Types of “writer’s envy” and why you should stop letting it affect you

“You can only be jealous of someone who has something you think you ought to have yourself.”

— Margaret Atwood

By now, you’ve probably forgotten Valentine’s Day. It was yesterday. 

Since I love hearing about romantic gestures, in honour of all you gals, this week, you can win this gorgeous Goddess Double Cuff Bracelet from Kim Smiley! Just tell us what you did for Valentine’s Day by clicking here (even if your date was Netflix).

(Kim Smiley cuffs are not only stunning, they ward off evil — thus making you luckier in love and helping you ward off any negativity.)

Writer’s Envy, or Author’s Envy, is an even worse feeling (or is it a trait?) than being envious of other women’s successes, be it in their relationships or their writing life. (I wouldn’t know. Keep reading…)

Being envious of other people’s relationships, thinking things like, “Her? She doesn’t deserve to find her soulmate. I’m so much prettier!” or “How can she find someone but I can’t? It’s so unfair!” or  “How did she land such a good guy? I’m a better catch!”

Writers who suffer from Writer’s Envy (we’ll keep it capitalized for its importance, because this is a big thing) have the same thought process if they compare themselves to other writers.

Much like an envious single woman, envious writers who compare themselves to other writers often think, “That person doesn’t deserve a book deal! My writing is so much better!” and “How did she land an agent when I can’t? I hope she doesn’t get a book deal!” or even, “How did her book end up a bestseller? It wasn’t that good.”

There is a difference between jealousy and envy. Jealousy describes a feeling of insecurity you have over a rivalry or of being replaced. Envy is a worse trait. 

“Envy is the feeling or sensation we have when we want to get something that someone else has, and we can’t be happy for them when they have it.”

For Patricia Polledri, psychoanalytic psychotherapist and author of Envy in Everyday Life, “envy is wanting to destroy what someone else has. Not just wanting it for yourself, but wanting other people not to have it. It’s a deep-rooted issue, where you are very, very resentful of another person’s wellbeing — whether that be their looks, their position, or the car they have. It is silent, destructive, underhand — it is pure malice, pure hatred,” she says. 

As Kate M. Colby wrote, “I’ve lost friends over jealousy and unnecessary feelings of competition. I’ve had close friends flat-out ignore my writing career. I’ve had acquaintances insult or downplay my abilities in order to praise their own. It sucks. It hurts. And I don’t want it to happen to anyone else.”

As you may know, there are certain “truisms” that, as a published writer, I actually do not believe to be true, like, “all press is good press,” which I wrote here. I do not believe, “those who can't do teach!” nor do I believe that “all is fair in love and war.”

Not everyone is worth loving. Not every war is with fighting. (And believe you me, all is NOT fair in divorce…)

Are writers the most envious people in the world? Kate says, “Of course, professional envy exists among academics, lawyers, investment bankers, and others, but writers seem to experience jealousy in a deeper and more enduring way. Envy isn’t just for failed writers, either. Even the most successful authors—Ernest Hemingway, Truman Capote, and Gore Vidal to name a few—succumb to author envy. 

Author Cindy Fazzi, admitting she’s felt pangs of jealousy at times, refers to Writer’s Envy as a “vicious disease,” reminding us that writing a book and finding the right agent to sell the book to the right publisher is hard. So, it shouldn’t come as a shock that writers feel envy whenever another writer seems to breeze through the process. She breaks down types of Writer’s Envy:

Lucky break envy: There will always be writers who seem to have all the lucky breaks in life, forgetting how hard it is to write a book.

They’ve done the work envy: This happens when you feel envy towards an author who is incredibly talented. (Instead of feeling envy, writers should channel their energy into working on their own writing.)

Bestseller envy: It’s impossible not to mention authors like E.L. James’s (Fifty Shades of Grey), who became the object of a ridiculous amount of Writer’s Envy (and ridicule). Again, redirect your envy — read books like Fifty Shades. Even if you end up hating the book even more, you might learn how and why it became so successful. 

Someone beat you to it envy: As I believe and teach my children and clients, no idea is an original idea. Meaning, you don’t have to write the first memoir on infertility, but you need to aim for it to be the best.

Movie right envy: We can argue whether the book or movie version is better, but seeing someone else’s novel — which you may have thought was mediocre — on the big screen can bring on Next-Level Writer Envy. (Support the popcorn at least, will ya?)

Extraordinary writing envy: Sometimes you encounter a book that’s so extraordinary, you can’t help but wish you’d written it. (But why take away from that someone who wrote it?)

There are a thousand ways writers can experience jealousy of other authors; comparing ourselves to peers in writing groups, social media friends, or books that have turned into phenomenons. Writers long for success. We wonder every day: How did they write a first draft so quickly? How do they have so many followers on social? Where do they find time to write a daily blog?

Author Elizabeth Sims said, “For years, I couldn’t even read novels by living authors who were more successful than me, which was almost everybody…if I read a novel by a dead guy or gal, I could appreciate it without stress, because at least I could mutter, upon closing the cover, “Haha, you’re dead and I’m not!”

Although she envied other writers (and still does), she acknowledges she’s also envied sometimes. “Whenever I realize someone is envious of me, I’m like, “You poor dumb shmuck, you have no idea that my life is a boiling cauldron of failure and anxiety.” But she always acts super cool and confident.

As Bill Gates says, “Life is not fair; get used to it.” Especially in love and in the world of publishing; green-eyed monsters writers can be as unreasonable as an envious partner when you were supposed to be home at 10:00 p.m but you arrived at 10:02 p.m., and suddenly you’re being interrogated with, “Who is she? WHO IS SHE?”

Author Kaulie Lewis admits, “I am a jealous person — jealous of the vacations I see on Instagram, of my sister’s perfect hair, of the latte the man next to me just ordered — but it took me a long time to realize I was a jealous reader and writer. In fact, I didn’t know that literature was something I could be envious of until I read Marina Keegan’s essay in the collection, titled ‘Song for the Special,’ where Keegan addresses her ‘unthinkable jealousies’ — why didn’t I think to rewrite Mrs. Dalloway? I should have thought to chronicle a schizophrenic ballerina. It’s inexcusable.”

Kailua openly states, not only is she jealous of most literary essayists, she’s “jealous of every writer who’s written a feature for The Atlantic and of every Paris memoir that’s ever been published.”

“You’re not jealous,” a friend corrected her. “You’re envious. You want to have written these books, sure, but it’s not like you feel you rightfully should have.”

She concludes that her jealousy was largely “just a cover for my terror” — writing something original when someone had already explored, written, and published all of my ideas and interests.

Well, as I mentioned, you don't need to be the first — you need to be the best.

In “An Ode to Envy” TED Talk, senior editor at the New York Review of Books and essayist Parul Sehgal says one of the wonders of fiction is its ability to accurately capture our jealousy. “When we feel jealous, we tell ourselves a story…a story about other people’s lives, and these stories make us feel terrible.”

When people say, “I should have written that,” what we mean is “How unjust, unfair, unkind that you were faster, smarter, and more fortunate than I.” Writers and amateur novelists can certainly be seen as whiners. (For another type of wine, check out these wine and book pairings by a connoisseur.)

“So long as there are writers in every coffee shop and behind the cover of every one of the thousands of new books printed each year, there will be people for us to envy,” says one writer.

But, again, I am a writer and I never envy writers, and definitely not their successes. I show up to book launches. I buy books by acquaintances I know I probably will never read. I feature them here in this newsletter. I use the clapping emoji every time I see a writer get published or announce a book deal.

 I may not like their books, their writing, or even them. But if something wonderful happens to them because they are writers? I think it’s fan-fucking-tastic!

As Maya Angelou said of envy, “Jealousy in romance is like salt in food. A little can enhance the savour, but too much can spoil the pleasure and, under certain circumstances, can be life-threatening.”

In this article, “The Upside of Career Envy,” the author suggests that to succeed as a writer in this competitive world — between 700k and a million books are published each year — it’s natural to compare our progress against people around us. (This may be one reason I’ve never been jealous of writers. I don’t tend to hang out with very many of them!)

I never compare my work to anyone else’s. I never “wished” to be another writer.

But, oh, how many times people have reached out saying, “I think we would really get along. I’d love to collaborate on a book. We have the same lives!” or “We have the same writing style. Can you read what I’ve written?” or “We are living parallel lives. Mine is just like yours, and everyone says I should write a book about it!” 

To which I think, “Why the fuck would you want to be me? I’m eating Kraft Dinner in my boyfriend’s old T-shirt; I have a kid who told me to go look at her Instagram when I asked her, “What’s up?”; the principal called because my other kid started a fight at school; I haven’t showered in three days; I am so cold and also very constipated. YOU DO NOT WANT TO BE ME!”

Case in point: One writer — who I have never met — reached out to tell me how she wanted to name one of the chapters in her memoir, “I Slept With Rebecca Eckler’s Ex.”

Imagine getting that call? Exactly.

Admittedly, over the phone, she has a good sense of humour. But I wasn’t buying this was a good idea.

Who cares that we slept with the same person? And why did she want to tell me this anyway?

As I said, “He’s still my son’s father." (Meaning, I can say negative things, but I’m also still going to be protective…because he’s my son’s father.)

To be candid, I find that women who profess to be “women supporting women” are actually “women who may support you but never if you succeed more than them.” Never. Ever. Succeed. More. Than. Them.

After 20 years of never believing there was a Writer’s Envy dartboard on my back, I found myself working with one. Yay me!

Let’s just say I think being in the same room triggered her to “compare” my achievements, both personally and professionally, with hers, leading her to be on guard with me at all times. I wanted to hire someone to sage me whenever I had to be around her. 

One day, we got into a bit of a bickering match about something, which was the first and last time I have ever gotten into an argument with another colleague.

She yelled, “I’m a writer too!” 

This was all kinds of weird. We weren’t bickering about writing, I had never inferred she wasn't a writer or that somehow I knew more about writing than she did. I think I even told her, a few times, how much I enjoyed her writing. 

But also, for the first time, I wanted to scream, “I’ll compare my writing resume with yours any day. Let’s do it!” (Aside from the fact that I don’t have a resume. And I also believe there is always room for more writers.)

Let’s just say this woman definitely found it extremely hard to be happy for any of my successes.

At my book launch, she met her television personality crush. She then posted a photo of them together on her social, writing that he had met her hero “tonight” — purposely leaving out that she met him at my book launch for my latest book.

Sure, our bickering sessions were not my proudest moments. When I won the best writing award (twice) she was the only one at the table not clapping. She trolls me but never to “like” photos of my kids or anything fun in my life, although she does with everyone else in the office. (Does any of this feel like “a woman who supports women?” let alone an “author who supports authors?”)

Frankly, her painful self-doubt and envy benefited no one — not her, not the website, and certainly not me. I have to agree with Joan Didion: “To cure jealousy is to see it for what it is, a dissatisfaction with self.” (Jealousy is a terrible disease. There should be a get well soon card for this!)

If my colleague, who had a stack of unfinished manuscripts, had viewed me as an ally — which I thought I was until I realized she didn’t see me that way — she would know I would have been only too happy to introduce her to people in publishing that could have helped her publish one of a handful of unfinished manuscripts.

Instead, she chose to be spiteful and envious, when most kind people recognize that the success of others does not in any way lessen your accomplishments.

Yet Writer’s Envy is inevitable. Like love. 

Author Noelle Sterne told an interviewer, “When other writers proudly announce their latest coup, my reflex of jealousy rises up. To my chagrin, I often agree with Ann Lamott: ‘You are hoping for small bad things to happen to this friend — for, say, her head to blow up.’ (Bird by Bird).

The most gut-wrenching, envy-induced occurrence happened in college. “I watched a classmate achieve my dream. She published a novel, dazzled the literary world. Every bookstore displayed towering mountains of her bestseller. The greater her praise, the deeper my self-deprecation. Chronically depressed, I stopped writing and reading reviews and crossed the street when a bookstore loomed,” Sterne wrote.

Another writer here, admits, “One night about five years ago, just before bed, I saw a tweet from a friend announcing how delighted he was to have been shortlisted for a journalism award. I felt my stomach lurch and my head spin, my teeth clench and my chest tighten. I did not sleep until the morning.”

And he had never even entered the contest!

I have also learned this truism: “First they hate you, then they envy you, then they copy you,” which, correct me if I’m wrong, I thought was a well-known quote, but now I think it’s only a known quote in my own brain because I can't find it on the Internet, thus it must not exist. The closest was, “They watch. They hate. Then they copy.”

Guess what this former colleague recently started doing. A book-themed newsletter, even mimicking the way I sign off. 

Now you’re going to say another truism, “Copying is the sincerest form of flattery.” Is it? Is it, really? Maybe. But, also, it’s just plain annoying. When I showed My Guy, he said, “It’s disgusting.” I just think it’s a tad creepy and a tad sad. Her newsletter attempted to do what I’m trying to do, and the timing seemed odd — starting a newsletter less than a year after I did.

But I always think back to my conversation with Nelly Furtado, who knows that our originality tank will always be full. And that other people will forever feel and go to sleep knowing they are the unoriginal envious writer/artist. 

It’s sad when other writers only wish you misfortune, namely because our level of what constitutes success is based on different measuring sticks.

If you’re envious of another author's life, just remember that most people show you what they want you to see — the version of their life they want you to see. So, the next time you get caught up in Writer’s Envy, always remember that you don’t really have their whole life story (pun intended). 

Also, there is someone out there envying you. And ask yourself this: Are you willing to give up your life and swap it with mine? I’m sure your answer is no.

I’m not jealous of Margaret Atwood. I don’t envy any of her successes.

Then again, I wouldn’t mind my face on a stamp, but I don’t think I “ought to” have one.

Until next time,

Flip your hair and the page! (And who knows? One day, that page may be yours.)

xoxo,

Rebecca