Ask the Author: Joseph H. Wycoff
Answered Questions (6)
Joseph H. Wycoff
As I indicate in the preface to _Arcane Cage_, a historical fiction unrelated to my first work, the premise originated from various sources and ideas ranging from philosophical discourses to family game-playing at the kitchen table. At a time when I still had hopes to become a historian, ten years ago, I first pursued the story in order to test the limits of the "reality effect" in historical narrative and as a means of improving my writing. The form of the narrative--the arc, tone, fonts, paperback size, footnotes, bibliography, etc.--reflects entirely the pretentiousness of the historical profession. On the other hand, the idea for the content, which I did not mention in the above-named preface, stems from a genuine interest in writing a fantasy novel that dispenses with the obligatory references to medieval England, the archconservative nostalgia for royalty or the return of kings, and the gratuitous fascination with gender violence or genocide. The world of magic I wished to create is one redolent with higher learning, direct democracy, and gender and racial equity. The persons who master arcana are the ones who become "ninth-level wizards," champions of the republic, and the vanguard of social justice. Now that I have put it on screen, I guess my humanist content is just as pretentious as the form of my historical narrative. Allow me to rephrase my answer: my most recent book comes from one and only one idea--Fireball! Fireball! Fireball!
Joseph H. Wycoff
I make a record of my inspirations in the acknowledgements for my first two self-publications. What training I have "to write" comes entirely from my training to be a historian. The environs of the archive or the library I thus find paramount in the earliest stages. Once I have stored up enough environmental stimuli for writing at length, I then go to a social space where I have no regard for the possibility of reader's block and an inspirational drink. When I completed my master's thesis, that was nothing more than my office desk and a coffee at the coffee shop--like any other submissive graduate student! For my dissertation, I diligently frequented the university library and chased that dead-time with an Irish pub where I had a whiskey during the final hours of my torment. My first self-published work took shape in the aroma of a research library, finished on the palate as the hoppy bitterness of a brew pub, affected a sensation of personal discovery in the writing process and recalled memories of aspiring to be a historian ten years after finishing my dissertation. My second work drew its breath from the demotic bouquet of a city library, budded in the salty camaraderie of a neighborhood bar, and lingered over post-doctoral dismay while at the same time recreating an atmosphere of higher learning. Lastly, as I mentioned, the content must suit the form--or, perhaps, a self-published book in the hand is worth five drafts from the office printer marked in red ink. I prefer to feel my writing in-hand when inspiration is at its premium.
Joseph H. Wycoff
I am working on the sequel to _Outsourcing Student Success_, another tone-deaf narrative that places the history of institutional research in the larger context of American higher education during the past 100 years. The rise and decline of institutional research over the past 100 years coincides with other tragic outcomes for higher education in the American nation-state. I originally intended to include four chapters on the consequences for college students and their families tied indirectly to the decline of institutional research. The denouement of the ninth chapter led me to defer those chapters to a later work and nest the history of institutional research in the loosely-connected prologue and epilogue about data science and the future of higher education. The prologue only hinted at the consequences for college-goers whereas the epilogue merely suggested the consequences for the discourse of higher education as a field of study. The second volume on this subject will be more explicit about both based on my further historical research and my immersion in the process and performativity that goes into the folly of data-driven decision making in higher education.
Joseph H. Wycoff
Self-publish. You are either writing or you are not writing. Only you know as long as you are unpublished. If you die without publishing or self-publishing one work, nobody will mourn you as a writer with a severe case of writer's block. In addition, if you only ever see your writing fresh off the office printer on letter paper, what you have written never looks like anything more significant than another class assignment, form letter, or executive summary produced during an otherwise unremarkable and unthinkable writing career. Make your content rise to the occasion by adopting the form.
Joseph H. Wycoff
I only know the worst things about being a writer. I imagine that better writers only know the worst things about being a writer more acutely. Therefore, it is best not to consider the best thing about being a writer. In fact, I am asked these questions because after nearly fifty years as an unpublished "writer" I finally found the right admixture of narcissism and disillusionment to regard self-publishing as a viable option. Now, there are plenty of good things about being a self-publisher including the opportunity to answer these questions. But, a writer? Writer should be ranked somewhere between pest control worker and newspaper reporter on CNBC's list of 10 worst occupations since 2017 (link: https://www.cnbc.com/2017/04/27/these...).
Joseph H. Wycoff
I don't know that I have ever had writer's block. I wrote what I had to write for my education. I write what people pay me to write so that a corporation can sell more product to consumers or a college can put on a good show to "evidence" data-driven decision making for the accrediting agencies. And, I write things that occur to me as worth writing at my own discretion.
I suppose the question refers more generally to the latter kind of writing. In that case, I definitely have had reader's block. My master's committee chair once told me he would not tolerate postmodernism in a thesis written by one of his graduate students. lt took me six years to work through that reader's block! "Write what you know!" all the advice books tell me. Friends and family on the other hand become afflicted with reader's block when they think that some shameful secret may be revealed in my writings. Agents and publishers of course have exercised their professional responsibility for reader's block. It is hard to fault them for that. Most recently, when I sought a publisher for _Outsourcing Student Success_, the reviewer acknowledged the thoroughness of my archival research and the lacuna in higher education literature on my subject, but nonetheless wielded the power of reader's block because of the "tone" of my narrative. I purposefully set the story arc of the historical narrative as a tragedy, so perhaps the reviewer wanted to read a romantic, comedic or satirical historical narrative about institutional research and higher education. Ultimately, you know, reader's block is highly subjective.
That is a useful insight, I learned, because the only way to overcome reader's block is to distance oneself from the reader. I have reached a sufficient age now to have attained the appropriate level of social alienation from readers and intellectual disdain for reader's block that I could not let pass the opportunity to self-publish.
I suppose the question refers more generally to the latter kind of writing. In that case, I definitely have had reader's block. My master's committee chair once told me he would not tolerate postmodernism in a thesis written by one of his graduate students. lt took me six years to work through that reader's block! "Write what you know!" all the advice books tell me. Friends and family on the other hand become afflicted with reader's block when they think that some shameful secret may be revealed in my writings. Agents and publishers of course have exercised their professional responsibility for reader's block. It is hard to fault them for that. Most recently, when I sought a publisher for _Outsourcing Student Success_, the reviewer acknowledged the thoroughness of my archival research and the lacuna in higher education literature on my subject, but nonetheless wielded the power of reader's block because of the "tone" of my narrative. I purposefully set the story arc of the historical narrative as a tragedy, so perhaps the reviewer wanted to read a romantic, comedic or satirical historical narrative about institutional research and higher education. Ultimately, you know, reader's block is highly subjective.
That is a useful insight, I learned, because the only way to overcome reader's block is to distance oneself from the reader. I have reached a sufficient age now to have attained the appropriate level of social alienation from readers and intellectual disdain for reader's block that I could not let pass the opportunity to self-publish.
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