The following conversation with essayist Sandra Hurtes helps us all realize that we have it in us to pursue the dream of publishing our essays. We need to stick with it, listen to others, and find the publications that are seeking what we are writing about.

Sheila
Tell me about your writing career — how you began publishing, how you selected the journals and newspapers you submitted to.

Sandra
I began publishing in 1995, after writing an essay, “A Daughter’s Legacy.” I’d had a few failed attempts at publishing before that; there were many reasons. I didn’t believe I was really a writer so I didn’t persevere. Connected to that, I didn’t know about the hard work of writing a publishable piece.

Sheila
I can relate. It is really hard to believe in oneself as a writer when no one has asked us to do this life’s work. It is also hard to understand what the “hard work” of being a writer is because when see published writing, we don’t see what it took to get it to the finished state (if there is such a thing.). I’d love to hear what you found is the hard work and what compelled you to discover it?

Sandra
By the hard work I mean staying with something, even when it seems you’ll never get the piece finished or even get a word down. With “A Daughter’s Legacy,” I had the entire story in my head for weeks. But when I sat down to write, I froze. Then, I thought about who I was telling the story to. It was my family, in particular one aunt I was very close to. So, I tried again. I put my fingers on the keyboard and imagined myself giving a talk with my aunt in the audience. The words poured out of me.

What I also mean by the hard work is listening to what others say and seeing criticism as gold. Getting published for me has been about returning often to the same piece, saving drafts, getting feedback, revising. Sometimes, though, it’s been timing.

Because “A Daughter’s Legacy” was my story of being the daughter of Holocaust survivors, the timing was perfect. It was the fiftieth anniversary of the year the Jews were liberated. I’d had a dream to be one of the many voices telling their stories, and so I was extremely motivated. Also, I loved the process of writing that essay. Two readers gave me feedback, and I revised at least twenty times. That’s when I knew I really was a writer and liked myself enough to let others know.

 The business end came very easy to me. I enjoyed researching the markets and discovering there were so many places to publish–once I moved my sights to possibilities other than The New York Times. The Times was a goal, but that essay ended up where it belonged, in The Jewish Press, a newspaper that had a Jewish readership. It was then reprinted many times.

Sheila
Where was it reprinted? How did you find those markets for reprinting? It’s always great to learn about the ways in which we can find new homes for writing over and over.

Sandra
I did library research, looking for Jewish-interest publications. The essay was reprinted in The Los Angeles Jewish Journal, Bat-Kol (an Israeli magazine), and The Brooklyn Woman, which had a general readership.

Today, when I teach I tell students go to www.newslink.org. It’s a great website for finding publications.

Sheila
Thank you for the useful link. Another question: Did you study writing in a formal setting?

Sandra
I did get an MFA, but was already a working writer by then.

Sheila
Where were you already working as a writer? What helped you make the decision to study for an MFA if you were already a working writer? Where did you study?

Sandra

I was freelancing for newspapers and magazines like: The New York Times, Writer’s Digest and Poets & Writers, but never making a living. I always had a job of sorts. I thought about getting an MFA, mostly for the intense focus on writing and so I could have a legitimate career as a college teacher.

As I said, everything is timing. I was at the Taos Writer’s Conference in 2004. I met someone there I knew from Brooklyn. She was my age and had just given up her apartment, packed up her car and moved to Phoenix. Next on her agenda was applying somewhere for her MFA. I thought, that’s a great idea! I’ll get my MFA, too. And, so I did. Only I didn’t pack up and move. I stayed in New York and went to Hunter College.

Sheila
Did you also study informally?

Sandra
When I first started publishing, I took a few continuing ed courses that were pivotal to my career. I loved the classroom community and connecting with other writers. I was a complete novice. Through others I learned about magazines like Writer’s Digest and Poets & Writers, and I joined the National Writers Union. I took suggestions from everyone.

Sheila
You mean suggestions about resources for writers?

Sandra
Yes, resources like associations, panel talks that go on in the city, places to publish and comments about my work.

Sheila
And a high point?

Sandra
A very high point was when an essay I wrote while in a class made it into the Times. The class had critiqued a draft of that essay. When revising, I addressed every comment. Also, a chapter from Anne Lamott’s Bird by Bird  (“Shitty First Drafts”) pushed me to write the first draft.

Sheila
What was the article about and why did you send it to the Times?

Sandra
The essay was about this very sweet, quirky guy I met swing dancing. We seemed perfect together; I even told my mother about him which I usually didn’t do. Richard and I had three lovely dates. Then, his friend called and told me he’d had a brain aneurysm and died in his sleep. I wrote about him in a questioning way. Why did we meet?

I first sent the essay to Mc Calls (they’re now defunct). The piece seemed very woman’s magazine-ish, but it was rejected in days. I then sent it to The New York Times. I chose the Times because they had a perfect column for it, “Close to Home.” Three days later, they called. I couldn’t believe it.

But, I mentioned the rejection from Mc Calls because after the essay was published, I received a phone call from a Mc Calls editor saying she loved the essay, would I write for them?

Sheila
Oh, Sandy. That was a very sad shock, I am sure, to have found out a man you were dating suddenly died. I am sure writing was important for absorbing the shock.

Who else did you read in addition to Anne Lamott for guidance?

Sandra
I read your book, Writing Personal Essays. You were a great teacher for me in two ways: I learned about clustering from you and the idea of putting in a circle, something I have strong feelings of love and/or hate for, then building from that. Also, your book armed me with information about different kinds of essays, when I taught my first writing workshop.
Sheila
It always feel so very good to hear from people I haven’t known that my work has helped. And then of course, it is fabulous to meet them.

Who else did you read?

Sandra
My role models were Faye Moskowitz’s, A Leak in the Heart and Vivian Gornick’s Fierce Attachments. With Moskowitz, each sentence is gorgeous and packed with love for her family. Gornick is bold and writes about her complex relationship with her mother, a very strong figure in her life. I relate to both writers. I also love Carolyn Knapp’s writing, particularly, Drinking: A Love Story.

Sheila
Thank you for the references!

It’s interesting to read about high points and the mentors we choose by reading their published work. It’s also always wonderful to read not only about success but about low points. It makes us feel better as we struggle. What would you report as a significant low point?

Sandra
A low point…well, one of the first feature articles I wrote was on spec for Cosmopolitan. I worked so hard, and when I believed it was perfect, mailed it off. Four days later a form rejection came back. I cried and couldn’t write for four weeks. Then, I forced myself to reread the article. I saw many reasons why it was rejected. The voice was wrong for Cosmo, and paragraph transitions were clunky. That was a turning point, being able to look critically at my work. I revised the article, and a year later it ended up in Complete Woman, where I became a Contributing Writer for two years.

Sheila
So nothing is wasted. What was your commitment as Contributing Writer?

Sandra
I wrote self-help features on break-ups and careers. It was fun to not write about me.

Sheila
I am glad you enjoyed that writing. It is good to feel versatile. One of my early poet teachers said we must always write in more than one genre because there are times when the writing in one we believe is ours, doesn’t come. However, yours seems to be happening on the page, and in my reading of essays you’ve written, I think that the writing you’ve done has been essential for your own development. Can you discuss that a little?

Sandra
When I started writing, and it was with such passion, I finally (I was 45) felt I was intelligent with something important to say. I suffered from low-self esteem and never felt as smart as my peers. I went to college later in life and drifted from job to job. Then, with my first essay, writing clicked, and I felt as if I grew into myself overnight. I was getting published often and my friends and family were in awe. I developed a stronger sense of myself. The next time I cried over writing, it was when an essay I wrote was published in The Washington Post. Wow! I had truly arrived.

Sheila
What was the title and topic? What made you write for that paper in particular?

Sandra
Well, I didn’t exactly write it for The Washington Post. It was my 18th submission — yes, the article on, why do I diet when I’m not fat — was rejected 17 times. After the magazines didn’t want it, I realized, I wrote about them as the enemy — making normal woman not like our bodies. So, they weren’t my market.

Then, it hit me, newspapers come out every day. They need work much more than a monthly and can be open to opinions. I began studying up on national newspapers and chose The Washington Post, Lifestyle Section. Good old timing again: New York Magazine had a cover story on anorexia. “Skinny” became the season’s hot topic. My essay landed on an op-ed editor’s desk, she called me, and I was thrilled. That essay has been reprinted on feminist.com, The Philadelphia Inquirer, and is anthologized in The Contemporary Reader. I’m very big on looking to the newspapers.

Sheila
Newspapers–may they stay in business!

Much of your writing is about being the daughter of Holocaust survivors and the complicated burden of sorrow. How do you think people from very different backgrounds from your own respond to your work? Why?

Sandra
I’m Jewish and connect very strongly with Amy Tan. Her issues about being an Asian American woman struggling for her own identity are very similar to mine. Regardless of background, certain life stages are universal. Finding out who we are, away from family; what we’re meant to do in this life; dealing with loneliness or unhappy relationships are just a few things we all go through. My hope is that people of all cultures relate to me. That would give me great pleasure.

Sheila:
What do you love about the personal essay?

Sandra:
The personal essay is my favorite form. I love the arc of the essay, the working toward some sort of insight and learning from my own fingers as they tap away. My essays tend to be short–1200 words. That’s just a natural length, not intentional. I also tell a lot, with some “show.” I read somewhere that essays more than any other form, are our chance to tell our story. I think that’s what I like best. I don’t get slowed down with style or technique–say, as I would for creative nonfiction. I just write.

Sheila:
I’ve read the manuscript for your forthcoming collection of essays. I am not aware of telling instead of showing. And I always think of the personal essay as one form of creative nonfiction–so I am wondering if you’d explain more about what you mean when you say that you tell a lot with some show and style and technique don’t bog you down as you think they might in another form.

Sandra:
Many years ago my dad told me a very touching story about his brother as a child. I recently wrote an essay and included that story. At first, I wrote it as my father had told it. In revision, I set it up a bit. My father and I were in the living room, we were doing something, and I dialogued my father’s words, to give it all a scenic quality. When I read it, I thought, I like it better the first way, just told directly and letting the story stand on its own, no frills.

I love writing description and scenes. And dialogue is great for breaking up long narratives. I’m doing all of that now in my memoir. But, the way I wrote when I first started, it was direct, from the heart, any technique was accidental. That feels like my purest writing.

Sheila
Thanks for that explanation. Next week we are going to post one of your essays that I find particularly moving. It is about your father and your father-daughter relationship. Without giving anything away, can you talk about what it meant to you to write that particular essay?

Sandra
It meant I wasn’t ashamed of letting people know me. I needed my father’s approval and permission to live my life, a different life than what he wanted for me. Making it public was a way to accept myself.

Sheila
I get a chill reading that. It is important that we allow others to know what is at the bottom of our minds and hearts and the personal essay lets us do that. Publication ensures others will know what we say to be true for us and feel even more strongly what is truest in their hearts.

Thank you so very much for your words. When will we be able to buy copies of your memoir in personal essays?

Sandra
It seems early November is publication date. Sheila, thank you for giving me your time and putting me on your pages.

Sheila:
My pleasure. And thank you for the story of your hard work, coming to writing at 45, your many writing successes.

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Sandra’s collection of essays will be available through Poetica Publishing Company, mid-October. It can be directly pre-ordered through Sandra at OnMyWayEssays@yahoo.com. The price is $15.00 plus shipping. It will also be available on Amazon early November.