When my daughter played for me the soundtrack for the movie Twilight (presently her favorite movie of all time), I was surprised to hear a song by one of my favorite bands, Linkin Park. The music video that the band put out for the song is one of the most imaginative I’ve seen, but it has nothing to do with high school, angsty teens or vampires. In the video the band plays the crew of a starship in the distant future. There are lots of neat special spacey effects, but I liked the sense of isolation and regret the video portrays (and if you go to Linkin Park’s web site, you can watch the whole thing by clicking on the Music Videos tab and selecting the first video.)
The older I grow, the more conscious I am of what I’m doing as my writing legacy. Not in the way you probably think, either – the profit-generating portion of my estate and potential income for my heirs is important, but that’s something over which I have little control. My books will survive me or they won’t; I won’t be around to see or worry over that. I rather doubt my work is destined to become a bunch of classics.
What I think of as my writing legacy is something that has nothing to do with Publishing or profit. It has to do with the nameless global community I joined the moment I wrote my first short story. I took my first baby step on the twenty-five year path to what would eventually become my calling, my art and my profession.
Traditionally writers make this journey alone. As a friend once told me, “There is no Us in writer, there is only I.” It is a solitary vocation, and no one holds your hand at the keyboard. Even when you collaborate with another writer, you’re still on your own in your head as well as when you produce your portion of the work. So it’s difficult to feel that you belong to a much larger group when you spend so much time working by yourself, and even harder to think outside yourself and be aware of all the other writers in the world who are doing the same. You probably never think about the writers who haven’t been born yet, or those who will join the community in fifty years, or a hundred, or a thousand. They likely won’t miss you; odds are they’ll never hear of you.
Why should you care? In a hundred years, none of this will matter, right?
Well, about a hundred years ago, a woman named Juanita took her daughter to California and started writing a journal about their lives there. She continued the journal for twenty years as they moved back and forth across the country. It wasn’t very exciting journal, but she added some of these new-fangled things called photographs and described where they went and the people they saw, as well as the birth of her youngest son. Although I don’t know for sure, some of her entries make me think she also encouraged her daughter to write.
The only thing that frustrates me about this lady is that she never wrote about the years she spent before she went to California. In her youth she served as a nurse during the last years of the Civil War, and afterward took care of soldiers at a veteran’s home. Maybe it was too traumatic for her, or maybe she didn’t think it was important. People who live in interesting times rarely do.
When Juanita passed away, she left the journal to her only daughter, Thelma, who also wrote. She wrote plays and short stories but she really loved poetry, so that was mostly what she wrote, and she was quite gifted. She published some of her poems but never tried to pursue it professionally. Her poetry was an intensely personal thing to her, so it’s understandable that she would want to keep private. She did instill a love of writing and books in her only daughter.
In time the poet passed away, but left behind the journal and the poems for her only daughter, Joan. Joan not only kept journals and wrote poetry, but she began writing humorous essays about life. She became a popular speaker at churches and went on to be published in newspapers and magazines. She tried to write one novel, but decided it wasn’t for her. She passed along the legacy of love for writing and books to all five of her kids.
Of the humorists’s five children, two began writing journals, poetry, essays and stories at young ages, and of those two, one (also a daughter) decided to pursue it professionally. It took some time, but that daughter eventually became a published novelist.
This entire legacy that began with the lady with the California journal to the professional novelist took 91 years. It’s still alive, too – the professional (that would be me) has a daughter, Kat, and she writes journals, poetry, stories, and is thinking about starting her first novel. When I’m done here, Kat will inherit the California journal, the poetry, the stories, and everything else I’ve preserved from the three generations of writers who came before me. And here we all are:
(From left to right: Juanita, Thelma, Joan, Lynn and Kat)
So yes, in a hundred years, what you write now just might matter to someone.
I miss my poet grandmother, who practically raised me, and I wish I had been old enough to talk to my journaling great-grandmother (she passed away when I was six.) My mother and I have talked about books and writing my whole life, and I’ve done the same for my daughter, who I hope will do the same for her children. That is the legacy I want to see survive me.
The tradition of writers in my family aren’t my only writing legacy. Through the internet I’ve found a much larger writing family, and talk about books and the work every day with them. I can’t take credit for all they’ve done, are doing and will do, and I wouldn’t try, but I think I’ve helped some of them with the work. Then there are the thousands of authors I read from the time I was a kid to present day, who deserve a mention. I learned to write books by reading books, so practically every author I read gave me something that contributed to my work and what will someday become my legacy.
Do I think anyone will miss me when I’m gone? Sure, my family and friends will. Will my passing matter to other writers? Probably not. All I can do is share what I know now through books and discussions, and hopefully leave enough behind to carry on the legacy to future generations of writers. The years may erase my name from the memories of those who write in years to come, and most will probably never know how what I write now will influence their work in the future, but the love and knowledge and kinship we share as writers transcends time. Through writing something of me will be passed on down the line. As long as people read and write, I and other writers will live on through them and their work. That legacy is the only torch guaranteed not to burn out.
Related link:
Stefani Evans wrote a lovely tribute to her mentor, poet and professor Peter Wild.
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Lynn–this post brought tears to my eyes. Thank you for sharing your remarkable legacy from the women writers in your life. I don’t come from a long line of writers, but my parents have both been lifelong readers and instilled in me a love of story from a very early age. My father, who has just a high school education, taught me that to learn, all you need is 2 things: the ability to read and a library card. My mother took me to the library every week from the time before I learned to read. (Though I hardly remember *not* reading!)
My boys both write as well. One is an avid online roleplayer and has been known to write a poem or two. The other a student journalist. I hope they will transmit their love of words and reading to their children some day.
best,
lisa
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Thanks, Lisa. Your father is a very wise man; the only writing education I received was via my library card.
I’m glad you’re passing the legacy on to your boys, too. Whatever they do with their writing, they’re bound to continue the line that began with your parents, and in that sense they’ll never really lose you or them.
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Wow, Lynn. That is completely and utterly cool.
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Thank you, sir. I think the coolest part for me is seeing my daughter reading the journal and chuckling over the old-fashioned gowns Juanita used to wear. It’s a wonderful way for her to meet her great-great-grandmother, too.
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What a wonderful family legacy. My grandfather was an oral storyteller, who told me ghost stories of the Old West that I never got tired of hearing. He got them from an old westerner who told them to him as a boy. My two daughters both love to make up stories and tell them to me or write them down. Storytelling and writing can be contagious!
I think you underestimate your influence. You’re a mentor to a lot of writers. The internet gives you broad reach!
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Your grandfather sounds so neat. My stepdad is like that; whenever he tells stories about living in New York in the forties and fifties I’m riveted.
The internet has really brought all writers together for the first time; if I can be remembered by the writing world for anything, I hope it’s for PBW.
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What a beautiful story!! No wonder you are a writer, with those genes in you. You are leaving a great legacy, even right here and in your own blog. That must count too, right?
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I hope so, Ruth. What you and Charlene wrote reminds me that I’ve never decided what should be done with my author blog and online content after I’m gone. Definitely stuff to think about.
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Your story reminds me of my own. My great-grandfather and great-grandmother passed away a couple of years ago. They left behind a legacy in both books and written words. Both of them dabbled in poetry. Grandpa also took the time and effort to write down the stories of his youth and to transcribe letters his mother and aunt mailed to each other. I have a story of my great-great grandmother moving to Michigan in a covered wagon; she brought yellow roses with her that now have descendants growing in my dad’s backyard.
I’ve often thought about sharing their stories and poems on the internet, but I’m afraid I couldn’t do either one of them justice. Looking back, I wish I made videos of them reading those stories to me. Wouldn’t have that have been something?
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I sometimes think about writing my grandmother’s life story, but I know I couldn’t do justice to the woman she was. I still might try — I don’t know, I remember things about her that my kids don’t know, so maybe just a book for the family.
I love that the roses your ancestor bought to Michigan are part of your family legacy. That would make a wonderful theme for a generational novel.
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Thank you for sharing that wonderful story. Legacy- an awe inspiring thing.
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My pleasure. I wish we could do writer geneaology. Wouldn’t it be cool if we could all figure out our writing family trees?
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I agree with Charlene: you are a mentor to a lot of writers. Thank you for sharing your story.
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A cautionary tale, maybe. You guys are my mentors.
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Oh what a beautiful legacy to pass down. You never know about your novels, heck Charles Dickens probably never imagined he’d be taught in high schools everywhere
, but what you’re passing to your daughter and what was passed to you is solid and concrete in every way that fame is not.
Me, I’m doing it in the other direction. I come from a long line of storytellers, but the best we have from my grandpa is recordings and nothing older than that. What can I say, my father’s family is almost pure Irish and they DEFINITELY kissed the blarney stone
. But I’m trying to start a writing tradition in both directions, encouraging both my father and my oldest son to write.
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What a great idea, to work on both sides of the family. I’ve written down all the stories I can remember my grandmother telling me about how she and her family survived the Depression, so that much is preserved, but I wish more folks in my family had put their stories down on paper.
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Hello Lynn — I’ve been lurking about on GenReality for sometime, enjoying the posts. But your wonderful story as encouraged me out of hiding to share a bit of poetry I found a long time ago. It is titled Legacy.
I am because you were.
They are because I was.
You have changed the world.
Thank you for sharing you story, Lynn.
Nina
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Nina, thank you for that verse, it is just beautiful. I’m going to write that in the front of my family journal, and hope it will inspire whoever reads it down the line to keep passing along the torch.
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What an awesome post. And what a great legacy to leave. I think at some point we all wonder what will remain when we’re gone. But it’s not so much what will remain behind, but what will live on into the future. I’m guessing your daughter won’t really understand the full impact of the gift she’s been given until she’s long an adult, but when she passes that on to her own children, that will be the part of you that lives on.
We should all be so blessed.
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Thanks, Theo. You know earlier today I was discussing contract terms with a soon-to-be-published writer overseas and for the first time thought about all the times I’ve done that in the past. Got a very weird feeling when I realized my writing family really is global now.
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Somewhere along the way, someone once said, like a single drop of water in a glass still lake, our lives touch a million more before we die.
I think you’ve already done that
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uh…well, your passing would matter to me. You bring a lot more to the table than just some great books.
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Of course, I bring cookies! Ha.
I think I’ll be around for a while yet. But if not, just remember, the e-book stuff was all your fault.
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I want to be like you when I grow up, which means I’d better get going cause I figure I’m only around 5 years behind you.
Seriously, I’m one of the writers who reads you for advice and encouragement and inspiration. And you would definitely be missed, so let’s stop talking about that. kthanks.
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Hey, I’ve never grown up. I only pretend I have. As soon as everyone leaves I turn up the stereo and play sock tugofwar with the pup.
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Wonderful, Lynn. I wear a tee shirt that says on the front MEMBER OF THE WORLD’S OLDEST PROFESSION and on the back STORYTELLER. I think often of the line that extends, as though we were all holding hands, from the human emergence from Africa as our species–all the way to us–and as far into the future as human beings will exist. I feel this kinship not only with writers but all artists, and often look at the art done in the caves of France and Spain 30-40,000 years ago and try to sense what it meant to be an artist then.
I think that’s one of the reasons I write about prehistoric people. The first title in my Spirit Flight series, ZADAYI RED, will be pubbed by TOR in July.
To all of you–kinship feels good. Thanks,
Caleb