WORDS WORTH QUOTING

By Bonnie Stanard

There's a quotation for almost any subject. Some of my favorites are from Oscar Wilde and Winston Churchill. If I'm in a bad mood, I open my folder of quotations and get a laugh while sorting out issues such as Why am I in a bad mood?

I've taken the first half of a W. Somerset Maugham quotation as the title for a presentation I've been working on for the Shepherd's Center in Lexington—"Three Rules of Writing." The audience won't know it, but I'd never attend a presentation with that title (unless I'm giving it...) What's wrong? you may ask. Maybe I'm getting cynical, but writing rules are for seventh graders. A person needs guidance learning the basics, but guidance is not the same as rules. If you don't know what point-of-view (POV) means, you need to read advice. But don't listen to rules. Rules are made by "experts" expecting to aggrandize their reputation.

What writer would say there are exactly three rules? Why not 10? If you browse the internet, you can find a hundred. I'm tempted to ask the audience what they think the three rules are, but they aren't writers. If a writer should show up, I can only hope they will stay long enough to get the second half of Maugham's quotation, which will restore my credibility, as it does for Maugham.

Whether or not they are amusing, quotations provoke us to think. They put glitter on language and show it in its best dress. Here are versions of quotations that I've taken from my folder. Some have been altered to make them applicable to either writing or life or the writing life.

 

• Over prepare, then go with the flow.

• No matter how you feel, get up, dress up, and show up.

• If a relationship has to be a secret, you should be in it.

• Be eccentric now. Don't wait to wear purple.

• However good or bad a situation is, make it better or worse.

• The most important sex organ is the brain.

• When in doubt, just take the next small step.

• Cry with one or your characters. It's more healing than crying alone.

• Everything can change in the blink of an eye. Try to see it does.

• It's OK to get angry with God. He can take it.

• All that matters in the end is that you love your story.

 

The Shepherd's Center is an organization run by volunteers that provides mental and physical activities for the 55-and-older residents of the Lexington area.

On the Bedside Table

By Bonnie Stanard

 

I've been asked where I get my inspiration to write. It has taken a while, but I've figured out a response, which comes as close to an answer as I can get. More times than not, my ideas come from books. There's always a book on my bedside table (currently The Name of the Rose by Umberto Eco, and The Lottery by Shirley Jackson).

 

Several years ago I read Rest in Pieces by Bess Lovejoy and didn't realize at the time that a chapter about Moliere would eventually inspire a novel.

 

Rest in Pieces recounts the adventures of Moliere's corpse. The famous French actor was stricken on stage, was removed to a house across the street, and died shortly thereafter. At the time, the Catholic Church condemned actors. Most of them renounced their profession to a priest just before dying to get a Christian burial. However, Moliere died without a priest. No Christian burial for him. Louis XIV intervened and the Church relented and allowed a burial at night somewhere in St. Joseph's cemetery, but nobody marked the site. Even his wife, upon returning to the cemetery, couldn't find his grave. His body was lost. But an idea grew and my novel found his grave and a character stole his skull. I have Lovejoy's book to thank for sending my imagination off to France in 1672.

 

Here's a thought I'm having now. At present I'm working on another historical fiction about a person being held in a prison-like chamber of a chateau. It's become a challenge to develop this story, given a situation in which nothing happens. When I mentioned this to a friend, he enthusiastically recommended a book with just such a plot—"A Gentleman in Moscow," which he said was a story about a man held prisoner in a hotel. I've ordered a copy but do I dare read it now? Will it unduly influence what I hope will be my story? Might I subconsciously copy from that story?

 

We subconsciously and unconsciously and deliberately take information from books, which is one reason why we should read authors whose work we admire. We might find in another book a person, place, or plot that motivates us to develop a story.

 

If that happens, it won't be the first time. Take a look at writers who based their work on previously published book.

 

The Hours by Michael Cunningham on Mrs. Dalloway by Virginia Wolfe.

Ulysses by James Joyce on The Odyssey by Homer

March by Geraldine Brooks takes a character from Little Women

Robinson Caruso re-written by J.M. Coetzee (Foe) and Michel Tournier (Friday)

 

From Steven King comes advice that doesn't grow old: "Read, read, read. You have to read widely, constantly refining (and redefining) your own work as you do so. If you don’t have time to read, you don’t have the time (or the tools) to write."

LIFE EXPECTANCY OF BOOKS

By Bonnie Stanard

I've been looking for a second copy of a Christmas music book I've owned for years. Recently, I went online as usual and typed in "Christmas music book," and once again, the search engine didn't find the one I'm after. In the past I've bought substitutes but have been disappointed. The music is never quite so simple or the arrangements don't accommodate vocal ranges or there's more obscure than well-known songs.

This year I went a step further and typed in the exact title of the book—Frosty the Snowman and Other Christmas Songs. To my surprise, the search found a match. A couple of companies offered used copies, and I snatched up one.

This has me thinking. Frosty the Snowman and Other Christmas Songs  is still a great buy, but it has been abandoned by publishers, presumably because it is "old." After all, advertisers make use of power words (going-fast, bargain, fresh). Old is not on the list.

ENDURING INSTEAD OF OLD

But is it possible that the internet may convince us shoppers that old is not necessarily bad? For example, when you order a blanket on the internet, do you know whether it's a recently offered item or a dated entry? If you like the blanket, you may be able to buy the same one again in the future. Online vendors don't put time limits on their listings, and many of them are not the "latest" or "newest."

CRAFTY BUYING

I have in my pocket as I write, the sales tag from one of two skirts I ordered online from Amazon. It is the tag from the best one. Because it is online, I may buy the same skirt again in the future, something I couldn't do if I had bought from a nearby shopping mall.

So what does this have to do with the lifespan of books? Consider the route taken by way of a brick and mortar bookstore and traditional publisher. If your book can get shelf space in a bookstore, that story is often short and sweet (or sour, as many of us discover). Unless sales are significant, it's on its way out before it can settle in. This is particularly true if $$$ isn't invested in promotionals. And then it is buried in the cemetery of out-of-print or backlisted books.

A LONGER LIFE

On the other hand, your book can be found online long after you publish it. (We won't go into how difficult it is to be found online, but bear with me.) Think of it this way, the clock isn't ticking. Our books have the chance to gain momentum over time.

Of course this doesn't apply to time-sensitive merchandise such as fashions and technology. But when it comes to books, let's hope that publishers will realize the value of investing with a view to selling long term.

VIRTUE AND VICE OF HISTORICAL FICTION

By Bonnie Stanard

Let's face it. The dead don't own anything, least of all their own story. And even if they wrote thousands of words when alive to describe their own life, it guarantees them no voice in history, at least not to those of us who believe only one truth—our own. But there are those of us who credit those voices from the past with truth, or more precisely, with relative truth (yes, that's an oxymoron, but you get the idea).

Historical fiction is controversial, and I look forward to participating in a panel discussion on the topic at the Aiken Book Fair on Saturday, November 13.

There are basically two camps of writers: (#1) those who do and (#2) those who don't try to stick to the historical record.

What Historical Record?

Writers # 2 jumble events, use purposeful anachronisms, disregard dates and places, and change personalities of historical characters. The Underground Railroad (set in the antebellum South) by Colson Whitehead is a prominent example with numerous historical inaccuracies (forced sterilizations, the 1930s Tuskegee syphilis experiment, a building with an elevator). Whitehead has been quoted as saying he was after "the truth of things, not the facts." Mmmm...whose truth? 

Is the historical record fiction?

One argument we make is to question the veracity of the historical record. Historians, who have studied this question longer that fiction writers, continue to revise the record as more data are discovered. An example is the revisionist view of post-colonial history. In the past, countries that owned colonies were lauded for bringing civilization to primitive cultures. Today the cheering has turned to criticism about the treatment of indigenous peoples. Do revisions suggest the record isn't true or to the contrary, does it indicate a honing toward the truth?

"History is but a fable agreed upon"

This is a quote that is ironically attributable to several sources, most often Napoleon. The point is that the historic record is one that is agreed upon by educated, knowledgeable people. We can argue that the truth depends on who is telling the story (the history of wars is written by the winners), but the stories are vetted by enlightened historians. Our age is one of uncertainty and doubt. Everything goes gray, but should we throw up our hands and say no historic truth exists?

To take a more jaded look

By flinging dirt at famous personalities, we attract an audience, not least of which are publishers and literary critics. We've been making money off of the imaginary weaknesses and/or faults of celebrated characters such as Marilyn Monroe, Einstein, Frank Lloyd Wright, and Frank Sinatra. As Guy Kay wrote in TheGuardian, "These works can be ethically troubling but some are superbly imaginative." 

Free Expression

Does sticking to the historical record suppress free expression? What about the First Amendment? Should our courts decide what we can or can't write about? When our imagination conflicts with what is accepted as historical fact, which is more important? To stick to facts or go with our imagination and forget about the record?

When I'm writing historical fiction, I study documents, books, diaries, etc. about the place and time and use what I learn to write events, characters, manners, whatever pertains to a given scene. As I write, I feel as if I am time-traveling into a different era, and I try for an authentic experience.

The same is true when I read. I want to be entertained, but I want to learn about our past at the same time. Don't give me jumbled history. I want to think of the characters as my predecessors, and even if the history we study is shot-through with questions, it's better than one author's concept of it.

MAKING MAGIC BELIEVABLE

By Bonnie Stanard

Magical realism (MR) incorporates the unbelievable into the world as we know it. In other words, we writers convince readers that magic is as ordinary as life. After recently reading The Erasers by AlainRobbe-Grillet, known for his ability to mix fact and fantasy, I took notes on how he did it.

TheErasers is a mystery novel about a murder. Descriptions wander with the perambulations of the protagonist—a police inspector named Wallas who has been called in to solve a murder. As he walks from the post office to the police station to what may or may-not be a murder scene, his gets lost, goes in circles, or in one case, ends where he began, which I admit, tests your patience. These geographic twists and turns are accompanied by a vague time line, though the entire story takes place in 24 hours.

Signals crop up suggesting there never was a murder. Witnesses provide vague answers to questions. The description of the murder suspect fits that of Wallas, the investigator. A clock stops at the beginning and starts up at the moment of a murder, which may or may not be the one being investigated. Ambiguity requires us readers to supply our own facts along with what is given. We think we know what's going on, but do we?

WRITING TECHNIQUES TO NORMALIZE THE FANTASTIC

Ideas I've taken from The Eraser that blur the lines of reality.

—Suppositions. As the inspector summarizes the situation to a police officer, we realize that his facts are actually presumptions. Nonetheless, the inspector takes action based on presumptions, though the question persists about what is real.
— Conditional verbs, e.g., could, may, might. In most fiction, these words are dead-weights that slow down the action, but in this instance, they add an element of unreliability.
—Recurring adjectives. To describe different people and/or places using similar adjectives allows a range of uncertainty. Doppelgangers are good.
— Unemotional narrative voice. In other words, when the tone is cool, calm, and collected, the reader tends to believe... even magic.
— Point of View. Without bending the rules too far, a careless approach to free indirect discourse POV allows different characters to provide biased views, deconstructing reality. The POV may blink, but not so much as to dislocate the narrative point of reference.
— Unclear antecedents. This is annoying, but I can see the point of it. There are times when I underlined the word “he” because it could reference either of two different persons. Lack of clarity sidetracks authority.
— Character ID. A close relative to the previous point is to delay referring to characters by their names in describing a given situation. Grillet uses terms like the man, character, customer, pedestrian. This adds fog to the scene, which launches doubt about the identity and/or nature of the character.

My favorite magical realism book is Life of Pi. Yann Martel's masterful writing will have you believing a boy on a raft after a shipwreck can survive with a tiger on board. (The book is better than the movie, which is also good.) Other MR books I've enjoyed are Love in the Time of Cholera; The House of Spirits; and Like Water for Chocolate.

An informative definition of magical realism can be found on Neil Gaiman's Master Class notes.

MORAL AMBIGUITY

By Bonnie Stanard 

There are those of us who call ourselves writers based not on the number of books we have written or sold but on the hope that we will make a difference to some reader somewhere. But what sort of difference are we aspiring to? 

I can say that my books have made a difference to at least one person, and that’s me. Each book has been a learning experience. They have forced me to explore worlds of the antebellum South and Medieval France. As a result, I’ve learned to appreciate the adage that the past is a foreign country. 

As I sit at my desk and think about my surroundings, I ask myself, what have I contributed to this place where I find myself? Did I make the chair I’m sitting on? Did I sew the shirt I’m wearing? Build the room? The house? Did I hammer a nail or install electricity? Build a street? Did I make my iPhone, create the internet? What have I actually done to bring about virtually everything I encounter and use every day? 

The answer of course leads me to realize my debt to our forefathers. The sweat and anguish of many individuals who worked together for centuries produced the advancements that give me the comfort and safety I take for granted. Perhaps this realization is one reason historical fiction appeals to me. It gives us a peep-hole through the concrete that divides us from the past. 

I’ve noticed that we criticize our ancestors based on expectations of the present with little notion of the cultural and moral differences that separate us from them. Today, historic heroes lose status regardless of their good intentions if they don’t conform to the sensibilities of the 21^st Century. They were products of a time when the meaning of good wouldn’t be found in a dictionary today. Our century is not just physically different from any other, it is emotionally different. 

It’s no exaggeration to say that our culture has been changed over time by gifted writers. Jane Austen pointed out that patriarchy is oppressive (it’s taking a long time to sink in). Charles Dickens told the world of child labor and the abuse of the poor. Dostoyevsky questioned our view of morality. Mark Twain, notably a humorist, took on politics. These writers have prompted us to look at ourselves critically. 

It takes genius to be as clever as canonic authors, but that’s not to say our writing doesn’t affect readers for better or worse. Even romance, sci-fi, mystery, or whatever the genre, has moral moments. It may be one sentence. It may be an inconspicuous tone. 

Our attitudes and values are daily shifting in directions based on what we see, hear, and read. In what direction are we going? We assume progress is positive, but the word is coveted as a marketing tool to sell good and bad ideas. “Improvement” may come at a cost that results in harm.

Will our novels throw light on destructive trends? Plots that exploit drugs, violence, erotica, and mayhem are exciting. However, without redeeming value, they impoverish our intellect and compromise our sense of right and wrong. 

I’m not talking about polemics as a plot, not about what we “ought” to do. I mean novels that surprise us with courage, honesty, and toleration. Will we give readers a reason to question what is going on with our world? 

WHERE TO FROM HERE?

By Bonnie Stanard

I’ve been preparing comments to make when presenting a scholarship at a high school awards ceremony at Pelion (where I graduated many years ago). The students of the Class of 2021 are looking ahead to college, jobs, and hopefully careers. I can’t recommend that a student take up writing (or any art) as a career. Artists have historically depended on benefactors to survive. Even today, to succeed it is more important to know the right people than to be talented.

In any case, there are those of us who call ourselves writers based not on the number of books we have written or sold but on the hope that we will make a difference to some reader somewhere. And for myself, I can say that my books make a difference to at least one person, and that’s me. Each book has been a learning experience. Each one has forced me into uncomfortable emotions. I have grown not just emotionally but intellectually. Research for writing historical fiction (17^th Century France, antebellum South) has made me appreciate the adage that the past is a foreign country.

As an aside, I’ve noticed that we criticize our ancestors based on expectations of the present with little notion of the cultural and moral differences that separate us from them. A hero is not a hero today if they don’t conform to the sensibilities of the 21^st Century. But that’s another story.

We writers have inherited meaningful books that have prompted us to look at ourselves. It’s no exaggeration to say that our culture has been changed by gifted writers. Jane Austen pointed out that patriarchy is oppressive (it’s taking a long time to sink in). Charles Dickens told the world of child labor and abuse of the poor. Dostoyevsky questioned our view of morality. H.G. Wells gave us a guidebook for imagining the future. Mark Twain, notably a humorist, took on politics.

It takes genius to be as clever as those authors, but that’s not to say our writing doesn’t affect readers for better or worse. Even romance, sci-fi, mysteries, or whatever, they have moral moments. It may be one sentence. It may be the tone.

Some contemporary writers have made their priority entertainment at whatever the cost. The resulting plot lines go from erotica to mayhem to retribution to violence. What of worthwhile values? What of conscience and justice? I’m not talking about polemics as a plot, not about what we “ought” to do. I mean novels that surprise us with courage, honesty, and toleration.

Our attitudes and values are daily shifting in directions based on what we see, hear, and read. In what direction are we going? Will our writing cave to trivial expectations? Will it throw light on destructive trends? Will it give readers a reason to look around and assess what is going on with our world?

Back to the awards ceremony. I’ll ask the students to look about themselves. What have they contributed to their safety and convenience? Did they make the shirt they’re wearing? Sew a seam or button? Make the chair they’re sitting on? Build the house they live in? Did they hammer a nail? Saw wood? Install electricity or plumbing? Did they make their iPhone, Twitter? What have they actually done to bring about virtually everything they use, need, and enjoy?

The answer of course leads us to the realization that we are indebted to the people who came before us. Some of them were creative and hard working and brought about the many things we easily take for granted. Some of them were destructive and left ruins in their wake.

BAD FICTION

By Bonnie Stanard

American Book Review has posted online “Top Forty Bad Books.”  However, this is not a list. Rather, numerous college professors discuss what makes a book bad. They get beyond subjective opinions, at least in the sense that theirs are educated subjective opinions.

Does “badness” belong to the book, the reader, or the situation of reading? John Domini of Drake University asks, “Why isn’t bad in the eye of the beholder? Why should a reader go with anything other than their gut?” Readers should go with their gut, but when it comes to giving a book a reputation, one opinion’s not enough.

Terry Caesar wrote, “Can we conclude today that there are no more bad books, only bad readers? Such readers don’t know how to make even the worst books productive.” What? Blame the readers? I can’t buy that. It’s taken me a long time to overcome reader-inferiority. For most of my life, I’ve thought myself a bad (read that moronic) reader if I didn’t like critically acclaimed books.

Terry Caesar also says that Zora Neale Hurston’s Their Eyes Were Watching God, is wondrously bad: stylistically precious, lavishly sentimental, ludicrous of characterization, and incoherent of theme. However, he excuses these problems with “Whether from the point of view of feminism or African American culture, Their Eyes is a damn good book.” Huh? Did the word bad just collide with political correctness and end up on the trash pile?

Though our workshop critiques sometimes get into technicalities, good or bad writing isn’t found in sentence structure or word choice. So what does make a book bad? These are samples drawn from the college professors.

• Does not have inherent empathy.

• Does not take risks. Is not curious.

• Makes direct and obvious attempts to call forth an emotion.

• Romanticizes two-dimensional, cutout characters.

• Plot is obviously manipulated.

• Its “message” remains obscure.

• All story is all pointless. Emotions give the story meaning.

• Makes mistakes in its representation of the material world (realistic fiction).

You could write a book on each of these weaknesses, which apply to concepts. It’s not the details they’re talking about. These mistakes originate with an author’s approach, even with their way of thinking. According to Christine Granados, “The novel is a blueprint into a writer’s soul. When I read what I consider to be a bad book, I notice that it is usually written by an arrogant person.” She explains with examples from Cormac McCarthy’s All the Pretty Horses.

Even books by celebrated authors have ended up on bad-books lists. For instance, novels by Kerouac, Hemingway, Jane Austen, and Milan Kundera are on Nicole Raney’s list, “14 Books We Give You Permission Not to Read.” 

Looking at the sampling of American Book Review’s list of fatal flaws, I see criticisms that suggest character goals for myself as a person. I need to have more empathy, curiosity, and subtleness. I need to be unbiased, spontaneous and audacious, principled, unafraid of emotions, and accurate in perceptions. Does this mean that if I improve myself, my writing will be better? Now let me see. Where to start?

Below are samples of books the professors dared to list as bad books.

Women in Love by D.H. Lawrence - It’s like someone put a gun to Nietzsche’s head and made him write a Harlequin romance.

The Genius by Theodore Dreiser – Dreiser had a mind so crude any idea could violate it.

Pierre by Herman Melville - so extravagantly mannered as to be barely readable.

Divine Secrets of the Ya-Ya Sisterhood - protagonists’ tribulations attributed to their alcoholism.

The Great Gatsby - manipulates conventions in order to be a “charming” book.

The Da Vinci Code by Dan Brown – formulaic knock-off of fascistic conspiracy theories.

IS YOUR WRITING HUMANING?

By Bonnie Stanard

Yes, the word is humaning but it’s new and I may not know how to use it. Among end-of-the-year lists are those that document words making their first appearance. Humaning shows up on 2020 word lists.

It was coined by Mondelez International (think Oreo cookies, Ritz crackers), and it’s getting attention—called ad copy genius by some and tommyrot by others.

In a news release, Mondelez explains that humaning creates a unique approach with real human connections, and will uncover what unites us all. Could we say that is an objective we fiction writers are chasing after? Are our novels being upstaged by a company selling Oreo cookies?

More Mondelez: “We are no longer marketing to consumers, but creating connections with humans.” Mmmm. Quite an assertion for a company selling crackers. On the other hand, it makes sense if you’re selling a story.

Mark Ritson, in an article in Marketing Week calls it “the greatest marketing bullshit of all time,” and “its new approach/philosophy/word makes them look very foolish.” When it comes to crackers, I can see Ritson’s point.

Whatever the controversy, humaning has made its way into the urban dictionary with a definition of “to act in a way that can only be described as human.” So this separates those of us who don’t act like humans from those who do? Then what is the opposite of humaning? Animaling? Nooo. (After all, humans are animals.) So is it planting? Maybe non-humaning? Un-humaning? Please! Don’t accuse me of non-humaning!

Marketing companies use and abuse language to persuade us to buy things. The challenge to copywriters is to attract attention at any cost, well, at almost any cost. Most of us fiction writers use a stable of well-worn words everybody understands. But copywriters resort to flaming language. After all, a fire is noticeable. It’s no surprise that words they add are a blister breed of language.

Marketing language plumbs the depths of our materialistic longing while appealing to the shallowness of our introspection. Take the word masstige (mass + prestige), another new word from the marketing industry. It means targeting the masses with prestigious goods. For example, car companies, such as Mercedes-Benz, have used masstige to sell mid-luxury models.

How about listicle (list + article)? Copywriters discovered that lists and/or bullet points quicken interest in products. If you’re like me, your attention span is better suited to lists than paragraphs.

Or thumb-stopping? Meaning to stop surfers from scrolling. Used by Pinterest, Shutterstock, and Samsung. The idea is that these companies help create online material for mobile devices that is so dynamic surfers come to a standstill.

I didn’t know it, but cutting-edge is out and bleeding-edge is in. What next? Butchering-edge? Killing-edge?

Another new one is immersive experience. This reflects the growth of technology and the inroads it has made influencing our senses. For example, a fitness workout app that resembles a game and provides information about your body.

Two new expressions I find particularly annoying: 1) purpose-driven lifestyle brand, a term used by Blue Apron, Chipotle, Goop and Godiva to describe themselves. I don’t need a company brand to make my lifestyle purpose-driven, thank-you-very-much; and 2) core competency, which means the underlying strength of a company or a person. This suggests that some people do not have core competency, something I find demeaning.

You can catch up on the meanings of some fun words, such as awesomesauce, beardo, amirite, nothingburger, and puggle by checking out Juliana LaBianca’s 2020 word list. 

CRITICISMS THAT HAVE HELPED ME

 

By Bonnie Stanard

It’s been said that Virginia Wolfe couldn’t write a bad sentence. Good for her, but I’m talking about me and my writing. When I began to write, I eagerly showed up at workshop with expectations of glory. I was so pleased with what I had written that I expected praise. Needless to say, I was in for a rude awakening. Didn’t understand it? Vague? Confusing?

I left the workshop thinking my poem only needed to be understood, not improved. I took criticism as the fault of the critic. After I got to know the work of other writers in the workshop, it became obvious that I was a weed (and a green one at that) in a flower patch.

Not to give workshops all the credit, I’ve learned the importance of interpreting criticisms. Obviously you can’t and shouldn’t take to heart every suggestion in revising your work. At the same time that I listen to criticisms, I filter them. Therein lies the challenge of figuring out if you need to defend or rethink something you’ve written.

A good critique is honest and respectful. I like to think I can take even the most damaging comment as long as I believe the critic is trying to help me and in general has respect for my work.

 HELPFUL CRITICISM

Most importantly, it will address specific passages or words. I listen to these:

— Doesn’t ring true

— Repetitious

— Lacks suspense or lags

— Discrepancy in character or time or plot

— Derivative, unoriginal (been done before)

— Weak construction (passive voice/cliché/wordy)

 

UNHELPFUL CRITICISM

I do not want to provide a guide for responses. That’s why questions to me about the work I’ve submitted are unhelpful. I’m not in workshop to explain what I’ve written. I’m there to get reactions. These comments may be honestly delivered, but how will they help me improve my writing?

— Questions about my motive for writing it

— Generalities like “slow,” or “great!”

— Weak/poor concept

— Suggestions about how to fix it (don’t assume I’m going to)

“Just don’t get it” is unhelpful if referencing a story or poem, but it can be helpful if said about a sentence.

Worse than unhelpful criticism is no criticism. If the room falls silent after I’ve read, I have to think my work has generated so little interest nobody cares enough to find fault with it.

If you go home at the end of workshop thinking your writing needs no improvement, maybe you’re a Virginia Wolfe. Or maybe you weren’t listening. Or maybe the criticisms were weak. Some people think it’s kind to say only good things in workshop without realizing they’re doing their fellow writers a disservice. Some criticisms that have upset me in workshop have turned out to be good advice once I’ve had time to think about them.

I’m not inviting my fellow writers to take shots at my work at the next workshop, but I look forward to being there and to hearing what they have to say about whatever I’ve written.

 

 

DO AUTHORS LOVE AMAZON?

 

By Bonnie Stanard

 

Can’t live with it. Can’t live without it. Is a great relationship going bad?

 

We writers, ignored by NYC’s legacy publishers, fell for Amazon in a big way. It seduced us with promises of newfound horizons, priceless connections, and a way to publish our manuscripts. We could forget the painful past. Didn’t matter that agents and publishers refused to accept our queries. Nor, as it has turned out, did it matter whether or not we could write. Amazon arrived on the scene and gave us the means to publish and sell our books.

 

Last week several organizations delivered a letter to the chairman of the US House Antitrust Subcommittee asking the government to look into Amazon’s unfair business practices, which have resulted in its controlling as much as 50% of all book distribution. The letter is signed by organizations representing booksellers (think independent bookstores), publishers (the big and little guys), and writers (Authors Guild).

 

They have accused Amazon of:

1) below-cost pricing of books to squash competition

2) refusing distribution unless the supplier purchases advertising

3) requiring publishers to offer Amazon similar (or better) terms as any competitor

4) requiring publishers to restrict price discounts to consumers

5) steering customers to illegal sellers of counterfeit/unauthorized books

6) manipulating discovery tools to make books hard to find without purchase of ads

7) steering consumers toward Amazon's own products

 

We might ask, “What does this have to do with me? I don’t publish books. I don’t own a bookstore. I haven’t written a best seller.. or second best or third best. So what?” Only the writer with no expectation of reaching an audience has nothing to lose.

 

We may be tempted to say this letter is just sour grapes from the losers. Amazon has taken on the competition and out produced and out distributed books. Now the losers are appealing to the government for help.

 

Should the government curtail Amazon? Let’s consider another question. Where do you buy quality books? Not at a local bookstore. We know what’s happened to them. Online alternatives to Amazon? Wordery, Barnes & Noble, Powell, companies struggling to stay alive or hoping Amazon will buy them. What has happened to retail booksellers?

 

Do we writers have viable options to Kindle Direct Publishing (Amazon) for self-publishing? There’s Apple, but if you go there, you have to figure out how to sell the book once it’s published. Amazon cleverly unites publishing with selling, a move that puts a squeeze on other print-on-demand (POD) publishers. In other words, those publishers survive by making a deal to distribute with Amazon. Which is what IngramSpark and bookbaby have done. Does this sound like a bottleneck to commercial traffic?

 

Regardless of how much Amazon has done for us writers, to suppose it can do no wrong is naive. Its position in the marketplace should be secured by innovations, not suppression of the competition. I like Amazon, but I don’t want to be forced to like it, whether to publish a book or buy a screwdriver.

 

 

 

 

  

SUBJECTING NATURE

By Bonnie Stanard

The Plum Tree Tavern publishes poetry that focuses on “specific images of physical nature...[which are] preferred over the writer’s judgments of the image.” I revised my submissions because of Plum Tree’s guidelines and one poem was accepted, which is not the point here. The guidelines suggest more than just an approach to writing a poem.

A TREE AS ME

Editor Streur writes that “the personification of nature trivializes nature.” Personification is evident in some of my poems which, upon consideration, I can see shows a lack of appreciation for the inherent value of nature. Just consider Joyce Kilmer’s poem “Trees,” which gives a tree arms, hair, a mouth and bosom.

POEMS WITHOUT I

According to Plum Tree Editor Russell Streur, “Once the writer injects his or herself into the picture, the poem often becomes more about the image of the writer than about the image of nature.” Obviously we can’t completely remove ourselves. What would be left? Textbook descriptions? However, he admits that “sometimes the I works” and makes the point that writing about nature is different from writing your thoughts about nature.

WRITING YOUR THOUGHTS

You can write about cockroaches until your fingers are blue, but it won’t be as fascinating as a photo or video. A strength of the written word is its ability to reveal notions and feelings that aren’t visible or audible. Personally, I’d rather see a glowing sunset on Netflix than read about one in a poem. Unless, and this is the caveat, the sunset is used to inspire human reflection.

NATURE’S DECLINE

We don’t write about a flock of blackbirds landing in the hay field or the vigor of kudzu because most of us live in suburbia where nature is imprisoned. We write our experiences. We write about a cardinal at the birdfeeder, which is more favorably met by editors who live in suburbia.

NATURE AS VICTIM

Nature’s beauty is for me to enjoy. Animals are to be eaten. Minerals to be mined. Plants to be cultivated. Do we look at nature as a means to accommodate our needs and comfort? Editor Streur’s guidelines warn us against putting our ego above ecology. It’s “the same arrogance that allows the pipeline to be built across the tundra.”

LAST WORD

A quote from Albert Einstein: “A human being is part of the whole, called by us “Universe”; a part limited in time and space. He experiences himself, his thoughts and feelings as something separated from the rest—a kind of optical delusion of his consciousness. This delusion is a kind of prison for us, restricting us to our personal desires and to affection for a few persons nearest us. Our task must be to free ourselves from this prison by widening our circle of compassion to embrace all living creatures and the whole of nature in its beauty. Nobody is able to achieve this completely but the striving for such achievement is, in itself, a part of the liberation and a foundation for inner security.”

TRYING TOO HARD

By Bonnie Stanard 

Any one of my poems has been through hundreds of changes and revisions. Sometimes I’ll change one word, sometimes an entire verse. Am I trying too hard to find the exact words or expressions to put forward a thought or feeling? Probably.

When submitting to journals, I have spotted sentences written by editors trying too hard.

— We want poems that press and push and ache and recede.

— I will be looking for verse that sets my skin on fire.

— send cutting, strange, and daring work

With guidelines such as these, it’s no wonder writers get the idea they should produce heart-stopping poems. Here are more guidelines to give writers a reason to either try too hard or quit.

— We want stunning and unusual imagery and language that compels.

— We seek to publish the innovative works of the greatest minds writing poetry today.

— We want dark and disquieting, fanciful and funny, surreal and surprising.

Let me see... what can I write that is dark, disquieting, fanciful, funny, surreal and/or surprising? Mmmm. It was a lonely, moonlit night with buzzards flying over the pizza kitchen where an ogre sprinkled parmesan on a poisonous crust. Does that fit the bill?

One submissions requirement reads like this: “We don’t want your problematic/hateful garbage.” So they only want unproblematic/loving garbage? Or they want problematic/hateful pearls of wisdom? Obviously the editors of this publication have read some really crappy poems and I’d better not add to their crap pile. Avoiding crap can spiral into trying too hard.

We hope to attract publishers with our work, but trying too hard to figure out what they’re looking for is a dead-end street. I have enough trouble figuring out what I want to say. This may be a leap into a taboo subject, but I fear that life is meaningless. In some weird way, I suppose I can prevent meaninglessness (is that a word?) by writing. The greater the fear, the harder I try. When I convince myself I’ve found meaning, I excel in doggerel.

Okay, so I Googled “meaning of life.” Julian Baggini wrote in an article in The Guardian: “the only sense we can make of the idea that life has meaning is that there are some reasons to live rather than to die, and those reasons are to be found in the living of life itself.”

However, in our search for meaning, some of us are trying too hard at “the living of life itself.” It’s a vicious cycle. I tell myself that I’m not going to figure it out, but that doesn’t stop the questions. Either my life means something or it doesn’t. The moment that I’m writing this is momentous to me. I think it has meaning. But does it?

Poetry tells us life is a mystery with no solution. It tells us to stop trying to find one. It tells us to settle for moments, for feelings, for epiphanies. I’m trying to do that, but I’ll have to try harder.

Good poems can scratch the surface and reveal substance. I scratch for substance and too often end on the surface. I hope some day to be able to write a poem like this one by Dan Collins.

LEAVING WEST TEXAS

Water may bless
this desert someday. Trees may spring
from this dusty soil; birds
may shelter in the branches—
and they will sing sweetly, maybe,
of terrible choices
they have made. But right now,
the only thing that matters
is this stop light
and this yellow line in the road.