The Loneliness of the Writer

Writing is a solitary occupation, and one of its hazards is loneliness. –Joyce Carol Oates

Some of the best times of a writer’s life come with long hours of uninterrupted work, a story unspooling before you on the computer screen, becoming one with the characters, the words flowing freely. But then the writing day comes to an end and you look up from your work, feeling strange, disconnected. As if you didn’t know where you belong.

What’s going on here? More than likely, it is loneliness you’re feeling, a longing for meaningful connection. The kind of lonely which is different from being in solitude. You want to talk to someone who will understand that you can spend all day finding your way into a new chapter. Someone to despair with when you are blocked.

This is where the writing community comes in, the community of artists and musicians. The people you meet at art exhibits or open mics or at poetry and literature festivals. In art classes and writing retreats and music camps. Those who know the world you live in, and who “get” what you’re doing. And since an individual’s art is intense and personal, the relationships you develop among those in that community can be as ardent, as fervent as romantic relationships.

Painters Vincent Van Gogh and Paul Gauguin developed such a relationship. Not a romantic one, but a close artistic friendship. They lived together for a time, painted together and learned from each other. As did the impressionists Paul Cezanne and Camille Pissarro. Some famous writing friendships include poets Elizabeth Bishop and Robert Lowell, and novelists James Baldwin and Toni Morrison. Great friendships come when you share your life. And when a great part of that life is your music or sculpture or writing, you need someone who can comprehend the highs and lows of that life. Someone who will ask how is your writing going? Your painting? And realize that the answer reveals how it is you are doing, how it is with your soul.

“An artist is always alone—if he is an artist,” Henry Miller said. “No, what the artist needs is loneliness.” Writing or painting or composing music require long stretches of focus and concentration. Withdrawal from the world. It is a strange irony: you need solitude, alone time to create that which brings meaning and purpose. But how can it be meaningful without someone to share it with ? You must be of the world to create art, but at the same time, you must be apart. How can you do that?

The answer is that you must find people who will help you flourish. Your artistic close kin, your writing tribe. They are out there, lonely like you are, wanting someone who understands just as you do. You must find one another.–Lucy Adkins

For more about making connections and finding inspiration in your writing life, go to http://www.thewritingandcreativelife.com