Who Am I to Write This Book?

I had never heard the phrase “imposter syndrome” until about ten years ago, but it captured so well how many of us feel that it is as tired now as a hotel hallway carpet.

Some lucky fools, blessed with confidence and self-importance, don’t second-guess themselves. They comprise somewhere around 10 percent of the set of People Trying to Do Difficult, New, or Daring Things. The rest of us harbor doubts.

Think of people who perform in front of crowds or appear on television – musicians, politicians, actors, athletes. How many of them wrestle with doubts while the audience sits back and enjoys the show? A lot of them, I reckon.

Then there’s those of us doing things that are less visible but also hard, things that have a creative component, or an unknown outcome. Think of doctors, pilots, plumbers, journalists, electricians, architects, beauticians, chefs – who are we to think we can do this stuff? Aren’t we all just grown-up kids? What if we take a chance and screw up?

That brings me to me. I had a crazy idea, that I could write a book about one of my favorite poets, Yosano Akiko. Never mind that I am not Japanese, that my facility with the language is lacking, never mind that Akiko wrote such complex poetry that scholars spend entire careers trying to figure her out. Never mind that I’ve never written a book before. I can do this, right?

Cue the Dragon of Doubt.

If the Dragon gets the best of me (or you, if you are trying to do something and you’re not sure you can do it), something wonderful might never be brought to life. Everybody misses out if we succumb to our fears. We must fight our Dragons with every tool in our sheds.  So, I am fighting my own Dragon with this: I am the world’s expert on myself.

In other words, I may not be an academic expert on Yosano Akiko, but on the topic of my reaction to her poems and my opinions about her life, I am the expert. I bring something new to this 100-year-old poet’s work and life story: a 21st-century American woman’s perspective. That’s what I have, it’s the picture I can paint, the story I can tell.

Thankfully, I am neither pilot nor surgeon, and no one’s life hinges on whether I succeed. I do not know all there is to know about my subject. I cannot understand subtle references to classical texts I have never read, and I am certainly missing metaphors and seasonal words.

I’d like to think that Akiko would be OK with this. She might be OK with the idea that she owned the essence of her poems only as long as they stayed inside her head. Once she let them go for others to read—like the painter or the musician or the singer showing their work to the world—they no longer fully belonged to her alone. Sometimes you start to sing a song, and someone else finishes it.

Next week, I will pack my bags and bundle myself off to Japan. It will be my first trip to Japan since the pandemic, and my first trip as Akiko’s self-appointed American whisperer. I will meet with people who know much more about Akiko and Japanese literature than I can ever hope to know. I am more than a little nervous.

But as I march myself into a room full of experts, I will take a deep breath and remind myself that I’ve got something to say. I will imagine that Akiko is standing behind me whispering, There are no imposters here, only human beings trying to understand themselves. Stand up tall.