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The Magic Moment
May 6, 2014
So. You have something finished. A story, a poem or a well-rounded article. You have content, edited and refined – and maybe it’s pretty damn good.
Now you need to know what to do with it.
Writers who develop their work professionally may already have the end in mind when they start a project – they know where to submit it, they know what that particular magazine/newspaper/competition/publisher is looking for and have a game plan to tick every box on the guidelines. Many writers simply write what comes to them and think about the submission process later. Fair enough. But here’s where cold feet comes in.
In speaking to a lot of emerging writers, I find there’s often only one thing that many of them lack when compared to ‘veteran’ authors. It’s not creativity. It’s certainly not enthusiasm or dedication. In many cases it’s not even experience – I dare say there are many ‘emerging’ writers that have experimented more with their craft, and for a longer period of time, than other writers considered to be seasoned contributors. The difference is often one thing: the consideration of what to do after the last edit is complete. So that piece might end up in a blog feed, read and appreciated by the fanbase but eventually lost in the archives. When, maybe, it deserved a chance to be a contender.
It can be scary to think about those stories and poems being sent out, away from our reach and at the mercy of unknown editors and publishers. I know. I remember my first attempts at submission. I started off as a teenager still learning the process of targeting publications with the correct content. Heck, I was still learning how to write – the pieces I was writing at the time were far from ready. I’d spend days, or weeks, bringing a story to fruition and posting it off, waiting anxiously for a response that sometimes never came.
I took chances and didn’t get any breaks until years later. But in the early days after declaring ‘I’m going to be an author’, I probably put as much time in researching for opportunities as I did developing my ideas. By trial and error I gave myself deadlines and worked to them so that I could enter short story competitions that looked appealing. I’m not against the idea of writing only for oneself and only thinking about the wider possibilities after all is said and done, but I think in my case the focus on submission is what developed my writing the most.
If you’ve never thought about submitting before, or just don’t feel confident in taking that leap of faith, then make your latest piece the one to leave the nest. If you’ve never thought about putting it in a magazine or a competition*, I guarantee that sitting down and reading it through with a specific target in mind changes your perspective on whether everything on the page really worked the way you thought it had. And there’s no motivator like a deadline.
And then you’ll arrive at that point. You’ve gone over the story, the characters, and the line-by-line passage of text so many times you could probably recite passages backwards in a foreign language while juggling flaming torches. (Actually, if you can do that, for the love of god put it on Youtube.) So there’s no more stalling. The deadline is nigh. The piece has been correctly formatted, and it’s attached to the email or sealed in the envelope.
What are you waiting for?
If you’re confident enough to take the work this far, then not submitting would just be a missed opportunity. Who cares if it’s rejected? Their loss, really. And it gives you a chance to look at it again, maybe re-style the content to match another target’s criterion.
So let the bird leave the nest. Take the chance that someone else will appreciate it. Just because it might be rejected for publication, that doesn’t mean it won’t be appreciated – maybe even admired. And every time you let a bird leave the nest, unsure whether it’ll come back or find a home somewhere else, that’s a magic moment where you’re placing hope in your own work. In many ways that’s more uplifting than the validation of having the same work accepted. That magic moment, more than anything else, is what gives you the confidence to do it again and again, and grow as a writer because of it.
Beau Hillier | Editor, page seventeen
*And, of course, seriously consider submitting to page seventeen. Aside from the obvious fact that I want to see as many submissions as possible to the general and competition lists, it’s also objectively a good place for emerging writers to start. It’s unthemed, makes emerging writers a focus for content selection and is diverse in the types of content it will take.
Re …?
May 1, 2014
Here’s something you’ve read here before: REVISE.
The end.
Oh very well, there’s more.
Revise religiously.
There. Satisfied? No?
Amongst a lot of more inexperienced authors, there seems to be an almost overriding preconception that you write your first draft, send that off (sometimes without revision), and then when you get feedback, take that in and there, it’s done. The end. Happy ever after.
After, like, two drafts.
Uh uh. Here’s an example of the process required.
Step #01
After you complete whatever you’re writing, read straight through it. This is when your mind’s still buzzing with ideas, and when you’re likeliest to see any immediate issues it might contain – usually, where something needs to be fleshed out, or included, or candidates for deletion due to repetition.
An important sidenote: After you’ve read through and revised, you’ve (technically) gone onto a new draft. But guess what? Any changes you include are first draft. For example, if you included a whole new passage, that’s a first draft new passage, even though it sits in a second (or later) draft book.
Step #02
Repeat Step #01. Yes, right now. Not tomorrow. Not after you send it to your friends. Now. Reread!
A danger of revising is that changes (whether they be additions, deletions, or modifications) can look awesome in isolation, but fail to work in the greater arc of the narrative flow. You can only see this with a read from go to woe. Reading an individual passage in isolation shows you nothing (in this context) other than that individual passage.
Step #03
You might guess what’s coming now … but redo Step #01. And keep repeating it until you feel there’s nothing more you can extract (in terms of revision) from your piece. There’s no point sending something off for feedback, if you know the issues the feedbacker is going to cite. That’s just a waste of time (unless you specifically request of them solutions to an issue which has you stumped). You want feedbackers to cite what you can’t see for yourself, so address everything you can.
Important complaint: ‘Aw, but I can change things forever.’
What we’re talking about here is meaningful editing. If you’re changing
The chair was blue and gold
to
It was a blue and gold chair
to
It was a turquoise chair
to
It was a blue divan
well, that’s not all that meaningful.
Every writer needs to learn when they’re tweaking for the sake of tweaking.
Step #04
Take a rest from your story for a time – at the very least, a week. At the very least. It would be great if it’s for a month. For a book, even six months. You need to retreat from it, need it to fade from your mind (and imagination). The words which have been so familiar need to become like strangers to you, and only time can do that.
It’s amazing when you’re not thinking about it, how many ideas will occur to you. Surely, this is something you’ve experienced before. How many times have you sat at the computer, unsure how to phrase a passage, or uncertain what comes next, and then you take a walk, or are in the shower, or out shopping, and bang! There it is. That perfect phrase. The next idea.
We place pressure on ourselves to produce when we’re trying to write, and that pressure can be asphyxiating, so obviously when we’re not focused on writing, our minds are free to breathe and can realise what comes next.
If you do have ideas, record them. Bullet-point them.
Step #05
If you have bullet-points, knock those off. Then give your piece another read. Now that you’ve had some time away from it, you should be able to look at it with fresh eyes. Then reread and refine your writing until you can get nothing more (meaningful) out of it.
Step #06
Send your piece out to get feedback. This has been mentioned before: don’t use anybody whose constructive criticism amounts simply to, ‘It’s good’, or who’s negative (e.g. family) simply to be negative, or because that’s their way. Find people who can give you analytical and constructive feedback that you respect.
Another important note: Also, make sure you’re on the same page with them. Some people have a tendency to offer feedback as they would write your piece, rather than get in the vein of what you’re trying to do. It can be difficult to recognise when feedback is valid, or when somebody’s citing something which is fine, but they’ve highlighted it because if they’d written it, they would’ve done it differently. However, if you’ve got two (or more) people citing the same issue, it’s a good chance there is an issue, even if you think what they’ve cited just happens to be the greatest writing ever.
Step #07
Take in feedback.
Step #08
Reread. Reread. Reread.
Step #09
Repeat above steps as required.
How tedious is all this rereading, revision, rewriting and waiting?
When people think of writing – when they idealise it as a concept – they don’t consider all the rereading, rewriting, and revision that’s required, but that’s the reality of writing we all have to reconcile.
Some things you’ll write and they’ll come out so well, they’ll hardly need any work at all. Others will be a slog, to the extent you’ll contemplate they’ll need to be chopped and sewn together, like Frankenstein, or that they’ll be unfixable.
If you’re going to be a writer, though, just make sure you understand the work that’s required after you’ve gotten that first draft out.
You might think you’re producing gold first draft (hehe) or, screw it, there’s enough greatness in your piece that it’ll win over wherever you’re submitting it to and they’ll bow at the feet of your magnificence, but it doesn’t work like that.
Your market looks at your writing and, often, it’s easy to determine how much work has gone into a piece. If you want to give your writing the best chance, make sure you put that work in.
L.Z.
Rekindling the Relationship
April 29, 2014
There aren’t many writers out there that are doing their job solely for money or fame. Both are fleeting in this business, after all. Any writer worth their weight in literary goodness goes down this road because they’re committed to telling stories, to sharing thoughts and feelings, and to celebrate the beauty of language.
Passion for writing is a requirement. Being a writer is a creative business, and so it’s imperative to keep enthused about your own work. Sometimes it’s easy. And other times it’s a loveless relationship, and it seems like the magic’s gone. The nights are cold and quiet. That fleeting time together is filled with awkward stares (usually at a screen or page).
But just because there’s a rough patch in the relationship, that doesn’t mean it can’t be fixed. Here are some quick tips to help spark the passion you once felt for your writing.
Make plans together. Every relationship needs some direction, after all. Set goals – big goals. Submit to a competition or magazine you’ve never had the courage to enter before (*cough*page seventeen*cough*). Get that novel down that you’ve always had in the back of your mind – even if you think it’ll be awful. Having something to aim for, and a deadline to meet; is a motivator that is often underestimated.
Don’t keep using the same move – it’s getting stale. That isn’t to say you’re not good at it. You’re probably breathtaking. But who wants to go through the motions, without any variety? If your last five pieces of fiction have been about vampires, then you’re probably in a rut. Try something that you’d never normally go for – you might find it surprisingly satisfying. It might also end in bruises, but that’s okay, because the experience itself is often naturally invigorating.
Suggest a swinger’s party. This perhaps seems a tad extreme to some, but who knows where it might lead? Finding the right company to swap your stories with can be a motivator in itself. Aside from getting some invaluable feedback, sharing your work with other writers is encouraging, emboldening and a major step in your own method of expression. The right workshop or writers’ group can be a melting pot of titillating feedback and encouragement.
Don’t be afraid to spend a little time apart – as long as you come back together in the end. I always advocate that when things get too rough to even be in the same room as each other, a couple needs to leave at least a little space to breathe until clear thinking prevails again. What matters is that it isn’t for too long. You’re still a team, after all – you and your writing. But if the writing process if feeling more difficult than rewarding, and you’ve gone through every ‘writing is hard work too, get over it’ inspirational quote you can find for motivation, remember that the hard work still warrants a chance to clear your head and recharge the batteries every now and then. Absence makes the heart grow fonder, after all.
Every writer has moments where the passion they once felt has been left to slip away. Speaking on a personal note, I’ve had a couple of those times in my own life – I first dedicated myself to becoming a writer about ten years ago and I’ve had a strong mix of easy enthusiasm and gruelling frustration. I’ll have plenty more. And so will you, if you plan to be a writer for a long time to come. And keeping enthusiastic every time you try to write can be hard. That’s when you need to remember why you fell in love with writing in the first place – and remind yourself how far you’ll go to honour the commitment you’ve made.
It’s a lot easier than it sounds. In the right relationship, it always is.
Beau Hillier | Editor, page seventeen
Ten Excuses
April 24, 2014
Everybody has a reason for why they don’t pursue what they want to do.
With writers, it seems these reasons are even readier. Talk to many writers, ask them how they’re going, and they’ll tell you why they haven’t progressed. It’s not their fault, though. Something’s come up. But they’ll get to it. When there’s time. Or at a certain date (New Year being the common starting line). Or when they’re feeling better.
Well, here are my mini-diatribes addressing ten popular excuses (in no particular order) people don’t write – because that’s what they are: excuses, not reasons.
1. Waiting for an ideal time in your life
When is this exactly? When the kids grow up, move out? When things settle down? When the planets align?
There will never be an ideal time in your life. There’ll always be something. That’s what life does to you. It throws things in your way. You can just get over one lot, when a new lot’s dropped on your head.
Instead of waiting for the ideal time in your life, learn to operate in the parameters that exist now. It may be the best you’re going to get, and even if it’s not, at least you learn to work in adversity.
2. Can’t today, I’ll start tomorrow
Tomorrow always seems ideal. Tomorrow’s fresh and new and – as of this moment – unsullied. But there are lots of clichés about tomorrow – e.g. ‘There is no tomorrow’, ‘Don’t put off to tomorrow what you can do today’ – and that sort of stuff.
Well, they’re right. Recognise this excuse as the ultimate procrastination. In all likelihood – unless you’re on Death Row awaiting sentencing tomorrow – you’re likely to find that tomorrow will be very much like today. Deal with it. Take your opportunity now.
3. Don’t have a sizable block of time to write in, just dribs and drabs
I am sure people exist who have virtually no time – single parents for instance. But truly examine what you do with your time through the course of the day. I knew a single mother who bemoaned her absolute vacuum of time, and yet she always somehow had time to watch The Voice, or a variety of other reality TV shows which had about as much cultural merit as odourless, noiseless flatulence.
Look at what you do through the course of a day. There will be indulgences. They might be tiny, mightn’t amount to much, but if that’s all you’ve got, then that’s what you’ve got to work with.
Otherwise, look at getting up a bit earlier each day, five days a week. Yes, it’s horrible, but if this is what you want to do, then this is what you need to do.
Ultimately, writing for fifteen minutes a day is better than no time at all, and those minutes will add up.
4. Waiting for inspiration
There’s a name for these people: pretenders.
No doubt, we all experience inspiration – an idea for a story, or for a painting, or whatever the case might be. But inspiration doesn’t do the work for you. That’s up to you. You need to sit down and then do what’s required – write that story, paint that painting, take those photographs. In short, you must realise your inspiration and interpret it onto the page.
Even if you have writer’s block, even if your brain seems bereft of anywhere to go, just sit down and FORCE yourself through the act of creating. It might be crap. You might have to toss it all. But just the act of trying might cause you to stumble upon an idea, get your creative juices flowing, and train you in the habit of trying.
5. Book’s getting/gotten boring
So many writers love writing the flashy scenes, the ones that appeal most. This is why so many writers start so many things, yet never finish them – when a story’s new, it’s exciting. But something happens. It gets boring. So they think it mustn’t be working. But wait! Here’s another new idea which is exciting, so that must be the way to go – start that instead.
The ideas that are most vivid in our mind are easiest to write, but they’re usually only a small part of a greater story. There will be seeming flat spots, though – seeming, because sometimes those flat spots provide even greater opportunities for drama or characterisation or whatever our story needs.
Work through it. If your story’s gotten tedious and you have another great idea you’d love to work on, tough. Stick with what you’re on. Finish it. Nobody’s interested in an incomplete story. Get through that tough spot. If you don’t, all you’re learning is how to give up.
6. Too tired
Oh boohoo. Really: boohoo. Unless you’re actually asleep, or in a coma, then you have the choice to write. You might think your brain’s too exhausted, that you won’t be able to be creative, but just sit down and try it. Force yourself to get words out on the page. Even if your face wants to plonk down on the keyboard, just do it.
Once your brain’s going, you’ll be amazed how little your tiredness affects you. But it won’t get going if you just surrender to the impossibility of being creative when you’re tired.
7. Not in the right headspace
Well, what exactly do we have to wait for? Nirvana? The right headspace is an illusion. The ideas are there, inside, in your head. On the surface of it, you might be preoccupied, angry, distracted, any of a number of different emotional states, but your imagination is all that matters, and that’s in there, just waiting for you to mine it.
If you have to go through anger, frustration, distraction, sadness, amour, or whatever to get to it, then so be it. Accept that. Once you do, once you compel yourself, you’ll be amazed how often you can find your way back to the right headspace.
8. No good physical space to write in
Perhaps you’d like some rustic cottage in the woods, with a typewriter by the window, a fire crackling in the fireplace, and a glass of wine. Would this be ideal?
Certainly, you might have kids running around screaming, playing, you might have noisy neighbours, you might have a noisy partner, but you have to learn to make do. One published author said she made the family understand that when her study door was closed, that was her time and she was not to be disturbed. That might not always be an option. But you may just have to accept what you have.
If that means your best place to write is with the laptop on your lap (hence its name: lap-top), on the couch with your feet up on the coffee table, so be it. That’s your physical space. You might like something more ideal, something luxurious, but until that comes along deal with what you have.
9. Too many distractions
By now, you would be able to guess that there’s not going to be any sympathy for this as an excuse. Tell people to stop bothering you. Stuff some earplugs in your ears. Pick up your laptop and go sit in the toilet, or go to the library, or save your work on a USB and book a library computer to use. There are always alternatives.
10. Low self-esteem
This is common to many creative people. Many of us think our work just isn’t good enough. It’s shit, so why bother? Let’s give up. Forget about it. Well, if that’s the attitude, why try at all? Why even nurture the aspiration?
All we can do are all the right things – get feedback, get edited, revise, revise, revise, submit. It mightn’t be good enough. But nobody was born brilliant, and even your favourite authors were edited. Put your work out there. It’s the only way to continue to improve. And if you want to write, accept you’ll be rejected, that there’ll be criticisms, that there’ll be doubts.
Your story’s not going to write itself. The story on your computer isn’t going to submit itself. A journal or publisher isn’t going to ring you and ask for your work. If you truly want to do this (writing, that is), then do it, regardless of how you feel about your work. It’s the only way to get to where you want to go.
This might seem an unsympathetic blog. It is. Life’s intolerant, and the writing life unforgiving. So many people search for a secret formula to writing, like it will unlock some wellspring and all the work will do itself, or doing the work will be so orgasmic that it won’t seem like work at all. There. The End. Perfect. Well, it doesn’t happen that way – and hasn’t happened that way for anybody. Anybody who thinks it does happen that way is an idiot.
Writing is excruciatingly hard work – to sit there, pour yourself on the page, to bare yourself to the world, to pursue the perfect word, the perfect phrase, the perfect evolution from one idea to the next, and for this wondrous jumble of words, sentences, and paragraphs to not only make sense, but to be entertaining, to be worth reading, to be airtight, so people aren’t coming along trying to knock it down, like it was a house of cards inviting one good, swift kick.
You want to write, sit down and do it. That’s it. That’s the magic formula. Any time there’s a reason to not to do it, dismiss it, or find a way to work around it, or bulldoze through it. Idealizing perfect conditions is just going to lead to procrastination. It’ll lead to you always finding an excuse as to why you can’t do it, or why you should stop.
But it always come back to doing it, and doing it daily. Writing’s a muscle. The more you work it, the stronger it becomes, and the stronger it becomes the easier you’ll find it to work through tiredness, distractions, writer’s block, et al, and as you do that, you’ll find those excuses become irrelevancies in your life, and all that’s left is you and the story you want to tell.
L.Z.
No Offence?
April 22, 2014
One of the most recent books I’ve read has been Wilbur Smith’s Vicious Circle. I read a little Smith when I was younger and remembered the old-school adventures to be brutal at times but rip-roaring and jolly-good – something that would make a good change of pace from some of my other recent reading material. Change is as good as a holiday, right?
Too bad I found it downright unpleasant to read at times. The torture scenes, I was fine with. The underlying sense of chauvinism, I could deal with. Then the main villain got his backstory, and the reader is dragged into the abyss.
Without giving too much away, let’s just summarise that the backstory of this one charming SOB is a long sequence of shock-and-awe involving combined incest/paedophilia, prison rape, sex slavery and people being eaten alive by pigs. I didn’t take a dislike to Vicious Circle just because of the content of this sequence. It was because every scene was laboured over – we are voyeurs to every depraved act, and it comes across as tasteless and unnecessary.
Let’s stop there before this becomes a review of Vicious Circle. My point here is not to demonise this book (although let this serve as fair warning for anyone planning to read it). Rather, for me this is a launching pad into a wider discussion on explicit content in writing.
I’m no stick in the mud. Anyone who knows me, likely already knows that one of my favourite books is American Psycho: the poster child for protracted and gruesome torture scenes.
So, on to the obvious question: what is the difference between the depravity of Vicious Circle and the depravity of American Psycho?
American Psycho, to me, represents a theme-driven mode of storytelling. Every device – the killing spree, the repetitive lunches, the long diatribes on 1980s pop stars – are in support of the book’s intention. American Psycho is able to justify its explicit material as being in servitude to the story’s satire and criticism of 1980s society. Generally I’m sceptical of novels that raise its commentary to the same level as its story, and as an editor I commonly advise against it, but there are exceptions to every rule and, in my opinion at least, this specific title manages the balance well.
Conversely, Vicious Circle lays out a path of sexual depravity and violence that serves only to vilify the main antagonist far beyond what is necessary. One could take the American Psycho angle and argue that this character is meant to represent all the dark impulses of humanity, unfettered and without restraint in a world that eventually turns a blind eye to his actions. But it’s a secondary mechanism – worse, it hijacks a plot-driven book. The more direct argument is: we see the bad guy doing bad things because this is a very bad guy, and we need to feel good that the good guy is going to get the bad guy. Cut. Print. Good guy wins.
So when we talk about the application of extreme content, what does this mean for other writers?
It means that explicit material in writing is always going to be risky, even when the story demands it. By taking that risk, you’re already narrowing your audience by their tolerance of sex and violence. Always keep the audience in mind when writing darker material. A quick online search reveals that Wilbur Smith has evidently lost many fans with his latest offering – he took a risk, and perhaps it hasn’t paid off.
The human experience can include some harrowing trials, and accurate writing often must address the consequences of human cruelty and callousness. The difference is in the delivery. To come back to our scapegoat, Vicious Circle demanded brutality to complement its subject matter. But it was hoisted by its own petard due to poor application.
Treat these themes with respect. In one of society’s odd little idiosyncrasies, writers have a little more allowance with gore and brutality than with sexual depravity – indeed, some sub-genres of pulp crime practically make brutality a requirement. But both avenues of explicit material need a justification above and beyond ‘bad guys are bad’ or simple shock tactics. Otherwise you’re cheapening your own material in service of gratuity.
Beau Hillier | Editor, page seventeen