[stylist] Johnlee's article

[LoriStay at aol.com]

Johnlee, I like what you wrote here.   Would you consider letting me use it 
in Slate & Style?
Lori
In a message dated 12/26/08 2:18:59 PM, johnlee at clarktouch.com writes:


> Shelley:
> 
> Aside from my six-year run as publisher of my own publishing operation, I
> have been involved in the publishing world for twelve years.  I've worked
> with many, many writers, about half of them hearing sighted and the other
> deaf sighted with a few deafblind.  While the quality of the writing always
> plays a role in whether or not something gets published, the deaf writers'
> writing from the deaf perspective is always, always an advantage.
> 
> No, I don't mean one needs to make a conscious effort to write "about" being
> deaf, in the didactic sense.  Just write about life--love, crime, family,
> whatever--but through deaf eyes, drawing from the deaf writer's own
> observations and sensations.  Ha Jin, the well-known writer, made the point
> in his latest book that there are too many writers who write about stuff
> they learned in a secondhand fashion, and readers can pick it up, even
> though they may not be conscious.  The writer's describing his or her own
> genuine observations and experiences for the purpose of describing things is
> very important and lends the work with an aura of, a vibe exuding
> authenticity.
> 
> So that's one benefit of writing exactly what you know.  Another boon to any
> writer is any type of outsiderhood.  If you look back on the annals of
> literature, those who are "different" from the establishment population but
> don't write from that different perspective don't get published often, or if
> they do, their work wears off quickly and they are forgotten.  Take the
> example of Thomas Caldwell, who was deaf, but wrote as if he wasn't.  Who
> knows him now?  Or take Richard Wright, a wonderful and groundbreaking
> African American writer.  All of his books are still in print, except one,
> and that was the only book he wrote about only white people.
> 
> You understand, there are tens of thousands sighted people writing and
> trying to get published.  So I cannot imagine any use in adding more of the
> same types of material to that pot.  There are only a limited number of
> genres and plots, and they all have been done over and over again.  But if
> you're blind, and you're privileged to have different sensations and a
> different touch in your observations, that's quite a blessing and will help
> your work stand out amidst the awful racket of the same old, same old that
> editors endure reading through week after week.
> 
> Now, my deaf writer friends, they all have found their most important and
> rewarding publishing credits through their deaf material.  Many of them,
> before they started workring with me, wrote only mainstream stuff, thinking
> they would have a better chance.  Not so.  Take Raymond Luczak: He has
> written over forty plays, but only twelve with deaf characters.  Thirteen of
> his plays have been produced.  All twelve deaf plays and one not make up the
> thirteen, leaving the rest of his "hearing" plays still collecting dust.  He
> has written four novels, only one with deaf characters.  No surprise: The
> three mainstream works remain unpublished and the deaf one won a prestigious
> fellowship and also a national first-novel contest and will be coming out
> soon.  Raymond's "hearing" stuff is good and worthy of publication, but the
> problem is that there are so many equally good stuff these days, because
> there are so many well-trained writers from all those MFA programs.  Those
> who get published are the ones with unique voices, original twists, or those
> who bring to the reader authentic tastes of different worlds.
> 
> I once got a story from a good deaf writer.  It was about the Titanic.  A
> couple gets separated at the end, the woman rowed away while the man sinks
> with the ship.  It was wonderfully researched and detailed.  The writing was
> smooth and luminous.  In all the fundamental areas, it was a superb story.
> But it was never picked up, and the deaf writer could not understand why
> not, since it was one of her very best efforts.  The reason, of course, is
> that the Titanic as the backdrop for a love story has been done to death.
> It was already worn threadbare even before that movie with Leo and Kate. 
> 
> But what if the couple was deaf?  They wake up because of the great
> commotion outside their room sending vibrations to them.  They ask each
> other what's going on.  Outside their room, they see people running.  They
> try to get someone to write to them on a notepad, but they're all panicked.
> So they have to investigate, and gradually, from all the visual information,
> they begin to understand.  A sailor tries to put the deaf woman in line for
> getting on a lifeboat, but she doesn't want to be separated from her
> husband.  All sorts of misunderstandings, issues, correctives, etc. occur.
> And at the end, a twist on the classic separation thing: The deaf woman
> decides to sink with her husband, so strong is their bond with each other as
> they come from a small community and the deaf woman cannot imagine venturing
> out on her own amidst all those hearing strangers. 
> 
> Now, isn't that a much better story?  A blind couple on the Titanic would
> likewise be much better than the mainstream version and would definitely
> stand out!
> 
> Incidentally, some of the hearing writers I've worked with but who have
> connectins to the Deaf world, they also have found greater success in
> publishing their work relating to the Deaf world as opposed to their more
> mainstream fare.  Take Morgan Grayce Willow, an ASL interpreter.  Her
> biggest book credit is her work on interpreting.  Her most prestigious
> magazine credit is for her essay "Double Language," about her experiences as
> an interpreter.  She has published other stuff, but with much more
> difficulty and less compensation.  Or take Pia Taavila, a wonderful poet and
> professor of English, who is the daughter of deaf parents, or a CODA as we
> call people like her--Children of Deaf Adults.  She has written both
> mainstream stuff and stuff having to do with her upbringing in a Deaf home
> and her continued link with the Deaf community.  You guessed it again: Her
> Deaf-related poems are more readily published and get higher praise.
> 
> It is not that they can't get published without the deaf material.  They can
> and have.  But it is against greater, much greater odds that they do.  Here
> and there, they are able to be heard, able to be distinguished from the rest
> clamoring for the same editor's attention.  And it's not that writing from a
> different perspective will automatically get you published.  The writing
> still has to be good.  But it is a huge advantage in arresting the editor's
> attention, curiosity, and interest.
> 
> I don't know how the deaf writers could possibly try to write mainstream
> stuff, or how you could avoid writing as a blind writer, but I never could,
> never wanted to.  It feels fake and contrived to me.  It would take too much
> effort to pretend, to write about auditory things I never heard, to write
> visual descriptions of what I have never seen.  I am of the opinion that
> "'catering" to the mainstream audience is self-defeating, because there are
> many writers that produce mainstream stuff and it's not like they're
> "catering" but they're genuine because they ARE mainstream.  I have always
> written straight from who and what I am.  And I am not complaining about my
> inability to write mainstream stuff because I've been published in POETRY
> magazine twice, while there are thousands of poets who can only dream about
> ever getting there; I've been published in McSWEENEY'S, America's most hip
> literary journal; I've won all those awards; my work has been broadcast on
> radio, including on the "Poem of the Day" program on Martha Stewart; I'm
> being interviewed by someone from The New Yorker right now; I've been a
> featured poet at an international cultural arts festival, flown there
> first-class and with all expenses paid . . .   so I guess I must be doing
> something right.
> 
> No, that was not to brag at all.  That was purely to make my point, to make
> my case for writing from a different angle, and to encourage you and others
> to try doing that.  Hey, it can't hurt to try, can it?
> 
> John
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
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> 
> 
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