If You Can't Write It, Don't (And Other Helpful Rules)
These are my feeling-rules for writing. All they are is a set of simple opinions, which are pinned to my cork board. Somehow, they help. Now and then, I edit them -- add things, take things out.
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These are my feeling-rules for writing. All they are is a set of simple opinions, which are pinned to my cork board. Somehow, they help. Now and then, I edit them -- add things, take things out.
I love the single-sentence story because it's so damn beautiful, the way it rolls across the page and creates a surge of rhythm; with those beats building, building, it's not hard to find pure feeling -- I suppose, if I'm frank, the form's sheer flow and undulating meter makes me express more boldly, plowing meaning, tapping mood, free-writing till I'm giddy -- most of all, I pen stories about sexuality, physical expression, yearning, touch, because this, in our culture, is so often repressed, and when we connect to it, finally and fully, it unfurls with a power that the single sentence suits -- in fact I've sometimes drafted in just one sentence simply to find the emotion in a story, before transforming it into a longer piece, which must -- in truth, needs -- shorter sentences... but honestly, stream of consciousness without full-stops (or periods in America) can forestall repression, plumb the unconscious, and let us speak more truly.
Several years ago, when I was juggling part-time teaching jobs, I found myself at a loose end over summer. In need of cash, I agreed to help out at a nursery for kids. I'd never worked with two-year-olds before, but took to it easily -- when you've sorted out fist-fights between raucous teens, you can pretty much bring the peace with folks of any age. It was the cleaning up of vomit, the setting toddlers down to rest that really made me learn! Often, I'd find myself asking, "Why am I doing this? Why not take a simpler job? Why not temp?"
Postscript: Case in point: While I was working at that nursery, I was responsible for getting the kids to sit down for lunch, and, with thirty two- to three-year-olds, this was quite a challenge. At one point, little J. was roaming around, staring through the windows, when he should have been seated. "Hey J," I said. "What you doing?" He shot me a guilty look. Then he puffed out his chest, like an adult might, and said, "Just checking the coat is clear."
Now how's that for a quirky little yarn? ;)
"But I tell you this, Henry, not another book of mine comes out before yours does! You and your work mean more to me than my life. I want the world to know you, the value of you. I swear it will. Today I loved the selflessness with which you enjoyed my successes. You are great, great, great, Henry. I will never tire of saying it."
From A Literate Passion: Letters of Anais Nin and Henry Miller 1932 - 1953
I'm currently starting a new project with some good friends of mine -- a collaborative venture -- and damn, it feels great. Know why? Because it flies in the face of divisive competition. So many of us, as artists, get low, I believe, because we lose sight of the fact that we're in this together. Taking something on as a team is competitive too, but it can also thrill and gel us. And the successes of our friends (no matter what that might mean) can make us feel sublime.
Competition can be fantastic. I enter contests all the time, and whenever I read an inspiring piece, it's a great incentive to start scribbling afresh. Writing with friends can be competitive too -- can drive you all to achieve in a stronger way. It's also good to understand the part you play as an individual. (If ever, for example, I sell a book, I'll be spreading the word like wildfire!). But there's a time for competition and a time for teamwork and it's important to discern which is which.
"There are Cinderella's two stepsisters, who cut off their own toes, and Snow White's stepmother, who danced to death in red-hot iron slippers. The Goose Girl's maid got rolled down a hill in a barrel studded with nails. Travel is hard on the single woman. There was this one woman who walked east of the sun and then west of the moon looking for her lover, who had left her because she spilled tallow on his nightshirt. She wore out at least one pair of perfectly good iron shoes before she found him. Take our word for it, he wasn't worth it. What do you think happened when she forgot to put the fabric softener in the dryer? Laundry is hard, travel is harder."
From Travels with the Snow Queen by Kelly Link (which you'll find in her gorgeously surreal collection, Stranger Things Happen)
Since the Middle Ages (and surely before) we've been obsessed with travel. Back then, a knight would journey, both day and night, through barren land and savage forest, often for the sake of some beautiful woman's honour. Even some of the earliest existing stories include the journey motif. For the Anglo-Saxon poet who first coined The Wanderer, life itself was journey -- we traveled on the ocean of this transient life to get to the Divine. And of course, we've now the road trip, the plane trip and the safari, though bizarrely enough, the themes haven't changed so much. We still believe movement of the body can mirror, or even encourage, that of the mind.
One thing I love about using the journey motif in stories is that the very act of writing is a journey itself. This is a most fitting metaphor for me because I tend to plan after I've written my first draft. Zany? A tadge, but I know I'm not the only one! The story tumbles out, then I go back through and sew it carefully together. This means, initially, the whole piece unfolds without a plan -- a bit like a treck through the wilds with no map.
I won't be blogging here for a couple of weeks, but hope you're all doing well. See you soon.
Click here to read Carol Ann Duffy's first poem as British Laureate. Now that's steel, baby.
Last night, at Brookline Booksmith, I had the honour of talking about and reading my work alongside Stace Budzko, Steve Almond and Rusty Barnes, with introductions by Tara Masih and Abigail Beckel of "Rose Metal Press". To start out, I read Stace's wonderful exercise prompt aloud. (Here it is, quoted from The Rose Metal Press Field Guide to Writing Flash Fiction):
"In order to fully understand and appreciate characters in conflict, sometimes we have to push REWIND. Write a story that begins at the end of the action and moves backward. What was the flashpoint that initiated the event? What insights or observations did the characters initially have? How might their lives have changed if they went in another direction? One thousand words or less."
I find it hard to write on the train. I can get ideas, can plan, can mull - but if I put pen to paper, it rarely works. The balcony's tricky too, as is downstairs in the local library where everybody chatters. And yet, on a trip to Chicago, I sat with my friend in the most crowded bar, and in spite of the noise and music, a story flowed out.
In a recent essay, Robert Olen Butler writes about creating the short-short story. He says:
I'll be reading along with Tara Masih, Stace Budzko (who read at the first Art2Art), Steve Almond and Rusty Barnes (editor of Night Train), at Brookline Booksmith on June 11th. The event is promoting the wonderful Rose Metal Press Field Guide to Writing Flash Fiction, edited by Tara Masih. We'll each be talking about different ways of approaching flash fiction. Kick off is at 7pm. Hope to see you there!
And in addition to the post below, here's a quick little plug (which is another plus-point of keeping a blog!):
Thinking, "Woah, I've been blogging for ages," I tried to make this blog into a book. It was an idle kind of project -- to see if it could be done. What would go first? I asked myself. How would the "essays" be grouped? Did the pieces need extending? Who was my target audience? "To make your blog into a book," the experts say, "you need to have a massive following." But I don't want a "massive following". I just want you... else I'll stop confiding. And why should a blog not be small? A kid with big boots.