Writing for Readers

[Steelhead]

Christopher Gonzales inquires:

>> A while back, someone posted a message about an author (XXX?) and said
>> something like "this author writes 1,000 pages of literary pyrotechnics,
>> and says he always keeps the reader in mind, meanwhile Vonnegut, who writes
>> thin novels, says he only writes for himself."

Well, actually Christopher, that assertion applied to the following writers:

a. Shirley MacLean, who said "thousands of pages for thousands of readers
and their thousands of lives."

b. James Redfield, who observed "sometimes it required dozens of sentences
to translate a simple ideogram from the wisdom of the ancient Peruvian time
travellers. It was a difficult task, but it was my destiny to do it."

c. David Foster Wallace, upon publication of IJ, "and they edited *me* more
harshly than Max Perkins did Thomas Wolfe (the real Tom Wolfe, not the
Other.). Some day my readers will revolt against the tyranny of editorial
censorship."

d. Danielle Steele, "My Zen master advised me--after my recent trauma on
Hard Copy--that it often takes many pages to accurately convey a message
craved by millions: absolutely nothing."

e. Marge Piercy, "the roadmap to Utopia won't be found in a Baedecker guide."