Throughout my childhood and adolescence, I was positive I’d become a famous author. Probably at an absurdly young age. I loved writing, wrote all the time—diaries, mysteries, historical fiction. My parents and teachers heaped praise on me. Then, when I took AP Lit my senior year of high school, my teacher had the audacity to criticize my work. I struggled to get As. Obviously, he didn’t have a clue what he was talking about. Those who can’t, teach, right? In college, I intended to double major in International Relations and English (all the better for writing a great spy novel). I did okay in English classes at first, but when I moved to an upper-level Southern Lit class I just could not get an A. My essays came back with so much red ink it looked like they were bleeding. My ideas stank. Poor evidence. Clichéd prose. I asked myself how I had the bad luck of another teacher who didn’t see my obvious talent. My mom assured me my interpretation of their deficiencies was correct.
I ran from that criticism. I stopped taking literature courses and went the non-fiction route. Forget novels, I would become a famous journalist! My experience in this track was different from the start because I absolutely loved the professor who taught these courses. Director of the Writing Center, an accomplished writer herself, and a genuinely nice person, she was definitely not an idiot. So, when I couldn’t pull an A on my essays in her class, I started to doubt myself. I can still remember the first day we went around the room and read our work aloud. As two of my peers (who are paid writers today, let me note), read their essays aloud, the realization that I was a second-rate writer spread from my ears to a pit in my stomach. My writing stank. Looked like an English minor would be in the cards so I could get out of these courses as fast as possible. I retreated to the warm embrace of International Relations, where my adviser and professor thought I had some talent and petted my ego. It feels way better to live in an environment where you’re doing well than to challenge and struggle and fail.
In grad school I tried to write freelance one summer, but got nothing but rejections on the same kinds of personal essays and fiction I’d failed to pull off in college. This time I wasn’t surprised. I was doing well in my Ph.D. program, though, and actually “wrote” a recipe that made the cover of Cooking Light Magazine the same summer I was trying to freelance (true story!). It felt easier to just give up and focus on what I was good at. Got my Ph.D. in hand, started at Rhodes at age 28, published my first book at age 30. Sounds like a success, right? But political writing isn’t hard for me. It’s also not all my heart wants to write. There are tons of personal essays and fictional stories in me, and although I’m still very scared of the same failures I had 20 years ago, I’m getting braver. I’ve been writing some stories that I have no intention of showing anyone, have actually talked to an agent about a non-fiction book that has nothing to do with International Relations, and am planning to go for it with one of these projects during my sabbatical next year.
I know I’m probably supposed to be sharing a story about overcoming failure, but I’m definitely still struggling with it. It’s flat out hard to fail at your passion, and all too easy to give up that passion for something you’re better at. I wouldn’t trade my career, but I would like to pepper my life with more creative writing. My apologies to all those teachers and professors and editors whose judgment I didn’t trust. And be careful – your parents are probably going to tell you you’re brilliant no matter what! I definitely can’t show my mom this essay…
Jen Sciubba, International Studies