Tolkien Was a Slow Writer and King Faced 30 Rejections

I’ve always loved creative writing for as long as I can remember. To create a fictional world, the characters, the plot, everything contained within…

… carefully planning and molding it within your mind and eventually sharing it with the world if you are so brave or perhaps foolish enough, is an amazing concept.

One of the things that inspires and motivates me to write even when I’ve doubted myself are the well known and successful authors of both today and yesterday. Behind even the most well known and successful writers is a story of failure, rejection and nearly giving up. However, their stories also include perseverance, long awaited successs, and ultimately improving as a writer.

J.R.R. Tolkien

The Lord of the Rings and The Hobbit have become undoubtedly some of J.R.R. Tolkien’s most successful literary works. The Hobbit was published in 1937 while the first of The Lord of the Rings trilogy — The Fellowship of the Ring was published in 1954. This was followed by the second of the trilogy— The Two Towers in 1955, and finally, The Return of The King which was also published in 1955. Tolkien even inventing his own lore and language for his stories.

“In a hole in the ground there lived a hobbit”.

As an English Professor focusing on language and literature, Tolkien wrote what would become The Hobbit on a blank page while marking school certificate papers. As he was going over these papers, he had suddenly become inspired by an idea and started writing.

Perhaps quite surprisingly, Tolkien did not start writing The Lord of the Rings trilogy until the age of 45 and did not complete it until the age of 63. As he had mentioned to publishers, Tolkien was a slow writer. Also keep in mind that Tolkien had a full time at Oxford university. The fact that Tolkien was a slow writer inspires me immensely as I am a slower writer.

Toni Morrison

Toni Morrison was another writer that had gotten a late start. An influential American writer with an utmost focus on social issues and black identity, Morrison penned what would become some of the most recognizable titles in literature — The Bluest Eye (1970), Sula (1973), Song of Solomon (1977), Tar Baby (1981) and Beloved (1987).

While these stories have become a success and even brought up rounds of great controversy, Morrison did not start her debut novel, The Bluest Eye until she was 34. Setting it aside to focus on life, The Bluest Eye was not completed and published until she was 39.

Toni Morrison’s novel, Beloved earned her the 1988 Pulitzer Prize. Morrison was also the first African American woman to achieve the Nobel Prize in Literature.

Stephen King

Known as the king of horror, Stephen King is one such writer that has deeply inspired me. Faced with rounds of self doubt, not knowing where to go with the story, and believing it would not be worth finishing, King trashed the manuscript for his debut novel, Carrie.

That might have been the end and he never would have known the potential and success his novel might (and it most certainly did!) become if his wife did not pull it out of the trash and start reading it.

Next, King was faced with 30 rejections of his novel, Carrie and a note from one publisher stating that they were not interested in negative utopia themed science fiction. That is until the publisher, Doubleday picked it up and it was published in 1974. Over time, he would eventually sell more than 4 million copies of Carrie as the book’s adaption to film would be the catalyst to its further success.

Ray Bradbury

Science fiction author Ray Bradbury is another favorite and inspiring writer of mine. Bradbury has become a well known writer in science fiction literature with novels such as The Martian Chronicles (1950), Fahrenheit 451 (1953), Dandelion Wine (1957), and Something Wicked This Way Comes (1962).

I remember reading his short stories in middle and high school and finding the characters to each story memorable and relatable and the theme gripping and imaginative.

Bradbury was also another writer that went through rejection after rejection with his stories. He continued writing more short stories and submitting them to other publications. It wasn’t until his 500th submission that he found success. That success was Dark Carnival (1947), a collection of short stories.

He would go on to publish more than 30 books and almost 600 short stories with quite a few being adapted into film.

Brush off that layer of dust that’s collected over your creative brain. Dust off that notebook, fire up that laptop. It’s been a while! Just remember, it’s never too late to start writing.