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How Penelope Fitzgerald became a late blooming novelist

commonreader.co.uk

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Re: How Penelope Fitzgerald became a late blooming novelist

#21

Post by 01HNNWZ0MV43FF »

breck wrote: post #7
dhosek wrote: post #2

I was 45 when I had my first fiction published and I’ve published at least one story a year since then (although there have been years that it’s felt like I just barely met that goal). I think my MFA thesis advisor assigned Fitzgerald to me as a role model of a late-in-life writer (it’s amusing to think of my then-45-year-old self as “old” a decade later). But like Fitzgerald, it’s not like I wasn’t writing before. I…

> I think that the 45 years of life leading up to my first publication were a big part of what made me able to write something worth publishing. "Before you can write the book, you have to be the book."

Darn, one less backup career for me

Re: How Penelope Fitzgerald became a late blooming novelist

#22

Post by marcofiset »

We need to normalize “late-blooming”.

Not everyone needs to achieve success (whatever that means) before their thirties. It seems like the spotlight will always be on the young blood revolutionizing a particular sector.

Most entrepreneurs don’t reach success, or even launch businesses, before being well into their thirties and forties.

Re: How Penelope Fitzgerald became a late blooming novelist

#23

Post by dhosek »

dudul wrote: post #10
dhosek wrote: post #8

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I think it is part of the public discourse, you just may not have encountered it. I recently had cause to recommend some examples of science fiction books that had good world-building that would be useful models for another writer. The two that sprang to mind that I gave the writer, it turned out, were both by female writers (although another non-fiction book I suggested was by a male writer). Part of my onboarding t…

A quick Google search indicates that 51% of the writers in the US are women. There is no discrimination there.

It’s not merely getting to publication, but also things like reviews, promotion, etc. The VIDA count project (which appears to have disappeared from the web) revealed the rather stunning imbalance on this front, which has been improved thanks to the illumination, but there continues to be discrimination in how books are received (one example often given is that Jonathan Franzen’s subject matter, written by a woman, is dismissed as merely “domestic” fiction rather than serious literature).

Re: How Penelope Fitzgerald became a late blooming novelist

#24

Post by hi-v-rocknroll »

defrost wrote: post #18
hi-v-rocknroll wrote: post #17

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Nice. I think I've heard of that title. I've met a few gems amongst a cavalcade of colorful characters who perhaps could be captured fairly between pen and paper to record an echo of human splendor that should live beyond time. - A paranoid but happy and cynical gentleman with long, scraggly hair like a wizard from the Appalachias who was a military aircraft electrician and an Apple rework tech. Stories spanning ever…

It's a great little film: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vRJpcc5kDTg starring https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/David_Gulpilil

Have to check that out. Good find!

Re: How Penelope Fitzgerald became a late blooming novelist

#25

Post by dhosek »

DoreenMichele wrote: post #9
dhosek wrote: post #8

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I think it is part of the public discourse, you just may not have encountered it. I recently had cause to recommend some examples of science fiction books that had good world-building that would be useful models for another writer. The two that sprang to mind that I gave the writer, it turned out, were both by female writers (although another non-fiction book I suggested was by a male writer). Part of my onboarding t…

This is what I think is not really being talked about: So I think women tend to lack mental models men seem to be inculcated with and this seems to be a separate issue from the much more readily recognized issue of gender discrimination. And you don't talk about it either. You talk about things like subconscious bias in other people. Bias in other people gets talked about a great deal. It certainly is a real issue bu…

Interesting insight. If I understand correctly, the core of your point was, “I think women tend to lack mental models men seem to be inculcated with” and now I’m wondering what I can do to help my daughter avoid this.

Re: How Penelope Fitzgerald became a late blooming novelist

#26

Post by DoreenMichele »

dhosek wrote: post #25
DoreenMichele wrote: post #9

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This is what I think is not really being talked about: So I think women tend to lack mental models men seem to be inculcated with and this seems to be a separate issue from the much more readily recognized issue of gender discrimination. And you don't talk about it either. You talk about things like subconscious bias in other people. Bias in other people gets talked about a great deal. It certainly is a real issue bu…

Interesting insight. If I understand correctly, the core of your point was, “I think women tend to lack mental models men seem to be inculcated with” and now I’m wondering what I can do to help my daughter avoid this.

If you are the dad, spend time with her. Everything I have read suggests "daddy's girls" do better career wise.

Holds true in my family. My sister was "daddy's girl" and ended up with a serious career. I didn't get the same attention because he was in Vietnam when I was little and I never felt close to him. I always felt like he loved her, not me.

It wasn't true. That's just unfortunate happenstance, but my sister got something I didn't.

Our educational achievements in high school were extremely similar, including winning the same spiffy scholarship to the same spiffy college.

She got a real career. I was a homemaker for two decades.

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