Mammoths, fantasy and defining modern writers.

I am an unpublished writer. I am an unpublished... writer? I am unpublished, therefore I cannot be a writer. 

That last statement is untrue. I am a writer. I have sometimes wondered if other people see me that way. Are there people out there who think that they cannot be writers because they are unpublished? Probably. It was how I used to think. But, I have and am studying writing, I think I should get some kind of title for that. Princess, would be my desired one. World dominator, empress! But, what if I applied that thinking to other subjects? I have studied history so... I am a historian! No. And the reason that I am not a historian is because I do not feel it. I love history, but in my heart I am a writer. I always will be. And also a little bit of an empress too.

I started thinking about this because I started thinking about submitting to a magazine. Or online journal, or anywhere. I am not at this point going to be picky. The thing is, I have gone through this process before. I have thought about submitting, researched for hours the best magazine to submit too, gotten a piece ready for submission, aaaaand backed out. I just cannot hit that button. I have done, and I have a slew of rejection emails to prove it. But, why can't I now? I think it is because that as a writer I do not know who I am. 

Writer is too broad a term. I am a writer of fiction, we could narrow it down that far at least. But then within that, what am I? Once, I would have said 'I am a writer of fantasy fiction.' Yet, I no longer class my writing as fantasy. Sure, there are fantastical elements to all of my pieces but they feel too real to be fantasy. Fantasy can be a comment on reality and real society but I think that my work goes deeper than that. At least I like to think so. I think it strikes real elements with a sledge hammer rather than encompassing them as fantasy fiction does, sometimes. I am well aware that fantasy is a very broad term and it could be applied to my work. 

Yet, fantasy is not the right world. Surreal sounds better. So going back to the top. I am an unpublished, surreal fiction writer. Does that sound right? Not quite. I do not think it is quite there. I want something harsher, something that screams look at me I'm being fucking amazing over here! Empress Jodie, sauntering through. Marching through. No, charging through! I want something that charges through with a lance, riding an elephant! No, a mammoth! Let's bring mammoths back! Let's all ride mammoths and charge into the world of fiction. Or better yet, let's all stop labelling ourselves as writers. The term is too broad, too encompassing, too much like fantasy and fiction. 

I propose that we all choose our own terms to describe our work and who we are and who we want to be. I have been stringing something together throughout this post. And after much more thought than there seems to be here I think I know who and what I am.

I am an empress and my work is a charging mammoth.