{"id":1417,"date":"2013-06-17T11:19:50","date_gmt":"2013-06-17T18:19:50","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.dianastevan.com\/?p=1417"},"modified":"2013-11-08T20:55:42","modified_gmt":"2013-11-09T04:55:42","slug":"spilling-your-guts-on-the-page","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.dianastevan.com\/uk\/2013\/writing\/spilling-your-guts-on-the-page\/","title":{"rendered":"Spilling Your Guts On The Page"},"content":{"rendered":"
\"Anton<\/a>

Anton Chekhov
Wikipedia<\/p><\/div>\n

Spilling your guts on the page is a tough one for writers.It requires bravery. But then, one only has to look at some of the greats and see that that\u2019s what they did to create their stories.\u00a0 F. Scott Fitzgerald<\/a>, Ernest Hemingway<\/a>, Anton Chekhov<\/a>, Philip Roth<\/a>, Jane Austen, Tennessee Williams, etc. etc. They all spilled their guts on the page.<\/p>\n

For the writer today, that should be easier than ever. We are living in a society where everything is up for grabs. If my dad was still alive, he\u2019d be shocked at how much the world has changed, how open so many are about their journeys, bad and good. The celebrities we\u2019ve looked up to and sometimes envied are spilling their guts now more than ever.<\/p>\n

Take Angleina Jolie’s recent divulgence about her double mastectomy<\/a>. Here we have a sexy and glamorous celebrity\u2014once voted by People Magazine as the world\u2019s most beautiful woman\u2014telling us she\u2019s had her breasts removed as a precaution against breast cancer. We want to know will the world still see her as sexy? Will her husband, Brad Pitt\u2014at one point in his journey acclaimed as the world\u2019s sexiest man\u2014stand by her?<\/p>\n

And then, there\u2019s Michael Douglas telling us how he got throat cancer<\/a>, giving us more information about his sex life than we need to know. We wonder how his wife, the stunning Catherine Zeta Jones, is taking this public revelation. I discussed this prominent actor\u2019s revelation with a young man, thinking he\u2019d agree with me that this was too intimate to share with the public. Instead, he said, \u201cThis isn\u2019t the 50s. Michael Douglas was giving good information on how to avoid STD.\u201d<\/p>\n

Marc Maron<\/a>, a comic, is another one who chose to display his trials in the media. He wasn\u2019t getting noticed until he made a number of podcasts revealing his years of rejection and how he was prepared to give his career up. Once his confessions were broadcast, he started getting the audience he craved.<\/p>\n

A few generations back, stars\u2019 personal struggles would\u2019ve been covered up. Today, celebrities expose theirs willingly on the net and in glossy magazine pages and in interviews on talk shows. Reality shows are a hit because they expose human frailties we can identify with.<\/p>\n

I believe we are often enthralled with these kinds of revelations (even when we criticize) because \u00a0this is the juice of life. When we see someone else screw up, we feel our situation may not be so bad. We are also heartened when they pick themselves up again showing that success can follow failure, and there are lessons to be learned from our mistakes.<\/p>\n

When you think about it, isn\u2019t this what good writers do? They spill their guts on the page, so the reader can connect with their characters. Feel what they feel. What do you think? Is this a good thing? Is this necessary for good writing? And how much is too much?<\/p>","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Spilling your guts on the page is a tough one for writers.It requires bravery. But then, one only has to look at some of the greats and see that that\u2019s… <\/p>","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_feature_clip_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":true,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","default_image_id":0,"font":"","enabled":false},"version":2},"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false},"categories":[88,4],"tags":[514,513,42,78,470,435,515,516,33,5],"class_list":["post-1417","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-life","category-writing","tag-angelina-jolie","tag-anton-chekhov","tag-character","tag-diana-stevan","tag-ernest-hemingway","tag-f-scott-fitzgerald","tag-michael-douglas","tag-spilling-their-guts","tag-writer","tag-writing-2"],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/p1LuVB-mR","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_likes_enabled":true,"jetpack-related-posts":[{"id":1979,"url":"https:\/\/www.dianastevan.com\/uk\/2015\/writing\/hemingway-in-cuba\/","url_meta":{"origin":1417,"position":0},"title":"Hemingway In Cuba","author":"Diana Stevan","date":"17 \u041a\u0432\u0456\u0442\u043d\u044f, 2015","format":false,"excerpt":"After two weeks in Havana, I have many stories about Ernest Hemingway in Cuba. There are tours to all of the Nobel prize-winning author's haunts: the bars that he frequented, the hotel room where he wrote, and his home outside of Havana. Not surprisingly, he's revered by Cubans. He wrote\u2026","rel":"","context":"\u0423 "Books"","block_context":{"text":"Books","link":"https:\/\/www.dianastevan.com\/uk\/category\/books\/"},"img":{"alt_text":"Hemingway in Cuba","src":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/www.dianastevan.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2015\/04\/Oldmansea.jpg?resize=350%2C200","width":350,"height":200},"classes":[]},{"id":1192,"url":"https:\/\/www.dianastevan.com\/uk\/2012\/writing\/ramblings-on-the-lowly-writer\/","url_meta":{"origin":1417,"position":1},"title":"Ramblings on The Lowly Writer","author":"Diana Stevan","date":"11 \u0413\u0440\u0443\u0434\u043d\u044f, 2012","format":false,"excerpt":"As I navigate the waters of pitching, writing, editing, revising, and marketing, I wonder about this profession of writing.\u00a0 As a writer, I am\u00a0 expected to work for hours, days, months, years developing my craft, and honing that story, all at my own cost of time and energy. 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Not for Hemingway, the use of unnecessary adjectives and\u2026","rel":"","context":"\u0423 "Art"","block_context":{"text":"Art","link":"https:\/\/www.dianastevan.com\/uk\/category\/art\/"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/www.dianastevan.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2011\/12\/hemingway.jpg?resize=350%2C200","width":350,"height":200},"classes":[]},{"id":1313,"url":"https:\/\/www.dianastevan.com\/uk\/2013\/writing\/unsung-writers\/","url_meta":{"origin":1417,"position":3},"title":"Unsung Writers","author":"Diana Stevan","date":"8 \u0411\u0435\u0440\u0435\u0437\u043d\u044f, 2013","format":false,"excerpt":"Now that I\u2019ve immersed myself in all manner of writerly pursuits, I\u2019m discovering wonderful writers who have no fame. They\u2019re a mixture of talents\u2014some who\u2019ve been at the game for decades, others who are just starting. 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