On Coping with the Pressure of a Professional Literary Scene

~by Amanda Silberling

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Did you get the call? A Facebook group sends messages from Illinois, to Connecticut, to California, all asking the same question: Did you get the call? In my Florida bedroom, my friend Andre and I work on an English project. Andre asks me what I think the theme of Madame Bovary is. Did you get the call? I stare at my phone, knowing that just one ring tone holds the validation I have been working towards for months—years, even. Did you get the call? A girl in Pennsylvania gets the call. Facebook tilts on its axis. The messages come quicker. Did you get the call? A boy in Massachusetts gets the call. Did you get the call? A girl in New York gets the call. Did you get the call? I have four texts, seven Facebook messages (Did you get the call?), three Snapchats, and zero missed calls. Did you get the call? Andre goes downstairs to tell my parents that he’s worried about me. Did you get the call?

I keep my phone on the loudest volume for a week. I never get the call. I check my mailbox every day when I get home for a month. Finally, a rejection letter. Did you get the call?

Andre and I don’t finish our Madame Bovary project that night in November. I apologize to him the next day (with one eye on my phone, just in case it rings). In class, my English teacher discusses the protagonist’s self-destructive desire for constant validation and superficial success. We decide that Gustave Flaubert’s Madame Bovary is a novel about a woman poisoned by her lofty expectations, slowly growing more and more disappointed with her life. She is her own worst enemy. Continue reading →