Happy November 30, writers!
No, really, please don't make a big fuss about
how I'm turning 40 today. I appreciate the impulse, I do! But let's just treat it like any other day.
I mean, if you want to send cards and, especially, gifts, it's
not like I can stop you. And it's not like our mailing address is on our website or anything.
A lot of hubbub lately about age-related lists: 30 Under 30, 20 Under 40, 100 under 200, whatever. I've
never been able to pay much attention to such things, because I don't find them meaningful.
Here are some writers who didn't publish a book until after their fortieth birthday: Toni Morrison, George Eliot, Frank
McCourt, Laura Ingalls Wilder. And dozens more.
Including Annie Proulx, who just won an NBA lifetime achievement award, and opened her acceptance speech with this: "Although this award is for lifetime
achievement, I didn't start writing until I was fifty-eight, so if you've been thinking about it and putting it off, well..."
I know, I know; she published her first book at fifty-three, and published stories back in
her thirties. Point is: You're never too old to begin writing, and you're never too old to find literary success. However you may define that.
I talk about a few famous writers who bloomed later in life, and then I talk about a non-famous writer (ahem) doing the same.
But what I really want to know is,
have you been thinking about writing something but have been, in Proulx's words, putting it off?
If so, and more importantly: What will make you put it off no
longer?!
