you cry, why do you keep doing it?”
That afternoon, I packed up the manuscript and my notes, drew a tombstone on the outside of the banker’s box, and wrote “R.I.P.” Then I put it in the attic. I could have easily left it there, but eventually I worked up the nerve to send it again. What I learned has informed me through the rest of my writing career. I hope that my hard-earned wisdom might help you along the way.
Don’t give up. After I brought the manuscript to the attic, it felt good to stop the endless cycle of hope and disappointment. A few months later, a fellow writer asked me whether I was working on anything new. “Well, I was…” I answered and told her about my project.
“Are you sure you’re done?” she asked.
For seven years, I had written and rewritten my memoir. I wanted to connect with readers. Didn’t I advise my children to be persistent in the face of adversity? In the end, it took more than three years to find a publisher. The protracted timeline gave me time to publish other, shorter work, which made me feel like a bona fide writer, even when the rejections suggested otherwise.
Clarify your writing goals. When I write, I lose track of time. I immerse myself in another world with its own sensory details. Even if the setting is a place as familiar as my hometown of Richmond, I often write about other time periods. To create a scene, I have to imagine the clatter of streetcars, the scent of wet tobacco on a rainy day, the hemlines and hats of passersby. Next I focus on choosing the right details, down to the way the words sound when read aloud. Nothing else I do holds my attention in the same way. I’m always writing – in a journal, in a notebook for early drafts, on my computer. This is how I make sense of everything. The satisfaction of crafting sentences and scenes always comes first. Only after that do I try to publish.
Balance writing and the rest of your life. I used to resent every interruption to my work. Now I see that diversifying my life actually helped make me a better writer. Having little time gave my writing even more urgency. I scribbled down a chapter of my memoir on the back of flyers at Starbucks while my daughter took a piano lesson. My words tumbled out because I never knew when I would have another quiet moment. When the writing didn’t flow, or when I received yet another rejection, something completely different demanded my attention. I couldn’t keep sulking when I had to make dinner or take the dog for a walk.
Keep rejection in perspective. No matter how many books, articles, and poems I’ve published, I’m not immune to rejection. No one is. It’s important to remind yourself that the work you’ve sent out has to fit the vision of the person receiving it. It’s better to think about rejection as the wrong fit, rather than a statement about the worth of your work, or worse, a pronouncement about whether you should be a writer at all. James Baldwin wisely reminds us all of what it truly takes to become an author: “Write. Find a way to keep alive and write…Beyond talent lie all the usual words: discipline, love, luck, but most of all endurance.”
About the Author
Raised in Richmond and now based in Boston, Clara Silverstein is the author of the memoir White Girl: A Story of School Desegregation, the historical novel Secrets in a House Divided, and four non-fiction books. A poetry collection and a cookbook are forthcoming in 2025. Her articles and essays have appeared in the Boston Globe, Runner’s World, and many other periodicals. Find her at www.clarasilverstein.com