In a chapter on the desirability of the writer maintaining a certain detachment, especially when describing sad characters or scenes, Madeleine L’Engle in A Circle of Quiet says this: “All the scenes that move me deeply while I am writing them end up in the wastepaper basket.”
Ye gods and little fishes!
Notwithstanding that it always gives me a galloping case of the heebie-jeebies to toss anything in the wastepaper basket, to throw out that which moves me, brings tears to my own eyes, would be like drowning a kitten! I’m all for detachment, and I do see the value of standing back a bit when we describe human darkness lest the loss of objectivity drive us to a dangerous identification. But why shouldn’t a writer feel deep emotion when she creates something meant to break the hearts of her readers?
In my story “Blood of the Lamb,” I describe a scene where a woman, pregnant with a female messiah, faces the horrific choice of permitting the damnation of humanity or aborting her own child. I trembled to write it. I tremble now to recall it. It’s one of my most powerful pieces and the only one to have received a nomination for the Pushcart Prize. I can’t imagine tossing it aside simply because it evoked such a profound response in me.
I’m willing to admit I may be missing something here, or misunderstanding the whole idea. I do that from time to time. But if the writer doesn’t feel, and feel deeply, what is there to write about?
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