Given the times we live in, I’ve noticed more articles and books, for writers and artists, discussing the value and importance of pursuing creative endeavors, such as:
Keep Going: 10 Ways to Stay Creative in Good Times and Bad by Austin Kleon
Your Art Will Save Your Life by Beth Pickens
The Gift by Lewis Hyde, first published about 40 years ago, re-released this fall
In the latest and final Glimmer Train bulletin, author Bret Anthony Johnston writes eloquently about the losses we’re all now experiencing—including the loss of Glimmer Train itself. (Its last issue has now been printed and sent.) He says:
[Loss] can make fiction—reading it, writing it—feel like an obnoxious waste of time. And maybe it is. … But what if all of this loss is the exact reason to read? To write? This is what I keep thinking; this is the rope to which I cling. What if stories are the light that will enable us to navigate the dark?
Read his full piece, Even in the Gathering Darkness.
As anyone who’s read Glimmer Train knows, it has been a publication with a singular and special mission, not once veering off-course. I greatly admire how its founder-editors have chosen their exit; may the light of their work shine for many years to come.
Jane Friedman has spent her entire career working in the publishing industry, with a focus on business reporting and author education. Established in 2015, her newsletter The Bottom Line provides nuanced market intelligence to thousands of authors and industry professionals; in 2023, she was named Publishing Commentator of the Year by Digital Book World.
Jane’s expertise regularly features in major media outlets such as The New York Times, The Atlantic, NPR, The Today Show, Wired, The Guardian, Fox News, and BBC. Her book, The Business of Being a Writer, Second Edition (The University of Chicago Press), is used as a classroom text by many writing and publishing degree programs. She reaches thousands through speaking engagements and workshops at diverse venues worldwide, including NYU’s Advanced Publishing Institute, Frankfurt Book Fair, and numerous MFA programs.
Loss, indeed. Are we not everyone of us going to lose everything eventually. The impending ‘big loss’ is the most compelling aspect of fiction, in my opinion. Loss is the very nature of the “heart of a story.” Every good story. And to go farther out on a limb, here — what is the spiritual journey but discovering how to abide in each and every one of our losses on the way to the big one? John Keats called that ability ‘negative capability.’ What say ye to all of fhat?
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Glimmer Train was the first publication I stumbled upon as a newly retreaded civilian. Have I twiddled my nascent writing career into neutral over the past 23 years?
No. I refuse to mourn. I’ve just finished my first query letter, and synopsis in the past week. Though I never got around to a GT submission… the publication has been as much a tool of recovery as education.
From my upbringing in Oregon, to the courage to become a resident of New York state… Glimmer Train is in my blood. Thank you for the inspiration to keep living… keep writing.