Tag Archives: writing

Writing Exercise #1: What Bothers You?

15 Thursday Sep 2011

Posted by in Writing

≈ 6 Comments

Tags

, , , , , ,

The first thing that comes to mind when I think of writers of substance (read: writers who create the kind of work that can support at least 90 minutes of thoughtful discussion) is that they see problems that really bother them. Social injustice is a big one; race, gender, sexual identity, and other power dynamics crop up a lot in the writing that has that ring of importance. Unfortunately, I am one step away from being politically illiterate. I’m straight, in the racial majority, and while I’m female, I have no dramatic stories of oppression to share. There was one time someone mistakenly called me a secretary because they saw me sitting at the front desk, but that’s about it.

But I still want to write something meaningful, so I took out a sheet of paper, set the clock for five minutes, and started listing things that bother me (no matter what they were). Here’s what I came up with*:

  1. “God” being an embarrassing word to say, never mind entity to believe in. I am religious, and I am rather intelligent. Not that I’d ever have the opportunity to verbally spar with Christopher Hitchens, but if I did, it frustrates me that he’d already think less of me for believing in God. This also goes for some believers who reject clear evidence in favor of literal interpretation–they make science-embracing, faithful people have to justify one or the other aspect of their belief. It’s annoying.
  2. Public schools
  3. Busywork
  4. The fact that I kind of like “Bridezillas.” How tacky 😛
  5. Cooking meat in milk
  6. Thoughtless cruelty
  7. Rape
  8. Rape or sexual abuse victims who go on to abuse others
  9. Narcissism
  10. Empty apologies
  11. Wearing shoes in the house
  12. Trash on a table
  13. People thinking they know a country just because they’ve visited (sadly, I have been guilty of this one)
  14. Patronizing people
  15. Laziness
  16. People who ask you how to do something, especially something simple, and then say something dismissive like, “Oh, I could never do that.” Why did you ask in the first place?
  17. Making inconvenient personality traits into illnesses (apparently being shy or introverted is an illness now)
  18. Wiccans
  19. Not having enough money, even though I work a lot
  20. Serial marriages and divorces.
I feel more strongly about some than others, and some definitely make better writing fuel than others, but I was surprised to see how many things I had a strong opinion about. I’m tinkering around a bit, trying to see which ones appeal to me most to start putting some new thoughts and characters on paper.
Now that I’ve put my list out here, I’d love some company. What bothers you? Make it as trivial or deep as you like–either way, I’d love to hear your perspective.
*A brief disclaimer, of sorts: I am not posting this list with the intention of being incendiary. This list was written as a writing exercise, and is not necessarily meant to condemn any person or group. They are opinions only, and I fully appreciate they may not be shared.

The Search for Substance

13 Tuesday Sep 2011

Posted by in Art, Books, Goals, Work, Writing

≈ Leave a comment

Tags

, , , , , , , ,

The first thing that’s struck me about my literature seminar this fall is how amazingly substantial the books are. That is, they offer something more than an entertaining story, or even a thoughtful one, and instead get at the kind of human truths that transcend their time or place. Oedipus is still current in the way that it raises questions of whether the gods are just, whether and where fairness comes into play regarding crimes and punishment, and how to understand the concept of a good man and a good life.

Disgrace, by J. M. Coetzee, is about men and women and sex, and the uses of sex. It’s about animals and obligation and the problems of how to live a life that has to involve giving and receiving a certain amount of cruelty. We’re going to spend hours tonight talking about meaning, not in a “what is the author trying to say” way, but in the “how does this book change our understanding of how we live our lives” way.

Perhaps (just perhaps) it’s unfair for me to compare myself to a Nobel Prize-winning writer, but I’ve always had a tendency to set my personal bar high.  I started by getting up early to write, took the next jump to sign up for 750words.com and its monthly writing challenge (I’ve only made it to 750 twice, but I’ve written every day this month and am pushing for the full 750), and I’m gearing up for NaNo. With word count building, my next logical step is to reconsider what it is that I’m writing. Again, I am aware Nobel Prize is a smidge high for a yardstick, but on the other hand, if you fail to reach it, you’re still probably going to be turning out something pretty good.

I’ve got some writing exercises I’ll be trying out in the next few days to find a way to add more of that delicious, meaty, philosophical substance to my writing. I’ll post them here. Stay tuned!

Published!

31 Wednesday Aug 2011

Posted by in Books, Goals, Poetry, Publishing, Reading, Writing

≈ 3 Comments

Tags

, , , , , , ,

I did it! Check out my article, “7 Simple Steps to Becoming Well-Read,” on Dumb Little Man (one of my favorite sites for quick, fun personal development articles).

Speaking of being well-read, this is going to be a great semester. I’m taking a Seminar on Literature and Writing with the scary Russian professor at my school (most of the time she’s really nice, but she does have a reputation for bringing a student to tears in class at least once a semester), and we are reading 11 books in 15 weeks. Expect my What I’m Reading section to get real highbrow, real fast, people. This week? Sophocles’ Oedipus the King, and a book of poetry called Supernatural Love. Stay tuned…

6 Ways to Beat Writer’s Block

17 Wednesday Aug 2011

Posted by in Writing

≈ 4 Comments

Tags

, , , ,

It’s happened, people. I’ve hit a wall. The weird thing is that over the last few weeks, I’ve actually had a spike in writing productivity. I’ve started getting up 15 minutes early to write, and have been churning out as much as 350 words even in that quick little sitting. Combined with some evening writing, I did almost 2000 words last week, not counting blogging. That sounds like the opposite of writer’s block, doesn’t it?

Maybe it’s not so much a block on writing as it is on writing fiction. Every day gets me 24 hours closer to the end of my MFA program, and makes me that much more aware that I need to have a book written in order to graduate (yeah, it’s still a year and a half away. So what?). A book of short stories, polished and thoughtful and linked enough in theme or tone or whatever to nestle harmoniously with each other. It freaks me the heck out. And being freaked out is not conducive to creativity.

The words need to come regardless, though, so here are my top tips for when I’m in a funk. Maybe they will work for you as well!

1. Write something else. Nonfiction works best for me–retelling a story from my life in as engaging a way as I can. I can always change characters or details later to fictionalize it and give it better narrative flow.

2. Read the headlines. News is cool because journalists and editors have already cherry-picked the wildest characters and most intense stories. One way to get a different angle (so you’re not just writing a fictional version of the news article) is to imagine how the story affects a family member, friend, or ex-lover of whoever is in the news.

3. Do something radically different for a day: refuse to drive, paint yourself all over with henna, cross-dress, eat backward (dinner for breakfast, dessert for lunch, breakfast for dinner and lunch for dessert), and so on. Write a story about someone who does that every day. Why do they do it? What problems do they run into?

4. Start a story-writing group with your friends. Assign a genre, a key word that needs to appear in the story (the more incongruous the better), and a deadline. Now all your friends are going to have stories written! Sometimes writer’s block is a matter of getting a solid kick in the pants.

5. Go to asofterworld.com. Click the “fnord” button to go to a random strip. Write the expanded, story version of what the strip says.

6. Write a story using only one vowel. It is possible, and it’s like drinking water upside down to cure hiccups–weird, but effective.

Disclaimer: I have not actually tried #3 myself, but it seems like it would work. If you try it, let me know how it goes!

That’s what I have to offer. How do you beat writer’s block?

The Art of the Pen (and Pen Case, and Writing Box…)

15 Monday Aug 2011

Posted by in Art, Writing

≈ Leave a comment

Tags

, , , ,

Making the call of whether painting is an art or a craft/trade is fairly easy. Someone painting portraits or landscapes or modern, abstract creations is making art. Someone painting walls or toys is practicing a trade. If they’re really skilled, you might call it a craft.

Making the same call for writing can be tricky. Are all books art? Is art a fiction/poetry/plays/memoir thing, or can other non-fiction books qualify? Is a beautiful cookbook art? What about pieces of writing that aren’t books at all, like handwritten letters?

The Walters Art Museum looks at these questions, makes a thoughtful face, and decides to do something completely different when it comes to the intersection of writing and art. I spent a Saturday afternoon with Andrew, checking out “The Art of the Writing Instrument.” Turns out, there have been artists for centuries, around the world, creating jeweled boxes for writing instruments, or writing tablets with paintings and poems meant to inspire, or exquisitely carved and jeweled quills and pens and ink bottles. Whether the user of these items wrote poetry, letters, or just doodles, someone believed enough in the power of words to make the tools beautiful.

Imagine keeping your ballpoint in this.

I found it at once inspiring and a little disconcerting to see all these rare, hyperexpensive versions of the tools I would use. Part of me wanted to go home and stick rhinestones all over an old necklace box and have my own beautified inkholder (later I remembered that I don’t use ink and am not particularly crafty, so don’t hold your breath for that project). Another part of me balked at the thought of writing with something that’s probably worth well in excess of a year’s rent. I grew up with the romanticized Starving Writer idea, the “room with a view” and cheap paper and pencils being all you needed to create something special.

What I think it comes down to, though, is the idea of consecrating writing. The artists behind the Walters exhibit work in a physical medium, so they consecrate the physical paraphernalia of writing. Many blog posts and books I’ve read talk about reserving a time to write that no one can touch–that’s consecration, too. It’s nice to think that whether or not I end up with something artistic on the page, there are people who find that simple act of creation beautiful, in and of itself.

Half of the year is over. List 10 things you want to do before 2012 begins.

28 Thursday Jul 2011

Posted by in Goals

≈ 1 Comment

Tags

, , , ,

A prompt from WordPress itself! Given that I’m in a lull, this might not be a bad time to recenter on my goals (writing and otherwise). Here goes:

  1. Frickin’ publish something. I don’t care what. It’s been a goal for so long, and it’s getting harder to be patient. (Note: I sent out a handful last week, and have more for next week.)
  2. Save enough money to take two classes this spring instead of one. I know we’ll be in the thick of wedding planning, but I want to graduate in spring of 2013, and I’m not going to make it going one class at a time.
  3. Take a trip somewhere. I’m always happiest to go out of the country, but local’s fine, too. I just want to explore more before the year is out.
  4. Get back on my 500 words writing schedule. I spent about eight months writing 500 words a day, and got amazing at it. Then I completed the novel I was working on, took a break from those 500 words, and haven’t yet been able to get back on that wagon.
  5. Be a better blogger. (More posts? More subscribers? Haven’t thought this one all the way through…)
  6. Figure out what’s keeping kids from coming to youth group! Participation is way down, and I’m getting kind of upset about it.
  7. Do NaNoWriMo.
  8. Learn some more about HTML and CSS so I can play with interesting website stuff.
  9. Catch up on my back issues of the New Yorker.
  10. Get better at relaxing? Am I allowed to say that? I do relax, of course, but it’s rarer for me to find myself in that state of happiness where I don’t have a nagging feeling that I should be somewhere else.
In conclusion, saving resolutions for January is for chumps. I’ll make goals whenever the heck I feel like it. I am, of course, always interested in hearing other people’s goals as well. I kind of dare Mr. A.P. Sillers to do a mid-year resolution post (earnest or in jest) on his blog.
The glove, Mr. Sillers, has been thrown.

Post-Show Blues

27 Wednesday Jul 2011

Posted by in Goals, Writing

≈ Leave a comment

Tags

, , ,

Great news–I got an A in Book Design! It took what felt like every spare moment I had (and then some, considering the several evenings I forewent dinner in favor of fiddling with the placement of a title or trying to learn what to do in Illustrator to keep my pictures from getting pixely), but the class is finally over, and yours truly rocked it.

I’m feeling a little adrift, though. When I was in high school doing summer theater productions, all of us in the cast used to dread the end-of-show crash, when we would wander aimlessly around the house, missing the rigid rehearsal schedule we’d complained about half the summer, and wondering what to do with these memorized lines and lyrics and dance steps that no longer had a useful outlet. It was the loss of a little identity.

Sometimes, ending a class is like that for me. I know, HUGE academic geek moment. But it’s true. I throw myself into these courses so hard that for eight or 16 weeks, I identify as a budding book designer or what have you. I’ve been taking it easy (or, you know, as easy as I can) the last two weeks, because I know I need a summer. I went to the pool a few times, actually sat down and watched an episode of So You Think You Can Dance all the way through (so those are the Top 10!), and on Saturday, my family and a representative sample of Andrew’s got together at my parents’ house for a BBQ engagement party. I even got to see my best friend for the first time in about six months (because we live in different states–neither of us is that busy).

I think I’m already gearing up to get some new project percolating, though. I’ve got stuff to revise, I’ve got a tentative idea or two, and I’ve got a “write daily” resolution that’s fallen by the wayside for too long. I’ll try to make time to do some more substantive stuff here when I can, but my real goal is to be able to come back here in not too long with some good writing news, so if I’m quiet, that’s why.

Mid-Year Report

07 Thursday Jul 2011

Posted by in Goals, Publishing, Work, Writing

≈ 1 Comment

Tags

, , , ,

It’s been a whirlwind three months! It’s amazing to think that only a few days after I posted the Quarterly Report, Andrew and I got engaged. I kind of wish I was reporting on progress in wedding planning: we’ve already figured out the guest list, set a date, booked the ceremony and reception sites, picked a pastor to officiate, picked bridesmaids, picked colors (more or less), started our registry, and scheduled tastings with local caterers. We are winning at wedding planning.

But this isn’t a wedding blog (yet :-P), and I had made myself some goals for the kind of writing work I had wanted to accomplish over the last three months. They were:

Submit 120 pieces

Write and revise 4 pieces

Okay. I have to admit I didn’t complete either of those goals as I had intended to. Here’s what I did do:

  1. Submitted about 10-12 pieces
  2. Began heavy revision of one story
  3. Started several stories that died after the 1st paragraph
  4. Wrote class material (Experimental Forms) that I ended up submitting to a contest
  5. Designed 2 completed book projects (Book Design) that definitely involved thoughtful revision
  6. Started full-time work in publishing
  7. Subscribed to Poets & Writers and The New Yorker
  8. Maintained reasonably regular blog postings and updated What I’m Reading and Home pages of my site

So while I didn’t turn into the warrior of submitting that I wanted to be, I haven’t been sitting on my butt for three months, either. What I think I’m doing well:

  1. With the new job, I’m simultaneously immersing myself in a word-driven atmosphere, improving my editing skills, and freeing up time to write (my commute’s two-thirds shorter now)
  2. I’m devoting significant time to creative work (design lately, analysis of experimental work and writing experiments of my own before that)
  3. I’m spending more of my reading time reading material that can help me with my writing

What I think I’m doing badly:

  1. I’m not actually writing
  2. I’m not submitting enough

Scheduling writing is a problem for me because, since so many of my day-to-day responsibilities are deadline-driven, anything that can be put off will be if I get into a crunch. I’m still struggling to make writing enough of a routine that I won’t drop it when academics or other deadlines need my immediate attention. I do still read every day, after all, so having that time in my schedule is possible.

Part of me really wants to give myself the same goals for the next three months (10 subs/week, 4 new polished stories gleaming on my desk), but I’m not sure that’s the best way to go. Instead, I’m going to try something tough, but hopefully more doable:

  1. Write and/or revise fiction at least five days a week, aiming for 500 words a day or 2 revised pages a day
  2. Submit at least five pieces a week (simultaneous submissions count)
  3. Keep doing the good things I’m doing (blogging, reading good stuff, working hard in class)

Hopefully I’ll have better luck achieving what I’ve set for myself in the next three months!

Is This a Step Forward or Back?

11 Monday Apr 2011

Posted by in Goals, Writing

≈ 1 Comment

Tags

, , , ,

I submitted my first three things of this month today. According to the goal I laid out for myself, these should be Submissions 11-13, instead of 1-3. I had a wonderful, wonderfully busy week, but procrastination creeps into the picture as well. On the other hand, I did get three things out, which compared to most days is a success. I guess what I am wondering right now is if I’m doing better than usual, but not as well as I want to be doing, is that a step forward or back? Do I mark this day up as a (small) success, or a mad scramble to cover last week’s slacking?

I’ve historically struggled with how to judge my own achievements. I tend to have much higher standards for myself than for other people around me, so that the fact that I think a fellow student or co-worker is doing a good job is not enough to translate for me into thinking I am doing well, too, even if I am doing as well or better. One of my best friends got used to me having a crisis whenever a new story was due.

“Of course it won’t be a train wreck,” she’d say. “How do I know? Nothing else has been a train wreck so far, and you are working really hard on this.”

And when I do work hard, it’s true, I tend to do very well on the projects I take on. But is this working hard? If I do three or four submissions every day this week, I can catch up, so maybe today is good, but that still leaves all the other days to consider. What I think I would really like to do is join one of those writer’s groups I hear people talking about from time to time. Kind of like my MFA classes, except instead of pushing us to read new, good stories and try to write new, good stories ourselves, this group could just kick all of us in the pants to send things places. I’d probably still get paranoid about whether I was making any progress, but it would be nice to ask some more people if they feel the same way I do.

 

Quarterly Report

30 Wednesday Mar 2011

Posted by in Goals, Writing

≈ Leave a comment

Tags

, , ,

All right.  So I know the blog has technically been up since October of last year, but this January is the more fair mark of when I got started with this whole ‘develop a web presence for yourself’ thing. I’ve been trying to take my writing life more seriously this year, so I think it’s a good idea to make myself more accountable. We’re at the 25% mark in the year, and I hear businesses like to do things in quarters, so let’s give that a shot here, shall we?

Okay, for serious this time.

What I’ve Done So Far:

Blogging has gone spectacularly well, I think. I’m posting regularly, sometimes even more frequently than the once a week I planned in January. I’m updating several areas of my site–my What I’m Reading page has seen a few updates, and I even posted a mini-essay to my Stories & Things cache. Making the leap to post blogs to Facebook gave me a wild jump in traffic for a little bit, and then it fell off again. I’m reading other blogs here and there to learn about what it is that’s working there to keep people’s attention. Maybe there are elements that translate to other kinds of writing, as well.

Speaking of, writing ‘serious’ things (read, creative work that I intend to send out for publication) is a mixed bag. In January I was high on resolution-fuel, pumping out words every day like a machine. Toward the end of the month, though, I realized I was starting to get lost in the novel, and not in the good way. I had so many gaps between scenes that I was losing the thread of what I was trying to do in the story, and felt like I was just meandering. It stood at about 15,000 words then, and hasn’t grown since.

I did write the Story in a Day, but didn’t revise it, and a few pieces for my Experimental Forms class, as well as the aforementioned mini-essay, so I’m turning out some product here. I’m also keeping lists of potential article ideas to submit, and I’d estimate I sent out around 10 pitches and manuscripts this last quarter. Low as that is, it’s a step up from what it’s been in the past, so I’m smiling, albeit with slightly gritted teeth.

Where Do I Need to Improve?

The perfectionist side of me wants to say “across the board.” I’m nowhere near the ideal of getting published regularly, earning enough to make a noticeable contribution to my budget (or, um, anything), and living that daydream writer’s life. Trying to make that happen in one swoop, however, is utterly unrealistic and a bit stupid.

I want to be more intentional about my writing. I feel like I’m heading there with some of the things I’ve done so far this year, but other times even successes have felt like happy accidents. I want to be more deliberate about growing in this area, so I propose that in the next quarter of the year, I try to meet the following goals:

1. Submit 10 queries or mss/week, total: 120 pieces. This is really scary, because as you can see I normally take something like three or four months to steel myself to send out that much. I have a good list to start me off, though, and if I want to make this happen, I need to get serious. Just try for 3 months to keep that level going, and see what happens.

2. Write and revise 4 new pieces. My problem is that I like starting things, but my enthusiasm dims toward the middle, and really fizzles out when it comes to reworking a first draft into a polished product. I need to force myself to finish what I start, and take the time and effort to make it something I’d (gasp) let someone else read.

And I’m going to end the list there for now. Both of those goals are ambitious enough to keep my attention for a while, so let’s get on top of those and see what happens from now til June. Business meeting adjourned, and back to writing!