The Pleasure of Writing a Substack

An ode to a new media form

May 16, 2023

I’ve just finished this Substack!

Since December, almost every Tuesday, I’ve been posting here on Substack, and I marvel at this new, and unfiltered way of reaching an audience. Some of my posts are preliminary versions of more lengthy and polished essays I may write later on; some are ideas I have pondered on for years. Many are spontaneous practice pieces.

The word “practice” has several meanings, and Substack has also become part of my writing “practice,” as in an intentional and even devotional activity to which I keep returning. Writing here once a week, I shut down the world and tunnel inward as I concentrate on some aspect of pleasure. The tent of pleasure covers so much, I will not soon run out of topics!

Pleasure comes in many forms, and at the risk of getting meta, I’m getting considerable pleasure from this very Substack, “The Pleasure Principle.”

The best thing about the Substack platform is the total freedom it provides. Freedom of subject, length, and format. Freedom to do one thing in one post and another in the next. Freedom not to publish at all when overwhelmed or uninspired. Freedom to choose the photos or art that will go with the piece. Freedom to make all the decisions. Freedom to take total control.

For most writers, this is a happy contrast to almost everything else about the profession. Unless we self-publish, we have no control over almost anything. We are published at the whim of agents and editors. We are told to shorten a piece 75% . . . and we do it. We usually have no say in our covers and flap jacket copy, and, in children’s books or magazine work, we have no say in the art that accompanies our texts. When our articles are published, we do not choose the pull quotes or even the titles, which are often sensational or misleading. We do not choose the ads that are placed by our words. We cannot decide whether our books will be reviewed, whether we’ll be interviewed or whether anybody will ever notice our work. It’s a zero-sum game: only a tiny percentage of working writers get any attention at all.

But writers on Substack have complete control of their posts: what they write and how they approach the subject, and how long the piece will be. Of course, they are also free to make spelling and grammar mistakes!

Apart from writing novels, the closest thing I’ve come to complete control in my work- life is a job I had for a year during Covid, producing a medical newsletter about a new specialty. I chose the stories, rewrote them to provide a little flair, found the photographs, and wrote the headlines. Sometimes just to keep things lively, I’d select a piece that questioned the specialty as a whole. I was aiming for a witty, savvy medical newsletter, and my boss usually went along with my shenanigans, only occasionally batting me down. Unfortunately, the company failed to find a newsletter sponsor, so they folded the publication.

I don’t need a financial sponsor to write here on Substack! I don’t need an editor to approve, dilute, or shape what I say! This is my little fiefdom, and the people who open these posts come into my garden to visit.

A few of my readers have known me since childhood. Others are more recent friends and acquaintances—and by “recent,” I mean from the past 20 years. Most subscribers do not know me at all, and these inspire me with wonder and gratitude. How did they find me? Will they go on reading me? Some people subscribe to dozens of Substacks. Will they keep opening mine?

Above all, will it bring them some pleasure?

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And here’s an ad that am happy to feature below my words! The heroine of my recently published novel, Cybill Unbound, knows a thing or two about pleasure! At 42 and newly divorced, she is about to embark on a life of sexual adventure. Can a woman feel passion well into her older years? Is strict fidelity necessary to every long relationship? One reviewer wrote: “Always titillating, never salacious!”