Writing Tip 12 - Have respect for the craft...

 

 Artists need to work at their craft and writing is (I believe) an art form.

So my tip for this week is to have respect for the work that goes into writing a book. Often it takes years to write a book and to bring it to publishable standard. Expect that this will be the case. If it takes only a short time, and it is to the best standard you can do, good on you! Well done. For me, writing a book is a marathon, not a sprint. It takes as long as it needs to take. Mostly, in retrospect, the book it ends up being better for taking longer. The book it might have been if completed earlier, and the later version, are two different works. The earlier version will almost always be the less polished or accomplished one (although it is sometimes fresher). The trick is to create the best of both worlds.

Remember, once it is out there, it is out there.

 

Writing prompt:

Go back and read some earlier versions of your manuscript (especially if you haven't looked at them for some time) and compare to later versions. Try to be objective, to view them from the perspective of someone who is coming to the work for the first time. What is better in the second version? What is worse?

Keep writing and honing your skill!

Perth Writers Festival - Saturday

So much to do. So little time.

The Perth Writers Festival, held in the grounds of the University of Western Australia, features a series of small tents, shade sails, and sprawling trees, marquees and food vans, and more permanent venues - the Octagon and Dolphin Theatres, the University club and the magnificent Winthrop Hall, most of which have some sort of air conditioning, which is a relief at he moment because of the run of days above 35 degrees C. The event is becoming so popular that it could do with a few more places to buy food for those (like me) too disorganised to bring something. There are places to sit - chairs and tables, a few beanbags, benches, the grass... and some round wooden slatted things outside the Octagon that serve as chair, table, sculpture and love seat, all rolled into one. Shaded paths, ovals and tennis courts with the University students keeping fit and playing some interesting-looking games involving pool noodles and boxing gloves (sadly, not in the same game).

At any one time there is a variety of free and ticketed events to choose from and half an hour between events to walk to the next venue, or buy a cup of coffee. The ticketed events are reasonably priced at around $13.50 (or less) and we are being treated to some of the best in the world, in their fields.

Yesterday I hit the ground running, detouring first to pick up my adolescent charges, who were booked in to see two of 'The Game Changers' events, featuring the developers of blockbusters (I gather from my more informed charges, although the only games I play are Solitaire and Brain Trainer). You might recognise Assassins Creed, Far City 2, Chaos Theory, Everybody's Gone to the Rapture, Gone Home. And more. You might recognise the names of Jill Murray, Clint Hocking, Guy Gadney, Bajo, Dan Pinchbeck, Steve Gaynor, and Dan Golding.  I dropped the boys off, pointed them in the direction of the venue, and hotfooted it to a Fremantle Press breakfast arranged by the tireless and talented people who make that undertaking the great thing that it is. Those of us who had books published in the last year had the opportunity to 'speed date' by each giving a 3 minute pitch to representatives of schools, libraries and other organisations that might like to have us come along to talk with students, other writers, and other readers.

I had thought of seeing Eleanor Catton's session at 11.30. she is the remarkable young new Zealander who is the youngest person to ever win the Man Booker prize. Instead I opted for some bonding time and a steep learning curve and sat in on the second of The Game Changers - 'What the Player Wants'. I'm trying to get my head around the world view of the gamer without actually doing the games, but not sure that this is even possible. The gamers (some pretty smart cookie kids, and some older 'kids') were enthralled, and even an old stick-in-the-mud like me found the session entertaining, although I felt that I needed to do some serious language classes to grasp the subtleties.

I wasn't going to miss Anne Summers and Carmen Lawrence for anything though. They were on at 1pm in Winthrop Hall, and about 500 people attended to hear them discuss The Misogyny Factor. If you want to hear Anne Summers speaking go here, and if you want to see her free on-line articles, go here. The publication is called The looking Glass.

Sunday is the last day of the Writers Festival - though not the Festival of Perth which features music, theatre, visual arts, dance, and so much more (imagine whatever you'd like here). If you are in the area, I would urge you to go along to something. It is all good and it nourishes the soul.

Perth Writers Festival - the story so far...

Last night Perth Writers Festival kicked off with a great talk by Lionel Shriver: on Literature and Religion, in which she commented on the dearth of serious (or reliable) religious figures in her own fiction. Seems she tends to kill them off but has them lose their faith first. Lionel Shriver is an accomplished speaker, witty, mind like a steel trap, and a great performer. She treated the audience to excerpts of her novels - some of the sections that related to religion - read expertly, and causing at least this audience member to suspect that more of her preacher father has rubbed off on her than she might acknowledge. Her father is, by the author's own account, a very good orator.  Wouldn't it be great to see Lionel Shriver in conversation with Martin Amis, who is another star of the Festival this year?

And the impressive names don't stop there. Today the highlights for me were and interview with Dame Margaret Drabble, the wonderful Liz Byrski in role of interviewer this time round, and another where Hannah Kent (the amazing young author of Burial Rites) was interviewed by Julia Lawrinson.  Great for gaining a perspective regarding the beginning of the writer's Journey in Hannah Kent's case, and not at the end (thankfully) but well along the way for the erudite Margaret Drabble. How generous these gifted and hard-working writers were with sharing their writing process, absolute (pure) gold for writers and readers alike.

All I can say is that we are very, very lucky to be able to listen to all of these generous writers, some of the best in the world, and to have them come to us.

Hooray! Perth Writers Festival is on again.

My favourite time of the year - a time to catch some of the world's best. Lionel Shriver was great last night, and looking forward to listening in on Margaret Drabble today. Hope to see you there! University of Western Australia.

Writing tip 11 - Take time to get to know your characters inside out

Character development is tip of the iceberg stuff. The little bit that finally appears in your novel is more stable, and all the more intriguing, if it supported by a whole lot of ballast under the water.

Or to continue using another well-used metaphor (because I like it) - think of it as sculpting. You start off with a great big block of something and chip away (or mould)  judiciously to create a great work or art (or a popular one). First you need to build your block.

In practical terms this means creating a deep history for each of your characters. What is it about their life experiences, where they were born, their personality, their physicality, their beliefs, that feed into how they respond to certain situations, and how they create certain situations? Very little of this needs to be used in the final cut, but the writing will benefit from the writer's deep understanding of his or her characters.

Why?

Consistency. Depth. Subtext. New leads for subplots. Inspiration with regard to the main plot development. A genuine process of discovery and the ability to share what the writer discovers through this exploration, with the reader.

Writing Prompt

Spend the equivalent of one full writing day developing a birth to current time history for each of your characters. Date of birth, family composition and dynamics, places they have lived, where they now live (in detail - the more the better), pivotal experiences, core beliefs, what has influenced their beliefs, physicality including any physical frailties, likes and dislikes, relationships, political beliefs and so on.  Once you have created this, consider how the information will affect what actually happens to them, and the decisions that they will make.

Women Writers Challenge - What is Left Over After and Sea Dog Hotel

Jung called it Synchronicity - where two causally unrelated things come together through meaning. In Art and Literature synchronicity happens all the time, and this time, at the start of my reading challenge. This is where I (along with many other active bloggers on writing) have made the commitment to read and review (a personally set goal of) a number books by Australian women writers this year. I'm reading ten and reviewing six.

I'm not sure if this counts as one, or two, reviews, but I'm posting these together because of an important thematic commonality shared by both novels, What is Left Over After, and Sea Dog Hotel. That is, both novels explore aspects of the mother daughter relationship where roles are reversed. The child is placed in a position where she is (at times) the default mother, required to take responsibility, and the mother is, at least part of the time, in the role of child.

It would be easy for a writer to tackle this subject matter in a way that creates a binary, a hardened point of view polarising ideas of right and wrong, either demonising the mother for not picking up her responsibilities or allowing a label of one or another form of mental illness to stand as a closed explanation for what occurs. It is equally tempting to cast the daughter as victim. To their great credit, neither of these writers does. The relationship between mother and daughter, the subtle exploration of these complex relationships, is undertaken with sensitivity and care in these otherwise very different novels.

Natasha Lester's debut novel What is Left Over After won the TAG Hungerford Award for an unpublished manuscript in 2008, which is no mean feat. I am not at all surprised. I found her writing to be accomplished, subtle, and emotionally sensitive. Natasha has since produced another critically well-received novel If I Should Lose You which I am looking forward to reading later in the year.

What is Left over After traces backwards and forwards through the life of Gaelle (Ellie) in a voyage of self-discovery after her baby daughter Aurora is stillborn. Much of the novel juxtaposes the relationship between Gaelle and her troubled mother, told as a story interwoven with magical stories of princesses and fantastical creatures that Gaelle's mother told to her as a child. Gaelle's muse, and witness, is a thirteen year old girl, Selena, who is befriended by Gaelle in Siesta Park, a tiny seaside holiday village in South-Western Australia. Gaelle has run away from her husband and friends in the months following the death of her baby daughter, and its self-destructive aftermath. I won't go into any more detail for fear of giving out spoilers.

The telling of Gaelle's story opens up spaces that cause us to consider both the saving grace and dangers of storytelling; its ability to transform, reveal deep truths, and act as a salve, but also how, if overused, it can seduce away from authenticity and closeness, making it difficult to know what is or isn't real, and difficult to engage in the moment; the grounded joys of the everyday. This is implied in Gaelle's case where her attempts to get at the truth are continually frustrated. Her mother uses story to avoid telling Gaelle (and perhaps admitting to herself) what she is doing with her life.

Playwright and novelist Marlish Glorie's first novel The Bookshop on Jacaranda Street was published through Fremantle Press. Marlish made the decision to self-publish Sea Dog Hotel as an e-book. The work and care that has gone into this new novel is self-evident. The story is primarily concerned with a mother-daughter relationship (Ruth and her daughter Grace). Young Grace feels responsible for taking care of her vulnerable mother but also wants to break away from her and return to a more stable existence, a door that now seems closed to her, as her much loved father has passed away and the family house has been sold. After the death of Grace's father Mother and daughter have wandered from place to place, never settling because of Ruth's apparent inability to do so, and when the story opens they are on their way to a tiny inland town in Western Australia, to a hotel ironically decorated on an ocean theme, hence Sea Dog Hotel. Ruth has bought the hotel, sight unseen, from the Internet.

As the story unfolds, we learn more about Ruth and her daughter, the story of the town and its inhabitants, and each becomes a catalyst for growth and change in the other.

Marlish Glorie's experience as a playwright comes to the fore as she explores these various characters and deftly employs dialogue in the vernacular, and  in the process bringing in that laconic country humour and stoicism that seems peculiar to people in Australian country towns. It is a warm and thought-provoking book, and well worth the incredibly reasonable e-book price which you can check out at Amazon.

Writing tip 10 - Season your text with an extreme scene, or two

Everyone likes a little seasoning. Some people like a lot. Whether it is pepper and salt, or the hottest chillies, it is good to have one or two highly seasoned scenes in your novel.

The difficulty with seasoning is knowing how much is too much, or too little. In a first draft I would suggest that where the text is restrained and pulled back, one judiciously placed scene of extreme emotional stakes, can lift interest, and keep readers on their toes. While it might come across as too much, or as melodramatic on first writing, it can be worked and pulled back  once you get to the editing process.

I think the key to writing a highly charged scene is to hint at, or foreshadow, the event earlier in the text, and to concentrate on the what (action, dialogue) rather than the how and why (adjective and explanation).

Writing prompt

Find a couple of novels that use dramatic scenes well and study what it is that makes these scenes work. It might be emotional content, placement and timing, the way the scene is written, or that the event depicted by the scene alters the stakes for the protagonist.

Now choose a place in your text where you might like to lift interest and try writing a high stakes scene of around 300 - 500 words for your project. Don't worry if the first draft is awkward and melodramatic. You can pull it back once you have the outline on paper or screen.

OR...

If your manuscript is too well seasoned with dramatic text, try pulling back a section of high drama that isn't working. Consider that light and shade in a story can help maintain interest.

Random Musings on Point of View and Theory of Mind

I've been grappling with some of the small 'p' political implications of point of view lately so I hope you will bear with me.

Currently I'm writing a novel from the points of view of a number of different characters, third person perspective, limited omniscient, I think it's officially called.

As I write I've been thinking about what psychologists (and others) call 'theory of mind' - a capacity that usually emerges in childhood, and which is based on the growing awareness that other people are independent, thinking, volitional beings.  Knowing this helps us to imagine what life might be like for another; to inhabit their perspective in order to better understand and predict what they might think and do.  Deeply understanding that others have their own psychological worlds has survival value for the individual, but also for the community because it helps people to develop empathy and build the strong social networks necessary for social cohesion and stability.

I've been thinking about what the novelist might do with point of view, that other artists might not (for example, an actor - at least overtly, constrained as he or she is by the script and gesture). The writer can show the internal workings of the mind, how the theories people form as they interpret another person's actions and motivations are sometimes spectacularly wrong, or right. This becomes apparent as other points of views are shown, and misconceptions are exposed.

The use of point of view as a plot device or thematic device interests me, and I suppose has done for some time, linked as it is to the politics of self-representation and the representation of another's identity. Used judiciously, perhaps point of view can bring into focus the normally hidden issues of who is subject and who is object at any one time, and the way in which these move around depending upon whose point of view is privileged at a particular moment in the text. Manipulation of subject/object position of the characters can greatly influence what happens.

I am thinking of Point of View in this context as being equivalent to the subject position. The subject position is privileged. The subject has the speaking stick. The subject can put his or her point of view. The subject can interpret reality for the reader. The object of the subject's perspective is fixed in order to be objectified and interpreted, and so has a much less powerful position. The object is continually being recreated and reinterpreted by the subject speaker.

This happens in real life all the time, of course. You only need to turn on the News to see it happening. In everyday life, between people of equivalent power and status, there is a dance between subject and object positions, and with ethical people, with friends, with peaceful workplaces and so on, there is cooperation, consideration, forgiveness, generosity - all depending on the level of understanding and ability of each person to put him or herself in the other's position, and the ability and desire to care for the other and sublimate the ego, to some extent.

My feeling is that the writer needs to continue to strive to develop this capacity (and desire) if they are to have characters that ring true and come to life on the page.

Writing Tip 9 - Write with Love in Your Heart

Each character (if real enough) was once a baby, a small child, an adolescent (maybe they still are). Regardless of what terrible (or good) things a character might do as an adult, fully-fledged character in a work of fiction, I believe he or she will work best if the writer deeply understands the things in their life that have brought them to a certain point. In order to deeply understand something, my feeling is that it is best to approach with love (which is an open, accepting attitude) rather than with cynicism and judgement (which tends to close off possibility). The writing can still be gritty, edgy, unapologetic, if that's what is wanted, but along with that will be the sense of complexity that suggests a real person.

So this is my tip for this week. For fully rounded characters, aim to be better than tolerant. Fall in love with your characters - every last one of them. Judge the action, not the person. (Some clichés have an element of truth, n'est pas?) Help the characters to grow and learn, or to try, and fail, to grow and learn.

Writing prompt:

Choose your least favourite character. Imagine them (with your own strong maternal or paternal feeling of love and protection) as a newborn baby, then as a small child of three or four.

Create a deep history for them, significant, life-changing events that shaped the 'person' that they became. Try to really get inside the character's thoughts, feelings, and motivations.

Now sit back and think about what, if anything, might change in how they are currently portrayed in your manuscript.

A Tribute to our Canine Friends - Poetry by Taylor Graham

I love to go exploring, but recently it's been confined to some well-trodden paths on the internet - Radio National podcasts, Blogs of my fellow writers, TED, health websites when I'm feeling hypochondriacally inclined, and poetsonline. Poetsonline is a great site for people who want to stretch their poetry muscle. You might want to check it out if you'd like some inspiration to write a poem or two.

It was on poetsonline that I first came across the poetry of Taylor Graham. I'm not sure what it is about this poetry that drew me in each time I read her response to one or another prompt that the poetsonline site puts up on a monthly basis, but drew me in it did! Not so surprising, as it turns out. Seems she is a prolific and well-loved established poet.  Anyway, in my ignorance of this last fact, I followed her link and emailed her to ask if she had any publications. At that time she had something coming up, she told me a little about it, it sounded fascinating, so at my request she put me on the list to let me know when her new volume would be launched. That particular birth happened towards the end of last year, and I placed my order.

The big day arrived about a month ago. It's still exciting getting mail in the post that isn't a bill or an advertisement, isn't it? I opened my package to find two volumes - What the Wind Says, and Walking the Puppy. Wonderful! I sat down to read it straight away. I wasn't disappointed.

Now here's one very interesting thing about Taylor Graham. This writer has devoted her life for the last forty years to training her German Shepherds to find lost people. I've tried photographing the back cover of What the Wind Says so that the longer story of this is conveyed, but what the poetry conveys is a deep love and understanding between her dogs - all individual personalities - and owner/trainer Taylor Graham. In the process the partnership has found and helped to resolve countless missing persons cases. It has inspired the poetry that seems to live and breathe within the pages of these books.

In Taylor's own words: (page 3, What the Wind Says):

Over the years my dogs have shown me so many things: footprint of a missing woman; my lost car keys; sunrise over rimrock; the spot in river where a drowned man was wedged under rocks; snake's-eye view of manzanita thicket; crevice in a collapsed building where crews might dig to find a trapped woman, alive; two boys playing hooky; sudden screamer-vistas not meant for tourists.

 Walking the Puppy is a slim volume which is written about a cheeky and strong-willed German Shepherd puppy called Loki. The dedication says:

for Loki,

the pup who wasn't like any dog

we've ever known before;

and who, not fitting our expectations,

created her own

The poems are delightful.

I hope you will seek out the Lummox Press website and purchase one, or both of these poetry books.