As you probably already know, on August 20th I published my play The Sorting. I likely won’t be publishing any other plays (unless the future has something different in store for me). So why this one? Why did I have to publish this particular play? What’s so special about it?
I’ve written other plays besides this one, but they were mainly for school projects, and some were only ever performed in class. The Sorting is the only one that has actually been performed performed. If you’ve grabbed yourself the eBook and read the introduction, then you already know all about that. This was a big deal for me. A director, who was not a classmate, turned my words on the page into an actual show. Actors I had never met before brought my characters to life. People bought tickets. Strangers! Not just friends and family. I was a playwright.
Starting in middle school, I became very involved in theatre. I was so involved in theatre communities and my high school plays, always striving for top marks in drama class, that I was convinced I would be a thespian for life. But university was not what I thought it would be. I started to enjoy my elective English classes more than the theatre classes I had to take for my major. By second year, I made the switch. I bumped theatre down to a minor (after all, I had racked up enough credits and wasn’t going to let them go to waste), and took on English as a major. That was the best decision I could have made. I’ve been an English geek ever since.
At the time, I thought that the ideal career path would be for me to combine my major and minor and become a playwright. That’s what I told all of my classmates when they asked why I was switching majors. But it turns out I was a one hit wonder. After The Sorting, I wrote only one other play that no one wanted to direct. I had no desire to write plays after that. It’s not that I became discouraged. Far from it. I simply realized that I had more talent and skill when it came to writing sci-fi stories, my newest fascination at the time.
So that’s why I wanted to publish The Sorting. It’s the only play I’ve ever written that made me feel like a true playwright. Audiences at the time seemed to enjoy it, so I knew the story was at least good enough for publication. Plus, it’s creepy enough to fit in with everything else I have and will be publishing.
I still love theatre. I still love attending performances and learning about the technical aspects that go into creating them, but I won’t be turning back to playwriting anytime soon. I’ll stick to novels and short stories for now.
