Write Your Own A+ Story

My daughter’s professor explained that the expectation for a “A” essay was to enlighten her with an analysis she hadn’t seen before. At first glance, it seems like a sound criteria for a high-level university essay. Except it’s not. It makes the criteria relative. A student’s mark is dependent on whether the prof has or hasn’t seen that analysis before, not how good the analysis is. A prof who has been teaching for 30 years and has “seen it all” will no doubt marker harder than a prof who has just begun.
It’s an easy “mistake” to make when we judge writing (in this case, academic essays). If we’re surprised by the unexpected, we often think it’s good. But it’s also limiting. A writer can still write well if they craft a conventional story with conventional characters.
Which is why, if you’re not getting traction in the publishing world for your story, it may have nothing to do with quality. It may have everything to do with the publishing industry (agents, editors, publishers) who have “seen it all”—so they’re looking for what they haven’t seen, not necessarily what readers have or haven’t seen.
This possibility is heartening to me. I can’t possibly write the best story for everybody, but I can write the best story for the one reader I most want to please: myself. I’ll aim for my own A+.