It’s sometimes comforting to know that other writers, famous ones, wildly successful ones go through the same trials the less famous and less successful do.

Here’s a picture of a telegram sent by American writer Dorothy Parker to her publisher while in the midst of writer’s… block/angst/despond…

In case this comes up too small to read, here’s a transcription:

WESTERN UNION

1945 JUN 28 PM 4 37

NBQ209 78=NUJ NEWYORK NY 28 422P
PASCAL COVICI.VIKING PRESS=
18 EAST 48 ST=

THIS IS INSTEAD OF TELEPHONING BECAUSE I CANT LOOK YOU IN THE VOICE. I SIMPLY CANNOT GET THAT THING DONE YET NEVER HAVE DONE SUCH HARD NIGHT AND DAY WORK NEVER HAVE SO WANTED ANYTHING TO BE GOOD AND ALL I HAVE IS A PILE OF PAPER COVERED WITH WRONG WORDS. CAN ONLY KEEP AT IT AND HOPE TO HEAVEN TO GET IT DONE. DONT KNOW WHY IT IS SO TERRIBLY DIFFICULT OR I SO TERRIBLY INCOMPETANT=

DOROTHY.

—————-

I love “can’t look you in the voice.”  And, “all I have is a pile of paper covered with wrong words.” I can relate to that.

On that subject (that is, piles of papers with wrong words), I worked on Sky yesterday and today, and am slowly moving through ch 3.  I have LOTS of papers with the wrong words on them. My consolation is that I also have a few papers with mostly the right words on them, and also, that all the work I’ve done on worldbuilding here, will pay off later. And it is coming together if roughly.

Telegram image courtesy of Nancy Campbell’s blog