January 22nd, 2012

Unlikable Characters

I’ve been working on a fairly grim new story. A few of my early readers, while they said good things about the story as a whole, were unhappy with the choices the characters made and, while they felt the choices and their results were honest and believeable, wished for better behaviour the fictional folk within the story.

No one has suggested I change these things necessarily, but they have wondered about how easy it’ll be to sell, pointing out that many people don’t like to read about unlikable characters.

It was a revelatory moment for me. People don’t like to read about characters they don’t like? Well, really? Yes, really–what sells a lot is, I suppose, more slanted towards the hero/villain market than the protagonist/antagonist one. Of course there’s always Macbeth, Wuthering Heights, anything by Martin Amis…but really, most of the time, yeah, likeable is what people like. I know this is true.

Huh.

But the other stuff, those other people with their bad behaviour, moral standards at variance to mine, bad spelling and poor table manners–fascinating! People I don’t like–I usually need to avoid sitting next to them on the bus lest they start making fun of my hair or expounding upon libertarianism. But in fiction, I can run through a logic that, while not mine, is *like* mine, and end up at fantastically different place. I am interested in thinking, reasoning, not particularly stupid people (stupid is too easy; it’s a one-word answer) that do things that I think are bad. To just say they are bad, and dismiss them with that other one-word answer, is to say it’s not worth trying to understand hate, or violence, or viciousness, or whatever.

Which is why I’m not interested in amorality–if you don’t know the difference between right and wrong, how can your choice to do wrong be an interesting one? There is a small but thriving genre of serial-killer thrillers written in part or entirely from the point of view of the killer, as he or she relishes the killing and never ever analyzes her choices. I read a few too many of these as part of a job I had, and consider them tantamount to snuff pornography; I certainly didn’t learn anything.

I am interested in immorality–people who do things I consider wrong because of an alternative version of morality or a view of extenuating circumstances or some other thing going on in their heads that makes the issue less than black and white. My objection to treating characters as villains in fiction is that limits the conversation to how others see these folks; we never see them as they see themselves. Because no one is ever not the hero of their own story, no matter how villainous they may seem from the outside. And I truly think no one thinks, or not for very long, “I am a bad person and what I am doing now has no moral justification.” I am interested in the justifications we all find for the compromises we make.

Which is why I am eager to read and write about people who behave in ways I find abhorrent, who forgive themselves for all of it, and never see the error of their ways–I want to know why, and how. Not all the time, of course–sometimes all I want is to read about is a sweet young book editor who can’t find some of her tax forms and eats too much chocolate, but at the end of the day is kind to her cat and her fiance and is rewarded for her efforts with a really nice new printer. I really hope someone is writing that book.

But other times, when I am feeling strong, I am looking for books that ask me to stretch beyond myself and my own petty concerns, and discover something I didn’t already know about the human condition, even if the new knowledge is uncomofortable or even unpleasant. I’m not saying my work does that…but I want it to. Isn’t that what fiction is for?

September 29th, 2011

My theory

Monday afternoon, I went with the lovely Laura Boudreau to visit our shared alma mater, the University of Toronto’s Masters in English in the Field of Creative Writing program. Hosted by the always amazing Rosemary Sullivan, we got to read to the class, and then answer questions and chat about “the writing life.”

I love doing this sort of thing, but I should probably not over-indulge. When people ask me what I think and then I tell them while they silently write it down, it gives me inappropriate delusions that I am correct, and possibly a genius, when I’m just…talking.

Anyway, the class yesterday gave me a chance to expostulate on one of my theories about writing, and since no one contradicted me I am more convinced than ever that I am correct. But…perhaps not. What do you think? Here’s my theory…

Someone had asked if Laura and I wrote outlines before we began work on actually writing stories, and if we thought it would be a problem to just start writing and see where the story took you. I said that I never outline and probably can’t outline–I just go with some characters in my head, and a vague idea of what they might do. Usually they don’t do that thing at all, but 12 other small things, 7 of which I cut in later drafts.

But I think it’s ok. I think that there are two gifts that a writer could potentially have in her brain, and most people get mainly one, with perhaps a splash of the other thrown in. The first potential gift would be the ability to outline, to sketch and map and plan until all that remains is to write it! You hear people say that sort of thing, “It’s all in my head, I just have to write it down,” and largely they are crazy, but some people who have it “all” not in their heads but on notecards taped in an ascending line on the wall, might actually mean it.

But if you don’t get the outlining gift, then you are me and you get a different one–the revising gift! I am excellent at looking at the lumpy, twisty, incoherent mess that is almost all my first drafts and pulling something ressembling a story out of it. And I am excellent at reworking that second draft again (and again) until it even ressembles–sorta–a good short story. And then I ask other people what they think, and use their feedback to write yet another draft. And then maybe I stop…and maybe not.

No matter how long the process takes, I rarely lose patience with revisions–I figure they’re the price I have to pay for not outlining. And I hate outlining, because it’s more interesting to me to write the story not knowing how it turns out, and also because I am bad at it (I hate soccor for that reason, too). I figure outliners hate revising–they like writing the story complete and having it come out pretty close to done. I don’t think anyone writes a perfect first draft, but I do know folks who can get pretty close, and then just go back and “tidy up” in revisions. Whereas I wholesale deconstruct and rebuild.

If you can’t write an outline and you hate revising, you’re probably either a genius who just bang out a good story with no fore- or afterthoughts, or–more likely–someone who is not cut out for the writing life. I really think you have to be one or the other to write anything: an essay, journalism, academic writing, whatever.

But I could be wrong. Especially since I’ve never written a novel, or anything super-long. Maybe when something is 200+ pages, you *have* to outline. What do you think??

August 12th, 2011

Myths of the Full-Time Writer

When I was in high-school, I read Banana Yoshimoto’s Kitchen (a great book, by the way). In the acknowledgements, she thanks her boss who let her write when she was supposed to be waiting tables. A light went on in my tiny teenaged brain–“Ah, that’s how you do it!”

That is not, as it turns out, how you do it. Most employers expect you to do the work you’re hired to do, and most writers, at least the ones I know, do something besides writing. Many of us simply have a full-time job and write evenings, weekends, and the occasional vacation. But even famous folks teach classes, edit journals and books, raise kids, and write for magazines–I can’t think of more than a handful of people in Canada who simply never do anything else than their own creative work.

*However*, there’s never and then there’s sometimes–many of us, if we are wily or lucky or both, can wrangle a period of time just for writing. I, for example, got to take a few months to focus on my new book, courtesy of the Canada Council, and I am most grateful.

However however, when you are slogging away in the salt mines, dreaming of perfect days spent with your perfect book, you might not accurately perceive how your life as a full-time writer might be. I didn’t, and since sometimes other people are like me, I thought I’d share my learnings with you, in hopes that your future transitions to full-time writing life, temporary or permanent, might be smoother than mine.

Myth #1: If I want to write full-time, I need to quit my job. This is totally true for some people, but not for everyone. It can’t hurt to ask for time off, if in fact you don’t *want* to quit. I like the people I work for and with, and most days enjoy my job pretty well, so I was eager to arrange my leave so I could come back at the end. On the other hand, if you hate your work, dread your colleagues, and dream of leaping into a fiery pit every morning as you board the bus, maybe you should consider quitting and using your post-writing hours to find a new job.

If, like me, you want to stay, think about the logistics. I was startled by how flexible and supportive my managers were about my leave, but they were also being logical–I wasn’t leaving work behind that would languish or be dumped on a colleague, and there was an easy way to suspend my pay. I knew colleagues had taken somewhat similar leaves and how it had worked for them, which is an important thing to know.

I think there are some companies that just have a “no leaves except for health” policy, and that’s pretty much that. If that’s the case for you, or you just don’t feel comfortable asking, another suggestion might be to try to scale back your hours and work part-time. I’ve done this in the past and it is *very* nice to have a day or two a week to work on nothing but writing. Just a thought!

Myth #2: The only thing holding me back from writing more is time. When I’m able, I will write all day every day. Who knows, this might be true for you–it wasn’t for me! I got a lot of writing done, yes–much more than if I’d had to jam it all into evenings and weekends. But I had a really hard time putting in uninterrupted days–at the very least, I had to go to the gym and run a few errands, and often I’d try to see another human being or something too (more on this below).

I got a lot of advice on how to be productive in unstructured time, most of which didn’t work for me but I’ll pass it on to you in case you can use it:
–write first thing in the morning, before doing anything else
–set a word-count goal and don’t stop writing until you reach it
–make a schedule and follow it every day, until it gets to be routine
–unplug the phone; don’t answer your email
–write in the morning, read in the afternoon (or vice versa)

Basically, I wound up doing whatever worked for the day–and mainly it worked pretty well. Some days wound up being wasted wreckages of clean floors and telemarketers, but I think that’s normal. Normal for me, anyway.

Myth #3: Writers are lone wolves, fuelled and solaced by their own imaginative creations. Again, maybe this applies to you. Actually, I’m one of the very few writers I know who self-identifies as an extrovert. That doesn’t mean that I’m not incredibly socially awkward, nor that I’m not often paralyzed by shyness–just that talking to other people, even just briefly, even about shallow or boring things, makes me happier than not doing so. And if I can actually have an interesting conversation with someone I like, home-run. One of my favourite things about my job is my varied and fascinating colleagues; I missed them and their daily chitter-chat intensely.

I would’ve been even worse off had I lived alone during this period; in fact, I probably wouldn’t have tried a leave when I did. As it was, I was octupus-like when my co-habitant returned home: clingy, intense, eager for mindless news of the outside world (ok, I don’t know if octopii enjoy mindless news). However, I did know about this extremely social side of my personality and took steps to bolster it accordingly–I made a lot of lunch plans with friends, used Air Miles to get gift-certificates to cafes and restaurants with Wi-Fi so I’d be able to work elsewhere than on the homefront, called my parents very often (they’re retired; it’s perfect!)

One of the best things I did on my leave was return to the habit of writing in the company of Kerry Clare. We used to do this after work in a cafe, but the birth of her daughter, Harriet, ended that. But this new version was even better, as we wrote during Harriet’s naptime and then, as a reward for all that work, we got to play when she woke up. Hanging around with a fellow writer gave me some good support, a spur to get to work, a source of baked goods and gossip in (somewhat) judicious amounts, and a place to go on Wednesday afternoons. If you, like me, like a little interaction with your literary efforts, I highly recommend a writing buddy. Though I doubt you’ll find one as great as Kerry, nor with as cute a toddler on hand.

Myth #4: A leave will build up some excellent writing momentum to carry me forward once I’ve returned to work and a more cramped writing lifestyle. I don’t know if many people even think about this, let alone believe it, but I did, and for me it totally wasn’t true. After so much time to do exactly what I wanted, even if I didn’t know exactly what I wanted to do nor even want to make my own decisions much of the time, it has been very very challenging, not to mention exhausting, to return to a more structured existence. I am still not really back on my part-time writing horse yet–if anyone wants to write a post on that, I’d be most interested.

May 10th, 2011

Spare prose

I spent a lot of time writing and then editing this passage, only to realize I can’t really use it in the story. It’s sort of inane, but I still like it, though, so am posting here in case you might enjoy:

*
Gretta rarely went to women’s homes. The library gave her 6 to 8 hours a day with her all-female colleagues, so she didn’t need to follow them home to have all the conversations needed to about books and movies and what one might do with leftover hard-boiled eggs. She was always so studiously avoiding speaking of anything personal that she certainly would never have occurred to her to ajourn the conversation to a more private location. But she went to Danja’s house, in a pleasantly crowded part of town by the highway.
The houses were tall and tippy-looking like houses in cartoons, and the apartment buildings were all low-rises. Danja’s apartment was just like Gretta’s, except three girls lived there, and two of them had cats. When Gretta sat down on the futon, a cat jumped up and began to sneeze. It was a white, long-haired cat, and when it sneezed it shook itself and bits of fur flew off, giving the impression that thing was allergic to itself.
Danja said, “Don’t mind Haruki, he’s just trying to make you feel uncomfortable.” She handed them Gretta a glass of something red, and put a bowl of chips down on the coffee table. “It’s Kool-aid, isn’t that funny? I hadn’t had Kool-Aid since I was a kid, and then I saw it in the Metro and I thought, ‘Why not? It’s only pennies a glass, after all.’ Isn’t it good? I mean, I sort of bought it ironically, but it does actually taste good.”
“It tastes like sugar,” said Gretta. “Red sugar.”
Gretta took a single chip. The dust on it was brownish red. She put it on her tongue and tasted salt, smoke, something vaguely meaty. “What flavour chip?”
Danja went back into the kitchen and picked up a crumpled silver bag. “Chicken wing.” She seemed to flush. “Uh-oh, you aren’t veggie, are you? My roommate must’ve got these.”
Gretta put another chip in her mouth without thinking, but wasn’t sorry. They really did taste fine. “Do you have a boyfriend?”
“Not really. Not…as such.” Danja put a handful of chips in her mouth and chewed quickly, then more slowly. “Wow, these really do taste like chicken. How do they do that?”
Gretta shrugged.
“I was seeing this guy from the theatre program? …it was sort of weird? He had this thing with this ex that never really got sorted? And then he just he was doing this internship in France and…well, mainly stopped calling and emailing and stuff.”
Danja’s upspeak made Gretta nervous. Danja was always quite happy to admit that she had jammed the router, that she’d lost the address to the gallery they were going to, that her current series of photographs was sort of crappy. “I’m sorry.”
“Well, no, long-distance is always sort of fucked, I guess. You never know if you’re fighting or if your emails are getting sent to his spam folder or what.”
“I guess…I guess all relationships are hard,” said Gretta, not sure whether she was lying because all her relationships had been easy, or telling the truth because she had never had a relationship.
“Tell me about it. Forrest has this ex, Gabrielle? Oh, she was a giant bitch. Always coming to class crying. Our classes. She wasn’t in school. But she’d know where Forrest’s classes were and come knock on the door. The prof would stop the seminar and open it, and she’d be there bawling her eyes out.”
“That’s terrible.”
“Poor Forrest. The new girl, she’s all right.”
Gretta said quietly, “New girl?”
“Oh, I forget her name.” Danja had gone back to the chips, enthusiastically. With her mouth full, she added, “He met her online, one of them dating sites.”
Gretta was silent for a moment, thinking about the lunchroom at the library, the smell of reheated chili and perfume, the chatter about husbands and garbage day and recipes. Then she took a sip of her Kool-aid and reached to get one of the chicken chips before they were all gone.

May 2nd, 2011

To Make My Own Days

I haven’t posted in a week for the opposite of my usual reason for delayed postings. Instead of too busy, I’ve been overwhelmed with free time, and utterly unable to organize myself to get much done. This is, at least, a new problem.

What it is is: I’ve taken a leave of absence from my job so I can write. I am extremely grateful for the time, both for the support and flexibility of my bosses, and to the generosity and faith of the Canada Council. Believe me, I am not complaining about anything, just a little afraid. Generosity, support, and faith–it’s a lot to live up to.

I don’t know if I made up this expression on my own, but whenever people are self-employed, I always say they “make their own days”–decide on the schedule, and then decide whether to follow it. And I’m slightly in awe of people who can do that. Even during my brief embrace of academia, which is supposed to be largely self-structured and freeing, I marched myself to campus every day and remained for hours, working in the library and common rooms so I could pretend someone else was making the rules.

Allegedly creative people aren’t supposed to admit this but: I love it when other people make the rules. I’m not great at making my own. Also in graduate school, I never had less than 2 jobs, often 3. Part of that was my very natural fear of starving to death, but the other thing was I like having to be certain places at certain times. Then, whenever there is a time when I don’t have to be anywhere, I know that time is for writing. When I *never* have to be anywhere, I’m never sure what time is for writing and what time is for putting up hooks and what part is for running errands and… Which pretty much explains my morning, in a nutshell.

There is also a part of me that believes that grown-up, responsible people get up early, work from 9 to 5, eat dinner, and then squash the rest of their lives into the time that comes after that and before sleep. Although, come to think of it, that never once happened in the house I grew up in.

I possibly picked up this theory during a rather devastating bout of unemployment after university, wherein I applied for 146 jobs before getting one. I think at that point I pretty much decided that if I could just find some people who would let me sit in their office all day and do something useful for them in exchange for enough money to live, I would never be unhappy again. And it worked out well enough; I’ve been basically very lucky in my employers, and I know I’m actually quite well suited to the 9 to 5 lifestyle; better than a lot of people I know, anyway.

But the thing about a good job, one you care about and want to do well, is that it does crowd out other things. It might refuse to stay in the 9 to 5 slot, and even if the actually work ends at 5, the more you care, the more you might have trouble turning your brain to other matters. And the thing about writing on a very flexible schedule is that you can always do it later. Later later later, there’s an infinite amount of it.

So to dedicate myself to writing *now*–that’s new to me. And in the 2.5 days since I’ve started, I have written a good chunk of pages, but I’ve also passed a lot of time fretting, working out, eating, staring out the window, looking at Facebook, and trying to reconfigure my internet connection. And wondering when the mail will come. And phoning my parents.

I guess what I’m saying is that I’m scared of wasting this wonderful opportunity, but I’m going to try my best. I’m not going to be too hard on myself if I can’t write all day every day–I’m already pretty sure that I can’t. But I’m trying to do all I can, without going insane, and if anyone who makes his or her own days has any tips on keeping to it, I would surely like to hear them.

March 23rd, 2011

What is a short story?

In honour of The Year of the Short Story, I’ve been wanting to do a short-story post. I decided to do a “What is?” post because I’ve read a few things lately that challenged, for good or ill, my personal definition of the story. And that reminded me that this definition *is* very personal, so I bet if I make this list, lots of people will be able to add to it, or debate various points, or tell me I’m wrong entirely. And the best way to celebrate the short story, I think, is to engage with the form: debate it, read it, write it, and think about it. So let’s do that:

Short stories have character(s) and events. Let’s get the really controversial stuff out of the way first: in my mind, short stories have one or more characters doing things, or having things done to them, or reacting to events, in a particular time and place. I’m ok with characters that aren’t human: dogs, aliens, faerie princesses, even a well-written tree character might exist somewhere. And the events can be minor–in Jincey Willet’s “Justine Laughs at Death,” the very dramatic story is actually a couple conversations on the phone. Much is *said*, and threatened, but there are few actual events. Still a really powerful story though. I think many writers are stronger at either character (Katherine Mansfield, anyone?) or event (Guy de Maupassant?) and just kind of take a swipe at the other side, which is fine if you can pull it off. But even if the story is mainly the creation and explanation of these wonderful characters, they need to do things sometime. And even if the wild logic of events *seems* to stand on their own, there still have to be people living them out. I really think there has to be a throughline of personality, and an internal logic to events to make a story. I know, craziness–have at me.

Short stories are short in word-count, and use their shortness for concentration of meaning. There is no exact word-count that defines a short story for me–I’ve seen some great ones that were more than 10 000 words, over forty pages. I can’t put a cut-off on the actual length, yet there comes a certain point where the scope changes the tone, and it just doesn’t feel story-ish anymore. Slowly evolving characters with lots of back-story, a build to a fore-shadowed climax of action, and then a reflection period after that–I guess you could do anything in a short story, but those things to me seem inherently novel-ish.

I just finished reading Truman Capote’s Breakfast at Tiffany’s (for the first time; am behind) and though it is usually termed a novella, and 117 pages I think that’s proper, I’ve also seen it deemed a short story. I think there might be a 117-page short story out there, but Breakfast at Tiffany’s is not it. Capote uses the pages for things that, in my definition, novelists do: framing of the story in future and past (Joe Bell’s story about Africa), situating the characters in lives outside the story (the arrival of Doc, which doesn’t influence the action one way or another, just teaches us a bit about Holly), and neat set pieces that sort of flesh out the characters but are mainly just neat set pieces. Don’t get me wrong, as a novella I think it’s brilliant–but the length gives it a very different flavour from a short story.

For a true short story, the length appears not a constraint or a limit, just the amount of words it takes to show what needs to be shown. As I said above, short stories are not constrained by length; they are exactly as long as they need to be to give the reader the joys, sorrows, laughs, or whatever the author wants to give in that space. But they are shaped like stories, whatever their lengths. I’ve read a few stories recently that read like the first chapter of a novel, or maybe the fifth chapter of a novel (I’m in the midst of judging a story contest at the moment, so I have a wide variety of these on-hand). The first-chapter ones, you get a lot of background and insight into the characters and their problems, and they’re sort of mulling over what to do about them; then it’s over. In the fifth-chapter stories, there’s tonnes of action, drama, intensity, but you don’t know anything about the characters or what all these events mean to them, or where anything is headed.

Both these issues used to come up a lot when I was teaching high-school students to write stories (teaching is perhaps too strong a word; try encouraging). When I urged them to give the reader a more complete, consolidated picture of the characters and their dramas, they retorted, “You said it had to be 2/5/10 pages, and that’s all I can fit.” Which is fair if you’re 15, and this is your first story, and you’re only here because your mom forgot to sign the permission slip for the band trip. But despite short stories’ well-earned reputation for inconclusive endings, your ending should still have a bit of that, “I see” sort of feeling, even if you get it three days later. Short story endings, as a rule, don’t shut anything down or solve any problems; they open things up to the next page, the page that isn’t there. Amy explains very well: “it’s always a bit of a shock to end a short story, as a reader or a writer, but then you carry that shock with you for the rest of the day. you feel restless, unquieted, maybe even a little angry. you’re fucking confused! and you don’t want to admit it, but that’s kind of the best feeling in the world.”

Many readers offer short-story writers the compliment of “It ended too soon–I wanted to know what happened next!” To a certain extent, that’s a wonderful compliment–well, speaking only for myself, I love to think I could create a world people would want to continue to live in, and characters they’d like to continue to know. However, there should be something basically satisfying and self-contained about a short story–you should receive enough knowledge, emotion, action, whatever the story requires, that when it ends, some part of you is like, “Yeah. I see…” and what you see is your own version of the next page. It takes work to craft that page for yourself–maybe this is what some people hate about stories–but the writer should have given you the basic tools to do so.  It is difficult to explain the difference between the ending-feeling you get with a crafted short story, and the feeling you get when the writer has just run out of space or steam and dropped in “The End” instead of writing the next bit. But trust me, there’s a big difference.

There’s this great Robert Coover story that I just read that elides almost everything that actually happens–the skips are bigger than the hits, and the story itself is tiny, just over 1000 words (what, you never cut’n’paste a story into a word processor to see how long it is?) And yet it packs a huge wallop; the elisions are the story, in a certain sense; but the fact that they are elided for both the reader and the character are the story, too. So you care at the end, about this man whose life you don’t really know, because he doesn’t know, either. Now, in my mind, that’s a good ending.

Short stories don’t do stunts or party tricks. I occasionally find (sometimes in my own work) things stuck in stories that are really cool, either stylistically (unusual narrative voices or perspectives, time fragmentation, kooky narrative structures, etc.) or content-wise (alien invasions, gender-bending, political or media satires) but don’t belong there. Not that I’m saying there could never be stories with the above, even all in the same story, but there’d have to be a bloody good reason for it. What makes a story not a story is when it contains a string of effects that don’t have anything to do with what the story *is*–the writer is just thrilled to be able to do this stuff, and is, essentially, showing off. FYI, this is why my flying baby story never worked out, but I think if I could integrate that baby more fully into the narrative, it still could.

The very wise Kim Jernigan says that stories are “research & development branch of contemporary fiction, where much of the stylistic and narrative experiment occurs” and I heartily agree. However, a successful experiment has to become one with the story, so that you can’t imagine anyone ever writing or reading that story without it. A true innovation is one that renders itself, in the moment of its creation, indispensible.

Like, for example, Matthew J. Trafford wrote this story, “Gutted,” that is about adolescent turmoil, about father-son relationships, about sexuality and “otherness” and violence. It’s a really wrenching story, one that leaves you exactly “gutted” when you finish reading it, and for that it is brilliant. The things I was thinking when I finished reading it were, “I really feel for those people” and “I wonder what they did next.” The thing I was *not* thinking was, “Hey, mermaid story–neat-o!” though in fact there is a mermaid in the story. There’s nothing wrong with “neat-o” but it doesn’t bear rereading, rethinking, mulling over in the shower. Trafford’s story transcends “neat-o” by doing a thousand other things right and writing the mermaid in so finely and subtly I seriously don’t think the story would have been possible in any other guise.

I’d say the same thing about Spencer Gordon’s short story, “Transcript: The Appeal of the Sentence, a story that’s a single, nearly 3000-word sentence about the speaker’s crush on Miley Cyrus. It’s a terrifying story, and terrifyingly good, because the interrogation of language and celebrity obsession, and the modern “It’s not what you’re like, it’s what you like.” ethos, plus this one guy’s personal and very sweet lunacy doesn’t seem doable in any other way other than the way Gordon did it.

—

I guess what it boils down to for me is, it works if it works. There are stories I love that break every rule above, but that’s because they aren’t rules–they’re really just observations of what I’ve seen working really well in a lot of stories. I’d love to hear/read other people’s observations, if they should like to share them…

February 27th, 2011

Outline Issues

Do you ever write outlines for written pieces before you write them? The last 4 words of that sentence seem redundant, but they actually aren’t for me. The only time I do an outline is after I have a working draft of a story. I call them “story maps,” partly because I like having my own terminology for stuff, partly because since it’s an outline of a thing that exists, it’s mapping the terrain rather than charting a course (as an outline would be). Story maps are a great way to see if your pacing is messed up (if your outline reads, “pages 3-4: describe room,” that’s a bad sign) and if you are putting the emphasis where you want it to (see previous example).

Even after-draft outlines are pretty rare; I don’t usually outline at all. My excuse is that everything I write is pretty short, less than 20 pages, so I can keep it pretty well clear in my mind without having to make any notes. I’m pretty sure, if I wrote a novel it would have to be different, but then again, maybe that’s just why I’ve never successfully written a novel–I’m just not an outliner.

I’m working on an essay right now that needed an outline as part of the review process. Even though I obsessed about it for ages, looking up “essay outlines” online, and got some good advice from Scott, I *could not* write the outline until I had gotten a good chunk of the essay draft written. The essay draft actually sucked quite hard, and now that I have written a lovely outline and had it approved, I am vigorously rewriting the draft to coincide with what I actually outlined. But I needed that sort of lame “warm-up” writing to even know how I want the essay to be. Weird, eh?

I haven’t written a proper essay in a while (what’s on this blog being very improper indeed). Now that I’m back in this mode, I recall doing this sort of thing in school, even grad school: you research, you make notes, and then you start basically at random and write until you have a good idea–then you go on from there trying to shape an essay, and later go back and scrap everything you wrote upt until that point. This is a pretty inefficient way to do things, but really it’s just thinking on the keyboard, and it makes me feel productive.

Does it sound smug or misguided (or both) to say I feel lucky that I’m not one of those writers who can’t put down a sentence until they’re sure it’s brilliant? If I were that sort, I don’t know if I’d ever write anything; most of what I write, even at my most inspired, requires huge revising. I wish I could outline properly, because I think it would save me some time, but I don’t really mind my process (except in outline-required circumstances). I’ve always thought a certain percentage of willingness-to-revise could be substituted for actual brilliance. At least, I hope it works that way.

January 15th, 2011

Opportunity for Toronto Writers

If you are in Toronto, you can take advantage of the wonderful Toronto Public Library writer-in-residence program, this year with Elizabeth Ruth. I just found out about it now, so maybe you don’t know about it either–here’s the deets:

Elizabeth Ruth, Writer in Residence February – May 2011
Manuscript submissions: Writers of literary fiction are welcome to submit novel or short story manuscripts for feedback. Elizabeth Ruth with read your writing and meet with you to discuss what is working and what might need further development. Submitting a manuscript does not guarantee a meeting with the Writer in Residence. Meetings are by appointment only.

Manuscripts should meet the following criteria:
• Fiction excerpts of up to 10 double-spaced pages in length.
• Typed or word-processed on 1 side of each page (handwritten manuscripts will not be accepted).
• Use 12 point or larger Times New Roman typeface only.
• 1 inch margins all around.
• No email copies accepted.
• Please don’t send in originals.
Manuscripts will be accepted from December 15, 2010 to January 22, 2011. However, the Library reserves the right to limit the number of manuscripts accepted. Please include: your name, address, email address and telephone number on your cover page. There is a limit of one submission per person. Mail or bring to:
Writer in Residence Program
North York Central Library
Languages, Literature and Fine Arts Department,
Second Floor
5120 Yonge Street
Toronto, ON M2N 5N9
Questions: gkelner@torontopubliclibrary.ca
The Toronto Public Library is not responsible for returning manuscripts. Please submit a COPY of your work
Manuscripts will be accepted: December 15, 2010 – January 22, 2011.www.elizabethruth.com

PS from RR–The North York Public Library is *really* nice.

December 19th, 2010

Reverb 18

What do you want to try next year? Is there something you wanted to try in 2010? What happened when you did / didn’t go for it? (Author: Kaileen Elise) (www.reverb.com)

Huh. This makes me seem uncourageous, but I can’t think of anything I specifically set out to try this year. Ok, maybe the big roadtrip to Charlottetown–which proved that I need to work on my driving skills and ability to mange stress. This has come up before in the Reverb process.

The thing I want to “try” in the new year is the new book–again, this has come up already (I’m finding some of these prompts a tad redundant). What’s new about it? Well, Iots of things, but I don’t suppose I’ll know exactly until I either do those things, or fail at doing them. Either way, much lies ahead.

December 15th, 2010

What I’m up to

If you haven’t heard my voice in a while, you might want to check out a podcast of a reading I did on Hear Hear’s website. You can also hear Andrew Daley, Julia Tausch, and Adrienne Gruber, all of whom I had the pleasure of reading with that evening, and all of whom are fab. The piece I did was an excerpt from my story “The Weatherboy”–if it whets your appetite for the whole thing, you can download “The Weatherboy” from Rattling Books. That reading is done by Gerard Whelan, and is really much better than mine–warm and musical, arch in places, completely as I would have done it if I were a much better reader. Enjoy!

If you’d like to see what a bunch of the writers from the last issue of The New Quarterly (including me!) are reading at the moment, please check out TNQ’s Who’s Reading What feature. And did I mention that I wrote the letter for TNQ’s donation campaign this year? For those not on their mailing list and who are curious, I’ve copied in the text from the letter below–if it inspires you to give, hooray–but no pressure.

My second acceptance from a literary journal was from The New Quarterly. I still have Kim Jernigan’s shocking, thrilling acceptance letter from September 4, 2006. I was utterly amazed; I had sent my story off to strangers, and they liked it, and wanted to share it with more. Kim said, “We’ve all…recognized…the way [the protagonist] tries to remain aloof from the lives around her while also feeling disconnected from her own life.” It was such a joy to be so well read, so understood. I felt like I’d thrown something fragile that I loved up into the air and a stranger had gently caught it.

When I first started sending out work, I was 28, and had been writing stories for maybe 15 years. It took so long, but I had finally reached that crucial point: my terror of rejection had been exceeded by my desire to share my stories, which I loved so much, and see if they resonated with anyone else. Publication in a respected journal gave me a sudden audience of serious readers, often subscribers who know the magazine well and are loyal to the editors; they’ll take a new writer seriously because they know who chose the work, and they’ll take the time to listen for that resonance. Publication in a literary journal is an invitation to join the conversation.

But let’s back up, to before acceptance or publication or that reading audience of subscribers–it’s thrilling just to have a reading audience of thoughtful readers on the editorial board. You can’t really ask for a more attentive audience than editors, who have read 100s or 1000s of stories and devoted their time to really listening to what each story is doing and why. That attention can be terrifying, too—if something is going wrong in a story, a casual reader or even a serious one reading for pleasure might miss it. Someone with years of experience critiquing and selecting stories, and who puts his or her name on the masthead won’t. When TNQ accepts a story, you can know it’s the real deal.

When I submit to a journal I respect, when they don’t take a story I can often learn something from that too. Even if they haven’t had time to offer criticism, knowing that the editors think it’s not quite there can be enough encouragement to go back to the drawing board. The TQN eds are notably generous with their time and criticism, however, and their feedback can be so valuable when I’m searching for direction. The story “The House on Elsbeth” was rejected by The New Quarterly in the summer of 2007, but with their feedback I revised over the next six months, and it was published in the mag the following summer.

But there’s so much more than just giving us a place to publish! The New Quarterly is good reading, and a pleasure I look forward to every quarter. More than entertainment, I and so many other writers count on the lit journals to bring the news: what new things are writers doing? What new forms or adaptations of old ones have the poets found? What are ways story-writers are solving issues of style and structure? And how are the lines being blurred between the genres in ways that expand them? I’ll never forget reading Elizabeth Hay’s “Last Poems” at three in the morning and feeling like she had told the utter truth, and yet made it more than just truth. How did she do that?

Every issue of TNQ—or any worthwhile litmag—brings me 20-30 voices, that many conceptions of the universe and the written word. Not all are my cup of tea, but heaven help the writer—or the human being—who drinks only from her own cup. I like reading something I didn’t expect to read, or to like. I like to be surprised—it’s very close to being inspired, I think.

I also like feeling that I’m part of this group of surprising writers and insightful readers—the team that goes out to the readings and applauds, the team that makes comments on each issue in emails and blog posts. On the famed TNQ/CNQ (Canadian Notes and Queries) tour of 2008, Kim and TNQ managing editor Rosalynn Tyo drove a few of us story-writers, plus a very little, very cute, very vocal baby, from Windsor to Waterloo in a blinding snowstorm. Some of us ate chicken with our fingers in the back seat, and everyone was in a strangely good mood, and I don’t think any of us will soon forget it.

Literary journals do so much to foster a sense that we are all—writers and readers, poets and artists, fans and friends—part of something we can work on, separately and yet together. I am so happy to write this letter for The New Quarterly, to remind everyone (including me) how much good they do.