I just completed a survey for my local government concerning the direction of writing in Western Australia. I've had a lot of pointed views on this since I was in university, where we were strongly encouraged to promote WA in our writing when we went out in the world of publishing. So unless you were really willing to write about your home town, and be a brilliant and unique voice for your country, Australian publishers weren't really willing to give you a break. My local press won't take fantasy. And I won't write about my town because I write to get away from it mentally. I wrote to escape my school life, the bullies and even friends I had who were mean to me. The teachers who wore me down with not trying hard enough and daydreaming all the time. The piles of homework I had that I couldn't start for the stress of how much work I had to do (I procrastinated a lot back then). But if a teacher asked me to write a story, it was the easiest thing in the world for me to do. I wrote a passage in my English exam for year 11 and I hadn't even known it would be part of the exam. I was terrible at maths, and none of the practical classes like woodwork or art were for me. I was useless with French and Japanese. I took music theory for three years when I could've opted out after one. I can't play the trumpet, though I learned to, I was awful. I took drama and dance classes, and did ballet for a year. I'm not a good dancer and I can't act that well. But I could write. So I did. And I still do now because I can.
But you wouldn't catch me writing about my friends, or the school I went to, or my parents, or my teachers. I refused to write about my friends, I said in an earlier post as such. If it was happening in my life and I was unhappy about it, then I wouldn't write about it. I kept journals, one in a code I stole from the one young adult series I read in high school when I was done with Interview with the Vampire and the Great and Secret Show. I shunned the Babysitters Club and Sweet Valley High, sticking only to the Degrassi High adaptations. Yet my school life, or even my personal life, wouldn't be part of my fictions because they were where I wasn't being taunted or yelled at or judged. I did try to incorporate my old high school in my new book, and the town is loosely based on a pastiche of country towns in Australia, but the name is fictional, and they characters could be from anywhere.
My actual location doesn't inspire me enough to want to write about it. It never has. I'm sorry, I couldn't even write an essay on how proud I was to be an Australian because I wasn't. I actually got an A for my essay about how I wasn't proud and why, because nearly everyone wrote the same thing about their so-called pride. Beautiful flora and fauna, nice beaches, our "multicultural" society that embraced everyone*... every essay was identical, save for mine. I said we were America Jr. And everyone hated me. More so for the fact I got an A.
So there you have it. I pledge no allegiance to my country and will not be forced to write about it to gain the approval of a publisher. It would be a dishonest book if I extolled the values and beauty of it, and if I were honest, it wouldn't be accepted either. Yes, we have horrible things here, if you write about the gritty stuff too you'll be accepted if it's about Australia. But I would write about how no one cares about Australian literature and movies outside of Australia. It would be dispassionate.
A kid my mother taught wrote the best book I ever read about my home town called 11 Months in Bunbury. It was amazing. I loved it and I wish I had a copy. Because it was at least honest. But it didn't gain much recognition. It was panned more for its style. I thought it was perfect. And he hadn't even graduated at the time. I wasn't even jealous. The two main characters have vastly different lives that briefly intersect, one boy suffering late adolescence in a town with nothing to do, and nearly succumbing to suicide (which seven boys around my age did eventually do not long after we graduated). The other older guy has a great life, a hot girlfriend, and he gets work cutting trees in Pemberton. The twist is the alienated kid decides not to throw himself off the tallest building in town (which is only ten stories high) and the guy with the great life is literally beaten to death by his drunk family. He nailed it. But it's not up there with our best sellers and he's not being lauded over. He wasn't supported and he wasn't really interested in being a writer. He vanished. But he was published.
I write to escape my own anger about this attitude. And I was clear in my survey what I felt was wrong and where my concerns were. I even left my name and contact details I felt that passionate about it.
It won't change how I write. Or why.
*We have a multinational society that doesn't fully embrace, and in some cases, shuns particular cultures. We also have a notorious refugee policy that imprisons refugees on a remote island just because they tried to get here by boats and not a plane. A particular politician who was flagrantly racist, and who went to jail for electoral fraud, has recently been able to rise to the ranks off the back of the resurgence of racism and Islamophobia here. We don't even have gay marriage, our government is actually actively working to stop it becoming a thing. So why would I want to write about a backwards society that protects religions despite being known as secular, and that has a history of racial bigotry spanning back to colonial times?
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