Ghosts in the Writing

 

 

 

Ghost Writing

For or against?

When I first heard the term 'Ghost Writing' I had no idea what it meant, when I found out that it referred to passing off the work of someone else as your own I was a little surprised. At first I thought, why would anyone who wants to be an author do this? Then it occurred to me that it's just like having a songwriter write you a song to perform as your own, then I realised I was totally wrong, it is in fact like being Milli Vanilli and lip syncing to the voices of other people and pretending that it is you, which is never ok.

I wondered what was in it for the 'Ghost', but then I realised that this publishing world is a hard one and if someone is going to pay you to write and you are good at it then why not, even if no one ever know who you are.

The concept of the 'Ghost Writer' never really bothered me greatly as it didn't affect my life and I never knew anyone who had released a ghosted book, until a couple of years ago. I was making real progress with 'Retaliation', the best I had done in years, I had one business book at the back of me and I was intent on following it up with a fiction book (little did I know I had a few more stops in the process to go before I would finish) and I went to work with this company, the boss of which was an up and comer, fancied himself a bit of an entrepreneur and periodically appeared in the media with the title of 'visionary' attached to him, he had some other descriptions but that was the one that stood out most of all. I always thought it was an impressive title reserved for those great people of the world, until recently I saw that same word in an article about myself and I realised that the media was prone to exaggeration.

Another title used to describe this person was 'author', he had apparently poured some of his visionary ideas into a fictional book and used them to construct the world his story was based in. I wasn't long in the place when I found out that he had came up with the idea and the concepts, then sent them off to a 'Ghost Writer' on the other side of the world to write the book. I have to admit I got a little annoyed with this, writing my first book '8 Simple Steps to Business Development' was the hardest thing I had ever done, writing my novel 'Retaliation' was even harder, there I was struggling to put my story into words and here was some rich guy paying someone else to do it. My upset over this subject I think came from him having the nerve to describe himself as an author, a title that I had coveted for years and even having released a book I still wasn't sure if I had the right to use it.

I have since mellowed on the subject, but I still feel the same to a point, writing a book is hard, especially when you first start at it, knowing especially that it does not come easily to most people, but when you finish your first draft you feel such a high, the accomplishment is great, then you re-draft and edit and re-draft until the book is as good as you know how to make it. I understand it is nice to read a well written book, but I will choose a great story over great writing any day, a story that has been loved, crafted and developed by its creator will always be better than a polished book of chapters with no soul.

I never 'outed' this visionary person and I didn't work with him for long, anybody who is happy to accept accolades that they do not out-rightly deserve will never hold my loyalty. But it does bother me about how often these books are written, creativity should be encouraged and harnessed and people with a good idea can and should finish it themselves, with help is fine, but as the teacher always told me, it has to be your own work.

That is just my view on 'Ghost Writing', I would love to get some opinions from the rest of you.

Written by Martin Wallace