Brian Yansky's Blog, page 27
January 23, 2011
You Got to be You
The way you see the world and the way you communicate the way you see the world is very closely connected to the voice of any particular manuscript. Even the particular voice of the narrator of your novel sees that particular world in a specific way and communicates it in the novel, BUT this voice is informed by your sensibilities as a writer, too, what might be called the voice behind the voice.
The way you see the world is what is most unique about you as a writer and it is something to be cultivated. Sometimes I think writers suppress this out of fear that their way of seeing the world isn't what's selling or fashionable, that it won't have any interest to readers. How can you know? I don't think readers really know themselves what they want until they see it. If you persuade them that your particular way of seeing is interesting and unique, they'll keep reading. Maybe building an audience will take several books if your way isn't assessable to an audience or is very different, but you have to trust that you'll eventually reach readers that respond to your vision.
The way you see the world is what is most unique about you as a writer and it is something to be cultivated. Sometimes I think writers suppress this out of fear that their way of seeing the world isn't what's selling or fashionable, that it won't have any interest to readers. How can you know? I don't think readers really know themselves what they want until they see it. If you persuade them that your particular way of seeing is interesting and unique, they'll keep reading. Maybe building an audience will take several books if your way isn't assessable to an audience or is very different, but you have to trust that you'll eventually reach readers that respond to your vision.
January 16, 2011
Ideas 2
I think novels come from imagination, experience, and memory. Any of these might contribute to the work: start it, push it forward, add layers to it. For me, ideas come from these, but I think I need to define ideas a little before trying to write about them more.
When we talk about ideas, we might be talking about any aspect of writing. What first comes to people's minds when people talk about their idea for a novel isn't always the same. Some people might be thinking about a situation and others might be thinking about a theme or setting. Very different. So there are these big ideas that are at the core of a novel, that drive it, and that can come from all kinds of places.
In addition to these big ideas, there are more focused ideas such as those, for instance, about character. You're thinking about your character and you have ideas about what he does, what he wants, what he fears, and how he fits into the novel. Some people start with character when they start their novel and the character helps ideas grow and develop and helps the author find his story and his way through that story.
Things can, of course, change and this will change your ideas. For example, you think you want to write a novel about loss. Your character's wife dies and it's a novel about how he copes with this terrible and difficult situation, but halfway through the novel he meets another woman and he starts to fall for her (Where did she come from? Ah, the mystery of fiction and life.) And his grief begins to fade and he feels amazement and gratitude and guilt, so then the novel becomes about this experience. Maybe the novel then becomes about this whole journey to a new life. (And so the beauty of revision because you'll have to revise the first part with this revelation in mind because ideas lead to other ideas in a plot. They have to be connected.)
Ideas work on many different levels in a novel. I think it's helpful to consider this and to think of ways to connect them.
Or so I think today.
When we talk about ideas, we might be talking about any aspect of writing. What first comes to people's minds when people talk about their idea for a novel isn't always the same. Some people might be thinking about a situation and others might be thinking about a theme or setting. Very different. So there are these big ideas that are at the core of a novel, that drive it, and that can come from all kinds of places.
In addition to these big ideas, there are more focused ideas such as those, for instance, about character. You're thinking about your character and you have ideas about what he does, what he wants, what he fears, and how he fits into the novel. Some people start with character when they start their novel and the character helps ideas grow and develop and helps the author find his story and his way through that story.
Things can, of course, change and this will change your ideas. For example, you think you want to write a novel about loss. Your character's wife dies and it's a novel about how he copes with this terrible and difficult situation, but halfway through the novel he meets another woman and he starts to fall for her (Where did she come from? Ah, the mystery of fiction and life.) And his grief begins to fade and he feels amazement and gratitude and guilt, so then the novel becomes about this experience. Maybe the novel then becomes about this whole journey to a new life. (And so the beauty of revision because you'll have to revise the first part with this revelation in mind because ideas lead to other ideas in a plot. They have to be connected.)
Ideas work on many different levels in a novel. I think it's helpful to consider this and to think of ways to connect them.
Or so I think today.
January 10, 2011
Where do ideas come from?
Where do ideas come from?
I like to say I get them in a little store out in West Texas somewhere near Marfa.
I wish.
So where do they come from?
No writer knows. Every writer though has many, many ideas. They come when you're in the shower, when walking the dog, on the drive to work. Ideas are everywhere. So when someone—and they will if they haven't already—upon learning you're a writer says they have A GREAT IDEA FOR YOU, A SURE MILLION SELLER IDEA FOR YOU, and all they want is 50% of the profits when you write the book based on their idea, you can either:
a. laugh in their face
b. explain to them that ideas are the EASY part
c. call all your friends over and laugh in their face
d. laugh silently to youself but try to explain to them that ideas are the EASY part.
e. Pretend you suddenly notice how late it is and run away.
Ideas are the easy part but an idea that actually works for a novel is not so easy. Most ideas aren't enough. I would say no idea by itself is enough. The novelist Patrick Ness says he waits to write a novel until he has an idea that is strong enough to attract other ideas. I like this notion that you start with one idea and others are attracted to it. Another way of looking at it is that ideas grow off of it, and together they help you fill out the first idea.
One idea isn't enough. You'll get to page two or ten or twenty with one idea and then the story will die. You need to be able to attract more ideas, or add other ideas to that idea to develop your story into something substantial enough to become a novel.
I like to say I get them in a little store out in West Texas somewhere near Marfa.
I wish.
So where do they come from?
No writer knows. Every writer though has many, many ideas. They come when you're in the shower, when walking the dog, on the drive to work. Ideas are everywhere. So when someone—and they will if they haven't already—upon learning you're a writer says they have A GREAT IDEA FOR YOU, A SURE MILLION SELLER IDEA FOR YOU, and all they want is 50% of the profits when you write the book based on their idea, you can either:
a. laugh in their face
b. explain to them that ideas are the EASY part
c. call all your friends over and laugh in their face
d. laugh silently to youself but try to explain to them that ideas are the EASY part.
e. Pretend you suddenly notice how late it is and run away.
Ideas are the easy part but an idea that actually works for a novel is not so easy. Most ideas aren't enough. I would say no idea by itself is enough. The novelist Patrick Ness says he waits to write a novel until he has an idea that is strong enough to attract other ideas. I like this notion that you start with one idea and others are attracted to it. Another way of looking at it is that ideas grow off of it, and together they help you fill out the first idea.
One idea isn't enough. You'll get to page two or ten or twenty with one idea and then the story will die. You need to be able to attract more ideas, or add other ideas to that idea to develop your story into something substantial enough to become a novel.
January 4, 2011
language
Since at the end of last year I was making a plea for including "story" or plot in the family of fictional elements, and to that end maybe exaggerating slightly the emphasis put on language, let me say this year how important language is. Here's a quote I've used before but is, for me, one of the best. Mr. Mark Twain, "The difference between the almost right word and the right word is the difference between the lightening bug and the lightening." That kind of says it all, but here's a simple example:
I'm walking up a wide path.
I'm walking up a big path.
I'm walking up a huge path.
I'm walking up a large path.
Each of these sentences is the same except for the adjective. To me, though, the first is much stronger than the second, third, and fourth. It gives a specific image of the path while big, huge, and large do not. How a writer says what he or she says, how he or she rewrites to say it with as much clarity and precision as possible, is the foundation of any good story.
Or so I think today.
I'm walking up a wide path.
I'm walking up a big path.
I'm walking up a huge path.
I'm walking up a large path.
Each of these sentences is the same except for the adjective. To me, though, the first is much stronger than the second, third, and fourth. It gives a specific image of the path while big, huge, and large do not. How a writer says what he or she says, how he or she rewrites to say it with as much clarity and precision as possible, is the foundation of any good story.
Or so I think today.
December 17, 2010
Do What You Do Well
On the other hand, continuing with my last post about story being the poor cousin to other elements of fiction and beautiful prose being sort of the prince or princess among them, if I could write beautiful prose, I would. I think I can write clever prose. There are many excellent writers who write great and powerful books whose language is not extraordinary. It's always good, mind you, but not the main way they get their power. I would say that's true of most writers really.
I think what you have to do is figure out what you do well and make that work for you. I think what bothered me in graduate school was how many of my classmates focused on language to the neglect of story and other elements of fiction. The truth was maybe one or two could write beautiful prose (and this was in a large group of talented writers). Most just didn't have that gift. But instead of struggling to develop what gifts they did have they got caught up on language because that was what all the teachers praised most.
I was lucky. I got more than my share of praise and attention in my MFA program. But I think sometimes teachers and others might actually slow down development. Yes, we always have to try new things as writers. Yes we have to push ourselves. But we are what we are, too. Whatever talents or skills we can use to make our writing powerful and entertaining should be used.
And with that I wish you good writing and a happy holiday. I'm taking a little blog break until after New Years.
If you're bored and looking for some writer talk, here's a new page on my website with blog interviews I've done recently on Aliens and Writing. http://www.brianyansky.comblog-tour2010.html
Finally, I thought I'd try asking if any of you have questions or topics you'd like me to write about. I'd be happy to give my two cents on any topic I've got two cents worth of comments to make. Leave a comment here or at any future post or email me at brian@brianyansky.com if any topics or questions come to mind.
Thanks for reading,
Brian
I think what you have to do is figure out what you do well and make that work for you. I think what bothered me in graduate school was how many of my classmates focused on language to the neglect of story and other elements of fiction. The truth was maybe one or two could write beautiful prose (and this was in a large group of talented writers). Most just didn't have that gift. But instead of struggling to develop what gifts they did have they got caught up on language because that was what all the teachers praised most.
I was lucky. I got more than my share of praise and attention in my MFA program. But I think sometimes teachers and others might actually slow down development. Yes, we always have to try new things as writers. Yes we have to push ourselves. But we are what we are, too. Whatever talents or skills we can use to make our writing powerful and entertaining should be used.
And with that I wish you good writing and a happy holiday. I'm taking a little blog break until after New Years.
If you're bored and looking for some writer talk, here's a new page on my website with blog interviews I've done recently on Aliens and Writing. http://www.brianyansky.comblog-tour2010.html
Finally, I thought I'd try asking if any of you have questions or topics you'd like me to write about. I'd be happy to give my two cents on any topic I've got two cents worth of comments to make. Leave a comment here or at any future post or email me at brian@brianyansky.com if any topics or questions come to mind.
Thanks for reading,
Brian
December 11, 2010
Story
In Austin, Texas, it gets hot in the summer. You can fry an egg on the pavement. You can cook a whole five-course meal. If you stand in one place too long, you start smoking. Hot.
How do you get that heat in writing? Everything has to be working in your writing and that includes the oft maligned element, story.
Story isn't easy. People realize it's hard to write well, to use language well. It's hard to develop character, create an interesting setting, etc.. But story doesn't really get its due. It lives in the worst fictional neighborhood and isn't invited to the fictional elements' parties. Its job is undesirable. It's the garbage collector of fiction.
Story is, in fact, seriously undervalued, particularly in MFA programs (at least that was my experience and seems to be the experience of many others). A lot of writers who write beautifully fail miserably because they have no story to tell or what faint story they do have to tell isn't told well. They expect us to read their work because they write pretty sentences.
I'm here to tell you—pretty sentences aren't enough( even though I love beautiful writing). You need all the elements of fiction, including story, to be working. I need them anyway—I need all the help I can get.
How do you get that heat in writing? Everything has to be working in your writing and that includes the oft maligned element, story.
Story isn't easy. People realize it's hard to write well, to use language well. It's hard to develop character, create an interesting setting, etc.. But story doesn't really get its due. It lives in the worst fictional neighborhood and isn't invited to the fictional elements' parties. Its job is undesirable. It's the garbage collector of fiction.
Story is, in fact, seriously undervalued, particularly in MFA programs (at least that was my experience and seems to be the experience of many others). A lot of writers who write beautifully fail miserably because they have no story to tell or what faint story they do have to tell isn't told well. They expect us to read their work because they write pretty sentences.
I'm here to tell you—pretty sentences aren't enough( even though I love beautiful writing). You need all the elements of fiction, including story, to be working. I need them anyway—I need all the help I can get.
December 4, 2010
intuititon
Technique is important. Learning craft is important. But it isn't enough. Of course you have to learn what you can, and then you have to bury it in your subconscious and find a way to get to that place when you're writing. But there are times when you should ignore technique, ignore your hard won techniques of craft, in favor of intuition.
Intuition is highly undervalued in our culture. We want to know the steps to accomplishing a goal. We want to reason our way to success. It just doesn't work that way in writing. Prescriptions for success in writing are published all the time, so why don't we have more great books? Successful people in many other fields, very smart people sometimes, who read these prescriptions for success, try writing fiction and are surprised and disappointed they don't work. Why aren't more of these people who are accomplished in other fields published? Why aren't more of them writing spectacular fiction?
Because there is no formula for writing a good novel.
Nope.
Writing is intuitive in many ways. You find what works for you through trial and error, study of craft, hard work, luck, but there is always an aspect of writing that remains mysterious. Sometimes you have to take chances. Sometimes you just have to trust your intuition.
Or so I think today.
Intuition is highly undervalued in our culture. We want to know the steps to accomplishing a goal. We want to reason our way to success. It just doesn't work that way in writing. Prescriptions for success in writing are published all the time, so why don't we have more great books? Successful people in many other fields, very smart people sometimes, who read these prescriptions for success, try writing fiction and are surprised and disappointed they don't work. Why aren't more of these people who are accomplished in other fields published? Why aren't more of them writing spectacular fiction?
Because there is no formula for writing a good novel.
Nope.
Writing is intuitive in many ways. You find what works for you through trial and error, study of craft, hard work, luck, but there is always an aspect of writing that remains mysterious. Sometimes you have to take chances. Sometimes you just have to trust your intuition.
Or so I think today.
November 28, 2010
So You Want to Write a Novel
Got this from David Kazzie's blog. I think it's pretty funny. Take a look.
November 27, 2010
writing advice
Here's my best advice about writing. Don't take anyone's advice about writing.
Not without the proverbial grain of salt or maybe a hundred grains anyway.
I love Robert Olen Butler's book about writing FROM WHERE WE DREAM. I think it is one of the best books about writing I've read (there are a lot of bad ones out there it has to be said) but there are many things in that book I don't agree with and can't use.
Why? All writers are unique. Writing is one of the most personal, idiosyncratic activities around. What works for one writer might take the life out of another writer's writing or at least lead them to do things that weaken some aspect of their writing.
Each writer has to find his or her way and take what he or she can from every source and leave the rest. It's hard but finding your own way requires going the wrong way a lot.
So should you take my advice about writing to not take anyone's advice about writing?
Not without the proverbial grain of salt or maybe a hundred grains anyway.
I love Robert Olen Butler's book about writing FROM WHERE WE DREAM. I think it is one of the best books about writing I've read (there are a lot of bad ones out there it has to be said) but there are many things in that book I don't agree with and can't use.
Why? All writers are unique. Writing is one of the most personal, idiosyncratic activities around. What works for one writer might take the life out of another writer's writing or at least lead them to do things that weaken some aspect of their writing.
Each writer has to find his or her way and take what he or she can from every source and leave the rest. It's hard but finding your own way requires going the wrong way a lot.
So should you take my advice about writing to not take anyone's advice about writing?
November 20, 2010
publishing
Forgive me. I'm in a ranting mood today.
I've been out and about more lately because my book just came out. I've heard various versions of this a lot lately, "I've written an awesome novel. I've been writing for six months or a year or two. No one will publish it because I don't know anyone. You know, it's the gatekeepers. It's a great book that would be a bestseller but I can't get past those gatekeepers." They go on to say everyone else is getting a big deal (but if you ask them who they know that got a big deal they will say they don't actually know anyone but they've heard, they've read someplace—big deals, everywhere). Why not them? Why not them? I think we all do the "why not me?" thing sometimes, so I sympathize, but I also think that media attention to a few big deals skews new writers notions about publishing.
I've got a few things to add to that.
The first is that I read an article not that long ago that said the average published writer wrote a little over ten years before he/she published his/her novel. Now, of course that's the average. You might do much better than that. I hope you do, but I didn't. And it says something, doesn't it, that it takes most writers that much time working on their craft before they publish. So, that's one thing. Learning to write well is a slow process. If you've written for a year or two, even if you've written some good work, maybe your work isn't quite ready to be published. Some writers do get to writing well very quickly but if you're not one of those writers, and obviously most of us aren't, you will get there if you keep writing with passion and a desire to improve.
Another thing: these deals people keep reading about are few and far between. People think there are deals being made all over the place and they're missing out. They read about the big deals online every week or two so it seems like they're the tip of iceberg, like there are many of these deals being made, but they're, um, actually the whole iceberg. Those few big deals every month are in the news because they are so few. The much, much more common small deasl aren't made a big deal about (ha) and the thousands of manuscripts that are rejected every week—you already know this—are not mentioned at all. I heard an agent speak recently. He said he got 5000-6000 queries a year. Last year he took on two new clients. I think that's about the number of queries my agent got last year, too. Now, to put things in perspective that agent said about 90% of the manuscripts he got, he could dismiss right away for various reasons, but still. Lots of rejection out there and very few acceptances. That's the norm. The big deal happens to someone, of course, and maybe you'll be that person but it's always a matter of luck and skill and the luck part, I'm afraid, is out of your control. Working hard to improve your skills though—that you can do.
Finally—are the best books always published and the others rejected? No. You may look at a published novel and think your manuscript is better than that. Maybe you're right. (Of course, it has to be said that writers are not always the best judges of their own work). However, a number of other factors are always involved in publication besides quality. And also we all view "quality" subjectively so it's a little hard to measure. For example, a person who hates all romance novels isn't going to be able to judge a good one from a bad one. BUT all of that aside, I think some bad books or so-so books get published and I'm sure a lot of very good manuscripts get rejected. It's the nature of publishing that manuscripts get overlooked and that some very good works that would only appeal to a small audience might not be published for that reason. That sucks.
BUT here's the thing. If you let yourself get too distracted by dreams of being published to acclaim and big checks, you'll miss out on what is most fun, most satisfying, most rewarding about writing-- the writing itself. And I believe that every writer with just a bit of talent can eventually, through hard work, through fighting to grow as a writer and writing a lot of words and reading, become a writer that agents and editors can't ignore.
Or so I think today.
I've been out and about more lately because my book just came out. I've heard various versions of this a lot lately, "I've written an awesome novel. I've been writing for six months or a year or two. No one will publish it because I don't know anyone. You know, it's the gatekeepers. It's a great book that would be a bestseller but I can't get past those gatekeepers." They go on to say everyone else is getting a big deal (but if you ask them who they know that got a big deal they will say they don't actually know anyone but they've heard, they've read someplace—big deals, everywhere). Why not them? Why not them? I think we all do the "why not me?" thing sometimes, so I sympathize, but I also think that media attention to a few big deals skews new writers notions about publishing.
I've got a few things to add to that.
The first is that I read an article not that long ago that said the average published writer wrote a little over ten years before he/she published his/her novel. Now, of course that's the average. You might do much better than that. I hope you do, but I didn't. And it says something, doesn't it, that it takes most writers that much time working on their craft before they publish. So, that's one thing. Learning to write well is a slow process. If you've written for a year or two, even if you've written some good work, maybe your work isn't quite ready to be published. Some writers do get to writing well very quickly but if you're not one of those writers, and obviously most of us aren't, you will get there if you keep writing with passion and a desire to improve.
Another thing: these deals people keep reading about are few and far between. People think there are deals being made all over the place and they're missing out. They read about the big deals online every week or two so it seems like they're the tip of iceberg, like there are many of these deals being made, but they're, um, actually the whole iceberg. Those few big deals every month are in the news because they are so few. The much, much more common small deasl aren't made a big deal about (ha) and the thousands of manuscripts that are rejected every week—you already know this—are not mentioned at all. I heard an agent speak recently. He said he got 5000-6000 queries a year. Last year he took on two new clients. I think that's about the number of queries my agent got last year, too. Now, to put things in perspective that agent said about 90% of the manuscripts he got, he could dismiss right away for various reasons, but still. Lots of rejection out there and very few acceptances. That's the norm. The big deal happens to someone, of course, and maybe you'll be that person but it's always a matter of luck and skill and the luck part, I'm afraid, is out of your control. Working hard to improve your skills though—that you can do.
Finally—are the best books always published and the others rejected? No. You may look at a published novel and think your manuscript is better than that. Maybe you're right. (Of course, it has to be said that writers are not always the best judges of their own work). However, a number of other factors are always involved in publication besides quality. And also we all view "quality" subjectively so it's a little hard to measure. For example, a person who hates all romance novels isn't going to be able to judge a good one from a bad one. BUT all of that aside, I think some bad books or so-so books get published and I'm sure a lot of very good manuscripts get rejected. It's the nature of publishing that manuscripts get overlooked and that some very good works that would only appeal to a small audience might not be published for that reason. That sucks.
BUT here's the thing. If you let yourself get too distracted by dreams of being published to acclaim and big checks, you'll miss out on what is most fun, most satisfying, most rewarding about writing-- the writing itself. And I believe that every writer with just a bit of talent can eventually, through hard work, through fighting to grow as a writer and writing a lot of words and reading, become a writer that agents and editors can't ignore.
Or so I think today.
