“Just As Long As”

“First, I don’t usually have deadlines for my fiction. Sometimes there are deadlines in turning around edits and so on. But in terms of starting and finishing a story or book, all my deadlines are internal – which, in some ways, makes things harder, and intensifies the struggle you mention above. (If I can work on something forever…oh God, I might end up working on something forever.)

There can be days or weeks or months where I’m thinking, ‘Dear Lord, please just show me that I have a story here and, if you would, what the heck it is, so that I can feel justified in going on.’ This is part of that syndrome wherein we artists are willing to walk through flames just as long as we can be assured that the whole escapade is going to lead is to something good.

Sadly, that guarantee is not available in the land of art.” -George Saunders response to a reader

Speaking of art and time and it taking what it takes, you have to read this great Substack from George Saunders.

If we knew ahead of time how long it would take, or how difficult it would be, or that it would eventually all work out, then it wouldn’t exactly be art, would it?