What is a novelist’s worth? One day, stuck on this question, Utsudo went to the library to clear her head. Looking at books by authors who no longer write—or are no longer alive—still preserved on the shelves, she concluded that novelists are observers, recorders and dreamers. Finding stories that touch people’s hearts, extending their life, and letting more people share in that feeling: that is a writer’s worth.

Translated from Utsudo’s original Chinese column.

One day, this question suddenly struck me:

As novelists, what exactly is our “worth”?

Looking for answers in the library

I puzzled over it without finding an answer, and because I cared so much, I lost the mood to keep writing. So that day I went to the library to clear my head.

The library is one of my favorite places to go in my free time. In the quiet space, I look at the colorful books lining the shelves. Each one is a carefully made work carrying countless crystallized knowledge and memories. They’re precious.

These authors may no longer write, and may no longer even be alive, but their works live on in some corner of the library. Isn’t that another way of extending life?

Thinking that, I couldn’t help feeling a deep respect for these books.

Bathed in the scent of books, I felt like a tiny shrimp in a vast sea of knowledge. Living in this brief era, all I’ve seen and heard, and all I’ve been through, are just a drop in the ocean.

While feeling small, I also felt peace of mind, as if all my hardships and unspoken struggles could be understood and accepted. That sense of belonging was amazing.

Once you strip away the noise of competition

We all compete for existing resources—publishers, fans, niches and so on. But strip away the noise, and isn’t it all the wish for our work to be seen? Though of course that includes the desire to earn more money and survive on this stage.

We’re always scrambling after glitter. But as time passes and that falls away, our work sits in front of a stranger, and to them the book means a new adventure, or another window onto the world.

In their eyes, all that commercial rivalry seems not to exist.

A novelist’s worth: observer, recorder and dreamer

Back to “worth.” I think we are observers and recorders, and also dreamers. We weave our dreams to express the ideas in our hearts, or to tell everyone a meaningful story. That’s why we write, share stories and celebrate life.

Writers of the past, in realist or fictional worlds, revealed and preserved to some degree their generation’s hopes and stories, and everything unique to that time and place. These have more warmth and soul than hardcovers locked away on high shelves or cold museum exhibits.

No matter how detailed a nonfiction book is, it can’t replace works that authors absorbed and internalized with their lives. Not everyone is a scholar willing to toil to explore the unknown. Cold, difficult records and histories, however valuable, just don’t sink in. What reaches people’s hearts will always be something gentler and more nuanced.

I think finding the stories that touch people’s hearts, extending their life, and letting more people share in that feeling is our worth as writers.

As novelists, we record our lives and hopes through stories. That moment becomes a priceless eternity.

Are you making history today too?

FAQ

Further reading

• Previous: Hey! I Heard You’re a Writer on Ghost Island #127: A Girl Who Wants to Draw; a Mother Crushed by Reality
• Start from the beginning: Hey! I Heard You’re a Writer on Ghost Island #01: Utsudo’s Debut — A Road to the Dream Covered in Frost
• Utsudo’s books

About the author

Utsudo is a Taiwanese light novelist and novelist VTuber with more than ten years in the industry and 40 commercially published print books. Her novel 《遺失的情書》 received a 2022 Ministry of Culture youth creative award. The 《嘿！聽說妳在鬼島當作家》 series records her experiences as a novelist in Taiwan.