Short is a style. Sure it is; think of Martin Scorsese, Kevin Hart, Woody Allen, and even Jack Black, dare I say – some guys pull it off – because it is a good feeling to be comfortable in your own skin. And maybe it’s more of an accomplishment when looks didn’t get you everything in life. But if you’re gonna be short, you gotta have style.
I was reading an article about Woody Allen. For many years, he’d make a film once a year – some good, some not so good. When he was asked if he thought his films would turn out better if he took two or three years to make them, he said it wouldn’t matter. He knows his own style. He knows how he works, thinks, and creates – heterodox as it may be.
You’ll read a lot of advice on how to write or make art in your lifetime. Last week, my advice came from David Sedaris, who said to focus on getting better at your craft, and the accolades will follow suit. This week, it is about how you have to do what works for you – not necessarily what works for everybody else.
Oppenheimer was criticized because he didn’t have “sitzflisch”- the ability to sit down in a chair for a long time and do the hard work. Another Physicist said, “His ideas are good, but his calculations are always wrong.” For good or bad, he is the mind that stood out in history.
I am able to churn out a page of poetry every Monday night, write weekly extemporaneous reflections, make YouTube videos most weeks, write and record songs, and complete writing 500-page novels in under a year. You want to know what I can’t do? Geometry and publication.
Now, should I focus on getting published and learning about Side Angle Side? Or should I do what God made me to do and be myself, regardless of whether or not it is the “right way?”
Donna Tartt takes nearly ten years to write a novel – and yes they are very good, but even she wrote a dud. Despite your process – whether it takes ten years or 20 minutes – it isn’t going to be perfect. It is going to be you.
I spent almost three years writing a collection of short stories in longhand that came out to 100 pages. Was it better than the first novel I wrote at twenty-one in less than a year? Arguably; But not definitively.
Call me a rough draft self-publisher til’ the day I die – my work isn’t going to be much better if it takes twice or ten times as long. For some, it might. I encourage you to take your time if that is how your mind works. You and I shouldn’t change who we are to suit one another.
Don’t disregard the fact that it took me a long time to get to this place – a place where I feel comfortable making art on my own time schedule. It isn’t about the hours you put into it; it is what you put into the hours. This is just me.
Be short with making your art if that happens to be you.
Ben Bonkoske 