Ego Terror

Sometimes I’m asked why, given the whole book thing, I’m a lighting designer.  Once I get through the usual reasons – get out of the house, joy of the job, love of theatre, meet new people, get to use a bit of my brain which might otherwise slumber, all the colour etc. – I also tend to throw in, casually, the following:

“Also, as a writer, particularly one who’s done it for a while, it’s very easy to get wrapped up in your own small world, and from every bit of good news build yourself a pedestal, and for every bit of bad news dig yourself a soggy grave to lie in.  However, when you find yourself as a lighting designer stuck up a ladder at 11 p.m. on a Sunday night, sweat pouring down your back, 8 metres of uneven, creaking metal between you and the floor and a lamp weighing more than you do swinging off your weaker arm, it does tend to put life into a certain perspective.”

Sometimes people laugh at this, and rightly so.  However it’s worth noting that basically, it’s entirely true.  I’ve said many times that writers can go a little bit barmy, and I have had a deep-seated terror of the same drummed into me since youth.  In recent months my editor (who I love) has been sending me sales figures with a cry of ‘look, good news!’ and I’ve finally cracked and asked her to stop.  This is for two reasons: 1. the second good news becomes even okay news, there’s a serious risk that I’ll feel glum about it and 2. if the good news remains good news, I will end up walking through the streets of London stopping random strangers with a cry of ‘I write books and am amazing wheeee!’ and no one wants that, least of all me.

The descent towards being a barmy author can be, I think, a slow and subtle one.  I’ve certainly ticked step one – viewing the whole world as material I can use in a book – but have striven for all I’m worth to avoid step two – getting worked up about things beyond my control.  Like how well a book is actually selling.

Oh sales figures!  How quickly do we writers leap to regard reviews and sales figures as a judgment upon our own self-worth.  For lo; if readers do not buy the book, it can either be because a) our publisher is useless, useless, useless I hate them all or b) because the book is terrible, terrible, terrible, I hate myself.  It is never because there’s a big market and a lot of books and no one really understands the forces behind a bestseller – oh no.  Writers, just like every other human out there, want someone else to blame for their predicament.  And as we tend to work alone, there’s not always that voice to calmly pull us back.  Sure, we can do bits and bobs to help, but there are so many forces at work in the success or failure of a book that now, as lazy shorthand, we may as well call it ‘luck’.

Then there’s the things writers do around writing.  Attending author panels, going to signings, doing book tours, writing blogs, hanging out on twitter, going to other writer’s launch parties, talking to editors, meeting other writers, talking to the press, teaching, writing reviews etc..  It is possible to build a very full and interesting life around writing, but it’s a life which is generally full of other writers feeling just as worried about their next pay cheque and whether anyone loves their books (and by extension, them) as you are.  Is that author’s books selling better than yours?  What references can you give in your interview or on your blog that seem most worthy of who you desire to be?  Is there a queue round the block at your latest signing, eager fans desperate to see you, or are you going to sit alone, chewing the end of your biro, trying to look like you’re so important it doesn’t matter that no one knows your name?

I know a great many writers who are bastions of reason and calm, and who write for the sheer joy of writing and who’s world is defined by that excellent professionalism.  I have also encountered a fair few who fairly burst with anxiety, and of tiny molehills craft great mountains of angst.  And, given how long I’ve been scribbling, and the innate and numerous flaws in my character, it seems sensible to have another job where frankly, if something’s dumb or self-destructive, you’re told so.

So I do theatre, as much as anything, to battle my own ego.  As a lighting designer, my work is only really remarked on when it goes badly wrong – and that’s fine.  Though I am considered a vital part of the ‘creative triangle’ of director, designer and lighting designer (sound designers are also part of this triangle, it’s just that ‘creative square’ doesn’t sound so good) it’s rare for anyone within this group to understand a word I say, save for ‘yes’, ‘no’ and ‘red’.  My job is that specialised, and with so many people on-stage, the last thing anyone needs is a diva lighting designer off-stage too.  I have worked on disastrously bad shows in which the cast and creative team have invested all their emotions and energy.  I have seen people sobbing backstage over an entrance that was ten seconds late, or a prop which wasn’t set where they thought it would be.  I’ve seen directors transform into vile, foul-tempered monsters because a bit of set was half a foot downstage, and I’ve seen auditoriums full of a bare handful of people between the lonely, empty seats.  I’ve also lit works of stunning theatre, punched the air with silent glee at a moment that works beautifully, heard audiences gasp with wonder; and on the way to achieving that, I’ve had to patch more pairs of trousers than sense, worked through horrific sleep deprivation and hauled kit around heavier than myself.  Every other week I walk into a theatre and can see huge emotions being wound up and let down by tiny events, and, as the person sat in the darkness away from it all, that more than anything gives me a certain perspective on my life.

As one of my favorite set designers always says, whenever anything goes wrong: ‘it’s a show, not a cure for cancer’.

Which wisdom I think could be instantly extended to books….