Welcome to Unmapped Storylands
Writers live a solitary life. You sit at your desk day after day, year after year, staring at a blank page or screen. You build imaginary stories, one word at a time. When you are not writing, you are reading. When you are not reading, you are thinking of writing.
Being a novelist, in particular, is the loneliest form of creativity. Surrounded though we may be by fictional characters, we have to remain in that space of pure solitude that is perhaps more relevant to ancient mystics and desert hermits than to our age of fast-consumption and social media. This is not to deny that many people lovingly contribute to the making of a book—editors, translators, book cover designers…. and as authors we owe an immense amount of gratitude to those we work with. But during the actual process of imagination, creation and composition, we are, and we have to be, on our own.
We have to stay inside our inner garden—which sounds poetic and romantic, until you cut yourself on the thorns.
Here is a little secret: I am obsessed with notebooks. I have dozens and dozens of them, piling up, towering above my desk. They are my companions. I carry them with me everywhere. I always take notes—personal observations, seeds of inspiration, foolish thoughts. Sometimes readers ask me, ‘where do you get your ideas from?’ I get them from my notebooks and my notebooks reflect life itself. My handwriting is beyond terrible. I was born left-handed and like many left-handed children at the time in Turkey, I was ‘converted’ to right-hand at school, and ever since then, I am averse to writing in longhand. The only time I don’t mind doing so is when I scrawl in my notebooks. Their pages may be full of illegible scribbles and squiggles, coffee and tea stains (and sometimes tears) but to me each is one is precious.
While I was working on my upcoming novel, There Are Rivers In The Sky, I spent hours and hours on crazy infinitesimal details. I almost ruined my health—physical and mental. I cried a lot, slept very little, failing to take care of myself. I fell ill afterwards. Writing fiction can be magical and exhilarating, but it is also gruelling and too close to madness.
When I finish a novel, I hand the manuscript to my editor, stop talking to myself or hunching my shoulders. I become a more social and ‘normal’ human being. Especially around the time of publication I do lots of book related events and interviews, attending literary festivals and cultural conferences. I profoundly appreciate meeting readers from all backgrounds and engaging in public conversations. But this period of extroversion does not last long. Then the pendulum swings back, and I return to my writing desk, light the candles in my cave, watch the shadows dancing on the walls, and retreat into the solitude of writing.
It is a strange life. Boring and tedious, many would say. You can only do it if you love writing. Not ‘like’, not ‘love’, but an odd passion that you can neither abandon or fully understand.
If you are enamoured of the art of storytelling.
When I was a young student in Turkey, many moons ago, I once made the mistake of telling a middle-aged male poet that I was writing fiction and I wanted to become a novelist someday. He smiled, took a puff of his cigarette and winked at me as if we shared a joke. ‘I’ll tell you what I’ve told others. Why be a writer, darling, when you can be the Muse?’
Being a woman writer, especially in blatantly patriarchal societies such as Turkey, can be very difficult, tiring, frustrating, and at times, suffocating. In addition to everyday misogyny and sexism, anything and everything you write can “offend” the authorities—from politics to history to sexuality—in the absence of democracy and freedom of speech. Words can get you in trouble. Words are not free.
And yet, words matter. Stories matter. Silences, too.
Stories bring us closer. Silences keep us apart.
Throughout the years, I have accumulated so many experiences, anecdotes and observations that there came a moment in my life when I realised I wanted to share them, especially with younger readers/writers/dreamers who might from time to time, and quite understandably, feel discouraged, disempowered. These are literary fragments, vignettes from a bookish life. Things that have not made it into my novels, but are nonetheless an integral part of who I am. Things that I cannot place on social media platforms, which have become either too quarrelsome or too picturesque. That is why I’ve decided to create a space, right here on Substack, that allows me to speak directly with you, the reader.
As well as my thoughts, observations and insights into literature, I will share with you my writing tips and musings not only about creativity, but also the obstacles in front of creativity. How do we nurture our inner garden? How do we keep that childish curiosity alive? In a world that constantly breaks our spirit, how do we manage not to lose our self-confidence, and fight back prejudices and stereotypes, including the fake duality of “the male as the creator, the female as the passive source of inspiration’?
As human beings we connect, remember, understand and process our emotions through words. The Muse is everywhere and inside every moment, however seemingly small or ordinary, because life itself is our inspiration and we—all of us, equally—learn something from it everyday as we follow the beat of its wings.
To the best of my ability, I’d love to use this platform to create something good and constructive, writing about literature and the art of storytelling, stories and silences, memory and amnesia, as well as love, sisterhood, resilience, rebellion, diversity and our common humanity.
Join me in this journey.
Elif Shafak
PS: I’m very new to Substack and trying to get my head around how it works. But what I do know is there will be three types of subscriptions to Unmapped Storylands.
Free subscription: Everyone who signs up will be able to read my posts. Sometimes weekly, other times they may be a little less regular. The important thing for me is that I write only my best stuff for you.
Paid subscription: Those who would like to receive more of my writing and have greater access to the community and conversations I’m hoping to bring here might want to consider becoming a paid subscriber for either £7 a month or £65 a year, which works out at £1.35 a week. There will also be little surprises along the way. Think of the subscription fee as like buying me a cup of Turkish coffee. But ultimately every paid subscription supports the writing I do here.
Founding Subscription: This is something very new for me, but I hope it will be interesting to some. I will also be offering a limited number of founding memberships which will be priced slightly higher than the annual subscription. As well as playing a leading role in supporting this Substack and the work and writing that I do, I will also gift you personal postcards/notes, and at times, signed books. To find out more just press the button below.
If for whatever reason you would like to become a paid subscriber but cannot afford it at this point in your life, please just reach out to me. Please also remember that whatever subscription you take out dear reader, I am grateful for your interest and your support.
