While musicians and actors present their work on stage throughout their lives, seeing their audience, their reactions and interacting with them, writers work alone at home, struggle to get published and then the book goes to bookstores, like a message in a bottle released to the ocean by a desperate castaway in search of someone to return.
Of course, there are reviews and criticisms in newspapers, websites and blogs out there. Even though nowadays more releases sent by publishers are published than analyzes of the book, they are essential for the author to know how they are being received and understood. Still, this is swampy terrain...
When my last book came out, “Xing Ling made in China”, by Solisluna, several reviews and articles were published, including one saying that the text “refers to the mocking verses of the colonial poet Gregório de Matos, but without forgetting the mockery of old Cuíca de Santa Amaro”, the other in which the journalist asks me the influences of the book and I quote Aldous Huxley, George Orwell and other authors, then he says that “although the author denies it, it is clear that Harry Potter was influence on his literature”. So I, who have never read Harry Potter nor said anything about him, due to complete ignorance of the subject.
The fact is that literature asks more of the public than other forms of art. The guy can drive while listening to music or look at Facebook while watching a movie, but when the guy picks up a book to read, he has to be dedicated, pay attention and, from time to time, he even has to take a look. in the dictionary to understand a weird little word that the writer used just to make your life difficult.
And how can you ask for exclusive attention in a world where television has more than 200 channels, smartphones have more than 400 applications, Facebook has more than 800 friends and more than 1,600 songs and films downloaded to be enjoyed?
It is difficult...
It's difficult, but if it were easy it wouldn't be funny! And that's why - among many other reasons, from psychological to psychiatric - that I and so many others write and, in my case, I don't intend to give up. Unless literature gives up on me.
But that's another story...
Victor Mascarenhas is a writer and screenwriter. He is the author of "Xing Ling made in China" (2013) published by Solisluna.
