what is the difference between being brave and being curious?
Tuesday, February 23, 2010 at 3:10PM watching & listening:
Harold Bloom recites "Tea at the Place of Hoon, " by Wallace Stevens
Listening & Reading:
Reading & Seeing:
Seeing & Liking:
Liking:
Alessandra Colombo
& Margaret Atwood's rules on writing:
1 Take a pencil to write with on aeroplanes. Pens leak. But if the pencil breaks, you can't sharpen it on the plane, because you can't take knives with you. Therefore: take two pencils.
2 If both pencils break, you can do a rough sharpening job with a nail file of the metal or glass type.
3 Take something to write on. Paper is good. In a pinch, pieces of wood or your arm will do.
4 If you're using a computer, always safeguard new text with a memory stick.
5 Do back exercises. Pain is distracting.
6 Hold the reader's attention. (This is likely to work better if you can hold your own.) But you don't know who the reader is, so it's like shooting fish with a slingshot in the dark. What fascinates A will bore the pants off B.
7 You most likely need a thesaurus, a rudimentary grammar book, and a grip on reality. This latter means: there's no free lunch. Writing is work. It's also gambling. You don't get a pension plan. Other people can help you a bit, but essentially you're on your own. Nobody is making you do this: you chose it, so don't whine.
8 You can never read your own book with the innocent anticipation that comes with that first delicious page of a new book, because you wrote the thing. You've been backstage. You've seen how the rabbits were smuggled into the hat. Therefore ask a reading friend or two to look at it before you give it to anyone in the publishing business. This friend should not be someone with whom you have a romantic relationship, unless you want to break up.
9 Don't sit down in the middle of the woods. If you're lost in the plot or blocked, retrace your steps to where you went wrong. Then take the other road. And/or change the person. Change the tense. Change the opening page.
10 Prayer might work. Or reading something else. Or a constant visualisation of the holy grail that is the finished, published version of your resplendent book.
Reader Comments (6)
this post is a sugarcube/treasuretrove
so many candies to explore
don't forget to bring the double AA batteries however
mines is solar
dont forget the moon though
I like the writing structure of your blog and it does a pretty decent job of presenting the material. bytdjn bytdjn - moncler shop 2012.
Christian Louboutin We all Christian Louboutin Ireland live Moncler Jackets UK in each of Moncler Jackets Sale the past, UGG Boots people UGG Boots UK will take GHD Straightener a minute GHD Hair Straightener to know GHD Straighteners a person, GHD Hair Straighteners an hour to Ugg Boots like someone, Ugg Boots UK and a day with GHD NZ the time GHD Straighteners to fall in GHD Iconic Eras Glamour Limited Edition love with a man Ugg Boots, and in the end Ugg Boots UK it, but it takes UGG 2011 a lifetime to New UGG Boots forget someone.