Once Upon a Time…
The stroke of a pen on a page says so much in a silent way. The blue horizon lines on paper are tracks for words to ride upon until they flow cleverly into something more, a sentence, a paragraph, a page, a book. Books begin as imagined, usually at a desk, in a quiet place, at a pinnacle for observation, with a pen and pad of paper, with a keyboard and a laptop screen. But, most books end in an unexpected way, unfinished in a stagnant digital file or looking at the bottom of a dark office trash bin.
Carrie knew this feeling, crumpled and abandoned by her author until being rescued by the careful hands of Tabitha King. Tabitha believed in Carrie and wanted to see her live. She encouraged her husband Stephen to finish and polish the book. Stephen King’s novel Carrie has become a bestselling horror novel, the rights of which were sold for more than $400,000. That is some expensive trash. By this vivid example, there is a real question in the air. Why do writers start books and not finish them? Why are good books left unpublished? One true way to answer these questions is by asking those who have wrestled with writer’s block, discouragement, and long hours of edits. Let’s ask the authors.
An Author’s Tale: Why Do You Write?
“I have loved to write since I was a girl,” Courtney Casper explained as she contemplated her path to authorhood. “It helped me process life & tell stories, both things I craved & loved.”
Courtney relates to the release that writing brings to the mind and heart. It is a medium of expression that upon first draft is brazenly raw. She recounts that the exploration of her creative abilities through writing and other art forms helped to calm her mind and heart during spells of anxiety and depression.
Casper, now a 30-year-old mom and current author, began her writing journey with a determined mindset. She has about 5,000-7,000 books in circulation, including books published through Deseret Book. She has not received a higher education in a writing-related field, consequently attributing her success to, “a relentless passion for connection with others & expanding our capacity for faith.” Casper is a self-taught graphic designer, illustrator, writer, and online marketing & web designer.
Courtney Casper has authored the following publications:
Volume 1 & 2 Companion Study Guide to The Book of Mormon
Choose Yes
Finding Sabbath
Find Truth: A kid’s Guide to Discovering Truth
Wide Margin Book of Mormon
Wide Margin New Testament
(Photos Taken by Ashley Chilcutt at Deseret Book.)
With her accumulated expertise and empathy towards depression and discouragement, Courtney Casper responds to writers who have turned their backs on authorhood. She provides a new perspective, posing the question, “What is discouraging you?! In a world where popularity seems to be king, I’d call for a reconciliation as to WHY you are writing this manuscript at all? Are you chasing what’s trending or are you writing passionately for your specific audience? Are you talking to that audience every day through the writing process? Are you giving them good quality content now, or waiting for your book to be completed?” Casper’s rhetorical questions lead to a need for deeper digging.
To discover the reasons behind why individuals write and why they stop writing, a short survey was given to a sample of 50 people in the Utah-Idaho area. The questions surveyed their general knowledge of the publication process and attempted to gauge the motivations behind starting and stopping a writing project.
When asked the multi-answer question, “What personally makes you unmotivated to write?”, participants were given the following choices and were instructed to select all that apply: Lack of time, Lack of Motivation, Lack of Inspiration, Lack of Resources, Lack of Confidence, Lack of “Know-how” in the Publication Process, and Other. As the top three answers, 24.47% answered that it was a Lack of Time, and Lack of Inspiration and Lack of “Know-how” tied at 17.02%.
A female participant age 18-24 with a high school education indicated through survey response that, “[She] started writing a book when [she] was young but gave up.” She also indicated that her un-motivators were a lack of confidence in the manuscript and the lack of “known-how” in pursuing publication.
A male survey participant between ages 55-64 with a Doctoral degree stated that, “Writing is a mode of communication that takes thought and imagination. It requires one to research, to analyze and make conclusions. Writing is a record of a person’s thought process. Writing widens horizons and deepens perspectives. I started writing because I wanted to experiment with the learning process. The same motivation keeps me going.” Despite his admirable drive, this gentleman indicated that he stops writing due to lack of time.
A survey contributor who chose to contribute anonymously said, “I love writing. I have written ever since I was a small child, encouraged by my grandmother. I usually write everyday whether in my journal or a book I am currently writing.”
This participant, like Courtney Casper and others, is making small strides in their writing endeavors despite unmotivating factors. This example demonstrates how the necessity to write has affected more than one of the interviewees since childhood.
According to Joseph Epstein, American essayist and editor, about 80% of Americans desire to write and publish their own books, but according to the small survey which asked what percentage of people desire to write, only 7% of participants knew this statistic. The survey data demonstrates that people are unaware of the high internal desires the majority of people have to express their thoughts on paper. Most projected that the only 50% of Americans have the desire to write a book.
Interestingly, 60% of the survey audience has thought about writing a book, but only 8% has actually submitted a manuscript for publication. The writing competition looks different when only a portion of the competitors actually start running to reach the finish line. These statistics illustrate the void between wanting and doing.
As encouragement to disheartened writers like the early Stephen King, Courtney Casper gives the following advice: “Don’t let the world’s rules for ‘success’ cloud your love for writing… If you love to write, if you feel called to speak, if you have something to say; say it, write it, speak it. And don’t look back." She reassures fellow writers that, “The process of writing and creating different books has been such an incredibly rewarding experience, to have them in the world & touching people’s lives is very humbling and fulfilling.”
If there is anything that has become present from the accumulation of this information, it is that books are still needed and relevant, if not for the reader then for the writer. Even in a technological world, there is something serene about the feeling of pages between fingers and seeing the warped shapes of letters from behind spectacles. The fire to write lives in the hearts of many people. May the Stephen Kings of the world remember the potential for success that is held in every piece of writing which, at the moment, may seem like a glorious pieces of trash but later may prove to be indispensable. May these words probe the writing fires within the hearts of those whose desires are fading to red-orange embers, ready to burn one true time.
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