Tag: #books

  • Rewriting is a Skill

    I fully believe that rewriting is a skill. A skill that I do not possess.

    I am trying to make a better effort this time around at rewriting. Really putting my mind to it. Making notes on the first draft, formulating an outline, crafting the words to build the story. And I just about hate all of it.

    As I get older, I begin to see patterns in my life. One pattern I see is my attraction to acts of immediacy in the arts. I love Jack Kerouac, Jackson Pollock, and Jazz. The theatre I have been the most successful at has been puppetry, which has been like pick up the puppet and go perform.

    It has been an artistic life and philosophy of, “First thought, best thought.”

    Yet, when it comes to my writing, my first thought is not the best thought. I have to work at a best thought.

    I remember a theatre professor back in college who told us that we had to learn to appreciate all the steps in the process of being an actor. Not love all the steps, just appreciate. You can’t be an actor if you hate auditioning, as the hatred of that step will come through when you try to get a job. But if you respect that step, then you will hone the needed skills that will help you audition, which helps you get to the next step.

    That’s where I feel like I am coming to. I don’t like rewriting, but I have first drafts that need reworking, and this is the next step in the process.

  • Ghost of Kilgore Trout

    If you know who Kilgore Trout is, then you are someone who has read Vonnegut. If you have read Vonnegut, then you most likely love him, because he’s the type of writer you either love or hate; not many in the middle.

    I always felt that Kilgore was created as a character to reflect how Vonnegut felt about himself as a writer, and the fear most writers have. Thus by creating this embodiment, the fear becomes knowable, and therefore manageable.

    If you don’t remember, the Kilgore Trout character was a great writer who could only get published in the worst magazines published. This lack of publication status causes Trout to doubt his abilities as a writer, and lose his grip on reality.

    I think Vonnegut touches on a very interesting modern anxiety; achieving your dream, but you still don’t get the validation you seek.

    I think about Kilgore Trout often.

  • Cowardly Writer

    A friend of mine, who I haven’t spoken to in over a year was awarded a grant so she could continue on her novel without having to look for a job at the end of the world. She is super talented, completely deserves it, and I’m very happy for her. The thing that piqued my interest was that my friend gave thanks to another author, who had informed her of the grant, when they had first meet at a writing symposium.

    As in all things it’s who you know.

    I know I have to have material in the first place; finish the novel, finish the story collection

    But, I think I know people. But I can’t bring myself to ask for advice or help.

    This is cowardly, but I think I’m afraid of my friends hating my work. I know I’m not in a place to share, but I can’t stay this way forever, as in my work will never see the light of day. I will never grow if I don’t open myself up.

    The journey is getting a little uncomfortable now…

  • Well-Read and Books on the Shelf

    Okay, one last thought that I had about the FaceBook argument. That guy kept asking me what conservative media I read, and I knew full well that it was a set-up question. No matter how many sources I named, he would say he read more, and hence was an expert, and thus my opinion was uninformed and invalid. I knew better than to play that game, but it did make me think about at what point does a person cross the threshold and become “well read?”

    There is the Malcom Gladwell rule/guideline of 10,000 hours of practice to become an expert. Does that apply to reading? Not reading up on a subject, because if you spent 10,000 reading about plumbing, you might not be an expert, but you would, or at least should, be very knowledgeable on the subject. But if you spent 10,000 hours reading, anything and everything, does that makes you an expert at reading?

    I don’t know where I was going with that…

    Being well read.

    Anyway…

    With all of the news interviews in people’s homes, the performance space in demand clearly has been a wall of books in an office setting. That is the “classic” sign of a well-read person. Some offices are a little too conspicuously clean and well organized, like the books are never touched. The offices I have enjoyed looking at are the ones where the books and papers are sort of stacked all over the place. Those are usually the offices of research doctors, and I want to believe that they just threw their books on the shelf when they are done reading it.

    I can admit that, since moving back from California, I only have about half of my books in the apartment, with the other half still in storage. We have one wall in the apartment that all the housed books live on. They are in no order, and just got thrown up there. It’s not author ordered, or even in some sort style of size of book color. We just them up there with the plan of coming back and put some order to it. That was seven months ago.

  • The Unexamined Life Sucks…

    Which I think is a more accurate translation from ancient Greek.

    I watched a documentary on Freud last night, and it didn’t help me sleep. What struck me in this program was that it claimed that in moments when Freud was stuck and frustrated by his own theories, he would apply them to his own life to see if they stood up to objective scrutiny. Depending on how you feel about Freud, you may feel that he succeeded or failed.

    It reminded me of Socrates’ quote, “The unexamined life is not worth living.” I know that he said it, or supposedly did, at his trial, choosing death rather than exile. Now, my interpretation is that the ancient world was about examining the external, and the modern world is about examining the internal.

    I remember wanting to write books from a very early age. I remember wanting to have as many books around me as possible. I can even remember memorizing the books my parents read to me, so I could act like I was “reading” them. (My daughter has started to exhibit the same behavior now.) I remember “scribbling” with wavy lines on paper, like I was handwriting a story. When I did learn how to write, this might have been when I was 9 or 10, I asked for and received a child’s typewriter for Christmas. I also remember wanting to tell stories; make them up, read them, perform them, etc.…

    But where did this come from?

    I understand the nature/nurture dynamic, but it can’t be all nature, can it? Being given books by my parents clearly had an impact, but is that it? Did books give me a feeling of power? Were books my “friend” when my older brothers left me alone to do older brother things? Was it playing by myself in those situations where I was forced to use my imagination to create my own stories as I did not have the interaction with another child? Or is it just something that is in me that was inevitable?

    I’m not sure if there is a clear answer here, or even a need for an answer, as in, what does that answer really “give” me? I am who I am, and I don’t regret it.

    But…

    As I mentioned above, my daughter has exhibited one of these behaviors. Is that coming from me, genetically, or from the example I set?