#0057 Perspectives on Rejection

How others respond to the inevitable

This week, dear reader, I want to share the words of others who write about rejection.

• One author learned to pivot.

• By making a joke of it, a humor writer turned rejection into the basis of an entire newsletter.

• And a third did a deep psychological dive into her past.

Glenn Bryant is a self-described “failing writer and human being” who publishes The Rejection Deal. One of the many things he does quite well is interview people. In December 2023, he interviewed author Siobhan Curham.

A key question from the interview, Q: In your career, how have you handled rejection?

Here’s a snippet of Siobhan’s answer:

You can let your ego lead you when it comes to rejection, and sulk and be precious and stubborn. Or, if you’re serious about writing and you want a career in it, you can take it on the chin, pivot and say, ‘Okay, you have a point. My book doesn’t fit neatly into a pigeonhole’.

Though I’m not sure if she’s still active on Substack, I wanted to include something from Amelia Diamond. She has shared funny pitches and stories that various places have rejected at her New Yorker Rejections stack. This one is from 2019:

I Think About This a Lot: How Ashlee Simpson and Diana Ross probably have every other Thanksgiving together.

Valorie Castellanos Clark’s Collected Rejections features an interview with Freya J. Morris, the founding director of the Oxford Flash Fiction Prize. The whole interview is great. Here’s a tiny bit:

For anyone going through rejection – don’t ignore the pain. It’s valid. Sit with it. Find where it is. Tend to it so that it can heal.

It’s important to remember we aren’t alone in rejection. As Dory said, “Just keep swimming,” er, creating!

I read on the interwebs — so it must be true — that prior to making Finding Nemo, Pixar's in-house art team was required to take marine bio, oceanography, ichthyology, and scuba diving classes to get the look and feel of the characters and their world just right. (Source: Photo by Sebastian Pena Lambarri on Unsplash)

Next time: Wouldn’t I like to know…