I was 19 when I got my first rejection from a publisher. An auspicious year was 1995, when my first ‘no’ for my first novel arrived in the form of an actual letter. I read it from start to finish and, absurdly, turned it over in case there was something extra written on the back that might help soften the blow. There wasn’t. So I stood there, re-scanning the short sentences while a mud fight of shame, rage and disappointment fought for control of the body beyond my trembling fingers.
I’ve had many rejections since and they are no easier to manage. My latest novel recently got five rejections in a single day. One of the good things about having an agent is it makes things more efficient.
While rejection no longer makes me cry, I still feel like crying for days afterwards. Rejection makes me feel invisible. Well, not completely invisible, but disappearing, like Marty McFly’s hand becomes see through once the premise of his existence is threatened in the film, Back to the Future.
Well-intentioned friends will typically seek to console the rejected artist by listing great ones who were initially told they were no good: Charlotte Bronte, Vladimir Nabokov, The Beatles. JK Rowling invariably makes the list. Look at her, they’ll say. She’s made millions! John Kennedy Toole committed suicide after publishers rejected his masterpiece, A Confederacy of Dunces. And he posthumously won the Pullitzer Prize!
But these names are the ironies of history. It feels like false hope to compare myself against them. After all, we hear these names because they were great. The exceptional exceptions. Going unnoticed, being unsuccessful, these are not indicators of latent greatness. What they suggest is a need to learn, to work harder.
In boxing, in tennis, as in most solo endeavours, there are stars and there are journeymen, professionals whose proficiency is undeniable, but whose lack of flair and ingenuity deny them uniqueness, the elusive ‘It’ factor. These people are moons, not suns, seen by reflected light, nearer earth and unthreatening enough to contemplate going there ourselves. If you think about it logically, it’s the journeymen, not the stars, who are truly inspirational. Consider the absurdity of the marketing slogan: be like Mike. It’s a bit like saying I want to be like Ramses the Second. A journeyman is relatable. Michael Jordan and Shakespeare are not.
There’s still pride in being a journeyman. And hope. Journeymen occasionally win. Their journey is long. Failure is inevitable along the way. It’s what you do with it that counts.
Rejection feels bad because of what is at stake, because it is we who are rejected, not just the work.
Rejection asserts the question of why we put ourselves out there at all. Why is a writer, or any artist, compelled to share their work?
French philosopher, Jean-Luc Nancy, gives us a clue. In his work, Being Singular Plural (2000), Nancy suggests the I/you dichotomy is a myth. He contests individuation as the premise of ontology because plurality, in the sense that we are beholden to others, requires us to navigate socially and define ourselves in relation to them. Others, says Nancy, are inescapable. In other words, the only way people can truly define themselves is via their relationships.
For artists, Nancy makes instinctive sense. Our readers, viewers and listeners are not only a source of income, but also a source of meaning. Our work doesn’t truly exist until it’s shared, considered, responded to. Rejection so framed is not mere disempowerment; it prevents us from mingling our consciousness with another, a process that augments the chimeric, inward quality of self. And so failure to win a prize, to publish or get a record deal is failing to exist.
The pervasive anxiety around posting our selves on social media is a measure of just how right Jean Luc Nancy was when he said: “There is no meaning if meaning is not shared… because meaning is itself the sharing of Being.” Who understands the leverage of that statement better than Twitter, Instagram and TikTok?
If there's a lesson in rejection it's probably wrapped up in humility. That first novel of mine went unpublished because it wasn’t good enough. The doyens of culture were doing their job in keeping me outside the gate. I kept working, though. Kept reading. Developed my craft. Now the gate occasionally opens. Even more occasionally, someone really sees me.
Rejection keeps one humble. And hungry. And longing to be found.
– Yannick