Am I really going to publish
the book I’ve been working on for years?
The one I started writing when I took a side trip to Vietnam on my way to a performance arts festival in Beijing in 2009…
When my friend Sonia, fresh from a Vietnam holiday told me of the boat trip she took up the Mekong River to the town of Sadec, where the French writer Marguerite Duras (my literary icon) lived as a young girl — I knew I had to go.
I made a pact before I left, that as soon as I stepped on the plane and every mode of transport that followed, I would capture every skerrick of detail and turn it into a book about writing and traveling. I gave it the working title: Writing on Planes Boats and Tuk Tuks.
Over the next few years I made more trips to Vietnam and Cambodia, filling more mini moleskines with notes that I used to write my Master of Arts Thesis, a 15,000 word memoir about searching for traces of M. Duras. It was called The Girl On The Ferry.
That was 2012 and I can’t quite understand how eleven years has passed. It’s true I was busy (who isn’t) leading retreats, teaching, traveling to festivals and residencies so I worked on the book in an on-and-off fashion. Some years I did nothing at all, some years I cracked the whip and was sure that would be the year of its birth…
It changed of course, it morphed and shapeshifted, it became another book to the one I started out writing. At first it was going to be just a travel book, then it became more about MD, but when my dead mother popped into the narrative, joining us on the journey, it took a deeper turn.
I think that’s why this book has taken so long. I soon realised it had a life of its own, it couldn’t be pushed, hurried along, rushed into a product. Of course avoidance was there too. Who amongst us really wants to stand face-to-face with our hard truths, biological tendencies and inherited sadnesses? For that’s what this book is about: how my mother’s sadness led to my enthrallment with MD, and how in turn MD helped me to understand my mother.
It’s now called Looking for Duras, Finding my Mother: a Mekong Journey.
Here’s the pitch:
Looking for Duras weaves three strands of memoir into one: the author’s lifelong infatuation with the French writer Marguerite Duras, a journey through Vietnam and Cambodia tracing her footsteps and a musing on mothers, memory and melancholy.
Finally I’m ready to go, ready to publish, to put this baby to bed.
But which way, which platform?
So far from publishers I’ve had one rejection and one ‘no comment’ — that’s not a lot I know. I’m in the process of approaching others, they all have their various requirements and it takes a lot of time. And then there’s the permissions to sort out for quotes I’ve used, mostly from MD and her biographer Laure Adler. I’ve been dragging the chain on that task too, but this week I shall, as you are my witness, send out enquiry emails to their publishers. If this is something you are having to think about for your book, you must read this wonderful article by Australian writer Beth Spencer, entitled, I’d like to have permission to be Post Modern but I’m not sure who to ask.
I’m always reminding my writers that completing your MS is just the beginning really. The next stage: final polish and proof, sending it here and there, waiting for someone else to say ‘yay’ or ‘nay’ can take just as long. Meanwhile your writing sits becalmed in the doldrums which is where I feel I’ve been lately.
So this week I had the idea to publish some episodes on Substack or another online platform (maybe here on Medium) just to bring some energy swirling in and around the words. I like the idea of publishing online — then I can add urls, YouTube clips of MD’s films and other interesting references.
If you have any ideas or experience of online publishing platforms you have used sucessfully, or any publishing companies you think might be interested in this kind of story, I’d love to hear about it.
Meanwhile I take solace from the fact that some books, just like some babies, have a long labour while others pop out in a rush. I love it when writers I’ve worked with get in touch to let me know that the book they were working on 15 years ago is finally published. Long time coming is OK, OK. Never say never!
© Jan Cornall April 2023
Jan Cornall leads international writer’s workshops, retreats and journeys with her company Writer’s Journey.
Coming up in 2023!
Draftbusters Online: monthly modules.
Mentoring packages to suit your needs.
Sensing Italy June 3 -10, 2023.
Story Hunters, India, Nov 4–19, 2023.
Moroccan Caravan, Feb 23 — Mar 8 , 2024.
Haiku Writing In Japan, late March 2024.
