Journelism

After a Dozen Years of Hard Work, Professor Sarah Bynum Reaches Her Goal of Publishing Her First Novel

Like many aspiring authors, Sarah Bynum faced a problem. Becoming a successful novelist requires full-time dedication, but not dying of starvation also requires a significant commitment, and the two are often mutually exclusive. Abandoning her rewarding teaching career, Sarah sacrificed financial stability for a chance to have time to write. Years later, it has paid off—her two novels have become critical and popular successes.

Preparing a book for publication is an arduous process. Sarah Bynum’s first novel, Madeline is Sleeping, she sheepishly concedes, took her 10 years from initial conception until finally ready for the public.

Sarah had always planned to be a writer, but after attending an advanced university writing program, she found a position as a teacher. She truly enjoyed the work, quickly falling in love with the “openness and transparency of eighth graders,” but it quickly became apparent that the position severely hampered her dream of becoming a novelist. “I had the absurd notion that I would be able to continue writing while teaching. I had no conception of how incredibly demanding the work was. I found it so hard to balance…. Teaching was rewarding, but too intense to allow me to achieve my long-term goals. I had to find a job that was more contained.”

After three years in the classroom, she made a conscious decision to find a new career path—one that would allow time and energy for her own writing to become a priority. She met the author Michael Cunningham at a local night class, and he encouraged her to study at the University of Iowa. The world-renowned writing program there, Sarah found, was a perfect fit, and she enrolled the following semester. “For the first time, I gave myself permission to think of myself as a writer.”

The experience gave Sarah the skills, perspective and opportunity finally to pursue writing actively. After receiving her MFA, she accepted a banal position at a development-consulting firm—a rare situation in which a more advanced degree actually led to a less-lucrative career, but this was okay with Sarah, who understood that her day job was but a bridge to sustain herself while she wrote.

Now that Sarah had a job she could leave at the office each day, she was able to commit herself to the writing of her novel, Madeline is Sleeping, a project that had been on various back burners since undergraduate school.

With her newly committed attention, she was able to finish the book; it was then picked up by Harcourt Publications. After that, the success and accolades came quickly. Madeline is Sleeping was a finalist for the 2004 National Book Award. Her second novel, Ms. Hemple Chronicles, was recently released and has received significant praise of its own.

“Writing tends to take the back seat to other things—like a paying job. I’m still trying to figure out a way to balance the two,” Sarah observes, considering the steps that she took to achieve her goals. It is exceedingly difficult to support oneself financially, while attempting to make a career writing. “My greatest piece of advice is to read voraciously and keep your overhead low. If writing is the focus of your life, you need to make very conservative choices for yourself; accept that you must create a very simple lifestyle.”

These wise words of humility and experience reflect sacrifices made, successes won.