Battlefield Chronicles #7 - 'Of War and War's Alarms'
'But O that I were young again/And held her in my arms.'
[Disclaimer: this is a meta-article that delves into my experiences as a writer in the information war. Among other things, it examines the stats for the pieces I write, and my strategies to reach the maximum amount of readers possible. If you happen to think that's nothing but clickbait, maybe you should skip this one.]
May was a good month. The temperature was agreeable, perfect for writing. And the results do show up.
My production in May was 26 articles: 5 in my War Blog here, 18 on the Gateway Pundit and 3 on the Frank Report.
I also got my best read story so far: 78k views - which is pretty cool for a new writer on the TGP news site.
If April was the month in which I was learning to write and finish stories every day, May was the moment where I focused on developing the 'art and science of finding an engaging story that I can tackle fast and effectively'.
I got almost 300k views. That is of course far from monumental, I know - but for comparison's sake, on my Substack, the War Blog, I am getting now between 49-52k per month - in a good increase over the last months average.
So you see how, even though I'm still finding my way on TGP, I already get around 6 times more viewership than I do on my own.
I'm getting well read, which is a joy for me, an average of 16,3k views per piece, up from 11,7k in my first month, March.
Like I've written before, any writer worth their salt is always trying to reach as many readers as possible. Anyone saying differently is either lying or is a dilettante.
Dealing with criticism:
As a writer, I come from a deep place in the 20th century where 'writers wrote and readers read'. Nowadays, lines are blurred, and a lot of readers no longer even read your work before writing about it.
Sure enough, an intelligent interaction with a knowledgeable reader can enrich your understanding of a subject - but it's oh, so rare.
The amount of vicious abuse hurled towards writers these days is nothing short of brutal and shocking. Worse, it's become normalized.
When I was mainly writing on social media, it'd be easier, since I used the 'mock and block' technique to perfection in a hilarious - but vicious - way, and many frenz and followers found my 'counterabuse' amusing to no end.
However, once you have your own blog - or worse, once you are writing on other people's blogs or news sites - you can't really do that.
So, how do you deal with that? So far, I'm choosing not to read comment sections too much, lest people who send nasty messages to writers because they have too much free time on their hands spoil my day.
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Not a long time ago, the idea that I'd be living this adventure of writing to an international audience would seem far-fetched, since before I joined Twitter, in 2017, I was in a profound personal and professional crisis, could not even get a writing gig in Rio de Janeiro, let alone imagine that I'd be writing for one of the most well read news sites in America, and that my blog, smallish as it still is, would have subscribers across 50 US states and 63 countries, in all 5 continents.
See the map, you'll understand how I feel.
Not bad for a humble guitarist from a far away shore!
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And my work is getting more international by the day.
I was just invited to take part in a group chat with admins from kickass Telegram channels from all around the world, from America and Russia to Brazil, France and Egypt - with everything in between.
It's another chance to meet new people, and try to take my work to different audiences, in far more intercultural way than I would have even dreamed possible a mere months ago.
It's a strange world, it's a terrible war - but it's also a wonderful adventure, if you know how to look at it.
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I recently did a couple of pocket shows for friends here in Rio, went out to see a couple of gigs by friends, and was reminded not only of how much I miss working with music, but also how nice it is to be out into the world and to get out of one's mind for a while.
I look back to my former self, devoting sizable amounts of time to playing the guitar and to cherchez la femme - if you know what I mean - and I do miss it.
This fucking war eats up our time and mental energy. It's worth it, of course - we must save the children. But it does come at a steep personal price for all of us. Yeats said it best:
POLITICS
by William Butler Yeats
'In our time the destiny of man presents its meanings in political terms.'
THOMAS MANN.
How can I, that girl standing there,
My attention fix
On Roman or on Russian
Or on Spanish politics,
Yet here's a travelled man that knows
What he talks about,
And there's a politician
That has both read and thought,
And maybe what they say is true
Of war and war's alarms,
But O that I were young again
And held her in my arms.
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