To me
A dedication that stood out
Recently, I picked up a book that caught my attention with the first two words. The dedication page read: “to me.” I always read the dedications but this was a first. As a bookworm, it caught my attention. As a writer, it made me pause.
I brought it up with friends wondering what they made of it. I was further intrigued when most of them kind of scoffed and shook their heads: not perplexed or overly impressed. “Who dedicates a book to themselves? It’s strange” was probably the most elaborated response I’ve heard (yet).
Normally, what I like about the dedications is that it shows the people behind the author. When you read the acknowledgments, it’s humbling because you realize, “wow, it took all these people to get this story across. From the writer’s head to the book in my hands.” As someone who still dreams of (and works towards) one day publishing a novel, I find it dauntingly reassuring.
And yet.
This author’s dedication to herself felt honest—as honest as the little love poems I’ve found in other dedications, and as honest as the big, bright, THANKS in all the acknowledgments readers usually skip.
Writers dedicate stories to the people in their lives, to the people who may often be the seeds for their characters or the ones who never make it to the page in any color, form, or shape, but are the support the writer needed to toil ahead.
And yet, every writer writes (at least in part) for themselves. Don’t they? Don’t we?
I’m halfway through the book and I’m still going back and forth over the dedication. Another person might say, ok, weird, noted, observed, recorded, and move on. Instead, I find myself turning it over in my head, like the seashells I used to pick up as a kid, holding it up to look at it from every angle.
While I was writing this, I remembered this scene from a 2000’s movie, Knight’s Tale, where the knight tells the woman he’s trying to impress that he’ll win the tournament for her, he’ll win it in her name. She replies something along the lines of “you want to win for yourself, if you want to prove your love for me, you will lose.”
To be clear, I believe there is something beautiful in sharing an accomplishment with the people in our lives but isn’t there also something beautiful in saying I did this for me? In recognizing that this is something we want or need? In admitting we want this and not being afraid or ashamed of saying it out loud?
~If~ when I publish my first book, I know exactly to who I will dedicate it. But I also know that this whole, sometimes exhilarating, sometimes frustrating world of words and fictional friends I’m creating is something I want to do; need to do.
Would you ever dedicate a story to yourself? If not, who would you dedicate it to instead? Let me know in the comments!
PS: If you like reading the dedications or haven’t paid them much attention till today and want to see what the fuss is about here are a couple of posts to keep reading
- Do you read the dedications? — By yours truly
- 35 writers who took book dedications to another level — By the Language Nerds
