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| Eliezer Sobel, author of MINYAN:
a profile of Eliezer Sobel from THE FORWARD
Jewish contemplative |
First Novel Blues A Hollywood agent called me about ten years ago, after reading the first chapter of MINYAN, which had been in the works for ten years before that. “I loved it!” she shrieked. This could be VERY BIG. You know I’m someone who works on BIG movie projects out here. I’ll call you again when I finish reading it. I’m taking it on my vacation—I’m SO excited!” She had used the word “big” twice. About a month later I received a small, pathetic white postcard, mailed from Greece but lacking even a photo of Corfu; just my address on one side, and on the other the following missive: “I’m afraid the rest of the book did not do it for me. I cannot work with this material. Since I am currently on holiday overseas, I will discard your manuscript here.” I had visions of the pages of my book scattered on the Aegean Sea, my characters drowning, flailing their arms helplessly.
I decided to go it alone and approach smaller presses without an agent. One of them--Bill Henderson of Pushcart Press--called to say he wanted to publish MINYAN, but wouldn’t get to it for a year. I was thrilled, and happy to wait. A year later, Pushcart was in desperate financial straits, and Bill advised me to begin sending out the manuscript again. I hooked up with the person who presently represents me, who began to submit the novel to three publishers at a time, and to regularly send me three rejection lettersin one envelope, a new level of efficiency in the realm if spirit-crushing. On a whim, I entered several competitions described in the back of Poets and Writers Magazine, and received word some months later that my book had made the semi-finals in two of them. Finally, as I was pushing a cart around Whole Foods one day, deciding between a carb-free energy bar made of whey powder and a spelt croissant, my cell phone rang and I was notified that Minyan had been selected from 400 entries as the winner of the 2003 Peter Taylor Prize for the Novel: one thousand dollars, and publication by the University of Tennessee Press in October 2004. So after four agents, nearly thirty rejections, and twenty years, on and off, of writing and revising, (sometimes very off) one would think I’d be ecstatic to finally get published, but I find that I’m unusually sober, particularly after reading an article directed toward writers that made the following astounding declaration: “Don’t expect your book to change your life.” That hit me hard, and I found myself wandering Barnes & Noble in a daze, realizing that my twenty-year effort, this pinnacle life-event of publishing my first novel, could quite possibly be a non-event, an infinitesimal droplet in a vast ocean of books, and that my prize-winning work could easily wind up in that scary $3.98 aisle in no time, right next to “Bathroom Wallpaper Design in the Deep South.” Then it occurred to me that beyond the world of literature, in the greater scheme of things, the release of my book will be even less significant, possibly one of the least important things that has ever happened in the entire history of the world. The fact that it seems to be one of the most important events in my world, I surmised, must be a testament to the power of self-delusion and human folly. I also observed a peculiar psychological mechanism kick into gear upon reaching this long-awaited milestone: instead of finally feeling acknowledged as a writer and propelled forward on a literary path, I felt more like George Plimpton playing quarterback in the NFL for a day, as if I had now officially had the experience of “being a novelist” and could move on, thinking, “I did that, so now what?” I promptly ordered a half-dozen used books online, all with titles like Careers for the Creative & Semifunctional, No Clue What To Do, and so on. I also perused the Outward Bound website, and briefly considered a career leading Alaskan Sea Kayaking adventure tours, although I’m not crazy about physical exertion, being outdoors, or navigating large bodies of cold water. Then, after sitting in University Auto Repair for six hours only to be told that they couldn’t find the keys to my car, and being charged $847 to fix various things I hadn’t come in for, I wondered how much training I would need to open my own auto shop, despite my current understanding of all things mechanical, which basically comes down to something I was taught by my Uncle Louie: “Give it a zetz.” (Yiddish, meaning, in this context, to bang on the thing, whatever it is.) But it wasn’t until I downloaded the application for a long-distance “Qabbalah and Your Sinuses Home Course” that it slowly began to dawn on me that “being a writer” was actually now a legitimate possibility, a valid life choice that was in fact open to me. I had spent too many years wanting to be a writer while doing other things that it was difficult for me to make that leap. In addition, I had always maintained the vaguely Zen notion that I was only a writer when writing. When asked the dreaded question at social gatherings, “What do you do?” I would always immediately begin dripping with sweat and mask my anxiety by saying whatever the most recent thing I had actually done: “I went shopping today; I’m a shopper, I guess.” During all those years of rejections and near-misses, I eventually went on writing strike: I already had about four unpublished manuscripts sitting in a box, and I didn’t want to add to the pile until and unless I got some confirmation from the publishing world to keep at it. Twenty years is a long time to wait for external permission to consider oneself a writer. And now it’s too late. I had no alternative but to cultivate another identity in the meantime, one that was independent of my success or failure as a writer. The best I came up with, though, was “person.” A person who does lots of things. And sometimes writes. Regardless, to actually live the life of the writer requires writing—the actual thing itself, the literal activity of putting words together on a page. I always wanted to skip the middleman. So I find it extremely intimidating that the publication of my first novel, like a first wife, implies a second. Particularly since all the writing books advise one to “write about what you know,” and I already did that. I don’t know anything else. My next book, by default, will be about all the things I don’t know. Here is an excerpt:
My friend Jerry Greenblatt read the above excerpt and recognized Norbert Wilner as the name of Minyan’s protagonist as well. By way of explanation, here is another excerpt from the newer work-in-progress:
* * * Watch for the release of my second novel, which should be out in early October, 2024. |
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