It’s a sad truth that writers make life hard for themselves. Most people look down on writers, and only half rightly, as decadent masturbatory alcoholics. They think what goes into writing is all staring out the windows and going for walks and chatting about stories so slow paced that the memory of reading them is almost painful.
“If I had to read Ford Maddox Ford, we are sure as hell going to talk about it.”
But there’s a considerable range of difficulties that being a writer presents. There’s insecurity, there’s neediness, there’s the arrogance and the drive to create. All these things vie for the writer’s attention and both add to and take away from the work itself.
Writers are looked down upon for their failure to publish. There are a number of new writing books that advise writers to think of themselves as writers from the get go, rather than holding back until their work has been properly appreciated. This doesn’t work for any writers, of course, it’s just wishful thinking.
“I'm not a virgin in the same way that you're a writer. It’s true in our heads.”
The fact is that writers are the worst people in the world at being writers. We take it too seriously. We drink too much. We smoke too much. We cry. We kill ourselves. The pressure we have put on ourselves is too much to bear and at the end of the day you can be published everywhere and win awards and still have it all mean nothing.
Because if you’re a writer, then by the time you’ve won the award you always wanted, you don’t want it any more.
“My whole life is different now.”
I’d like to propose a new kind of writing, a new literary movement based on the principle of Write More, Less Worry: Wromolectuality. Writing done by the people who are best suited to handle the pressures of writing, namely everyone who isn’t a writer.
In Wromolectuality there’s no pressure. There’s no need to publish, no need to succeed, and in fact no need to study literature at all. Once you’re a Wromolectual, you’re already as good as you ever need to be.
“I'm a Wromolectual!”
I know what you’re thinking: “How will I know if a work of literature I’m reading is Wromolectual?”
Wromolectuals can be both minimalist and maximalist, realist and fantasist, intelligent and stupid, handsome and ugly, short and tall, or any viable combination of these things. What defines a Wromolectual work more than any other detail is authorial ballsweat gauged on the following scale wrung from various underpants during extreme literary exertion:
- Pickle Bucket – Ernest Hemingway, The Sun Also Rises
Clearly not a work of Wromolectuality. Many have said that Hemingway’s balls were obviously very sweaty 
(See sidebar) but even given that, a pickle bucket is way too much.
- Pitcher – Bernard Malamud, The Natural
Getting warmer, but Malamud really worked the metaphors in this one, cranking out some extra juice, as Hemingway called it.
- Pint – James Joyce, Ulysses
Fitting really. Still too much.
- Four Tablespoons* – Stephen King, The Stand
Frankly I was surprised by this, and many have pointed to later tests that showed King may have been dousing his shorts between wringings. The world may never know for sure.
- Not a Drop – Dan Brown, The DaVinci Code
While not technically a Wromolectual, Dan Brown is certainly a precursor to the movement. The DaVinci Code displayed the level of devil-may-care attitude most Wromolectuals aim for, and Brown’s later relaxation and utter lack of anything resembling shame identifies him clearly as the Wromolectual ideal.
In the short run, I think Wromolectuality will bring the literary world a bit closer to sanity and comfort. In the long run, I hope that we can all become a little more Wromolectual and a little less sweaty.
