Anyway, Garth, please take a look at the new HiP forum in Ning

http://healthoverip.ning.com/forum

But, back to the notion that Garth framed above, even to a rank amateur linguist/anthropologist, the notron of language’s evolution, driven by largely female gossip, strikes me as interesting if not spot on

As to the subject matter of these latest posts, thankfully I have no experiences to offer; all of my friends who are artists of any kind seem to be caught in this position, of spending more time and energy trying to sell art than to produce it.

The buzz word a few years back in finding a meaningful career was to follow your passion and try to make your living doing what you love most. I tried that and failed, after ending a professional career that was unsatisfying for a similar reason; it ate up all my time and my identity. These days I have a job that is meaningless to me and that I don’t think about after I leave the office. I don’t make that much money and it’s not that satisfying, but that nine hours a day does not too badly interfere with my intention for the balance of my life, and that’s a sacrifice I’m willing to make.

So I applaud your courage and what I perceive to be underlying confidence in yoru art. Considering what sells these days, I’m not sure that commercial success isn’t more of a condemnation. Maybe you are experiencing the true reward for the quality of your work at this time, when it is being experienced more by people with the ability to appreciate it.

Just an unverifiable thought. Hang in there!

Second, is my predictable response, from two viewpoints. You have to make a concerted effort to get outside your comfort zone (and network) to branch out into another one. And, as far as people who put down the publishing business for its emphasis on marketing, we have to remember that not only is it a business, it is a business in a severe struggle for financial survival. There are perhaps millions of writers out there who expect their books to sell “by osmosis” without any effort. Sorry, that’s not the products sell. Writers who want their books to sell without marketing are lazy, scared or both.

I will add, however, that the publishing industry needs to recognize that they are in a chicken-egg quandary. They expect an author to already be on the road marketing a book that hasn’t been published, yet what’s the point in scheduling appearances if your book isn’t out there? They need to test for a) a good idea/premise/message and b) drive/commitment.

Is your desire to sign with a publisher? Then please, my friend, don’t join the host of writers out there lamenting the need for marketing, because their scorecard must NOT be to get published. (I’m not sure what their scorecard is, frankly…) But you - Gareth Young - are way too smart and sophisticated for that!

Reading a book takes time that people aren’t willing to give you unless they have a very good reason, and over time this “reason” becomes your brand.

Yes, book publishing is marketing, but I don’t know if that is always such a good thing. I studied English and American literature for my BA and MA and also taught it, so I still have a perhaps antiquated and romantic view that literature is supposed to do more than give people what they expect…when a ballet mother I know brought in several of the last decade’s best-sellers and announced that she would throw them away if nobody took them, I asked her what one of the books was about. She couldn’t remember. Her reaction was, “Oh,it was some trashy thing I read at the beach and it made no impression.” If that was a best-seller, the pinacle of success in writing today, that most writers aspire to, then what was the point?

Well, the answer to that question is easy. Each of us has to has to have his own point, must find the meaning in what we write, or write out of that core.

The marketing is important, but so much of that has to do with “credentials”, or “platform”…what right do you, the writer, have to be writing a book and why should anyone read it?

For me, that question is irrelevant and any answer will be purely speculative. The proof of the value of a book is in the reading. And anyone who reads my work will understand its value.

It may sound arrogant, but that is the arrogance which any writer of conviction must have–and has probably earned.

When you think about it, he was right: most all of our words and phrases are but analog comparisons to some other notion or thing. And, what Nietzsche may not have realized (probably did) but contemporary linguists, computer scientists, AI esxperts and neurobiologists all certainly understand, is that language has an even more fundamental role in human intellect than mere communication (itself damned important!). Indeed, the way we process and store information is through subliminal use of vocabulary, syntax and grammer: the reason we can’t consciously recall things that happen in the first few years of our life is that we don’t yet have the verbs, nominatives, qualifiers, etc., to rationalize, remember an rearticulate them even in our own minds!

`just another slant on “language.”

My guidance for you, dear friend and great talent, is that you have to prepare for fame - to be ready for the highest of heights. But the goal is not to become famous. No, dearie, the goal is to get your message across. To stimulate thought and emotion. To communicate your vision. To share your God-given talent. To help others by opening their minds and hearts. To reach as many people as possible. To awaken them as you, yourself have been awakened.

The path to accomplish this requires that you align with the Divine and shoot for the stars to meet your aligned goal. Be ready, my friend, for fame!