6 Lessons I Learned on the Road—That Took 18 Months—to Publication in a Literary Magazine
2. Write your first drafts in your native language—if that feels natural.
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1. Avoid storytelling that explains a character’s culture and community.
“I’m a Black woman writer. I want to write stories anyone can read but I also don’t want to write words on the page that dangle on the faces of white readers.”
Before I learned to write for my people, before I learned to listen to my characters, in the middle of an action my character took, I wrote words that explained why a character bit her chest, fell to the ground, and tore her hair at a funeral ceremony. One night, pacing around my bed, flinging her arms, and moaning—why are you explaining my culture and community?!—my protagonist woke me up.
Her disappointment—in me—came off her like a smoke.
Until I read Night of the Living Rez: Stories by Morgan Talty, it didn’t occur to me that I was clutching the hands of white readers, that I was writing words that should not be on the page—which Talty calls “performative for a white readership”. David—the main character in the interconnected stories in Night of the Living Rez—never explains who he is or his community. Reading this story collection was as much a learning experience as an aesthetic one.
The short stories I am writing are set in a small town in Ethiopia. Sometimes I think the road to publication in a literary magazine would be easier if I explain my protagonist’s culture, her community, and the cultural elements in the story. But then I ask myself, why should I? I’m a Black woman writer. I want to write stories anyone can read but I also don’t want to write words on the page that dangle on the faces of white readers.
2. Write your first drafts in your native language—if that feels natural.
“I could have written the first drafts in English first, it would have saved me time, lots of time, but when I wrote the story in Amharic, it felt like my characters stood in front of me, and when they spoke I could hear them fine.”
On this road, when I write my first drafts in English, I learned I miss the essence of the story, of the characters, of who they are. After Our River Vanished, my first short story to be accepted for publication in a literary magazine, would not be the story that it is now if I didn’t write several drafts in Amharic first. The characters in my stories speak Amharic, my native language, and Gurage, a language my mother speaks and I know a few words of. To give the story life, I listened to my mother when she speaks in her mother’s tongue, I went to the town where my stories are set, and paid close attention to Gurages when they spoke and did things. I could have written the first drafts in English first, it would have saved me time, lots of time, but when I wrote the story in Amharic, it felt like my characters stood in front of me, and when they spoke I could hear them fine. If I had written the first drafts in English, it would have felt like my characters stood far from me, and when they spoke I would have strained my ear to listen.
When I started writing short stories, I used to force myself to write in English. Now, I write my draft zeros, and sometimes a few more drafts, in Amharic. Sometimes I jump between English and Amharic. Then, when I rewrite the story, based on the nuances and cultural elements of the Amharic language, I make a decision, what words to use, what style to use, and how to tell the story in English. Trying to figure out how to rewrite or how to remake that original Amharic text while replacing every single word is sometimes shoulders-bending. But I like the challenge, to render into English some Amharic words and expressions that are difficult to describe.
3. Give yourself permission to be messy and as terrible as you can be in your first drafts.
“The freedom to write whatever comes to mind, in draft zero, in sentences that read like someone who can’t write a sentence is writing them, allowed me to go to places I never thought I would go, create characters I never thought I would find intriguing, write storylines I never thought I would use for a short story.”
When I write my first draft—whether I write it on paper or my laptop—I call it draft zero. In this draft, I give myself permission to be messy and be as terrible as I can be. I write a warbler on a tree, a hut that looks 200 years old, that moment when the mothers flew past the epileptic boy. These things might be important, or not, I might breathe life and turn them into a story, or not, I don’t know, all I know is these things are coming to my mind and I write them without reading what I’m writing.
Later, much later, I read what I wrote, ask myself questions—what is this? What am I saying? What are my characters saying? Is this important? Why is this important?
After Our River Vanished is born out of its draft zero.
On this road, I may end up with draft number 10 or 20, but I always start with draft zero. The freedom to write whatever comes to mind, in draft zero, in sentences that read like someone who can’t write a sentence is writing them, allowed me to go to places I never thought I would go, create characters I never thought I would find intriguing, write storylines I never thought I would use for a short story. No one sees my draft zeros, not even my person. The mess in my draft zeros that hurt my eyes, only I get to see. These paragraphs that are all over the place, these people that don’t make sense, that make me want to tear my hair out of my skull, these scenes I’m not even sure can be called scenes, these moments that make me think can turn into a novel, only I get to read.
4. Write and write and write.
“The writing is the Himbasha I want to savor, take my time with.”
Someone I know who’s always talking about being published in a literary magazine, after I told him The/temz/Review accepted my short story, asked me if there is a way around writing. It took me a minute to get what he was asking.
He wants to be published without writing?
The writing is the Himbasha I want to savor, take my time with. Yes, I still can’t believe that this road led me to publication in a literary magazine, a dream I wanted for so long. Still… the best part—the part I love the most on this road—is the writing part.
5. Rejections are part of the road.
“I learned rejections are part of the road, they don’t stand outside the road, waving at me from afar, they are right there, on the road, blocking my way.”
In I Received Rejections for My Short Stories, in All Kinds, for 18 Months, Until…, I wrote that I received all kinds of rejections, those that turn your world black, those that make you feel happy but also confused, those that do not feel like rejections (these are my favorite ones where an editor takes the time to write personal notes). I don’t know how many rejections I received in the past 18 months (maybe one day I will count them, just to see how many). I learned rejections are part of the road, they don’t stand outside the road, waving at me from afar, they are right there, on the road, blocking my way. Sometimes they tell me things that make me race to my bedroom and hide away, sometimes they tell me things I need to know about my story, sometimes they tell me, right in my face, that my story is just not good, sometimes they don’t tell me anything—they just stand there blocking my way.
And the only way I can advance on this road is through them.
6. Patience.
“Patience in letting a story tell me what it wants to tell me.”
On this road, I learned patience in letting a story sit for a day, or a week, or a month, or even a year. Patience in trudging behind, to let the story lead me wherever it wants to take me. Patience in letting a story tell me what it wants to tell me. Patience in listening to the story, to the characters. Patience in rewriting the same story. Patience in rereading the same story. Patience in waiting to hear back from editors of literary magazines. Patience in receiving acceptance for publication. Patience. And patience. And more patience.