Thoughts on writing from a Cul-de-Sac

Beating Cancer

noreply@blogger.com (sean a. scapellato) — Tue, 16 Sep 2008 14:02:00 +0000

I've written about this before, and I'm saying it again (more to myself than anyone). The cure to the snarling critic on your shoulder telling you you're crap is called BIC. Butt. In. Chair.

You write through it. You work through the pain.

In my reminiscing about David Foster Wallace, I came across a Charlie Rose interview with him, Jonathan Franzen, and Mark Leyner (someone calls these wacky post-modernist types "word punks," which I love). Rose was asking them about the influence of the Internet on reading--how prescient this was, being 1996--and Leyner said he didn't really care that there might be a dwindling reading audience. In audacious fashion all three writers claimed that one must write for self first, an audience second. If you read any of these three writers, this point becomes abundantly clear.

Lesson learned (and will be re-learned and re-learned every time the cancer of inactivity and leach of self-esteem infects my mind).

Advice to myself:
Don't write what you think other people (i.e. agents and editors) want to read.

Stop trying to sound like someone else. Be yourself (advice I heard when I was sixteen and trying to get the prom queen to notice me).

Stop writing like you just finished some How-to book on how to be literary.

Lose the snobbish-ness. Write a good story. The rest is silence (Thanks, Hamlet).

David Foster Wallace 1962-2008

noreply@blogger.com (sean a. scapellato) — Mon, 15 Sep 2008 13:33:00 +0000

Anything I think to say about David Foster Wallace seems trite or somehow undeferential to the talent he possessed as a writer. I cannot think of anyone who has written more precisely, cogently, ironically, humorously, empathetically on the human condition, the zeitgeist of America, or the peerings inside the soul. Inimitable doesn't cut it. Genius perhaps.

It's a bummer day.

For an incredible interview with Charlie Rose several years ago, click here. The ending is a little haunting.

The Terminal Cancer of the Writer

noreply@blogger.com (sean a. scapellato) — Sun, 14 Sep 2008 19:43:00 +0000

Ever have one of those days? You know, a day when every word, every sentence, every paragraph sounds like a juvenile, moronic, wannabe writer wrote it? The scene couldn't have stiffer characters, lamer dialogue, more pedestrian description (baby blue eyes? Seriously?).... You have the motivation, the hunger, the knowledge, yet, with sentence after sentence, a dismal truth blooms in your mind: you really are a charlatan, a dilettante, an incompetent fool.

You are quite certain that if by some chance you could instantaneously pluck the worst writer on the planet from the huddling, scribbling masses that you would be that guy. No photo-finish, no tight race with hanging chads. Yep, far and away the winner, you're the one, THE worst writer alive, blissfully unaware, pounding out your middling prose as if it were the next prize winner.

Okay, you get the point. It's the enemy, the devil of all good prose. The terminal cancer of the writer. So, now, you've diagnosed--perhaps even self-medicated (more whiskey, Mr. Fitzgerald?). What do you do about it?

I'll get back to you....

noreply@blogger.com (sean a. scapellato) — Thu, 11 Sep 2008 01:31:00 +0000

October 16, Charleston Premiere of The Secret Life of Bees. For more information, go to http://www.lilaconnects.com

Great Class

noreply@blogger.com (sean a. scapellato) — Thu, 11 Sep 2008 01:19:00 +0000

Once a month I have the privilege of co-leading a writing workshop of adults who want to learn about fiction. We write, we think, we talk, we read. It's light-hearted, but full of great questions, higher thought, serious study. Our people are from all walks of life: teachers, technical writers, nurses, construction workers, military folks.

Some want to escape "real life" for a few hours. Others want advice on finding an agent or publisher. Some want to dive into exercises (Write about yourself in the 3rd person...Go!). Overall, though, I think we want the shared inquiry into a difficult craft, the keys to universal human expression, a common experience as artists. It makes me think of 20 people who can't swim jumping into a boat, saying simultaneously, "Let's shove off."

It's scary, but oddly comforting.

Not Finished, Not Even Close

noreply@blogger.com (sean a. scapellato) — Thu, 11 Sep 2008 01:13:00 +0000

So there are problems, big problems. But then, it could be worse. I could be reading a form letter, unsigned. I could be drowning in the silence of a non-response.

Literary agent says what can simultaneously boost and burst a writer's ego: "You write your ass off, but the story doesn't grab me." "You have amazing chops, but the book doesn't deliver what you promise."

And suddenly, I'm sixteen: "Can't we just be friends?" Yeah, that feeling.

So now, there are options. Rewrite--no promises. Or...shelve it and start next project--no promises. Or...give up and go back to playing Scrabble.

The pity party is over. I'm back to work. There will be blood.

Finishing, Now the Down-side

noreply@blogger.com (sean a. scapellato) — Thu, 12 Jun 2008 15:43:00 +0000

I finished my book last week. I gave it to a trusted writer friend for honest feedback. I sent it to my agent. I wiped my hands, the brand-new engine freshly built and bolted. I let the hood whack shut in supreme pleasure at the sound, buffed the bumper till it shined.

Sure, there would be comments, suggestions, questions. But the book was as good as I could make it. My abilities could execute no finer prose. Then, reality. No sooner had I paid for postage, I was leveled with a stomach virus, followed by a cold and sinus infection. My friend's feedback, while spot-on and brilliant in its insights, arrived mid-illness. To extend the metaphor: the car did not start. A tire fell off. Someone forgot the battery.

Me: sick, tired, bed-ridden. Manuscript crisply cornered on my agent's desk awaiting appraisal. Too many problems to name in the story. Potential disaster.

Does Dan Brown have this problem?

Finishing, the Up-side

noreply@blogger.com (sean a. scapellato) — Thu, 12 Jun 2008 15:24:00 +0000

Finishing a short story or a novel completely rocks. You wrench office door clean off its hinges, bursting forth in proclamation, "I'm FINISHED!" It's the grown-up science fair project on the due date--sheer joy as that sucker backs in on a flat-bed truck to the amazement of your peers. You walk around for days in that buttery glow. You're like the guy who tells everyone his cholesterol dropped a hundred points: "Guess what?" you say even to strangers, "I finished my novel." It's true. People will pretend to be in awe. You'll look down your nose at the inferior fiction in Barnes & Noble. You'll wear black turtlenecks for a few days, and you might even tell a stranger, "Yeah, I'm a novelist. Just finished my latest book." You won't even think how to get past the next question: "So where can I buy your book?"

After all, when the book is still warm off the printer and you've stacked the pages so tight they resemble the ream of paper freshly torn from the wrapper, after you've named it, written your acknowledgments in your head, chosen your beautiful epigrammatic quote, after you've cast the movie in your imagination--you gawk, you imagine it's your first child from the womb. You think, I did that. Here's my contribution to the world. Something from nothing. Story and character, man in conflict with himself. This is your golden period--no criticisms, no rejections, no reason to think editors won't fight like kids in a sandbox to publish it. And it's OKAY. Bask in it. Enjoy it.

The darkness will come later.

Titles, oh God

noreply@blogger.com (sean a. scapellato) — Tue, 13 May 2008 17:48:00 +0000

Can I be honest and admit that I HATE titling my work? So much pressure....how do you possibly capture an entire novel in three or four words, even eight or nine? Hell, I can't even capture my novel in one-page synopsis without stopping every few minutes to shop for a gun online.

I wish I could hang a blue handicap sign on the cover page of my novel, something saying "Author Title Challenged." There, free parking.

How can I have such confidence in my story and contempt for any title I come up with? Quite easy, really, especially if you have titles like these:

Untitled
Horrible Novel
Insert Gun, Pull Trigger

I can scan my bookshelves and find so many genius titles. Why could't I have dreamed up these gems?

The Violent Bear it Away
Their Eyes Were Watching God
The House of Sand and Fog
To Kill a Mockingbird
Lonesome Dove
Middlesex
Fahrenheit 451
Catcher in the Rye
What We Talk About When We Talk About Love
Blood Meridian
A Prayer For Owen Meany
Cry the Beloved Country

Yes, I could go on. A writer friend of mine says your entire book should be found in your title and your first sentence. While I agree, finding the right words is another sisyphean task altogether. Roll that rock up the hill and watch it come right back at you.

I need a rock pusher!

Congratulations to John Hart

noreply@blogger.com (sean a. scapellato) — Sat, 03 May 2008 17:59:00 +0000

My friend John Hart texted me last night from the Edgar Awards to say his second novel has won the 2008 prize. He beat out Michael Chabon and Ken Bruen, among others, a feat we both agree is monumental. Mucho praise and adulations. This sophomore effort to The King of Lies deserves every award it gets.

Rare Philip Roth Interview

noreply@blogger.com (sean a. scapellato) — Wed, 30 Apr 2008 20:37:00 +0000

Philip Roth doesn't give interviews often, and in this one, his opinions about the books he writes and how they might be viewed in the future is compelling (even if it's a tad apocalyptic). Notice his response when the interviewer asks what he'll do if the novel dies out.

Composting (Some Thoughts)

noreply@blogger.com (sean a. scapellato) — Tue, 29 Apr 2008 13:31:00 +0000

Natalie Goldberg has this marvelous little chapter in her classic book Writing Down the Bones where she explains the concept of composting. Her contention, and I agree, is that we accumulate a lot of junk throughout our daily lives. Over time, the mind, consciously and subconsciously, will sift through the miry bog, process the information one piece at a time, and then when the time is perfect, a flower will push up through the mess. We have to be ready to water it, to make it grow (translation: be ready to write).

Some writers say the best way to write about a place is to NOT be there. Want to write about the beach? Do it in the dead of winter snow. My friend Pat Conroy wrote his masterpiece The Prince of Tides from Rome. The descriptions of the South Carolina marsh stemmed from his deep longing to be there.

Need to write about your father's passing? An unrequited love? You have to let it sit. You have to let the brain keep turning it. Time will do its thing--doesn't it always? Sometimes this means, doing nothing. Sometimes, it means scribbling your way through journals, waiting for the gems to appear.

In the end, whatever your method, when the flower blooms, you'll be ready for it.

The Sesquipedalianist

noreply@blogger.com (sean a. scapellato) — Mon, 21 Apr 2008 21:05:00 +0000

I came across the word in an editorial by Dick Cavett in the New York Times. He was discussing the bloated use of euphemism by our commanders in the field.

Politics aside, you have to love the irony of this gargantuan bohemoth: sesquipedalian. Defined, the word describes a person who uses overly long, complicated words in speech or writing (broken into its roots to mean "foot and a half"), which then begs the question, is it possible to use this word without committing the very crime you've leveled against another? No, and that's the beauty.

Not to be outdone, there also exists a beast to characterize one's fear of long words: hippopotamonstrousesquipedaliophobia (words the size of a monstrous hippopotamus perhaps?).

As writers, you're allowed maybe one of these zingers every hundred pages or so (you're NEVER allowed to use hippopotamonstrous...). But when the word becomes the precise word, oh how beautiful it can be. You know what I'm talking about. Just this morning, I've been prowling my list of beauties (I keep a list of great words in my journal for use in stories when the occasion is right). They're not all fifty-cent words, but they'll shine if they find a home on the page:

Woodsmoke
Reliquary
Juvenilia
Blockade
Cinch
Tumescent
Whipsaw

Mark Twain said the difference between the right word and the almost-right word is the difference between lightning and lightning bug. Don't be afraid to flex your verbal muscles when you've got the perfect word, but don't fall prey either to the bloviating puffery of the sesquipedalianist.

Hire the Guy with the Truck AND the Trailer

noreply@blogger.com (sean a. scapellato) — Thu, 17 Apr 2008 14:02:00 +0000

A famous drummer was asked once why he spent so much time learning to play overly complicated rhythms, blazing fills, and impossible multi-limbed independence when most of his recorded playing was a straightforward groove. His answer: Every carpenter wants the best tools in the toolbox.

As writers, I can think of no better metaphor. Aside from how to get an agent, the most popular question ever asked of writers is "how do I become one?" (When a young woman asked Robert Penn Warren that question, he replied, "When did you decide to be so beautiful?" What a schmoozer.)

The best way to become a writer is WRITE! See my BIC entry below. The mere act of putting words on paper engages the mind, teaches us what we really think, how we really feel. We learn by doing--dialogue, characterization, setting, conflict, all these things become clearer as we implement them on the page. You learn nothing by talking about writing or staring into space. You learn nothing by writing only when inspiration hits. Write often, every day if you can. Do your thinking in the car and shower. Over time, your writing will reveal what you're good at, what you're bad at--which should then arouse curiosity, which takes us to the next tool: READING.

You don't get point of view? Google it or buy a book on it. Read a novel in that viewpoint and study how the other writer did it. Not good with grammar? Take a day and relive those joyous middle school moments. Learn what an introductory participial phrase can do and how to include that construction in your toolbox. (Re)learn the comma rules and how to use those stupid apostrophes. No one who calls himself a writer should be making the its/it's mistake. Try submitting something with a few there/theirs/there's mistakes and see what happens.

My habit is to read constantly. Always, I have a novel and a book on writing going simultaneously. Sometimes I take a break and read non-fiction. Sometimes I read Entertainment Weekly (oh, the shame). In any case, read to enjoy. Read to fill the toolbox. You never know when something will come in handy. Learn new words, new sentence constructions. Learn to be funny, serious, poignant. Know why people do things.

Yes, it's simple. You find tools at Lowe's and Home Depot. Writers find tools through reading and writing. Imagine that. If you call yourself a writer, but you don't read, then REPENT, SINNER! That's like running on one leg. And your toolbox will be only half-full. If you read and don't write, well, you're a reader.

The Greeks say "Know Thyself." I say have a toolbox so big you can't fit through the door. Always hire the guy with the truck AND the trailer. Know what I mean?

B I C

noreply@blogger.com (sean a. scapellato) — Wed, 16 Apr 2008 15:17:00 +0000

My friend Carol Peters posted on her blog the poet Jorie Graham's answer to a question asking what advice she had for aspiring poets. In it, she quoted John Berryman who warned of writers succumbing to the "thinky death." In context, I think he was warning poets not to write poems with an interpretation in mind, for that could lead to stiffness, preachiness, bad poetry in general.

For the novel writer, the "thinky death" could fall along similar lines. Activists, philosophers, and religious zealots--take note. Literary agent Pat Walsh sees it all the time. In his excellent book 78 Reasons Why Your Book May Never Be Publish & 14 Reasons Why It Just Might, he laments how many writers whose books don't make a point; rather their point makes an entire book. Camus, Kafka, and Sartre did it (and well), but I don't see those novels lighting up the bestseller lists in the twenty-first century. They might not have even been published in today's market.

A similar tangent to the "thinky death" is the writer who stares out the window all day (me), talks incessantly about his novel (me, but to myself), and is addicted to writer groups and conferences and revising the same novel that's been under construction since the heady days of university (not me, thank God). These are the thinkers, which produces that horrible symptom of talking, which means that no writing is getting done.

Here's the vaccine to the "thinky death." Ready? It's called BIC--BUTT IN CHAIR. You gotta do it. Can't fake it any longer. Pray, play Scrabble, drivel on in a blog, but then get the words down. Set yourself a goal. Here's mine. "I'm not getting out of this damn chair until I've written this scene." Notice I did not apply an evaluative label. It could be awful, skeletal, without any verve whatsoever, but you know what? I've got something to work with.

So, think about that (but only for a minute) and post BIC on your desk lamp. I'm rooting for you.

Effective Silliness

noreply@blogger.com (sean a. scapellato) — Wed, 16 Apr 2008 15:00:00 +0000

Have you been working on a manuscript for a while? Want to make it fresh again?

Change the font. I'm not kidding. Change it. Right now.

I've been writing in Times Roman since the Roman Empire, it seems. Just the other day, I changed the entire manuscript to Big Caslon--attracted first to the name, and now I really like the font. If you're a Mac-head like me, you'll find it in MS Word.

Anyway, when I sit down to write in the morning, it feels new all over again. My characters suddenly sound smarter. Can't tell you why. Same stuff, right? A different window dressing perhaps.

Sometimes, I drink coffee with real sugar, too, except that IS better than the artificial stuff.

A Good Job (if you can get it)

noreply@blogger.com (sean a. scapellato) — Sat, 12 Apr 2008 15:39:00 +0000

Being a writer is impossibly difficult. The only way to publish a novel is to hire an agent. Agents get a hundred queries a week (mine does). He might ask ten of those letter writers to send opening chapters. From those, he might ask for one complete manuscript. Last year he took on one new fiction writer. Sheesh.

So, let's say this lucky hired soul actually gets his book on an editor's desk (thanks to a great effort by the agent--all those lunches and phone calls paid off). This editor might read five or six manuscripts a week--not in the office, mind you, but on the train home, at night before bed, on weekends. He might get offer a contract on a book every few months.

This is withering news. More people win the lottery than receive publishing contracts.

Of all the people writing novels, maybe half of one percent might get them published. Of those, maybe a half percent might make enough money to quit their day job, and of those, maybe a half percent might go on to make writing novels a career. No matter your literary taste, you have to tip your hat to the Nora Roberts' and John Grisham's of the world.

Why so hard? Failure lies around every corner. We'll always be rejected more than we're accepted. Even at acceptance (contract signing time!), the real problems begin--fights over format, jacket covers, publicity budget, pub dates, titles, etc. Then your book appears on book shelves, and now it must sell--empty book signings, bad reviews, missing copies, no reviews all the recurring nightmare of the published author. For a look at the carnage, check out the remainder discount racks at the bookstore. No one is immune, not even Dan Brown.

So, you still want to do it? Yep. Despite all that? Yep. Fitzgerald's books were all out of print, and he died with no money. It took seventy-five years for anyone to realize Moby Dick was a genius novel (just don't ask any high-schoolers for their opinion). Were it not for Alice Walker's tireless stumping in the 70s, no one would know who Zora Neale Hurston is.

Truth is, the written word can make a difference. A career of pushing words around on the page is a job to die for. If it were easy, we'd all be doing it (then again, according to my agent, we all ARE doing it).

If you learn to treasure the process and remain committed to the act, you can succeed. Attach too much self-worth to the results? Forget it. The real reward is finding the zone, that quiet time where your brain takes you deep into the nether regions of consciousness where you spin out your stories, and you swear for a time that the magic is indeed magic. Yep, that's the why.

What Kind of Writer Am I?

noreply@blogger.com (sean a. scapellato) — Wed, 09 Apr 2008 14:33:00 +0000

Had a teacher tell me once there were two kinds of writers: one writer who says, "Read these words I am putting on the page and get lost in the story." Then there is the other who says, "Watch my hand move. Isn't it awesome?"

The idea, of course, suggests we should be committed to the story on the page and not overly concerned with diction or syntax. We're taught as authors to get out of the way of the story, to use a style appropriate so as not to call attention to itself. If I use a word like peripatetic when I could have used wandering, for example, I might be asking you to notice my hand.

But what about a Thomas Wolfe or a Michael Chabon? Writers' writers as we call them.

Or what about the person who says, "You're taking all the fun of writing away if I can't explore language and words and story."

I suppose the answer is to consider another analogy: there's nothing wrong with hot soup, but, remember, too much spice can ruin it.

And, sometimes, peripatetic is the right word.

Random Thoughts Over a PB&J

noreply@blogger.com (sean a. scapellato) — Sat, 05 Apr 2008 17:04:00 +0000

Okay, I just leafed through a great book on editing, and now I'm pondering writing advice that's been making the circuits for years. Consider these few:

After finishing a draft, put the manuscript in a drawer for a few weeks. I put my clothes in a drawer, maybe some thumbtacks and paper clips, but never a manuscript. Maybe I close the computer file, or if I've printed it, stick it in an expandable file folder. I don't know, but a drawer? How about a shelf? Maybe I'm just weird.

Show don't tell. Great advice, but so ambiguous. Maybe it should say, "Show some, tell some, show some more, tell the unimportant stuff, show the important stuff--all in moderation."

Beginning writers shouldn't use the first person point of view. It's not gasoline powered. It's not multi-bladed. It can't maim or kill. If first person is the right point of view, then it is.

Literary novels are much tougher to sell than commercial novels. Aren't all novels literary? Aren't all novels published commercial? I'll concede on one point, though. ALL novels are hard to sell right now. My agent says more people write them than buy them.

YIKES.

A Brush with Greatness

noreply@blogger.com (sean a. scapellato) — Wed, 02 Apr 2008 01:51:00 +0000

I saw Doug Marlette on a book tour a little over a year ago. Upon hearing he would be coming through South Carolina, I made the drive from Charleston to Litchfield Books, a wonderful independent store owned by Tom and Vickie Warner.

Doug's second novel Magic Time had just been released to fabulous reviews and seemed the proper follow-up to his award-winning first novel The Bridge. Doug knew what fame and notoriety were about, having won the Pulitzer Prize for his editorial cartoons in the Charlotte and Atlanta newspapers. According to his best friend Pat Conroy, with whom he spoke every morning, this novel writing thing had turned into a second career, and it was ridiculous to think one man could have so much talent.

And that was precisely why I wanted to meet him. It's a privilege to meet people who have mastered anything (a Tiger Woods, a Wynton Marsalis, a Meryl Streep), but here was a guy who achieved success in TWO fields (rigorous, competitive ones at that).

As is common for all writers who've endured a book tour, the store was nearly empty. Turn out had been modest, and I arrived midway through the second hour. I shook Doug's hand, mentioned a few friends I knew we had in common, and we talked for the better part of 30 minutes. Doug was gracious (wanted to know details about my writing (this took 8 seconds)); he was charming and told me several stories about the inspiration for The Bridge; he signed both my books with generous inscriptions; and he gave me a quick pep talk about making it in a cut-throat industry. I left the store pumped, ready to write, feeling as if I'd made a new friend.

I did not see him or speak to him after that. Nine months later, he died in a car crash. He was on his way to a Mississippi high school who had produced a musical about his cartoon strip Kudzu, and had planned to meet the students who'd adapted his work. The road was wet. The car he rode in hydroplaned and hit a tree. He died instantly.

That fall, I read an article Doug had written before his death about getting to spend an afternoon with Walker Percy in 1989 a year or so before Percy died. In the article, Doug mentioned several times how generous Percy had been with him, a young man on the cusp of life learning from the wise. He said it was an experience he'd remember the rest of his life. When I think about my afternoon with Doug Marlette, I think, me, too.

I met him once. I miss him anyway.

Help! I'm procrastinating

noreply@blogger.com (sean a. scapellato) — Mon, 31 Mar 2008 01:59:00 +0000

What I do when I don't want to write:

Do the dishes
Play fetch with the dog
Research carpal tunnel syndrome (which I'm getting from all this typing)
Research the Kennedy assassination (subject of current novel project)
Play Scrabble
Reheat coffee
Read Entertainment Weekly
Bite cuticles
Nap
Watch Youtube videos of great drummers
Research Hollywood celebrities to play the movie roles of my novel

I have time to write. I schedule it each day. I have the will to write. Sitting down each morning, I am ready, fingers poised to pour out the brain's inspiration. And some days, the brain rebels. My dog won't come inside when I call him; the brain won't form a sentence, or when it does, the sentence blows. DELETE. Try again.

Not sure what that's about. I know this, though. The Internet is the enemy. Some mornings, I have to get belligerent. This involves a trip to Barnes & Noble where the Internet costs money, where I have to sit down and write (or browse the new fiction--I REALLY am my worst enemy).

The things we tell ourselves, the acrobatics we go through....

They're JUST adverbs

noreply@blogger.com (sean a. scapellato) — Thu, 27 Mar 2008 19:58:00 +0000

In an earlier post, I mentioned my belief that writers cannot be objective about their own work. For example, I had a character utter the following sentence in dialogue: "'I'm bored," Sam said, stifling a yawn." Advice: if a character says he's bored, chances are, the reader is, too. Bad writing. Didn't even catch it, but a reader did.

Any great writing teacher, will tell you: avoid adverbs (to which I want to raise my hand and ask, "Completely?"). I had a teacher who said adverbs were like mice. They multiplied when you weren't looking, littered themselves throughout your manuscript never to be noticed again. And when do we notice? We're worried about plot, characters, pacing, suspense, setting, dialogue, arcs, titles, chapter breaks, names, realism, style, flow, book tours, the Pulitzer. Okay, well maybe not so much the last two. Point is, who cares about a pesky adverb?

Truth is, they are like mice. Want a different metaphor? They're artery cloggers. No single one shuts down the system, but get enough clumped around a verb, a paragraph, a novel, and you'll have full cardiac arrest (read: rejection).

One of the worst adverbs is the qualifier VERY. I just ran a check on the first third of my novel (40,000 words). I have 23 very's. Many are in dialogue, but I'm thinking at least 20 can go.

23 out of 40,000 isn't terrible, but I can give myself no pats on the back yet, for I've happened on the most nefarious of adverbs: JUST. Ran the check (Oh, God, the horror). I have 165. And that's only the first third of my manuscript. Do I self-flagellate, cut my wrists, buy a headstone? No, but there will be an amphibious landing on the black sands of JUST, and we will plant the Good Writing flag on Mt. Adverbial if it kills us. Sorry. Melodramatic digression.

As writers, we must pay attention. We don't see what we aren't looking for. Test the theory and look at this video. Pay careful attention. When you see how right I am, then stage your own amphibious assault. (adverb count on this post: 15. Jeesh).

Critiquing: "I just don't get it"

noreply@blogger.com (sean a. scapellato) — Tue, 25 Mar 2008 16:36:00 +0000

A student of mine wrote an honest e-mail saying that a critque I provided on a fiction piece irritated him. Certainly, I wasn't trying to irritate him. He asked my opinion, I gave it, and he didn't like what I said. Should I have been more encouraging? Should I have cited more well-executed turns of phrase?

It begs a good question: why invite criticism of work when it will only irritate or crush the fragile ego that every writer keeps hidden in a well-buffered room of the brain? We spend years plying the craft, reading about it, improving our skills, and when it comes to feedback, we cringe and hope only that it's softer than the last round. It seems ludicrous we'd put ourselves through such torture, only to make the suggested improvements and submit it again. It's asking someone to tell you your face is ugly when you think you're making the best of what you have. Flannery O'Connor when asked if writing programs were stifling too many young writers uttered her now famous phrase: "My opinion is that they don't stifle enough of them. There's many a best seller that could have been prevented by a good teacher." That's a real pick-me-up, isn't it?

And how hard is it to stomach criticism when the critiquer just doesn't get it or is not of the same caliber writer as you? Maybe we should all adopt the Kerouac approach. Write insistent first drafts, don't change a word, and proclaim their urgency and the beauty of first thoughts. Or maybe we should listen to Anne Lamott: write the shitty first draft, thank the good Lord it's over, and revise, revise until the work is no longer an embarrassment. Maybe you're like me--an inveterate reviser, so attached to writing and erasing and writing again that unless someone yanks the damn thing out of my hand, I'll rip right through the page. Walt Whitman revised Leaves of Grass his entire life. John Irving rewrites until he drives himself to drink. It's a compulsion I know well (the revising, that is). And why do I rewrite like a obsessive compulsive? I'm avoiding feedback. Work that isn't finished is permitted to be bad. Works in progress, by their very definition, are not polished. Never underestimate the convenience of a good excuse. But like all things, we must come out of the room eventually, manuscript in hand, and share the words. If you want to see it published, you will indeed share the words and solicit feedback from a test audience. Even Spielberg would nod his head at that one.

The tough answer about criticism is you take it. Writers lack objectivity about their own work. It's why I can't see I've used the word really three times in one sentence (when I shouldn't be using the word at all). It's why I don't catch the bad dialogue ("Hi, Danny"), the cliches ("wide as a house"), or the dangling participles ("She had brown hair weighing a hundred and ten pounds")--this after reading it ten times through.

The way to accept criticism is to ask for it ONLY when you're ready to receive it. Ask for it too early, and the catalog of opinions will confuse you. Ask for it when you're too fragile, and you might give up. Employ the readers you trust, whose opinions you respect, and filter all results. But be careful. Just because a reader may not be as articulate as you'd like doesn't mean the criticism can be ignored. Sometimes "I don't get it" is more powerful than "your use of the objective correlative resonates with me."

We must all learn to leave ego at the door, to make the writing about the writing, not the writer. If you need to hear that you're wonderful, give the book to your mother. If you need to hear the truth, share it with a teacher or writing colleague. It's horrible medicine, but it's what makes healthy (and publishable) books. In the end, when my agent says, "We're not getting the response we hoped for with the novel," I have three choices. I can give up. I can curse the literary establishment for being tone deaf to my lyrical genius, or I can write another book.

I'd like to say, I just shut up and start writing, but in truth, I give up (for about a month). Then I throw darts at a map of New York City for about another month. And then (alas) I get my ass back in the chair and start the next book. Flannery O'Connor wouldn't be happy, but my mother would.

It takes a year

noreply@blogger.com (sean a. scapellato) — Mon, 24 Mar 2008 17:56:00 +0000

Well, I started this blog a year ago, and now I think I'm ready for the first entry. I suppose this makes me either the world's most egregious slacker or perhaps someone neurotically (psychotically) contemplative. Was it Flaubert who was said to spend all morning inserting a comma and the afternoon taking it back out? That's me, only it's probably a sentence I'll end up trashing later on.

My father was always one for not doing work twice--an example: carrying the trash can to the door, only to carry it to the outside can later. It's a little funny I'd end up spending half my life doing double, triple, quadruple the work writing, revising, trashing, writing, revising, rejection, etc. When he asks how the writing is going, I tell him the words came out right the first time. This very second, he is calling on the cell phone asking me to proofread one of his legal brief. (I didn't answer. I'm so bad.)

Okay, to the point. I just finished reading an excellent blog by Kate Flora, a lengthy expose about trying to live the life of a published writer. Her words have pushed me off the fence of my Prufrockian indecisiveness. I had to share, and thus becomes my first blog entry. Aside from being scarily accurate and a touch depressing, Kate's piece is a must-read, a caveat emptor, to anyone thinking of persisting in this writing mess. As an old professor advised: "Quit if you can." And if you can't? Well, don't go reading Kate's blog with any sharp objects within reach.