Author Bios: Are you a person or an object?

Why don’t we tell it how it is in author bios on blogs and web pages? We are asked to strut our stuff, padded and polished till it shines in a process that disappears vital aspects of our lives. Why? Because the world wants to rank us, fit us into the dominant discourse of our disciplines and times. Such discourses create algorithms of and what’s in and what’s out and we willingly flatten our experience to promote ourselves in predetermined ways.

I discovered this the hard way when I was developing wattletales. 

One day, I presented a personal bio to a writing critique group. In the silence when I stopped reading, some members sat with mouths agape.  Braver souls spoke up in criticism. Too revealing was the word. A few kind souls felt sorry for me and suggested in sensible tones that I do it ‘the right way’.

One person was unequivocal in her view that nobody was interested in my personal life. And, there it was. The ghastly rejection of what I thought were the awesome, colourful, shameful and sorrowful episodes of my life that made me who I am. I was not allowed to use that. So, I conformed. The About section on this website is the result.  It hangs in cyberspace unread excluded by the divide and conquer algorithm of our times.

This unfortunate episode got me wondering whether people are so immured in hierarchies of power, fashion and their associated promotional jargon that they no longer think for themselves? This brings director Peter Weir’s wickedly insightful film, The Truman Show (1998) to mind. In it, Jim Carry stars as the hapless Truman Burbank who slowly realises that his whole life is broadcast 24/7 as a reality TV show. The corporation that shelters him in a glass bubble beams the minutiae of his daily life to millions without his consent. 

The Truman Show glorifies the personal and may seem to contradict my argument. Yet Truman tries to escape when he realises his personal life is not his, not private. There are resonances with Forrest Gump here. In both movies, there is a fascination by creators and audiences alike with the simple in a world of complexity and insecurity. Gump is adored because he is true to himself, he does not intellectualise. Truman was a happy soul until he started thinking for himself when he realised his life was not real as he thought it was. The movies fit a different algorithm that incites nostalgia for innocence lost.  

Recently, I found a promising article on ABC News online (4 January 2019), entitled “Five emerging Australian authors talk about writing their breakthrough novels.” In this piece, each author describes their journey to success, exposing personal difficulties, self-doubt, failures and all that human frailty stuff. It made me wonder if our failings and suffering only interest others after we become successful. 

I think of those marvellous actors and musicians who died young, alcoholics or drug addicts who are forgiven because of their legacy. Ordinary folk don’t get a look in. If you or your children or someone you love is an addict, it is more likely they’ll be denounced vilified or gaoled. So, success counts. Fame counts when it comes to personal lives being revealed. 

In mouse-ridden garrets, lofts and rooms around the world, struggling artists and writers are still alone with their creative urges. But, if you don’t hit the big time, you are just another failed derelict who doesn’t count in any algorithm of what’s deemed important in your time.

The corporate characters in The Truman Show argue that life inside the artificial bubble where Truman lives is not fake. It is real, they say, but controlled. Their justification for their hideous betrayal of trust is that the show (like the personality of Forrest Gump) comforts viewers. 

We need cautionary tales every now and then, as much as we do tales of heroism and overcoming the odds. But the hard fact is, the only way we can reap success writing about our personal experiences is when we write to help others. Better still, if you become famous, even your wickedness might become interesting.

There is hope. I prepared a submission for a publisher a little while back who, unlike others who want 200-word synopses and 10 pages of a novel they have no intention of reading asked me why I thought was I the right person to write the book I was submitting. I think they are on the right track.  

So, do you write about yourself as a person or an object? Try This —

Pay attention to your orientation to the page and follow your heart. Say what you really, really want to write in a bio. Then, turn it around and find all the awards, achievements and worldly successes or accolades you have had in your life and write it again. Which do you like best?

You can read more on a similar theme here.