I think I've already written about my affection for Of Human Bondage by WS Maugham - now I come to think of it I don't think there is any other book, apart from LOTR, that I've re-read so many times. Pride and Prejudice? Tess? HMS Surprise? Hmm. Not sure.
Anyway I recently re-read it and it confirmed all my best hopes like it always does. What makes it a great book is that every time I read it I discover something new in it. For a long time I've admired its control of character, use of language and how it engenders sympathy for Philip. Although giving him a club foot and making him an orphan looks a bit obvious even to a newbie such as myself.
Anyhoo, this time around it struck me that what gives the book its power is that some of the incidents in it are so well tied to the stage in Philip's life at which they occur. Mildred's destruction of all Philip's property has to happen because in doing that she severs his link with his past - which she represents. By destroying his possessions she forces him to start anew and launches him on that track. After this incident Philips' life slowly, with one major downturn, starts to pick up. He becomes reconciled to who he is and starts to swim well in the stream of life.
For a long time though I just did not get why she did it apart from it being one with her narrow, vindictive character. Which is another reason why its a great book. Not only do the incidents underscore the broader story of Philips journey through life they are also utterly in tune with the characters of the people carrying them out. I'm not sure how many times I've read OHB but I'm betting that 2008 was by no means the last.
Tuesday, November 25, 2008
Sunday, November 16, 2008
And we're back
August 13th. Ooof. I'll blame crazy times at work for the hiatus. I don't propose to bore anyone with the details instead I'll bore allcomers with more entries. Don't say you weren't warned.
Wednesday, August 13, 2008
Standard operating procedure
An observation. Another - related to the first. A moment to ponder and give me time to think while I write. A hyperlink. Two. A question about what it means. Is it good? or bad? Perhaps it is both.
Anecdotes to explore what this means. One of them might be quite funny. Or self-deprecating. Oh, other people have gone through this.
Emotion creeps in. Pathos. An attempt to lighten the mood with a pun. A hint of bitterness and regret. A rant that almost breaks out in flaming rage. Hulk smash! Realism drags the post back to saner waters with the rider than I wonder if I'm cut out for this. How many rejections? State how much it matters to me. Again. Verbal teeth are gritted. Fuck it, I'll do it anyway. A witty sign off.
Anecdotes to explore what this means. One of them might be quite funny. Or self-deprecating. Oh, other people have gone through this.
Emotion creeps in. Pathos. An attempt to lighten the mood with a pun. A hint of bitterness and regret. A rant that almost breaks out in flaming rage. Hulk smash! Realism drags the post back to saner waters with the rider than I wonder if I'm cut out for this. How many rejections? State how much it matters to me. Again. Verbal teeth are gritted. Fuck it, I'll do it anyway. A witty sign off.
Friday, July 25, 2008
The Whine List
I've become a fan of Mur Lafferty's podcast "I Should Be Writing" which is a great source of encouragement for writers labouring in the wilderness - that would be me. It's good to hear about the experiences of someone going through the same hassles I am and Mur has lots of level-headed advice about the trade.
But in this podcast she said something that experience tells me is not true. Writers, she said, should try to get better at what they do because the better the story they write the more chance there is that someone will want to publish it.
I've no quibble with the assertion that writers should study their craft and hone their abilities but, I've got to say, that will have almost no effect on the saleability of a story.
I'm driven to say that because of a comment that turned up in a recent rejection - yet another which was of the "almost but not quite" species. The comment was that the whole picking of which stories to publish was such a subjective business.
Until I read that I'd harboured the fantastical notion that an editor presented with ten stories for five slots would pick the five best - by which I mean the most technically adept, the best written. But I have been foolish and deluded. Editors pick what they like to read. By which I mean crap gets published all the time.
It strikes me that it would be perfectly possible to go through an entire writing career turning out technically flawless stories but never getting anything published because no editor liked any of them quite enough. Tobias Buckell said he got rejected 500 times before he started to make it. I hope it does not take me that long. I've just hit 100 rejections after three years. So to hit 500 I'll have to do this for another 12 years.
The days after I realised all this have been dark - I've really considered giving up. Especially when I worked out that since I've supposedly been getting better at writing the ratio of acceptances to rejections has got a lot worse. Significantly so.
I've said before that my motivation hinges on whether I get a good response to what I put out and at the moment I'm not. Now though I realise that the only person I need to please is myself. I feel quite liberated and what I write has changed a lot. Getting published is a bonus that luck has a lot to do with. And I have to believe in luck. How else, to paraphrase Cocteau, how can I explain the success of my rivals?
But in this podcast she said something that experience tells me is not true. Writers, she said, should try to get better at what they do because the better the story they write the more chance there is that someone will want to publish it.
I've no quibble with the assertion that writers should study their craft and hone their abilities but, I've got to say, that will have almost no effect on the saleability of a story.
I'm driven to say that because of a comment that turned up in a recent rejection - yet another which was of the "almost but not quite" species. The comment was that the whole picking of which stories to publish was such a subjective business.
Until I read that I'd harboured the fantastical notion that an editor presented with ten stories for five slots would pick the five best - by which I mean the most technically adept, the best written. But I have been foolish and deluded. Editors pick what they like to read. By which I mean crap gets published all the time.
It strikes me that it would be perfectly possible to go through an entire writing career turning out technically flawless stories but never getting anything published because no editor liked any of them quite enough. Tobias Buckell said he got rejected 500 times before he started to make it. I hope it does not take me that long. I've just hit 100 rejections after three years. So to hit 500 I'll have to do this for another 12 years.
The days after I realised all this have been dark - I've really considered giving up. Especially when I worked out that since I've supposedly been getting better at writing the ratio of acceptances to rejections has got a lot worse. Significantly so.
I've said before that my motivation hinges on whether I get a good response to what I put out and at the moment I'm not. Now though I realise that the only person I need to please is myself. I feel quite liberated and what I write has changed a lot. Getting published is a bonus that luck has a lot to do with. And I have to believe in luck. How else, to paraphrase Cocteau, how can I explain the success of my rivals?
Monday, July 14, 2008
The rules for the game
In no particular order...
Be specific - sardines being grilled is better than fish being cooked.
Use active and direct verbs - he walked rather than he was walking.
Avoid abstractions - such as horrible, violent, frustration.
Make every scene and sentence count.
Use the minimum amount of magic/hi-tech to get things moving.
Adverbs - Gah, away with them.
Reveal character by action. Put characters in situations that force a response.
Do not hide information. A surprise works better if no-one suspects it is coming.
Experts plan to the end.
Dialogue - Do not let it meander. Conversations are great ways to show character and attitude.
Elaboration of motive - a character's actions should reveal more about them, what they are doing and why they are doing it.
Write for yourself and no-one else.
Writers write - try to make progress every day.
Keep an ideas notebook with you at all times.
Be specific - sardines being grilled is better than fish being cooked.
Use active and direct verbs - he walked rather than he was walking.
Avoid abstractions - such as horrible, violent, frustration.
Make every scene and sentence count.
Use the minimum amount of magic/hi-tech to get things moving.
Adverbs - Gah, away with them.
Reveal character by action. Put characters in situations that force a response.
Do not hide information. A surprise works better if no-one suspects it is coming.
Experts plan to the end.
Dialogue - Do not let it meander. Conversations are great ways to show character and attitude.
Elaboration of motive - a character's actions should reveal more about them, what they are doing and why they are doing it.
Write for yourself and no-one else.
Writers write - try to make progress every day.
Keep an ideas notebook with you at all times.
Friday, June 20, 2008
Off the leash
I've often wondered if I'm too polite when I write - perhaps it's the curse of my middle-class upbringing. Certainly, it's something one reviewer accused one of my characters of being for his impeccable behaviour during a scene set on the NY subway.
But it was reading The New Weird that really got me thinking that I needed to throw out at least one baby and its bathwater. The book is great on the history of the New Weird and why it came into being. One of the main motivations is dissatisfaction with Tolkienesque type fantasy and the limitations of that form.
I've said before I have problems with elves but my wish to write something different always felt like I was breaking the rules and, to be honest, I felt a little uncomfortable doing it. This is despite the fact that I'm a huge fan of China Mieville (Perdido Street Station is a breath of fresh air) and many other alumni of this field. I just didn't get why they did it and the anthology clued me in.
I'm aware that many books/stories have appeared before now that had a whiff of New Weird about them but it's the extreme nature of the form that defines it - to my mind. The heady mix of insanity, bodily awareness, cityscapes, Dickensian character-building and love of language is hard to mistake once its salient features are pointed out. It is also utterly convinced by its settings - no clever, clever post-modern awareness of the story as a story here.
Reading the anthology also chimed with comments from other writers about their development. Many speak of the moment when they found their voice and started creating the stories they were put here to write.
I certainly feel that a big change has taken place in what I write - I'm no longer ameliorating what I write to fit the conventions. Away with them. Give me liberty or give me daeth. The story I'm working on at the moment has flowed out of me so quickly that at times I feel like a witness more than a writer. It feels more honest. I have no idea about whether it is any good - though the strength of its voice will be a plus.
The changes means that some of my fears about writing have gone in that I feel so much happier about the stories I'm producing. Writing was starting to feel a little formulaic prior to this realisation. And one story very much of the old school keeps getting bumped as I work on these others. But those fears have been replaced by others which centre around whether it is any good at all. There is a lot more at stake too as they are far more personal. Time will tell whether the change means I get more published. But I'm happier than ever about doing this.
But it was reading The New Weird that really got me thinking that I needed to throw out at least one baby and its bathwater. The book is great on the history of the New Weird and why it came into being. One of the main motivations is dissatisfaction with Tolkienesque type fantasy and the limitations of that form.
I've said before I have problems with elves but my wish to write something different always felt like I was breaking the rules and, to be honest, I felt a little uncomfortable doing it. This is despite the fact that I'm a huge fan of China Mieville (Perdido Street Station is a breath of fresh air) and many other alumni of this field. I just didn't get why they did it and the anthology clued me in.
I'm aware that many books/stories have appeared before now that had a whiff of New Weird about them but it's the extreme nature of the form that defines it - to my mind. The heady mix of insanity, bodily awareness, cityscapes, Dickensian character-building and love of language is hard to mistake once its salient features are pointed out. It is also utterly convinced by its settings - no clever, clever post-modern awareness of the story as a story here.
Reading the anthology also chimed with comments from other writers about their development. Many speak of the moment when they found their voice and started creating the stories they were put here to write.
I certainly feel that a big change has taken place in what I write - I'm no longer ameliorating what I write to fit the conventions. Away with them. Give me liberty or give me daeth. The story I'm working on at the moment has flowed out of me so quickly that at times I feel like a witness more than a writer. It feels more honest. I have no idea about whether it is any good - though the strength of its voice will be a plus.
The changes means that some of my fears about writing have gone in that I feel so much happier about the stories I'm producing. Writing was starting to feel a little formulaic prior to this realisation. And one story very much of the old school keeps getting bumped as I work on these others. But those fears have been replaced by others which centre around whether it is any good at all. There is a lot more at stake too as they are far more personal. Time will tell whether the change means I get more published. But I'm happier than ever about doing this.
Monday, June 09, 2008
Pause for thought
It's fair to say that commas and I have never got on. Perhaps its the way they lie insolent on the line like a drunk in the gutter, perched between the respectability of the pavement and the out and out seediness of sprawling in the road. Whatever. I use them like I use pepper on pasta - the dish looks better with it and occasionally a crumb will land in the just the right place to counterpoint the taste of the sauce. Was that metaphor too tortured? I hope so.
I'm not sure why it is that commas and me are such strangers. I'm a whizz at spelling but I have no recollection from my school days of the laws of commas being drummed in to me like spelling - though the fact that I read like a crazy person might have helped my ability to spell.
This admission is perhaps something of a surprise given where I work and what I have done for a living for the past 15 years. It's perhaps a comment on the sad state of prose in the papers or simply that, even if I do not know, many of those that I have worked with do. Subs are a boon!
Lots of the comments I've got on stories I've put together recently have focussed on commas and my cavalier (ab)use of them. One story was critiqued by an English teacher and, this is going to sound a little odd,I got a real thrill to find out where they should go. It really changed the way the lines read. I'm a long way from being like Proust or Oscar Wilde who, it is said, having removed a comma from one line pored over the text for two days and then put it back in. At least then, the story goes, they knew why it was there.
That very kind reviewer pointed me to this site and it turns out there are rules for using commas. I always thought it was something much more abstruse but no. There are proper places where they should be used. Cool. That OWLS site is fab in other ways too - it has lots of great advice for novice writers. And the more I write the more I realise that's what I will always be.
I'm not sure why it is that commas and me are such strangers. I'm a whizz at spelling but I have no recollection from my school days of the laws of commas being drummed in to me like spelling - though the fact that I read like a crazy person might have helped my ability to spell.
This admission is perhaps something of a surprise given where I work and what I have done for a living for the past 15 years. It's perhaps a comment on the sad state of prose in the papers or simply that, even if I do not know, many of those that I have worked with do. Subs are a boon!
Lots of the comments I've got on stories I've put together recently have focussed on commas and my cavalier (ab)use of them. One story was critiqued by an English teacher and, this is going to sound a little odd,I got a real thrill to find out where they should go. It really changed the way the lines read. I'm a long way from being like Proust or Oscar Wilde who, it is said, having removed a comma from one line pored over the text for two days and then put it back in. At least then, the story goes, they knew why it was there.
That very kind reviewer pointed me to this site and it turns out there are rules for using commas. I always thought it was something much more abstruse but no. There are proper places where they should be used. Cool. That OWLS site is fab in other ways too - it has lots of great advice for novice writers. And the more I write the more I realise that's what I will always be.
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