Gail Anderson-Dargatz is a formerly local writer. She graduated from the high school where I teach, and until last summer, she lived over the hill and wrote about our region. At the moment she’s living all the way across the country on an island in Lake Huron. Gail also teaches at UBC in the Creative Writing Masters program. In addition, she has a blog. On her blog she has a guest author visit from Vincent Lam, and(here is the point of this post at last!) Vincent Lam has a fun post about editing. Enjoy!
be bad May 19, 2012
A colleague of mine was telling me yesterday that she wants to write. She is terribly impressed that I have written these books. She would like to write a play.
But…
But she hasn’t.
Why?
Because she gets in the way. She doesn’t know which direction to take a scene in, so she takes it neither direction. She doesn’t know how many characters to use, so she has none. She has so many things, that she has nothing.
I told her that she should give herself permission to write a crappy play. If she can free herself from the idea that what she has written must be good, she can actually write SOMETHING. Once there is something on the page, you can edit it into something better. If there is nothing on the page, well, there’s nothing!
I read that Diana Gabaldon wrote Outlander as a practice novel. She thought she’d try writing a novel, and since no one was ever going to see it, she could do whatever crazy thing struck her fancy. She gave herself permission to have fun with the experience, and she did.
When you give yourself permission to be bad, you give yourself permission to take risks. Let the voices in your head go nuts. Catch what they say. Don’t think about it. Don’t worry if it’s ‘right’ or if it’s ‘good.’
Just let it BE.
Try writing the same thing from different characters’ perspectives. Try different narrative styles. You need to put the time in and explore the process. You will find something interesting, but you won’t if you don’t let it happen.
Give yourself 15 minutes. Tell the inner critic to leave you alone, and just write. Don’t stop yourself from achieving your dreams. Don’t be your own enemy.
Write it.
editing May 16, 2012
I mentioned the other day that I enjoy the editing process. Apparently I am not alone!
On his blog David Antropus recently wrote, “editing is an integral part of the creative process and isn’t really qualitatively different from writing. What we tend to call “writing” is in fact “initial drafting” and what we often think of as “editing” is just a deeper form of “writing”. Every bit as creative, and potentially just as satisfying. At its best, it’s the layers of paint over the pencil sketch.”
He goes on to demonstrate, showing the process. Check out the indiesunlimited piece by clicking here. He has some valuable links in the comment section. Read through it all. Great stuff!
waiting April 13, 2012
“Patience is virtue.”
“Time mends all things.”
Yes, yes.
But John Dryden warned in 1680,
“Beware the fury of a patient man.”
Because even the stretchiest elastic
will break when stretched too far.
Still
St. Augustine advised,
“Patience is the companion of wisdom. ”
So, I am fighting
to be wise.
write on the page
“We will open the book. Its pages are blank. We are going to put words on them ourselves. The book is called Opportunity and its first chapter is New Year’s Day.”
Edith Pierce
Our life is a story. Some are romances, some are adventure stories, some are didactic, some are political thrillers, some are fantasies… What’s yours?
Myths about writing April 12, 2012
LOL. My first book hasn’t even been out a year and I have run into many of these comments.
Worth a read!
Arg! April 11, 2012
Your priorities are
not my priorities.
Your time is
not my time.
Your hopes are
not my hopes.
Your deadlines
are not my deadlines.
But all
of mine,
depend
on yours.
on the muse… April 10, 2012
When the muse is dancing,
one plays her a tune.
Just thinking about inspiration. I try to keep my teaching work at school. I treat the job as ‘9 to 5’ and mark and prep after school. I try to never bring any marking home with me, mostly, I confess, because there are so many other distractions at home that I’d never look at it.
Writing, however, is a different thing. I’ll have ideas simmering on the back burner most of the time, but when I sit down and the words are coming, sometimes it is impossible to shut them off. I might be stuck, writing frantically for hours. If I don’t, then the words will still be pouring out, while I’m lying in bed. There is no sleeping at such times.
So my metaphor is explained. When the muse is dancing, one must play her the tune, because she will keep dancing one way or another. If you don’t capture her inspiration, it will carry on without you.
Story cube #1- bed to bridge April 9, 2012
While on a flight to England recently, I discovered Rory’s Story Cubes in the Duty Free catalogue. The 9 cubes, embossed with images on all six sides, originate in Northern Ireland. The company suggests that we think in images, and thus stories are opened up to us by rolling the cubes. Intrigued with the idea of using such tools in my class room or to aid with incidents of writer’s block, I purchased a set. There are a number of ways to use the cubes, for solo or cooperative story telling, for inspiration or for competive story games. I can see using them in creative writing classes, and also in drama class. I am just beginning to play with them, but here’s an effort at a flash fiction (470 words) based on the following cube roll:
<!–[endif]–>
Story cube #1
Once upon a time…
It was a dream. I knew it, but it didn’t make it less real, or less terrifying. Whether or not I was, in fact, safe in my bed, the panic still engulfed me and I fought for wakefulness without success. I was trapped there, inside my dream. Aware, but helpless.
There were footsteps echoing around me. At first, it was just one person’s heavy tread, and I struggled to open a window that appeared as I wished to investigate, but then the treads changed and they echoed all around me, as if an unseen army was tromping through my bedroom.
I quivered in fear, coming to a terrifying awareness that whether or not I dreaming, I was not at all asleep. I was fully awake, and the noise was real. I was in danger.
In William Golding’s Lord of the Flies, a parachutist descends to the island to send a message from the grown ups. The message is lost, and the hope that his arrival may have brought becomes brutish superstition instead. That’s how I felt as the boot steps echoed, and a supersticious dread of zombie armies, heck, real armies, filled me.
Hope knocked on the door at that moment. “Hey! Anyone in there?”
“Yes!” I bellowed. “I’m here! Can you get me out?”
There was a fussing about with the lock and then a muttered curse.
“What happened?”
“I cut my hand trying to jimmy the lock. I’m bleeding all over the place here.”
I waited, with growing impatience at the noises emitted from the lock set, until there was a click, and an outburst of satisfaction from the other side of the door.
I grabbed the knob and the door fell open, revealing the stone walls beyond and an amazing apparition.
I stared.
She stared.
“Who are you?” I finally asked, recovering a bit from the dazzle of light beaming off her glowing form.
“I am, um,” she shook her head a moment before changing her mind. “No. Who are you?”
“I’m a prisoner. I’ve been locked in this room inside this pyramid for… well. I don’t know how long. Who are you? How did you get in?”
“I live here. I mean, I live in a house near here. I heard a noise. I came to investigate.”
Investigate?
“You’re not in a pyramid,” she added thoughtfully. “You’re in my head.”
“I can’t be.”
She nodded sagely. “Of course you can be. You are.”
“Can you get me out? Out of the pyramid, I mean.”
“I told you, you’re in my head.”
“Yes, yes. But if you think me out of the pyramid, perhaps I won’t feel like I’m in one?”
“Oh. That’s an idea. Are you expecting to get out of my head, as well?”
I shrugged. “Let’s cross that bridge when we come to it. In the meantime…?”
<!–[endif]–>
O plans a day travelling through the dawn April 6, 2012
I waved franticially as the glowing horses approached, “Eos! Slow down!”
“I don’t have time for you, O!” she called back, raising the reins and snapping them.
“Just make some room on the chariot. Come on.”
“You’ll add stress to the horses.”
I raised my eyebrows and she glanced away with a dramatic sigh. “Fine. Get on.” She shuffled over a bit.
I leapt up and squeezed beside her. The chariot was only made for one. We were uncomfortably close.
“What is it?” Her breath was soft, with a faint tinge of coriander.
“I was wondering…”
“I’m not slowing down for you,” she broke in.
“I didn’t ask you to!”
She sighed. “It’s the only thing anyone ever asks me. I’m not stupid. You want me to slow down a day:”
“That’s not what I want.” I met her eyes, bouncing slightly with the movement of the horses. “I thought I could help you out. I wondered if you needed a break.”
“A break?” She studied me suspiciously. “What do you mean ‘a break’?”
“A break. A day off. A chance to get off the back of this chariot to do something you want to do.”
Her eyes grew large. “Seriously?”
I nodded. “You work so hard. You deserve a break.”
“When?”
“When would you like to get away?”
“Tomorrow?” she whispered wistfully.
“Sure. I’ll take the day off school. I’ll meet you at five?”
“Perfect.” She sighed happily, her golden eyes twinkling. This will be fantastic. Is there anything I can do for you while I’m off?”
I tried to look guileless. “Oh. Um. Well, if you have a chance, would you pop in to see Morpheus?
“Oh sure! I never get to spend any time with him. That’d be great. Do you have a message for him?””
Shawn L. Bird 