L.E. Truscott's Blog, page 6

Tell Me If You’ve Heard This One Also…

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I was still reading my dictionary this week. Here are a few more charming but seldom seen words.

*****

asseverate – to declare earnestly or solemnly, to affirm positively

brisance – the shattering power of high explosives

cavil – a trivial and irritating objection, to raise such as objection or to find fault unnecessarily

daubery – unskilful painting or work

eristic – someone who engages in disputation, a controversialist, a troll

farouche – fierce, unsociable, shy, sullen

glabella – the flat area of bone between the eyebrows

hie – to speed, to go in haste

illatim – drawing a conclusion

jussive – expressing a mild command

kerf – a cut or incision made by a saw or other instrument

lepidote – covered with scales or scaly spots

marmoreal – of or like marble

nictitate – wink

orison – a prayer

picaresque – roguish

quondam – former

redintegrate – to make whole again

scandent – climbing (like a plant)

telluric – earthly, terrestrial

univocal – having only one possible meaning, unambiguous

vulnerary – useful for healing wounds

wedeling – a series of turns made at high speed

xeric – relating to an environment containing or characterised by little moisture

yaffle – to speak vaguely, pointlessly and at considerable length

zymosis – an infectious or contagious disease

Book Review: A Year Rewritten by Andrew Rogerson

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I’m pausing my year of reviewing Australian female writers to sneak this one in and will return to the promised reviews in August.

*****

I saw Andrew Rogerson at an open mike night where he read two poems (performed them from memory actually) and as soon as I got home, I bought this book (which he had spruiked). It’s a high concept book of poems where he wrote a haiku a day for an entire year. For those who don’t know, a haiku is a Japanese poem composed of three lines with the first line containing five syllables, the second line containing seven syllables and the third line containing another five syllables for a total of seventeen.

Sounds easy, right? Not even seventeen words, just seventeen syllables a day. (If all writers could get away with this kind of workload, they’d probably be a much happier lot.) But, of course, there’s very little about poetry that is easy, writing it or reading it.

A Year Rewritten is a very short book, necessarily because of the concept. It took less than hour to read and it’s a little like a verse novel with one obvious difference: I had no idea what the story was. There were hints of love and loss and illness but the haikus were quite obscure. Poetry like this is often difficult to interpret, so attempting to string it all together in my understanding as a linear story proved impossible.

Having said all that, there are some really lovely passages.

“What a shame that he’d

Break his ring, eat his children

And cave your roof in”

“Change how you start and

You might just change how you end”

“Those who raised me would

Swim an ocean for me or

At least take a boat”

“I fear you will die

If you keep looking for God

In bottles and beds”

“Took your breath away

But filled your lungs with the truth”

“Do that thing you do

Where you turn something off then

Turn it on again”

“When everyone hurts

You walk alongside the ones

Who can match your limp”

“Friday night I go

To bed tired and thank God I’ve

Something to tire of”

“Stop breaking your word

And you’ll find you stop breaking

Everything else too”

“Wander streets like a

People junkie vowing to

Never miss a dose”

This is a book for people who love words, not stories. Perhaps the chosen format limited the possibility of a deeper understanding but the shallow understanding I do have has left me with a sense of someone who is only just beginning to explore his own depths as a creator. Certainly, the poems Andrew Rogerson performed at that open mike night showed a writer I’d like to explore further. Since he hasn’t published anything else at this stage, I might be waiting for a little while.

In a word: promising.

3 stars

*First published on Goodreads 28 June 2019

Spoken Word Night at Bunjil Place

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Last week, I attended the monthly Spoken Word Night at Bunjil Place in the south-east of Melbourne. My sister had attended the previous month and thought I would enjoy it as well.

“Wow,” she said, as we entered the free event. “There are so many more people here tonight. Last time, there were about ten.” It had increased to around fifty on this night. Word was clearly getting around (pun intended).

Anyone could sign up to speak, before the event or on the night, and a feature performer was also scheduled. My sister was considering it until the organisers announced that they were overwhelmed with people wanting to speak and weren’t going to be able to accommodate everyone.

There was genuine diversity among the sixteen speakers – women and men, people of colour, people with disabilities, various sexual orientations, a couple of global accents (although mostly Australian), various body shapes and sizes.

Almost immediately, it became clear that words – just words – wouldn’t be enough. This wasn’t just about speaking. This was about performing. And it was amazing.

Jessie was first. She told a story about a trip to Bunnings with her father and ended with ten lessons she’d learned from a $2.00 pot plant.

Wilma was next with a story about “Beauty”, a life model in an art class with scars “from scapula to sacrum”. She was my sister’s favourite speaker.

Then came Zoe, who read an extract from her self-published book about achieving your authentic self. And this was the point at which I realised there was a problem. First names only. It’s pretty hard to track down writers when you only know their first names. And as Zoe finished her reading and left the stage, she also failed to tell the audience the name of her book.

In fact, apart from the featured poet, who was clearly a professional, the only other speaker for the night who actually plugged themselves and their work was Andrew Rogerson, the fourth speaker. He did two amazing poems – “Serenade” (“I’ll consider you as colour in a life of shade”) and “Baby Blues” – and then mentioned his book of poetry titled A Year Rewritten was available for sale as an ebook. I bought a copy of it as soon as I got home.

Jamie performed three poems that sounded like songs her voice was so musical. Amy read a poem in honour of her best friend who had died aged nineteen. Reece rapped. Jasmine (“When Boys Treat You Like an Uber Rating”), Cassie (“Vagina”) and Benjamin (“Black Is the New Black”) read poems as well. Melody apologised for bringing her son, who looked about seven (“No one has a voice quite like mine”). Melanie got up when Melody was called and then awkwardly sat back down, then got back up after Melody was done to read “Song for the Broken Smiles” and “The Trapped Girl”. July was trying to face his nerves, not his fears, and performed a poem about finding out the man he was in love with wasn’t gay. Tara wore the most amazing pink, platform, patent Mary Janes with two straps on each ankle and dedicated her poem to Polynesian women (“Your existence proves truth… you are a child’s first word and a loved one’s dying breath”). And Tavani, a previous featured poet, read his ode to Instagram (“I, like a child with an imaginary friend, will never admit to myself that this isn’t real”).

The actual featured poet for the night was Soreti Kadir. Her work is available on Sound Cloud, she said. Odd, I thought, until she started her performance. Words on a page would not do her justice. Her voice is an essential component of the work.

And that was it. Two-and-a-half hours had disappeared just like that. Most of the performers were first-timers but even if they weren’t, I still would have considered them brave. I don’t do public speaking. I do everything I can to avoid it. That’s why I’m a writer. The last time I was required to do public speaking, I put together a PowerPoint presentation and recorded my narration over it. All I had to do was stand at the front of the room and push play on a laptop.

The next Spoken Word Night at Bunjil Place is on Thursday, 18 July (link here). I won’t be performing but I might see you there.

Tell Me If You’ve Heard This One Before…

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I was reading my dictionary as I sometimes do and came across some lovely underused (possibly widely unknown) words. I’m always a bit iffy about actually including these sorts of words in my writing because most people will just go, “Huh?” and have to look up their meaning (and that’s in the very unlikely event that they can be bothered).

So instead I will just leave them here to be admired in isolation. Enjoy.

aptronym – a name that reflects the job, hobby, character, etc of the named person (such as Mr Green for a gardener)

blandish – to flatter, coax or cajole

comestible – edible

declivous – sloping downwards

effulgent – radiant (this is one for the Buffy and Angel fans)

fleer – to grin or laugh coarsely or mockingly, to deride

goaf – the space left in a mine after the extraction of coal

hebetate – to make or become dull or blunt

idiopathic – of unknown cause (usually refers to a disease – my primary school aged niece has juvenile idiopathic arthritis, juvenile because she’s young and idiopathic because they don’t know why)

jugulate – to suppress by extreme measures, also to cut someone’s throat or strangle them

kismet – destiny

lilaceous – a lilac colour (seems obvious now)

majuscule – large (the opposite of miniscule)

niveous – snowy

otiose – idle

pinguid – oily, greasy, fatty

quietus – an end

recrudesce – to recur, especially a sore or a disease

sanguine – naturally cheerful and hopeful

tomentose – fleecy

uranian – heavenly

volitant – flying

wrick – to wrench or strain

xanthous – yellow

yaw – to deviate from a straight course (ship), to tilt from side to side (aircraft)

zephyr – a soft and mild breeze

 

And here’s a nice note to end on for those of us who wonder whether Microsoft Word really knows what it’s doing. It recognised most of these words, only failing on “aptronym” (which it kept automatically changing to “patronym”), “hebetate” (although it knew “hebetation”), “pinguid” (alternative suggestions were “penguin” or “pinged”), “uranian” (alternative suggestions were “uranium”, “Urania”, “Iranian”, “Iralia” and “Turanium” – who knows?) and xanthous (a few variations of “xanthium”). Maybe there’s hope for Microsoft Word yet.

Balancing the Need for Medication with the Need for Creativity

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About a year ago, I began seeing a specialist to look into some medical issues I was having, primarily joint swelling and pain and allergy-like symptoms. With a family history of autoimmune diseases, the likelihood was that it was just my turn.

I had blood tests and an MRI. No sign of osteoarthritis. The specialist suspected fibromyalgia (the diagnosis often given when doctors can’t figure out what’s actually wrong). I was put on medication that didn’t do anything but give me blood noses.

I had more blood tests. I was put on a different medication, an anti-depressant that can be used off label at low doses as tool for pain management. I had a massive allergic reaction. I couldn’t eat, sleep or tell when I needed to go to the toilet. My whole body wouldn’t stop shaking, my mouth was constantly dry and my legs wouldn’t stop jerking. And I still had all the joint swelling and pain and allergy-like symptoms. After ten days, I was advised to stop taking it.

I had even more blood tests. I was prescribed a two-week course of anti-inflammatory steroids. It was the best two weeks of my life, pain and symptom free. And it proved that whatever condition I did have was inflammatory. But steroids are a short-term measure. So I stopped taking the steroids and began taking rheumatoid arthritis medication.

I haven’t been diagnosed with rheumatoid arthritis or anything else yet. Most autoimmune condition diagnoses are a matter of elimination and I’ve only been taking this medication for a few months. It took my mum over fifteen years to get her definitive autoimmune condition diagnoses.

What I have noticed though is that I’m having difficulty writing. I’ve started over a dozen blog posts and haven’t been able to finish any of them. I’m not writing well. I’m not choosing interesting topics to write about. I’m struggling with motivation. I’m struggling with creativity.

I don’t know if the medication has anything to do with it. It could be due to the fact that it’s the start of winter and recent studies have shown women work better in warmer environments. It could be that I’ve only just stopped working a full-time job (which in addition to the freelance work I do was just about killing me) and my brain needs a break. It could be that the things I’m trying to write about haven’t had enough time rumbling around in my head to emerge in fully formed ideas.

I hope it’s not the medication. I don’t want to have to choose between it and my ability to create. I’m probably just being silly. But in the meantime, you’ll have to forgive me for any mediocre blogs I post. Fingers crossed, it’s just one of those temporary lulls that we all have from time to time.

Book Review: In the Quiet by Eliza Henry-Jones

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I feel like the subtext of this book can be summed up by these lyrics: “You love her, but she loves him, and he loves somebody else, you just can’t win. And so it goes, till the day you die. This thing they call love, it’s gonna make you cry.”

Cate and her husband, Bass, seemed to have had what everyone wishes for: shared goals, shared love, a true partnership. Everyone around them, however, is embedded in various stages of unrequited or inappropriate infatuation and relationship struggles. And part of the reason for this is that Cate is dead. I’m not giving anything away. She narrates the whole book and reveals this in the first sentence.

Bass is devastated but struggles to express it. Their teenage children, twin boys Rafferty and Cameron and daughter Jessa, mask their grief variously with anger, nonchalance and neuroses. Laura, Cate’s best friend, focuses on caring for Cate’s horses, despite her own family problems. Bea, Cate’s sister, wants to help but no-one seems to appreciate that.

There are a lot more people in this book. It’s set in a country town where everybody knows everybody and everybody pops up here and there every so often, but not so often that when they reappeared I didn’t ask, “Who were they again?” It took me until about half way through to get them all straight in my head.

Not a great deal happens in terms of plot. It’s more of a character study. But despite being told by the person who should know all the other characters better than anyone else, Cate doesn’t offer much in the way of insight. It’s due to the fact she’s dead, we’re told, and she can’t remember things the way she used to. She’s fuzzy around the edges and therefore so is the story.

The reason for Cate’s death at such a young age is concealed until close to the end of the book but it’s not really that important in the grand scheme of things. It actually feels a bit like an afterthought.

In the Quiet is a hybrid piece of literature: part eulogy, part romance and part emancipation. The Lovely Bones minus the murder. We Need to Talk about Kevin minus the murderous son. Just like those novels, it’s beautifully written.

But it lacks the gut punch that those other two novels deliver. “You will weep,” Nikki Gemmell promises on the front cover. I didn’t. It won’t leave you stunned. In time, it will just leave you. But you won’t regret it.

3 stars

First published on Goodreads 19 May 2019

Homage or Something Else? The Trick Is Not Minding

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What do the films Lawrence of Arabia, All the President’s Men and Prometheus have in common? On the face of it, nothing. If you haven’t seen them, you’d certainly never figure it out. But in all of them, there is a relatively short scene involving the following punchline: “The trick is not minding.”

In Lawrence of Arabia, it is said by TE Lawrence, a real-life eccentric, war hero and author of Seven Pillars of Wisdom, and shows him as someone witty and intriguing but also desperate to inspire awe and respect in those around him.

*****

Lawrence is with Hartley in a basement with a high window out to the street, waiting for Potter to bring him a newspaper.

Lawrence: Michael George Hartley, this is a nasty, dark, little room.

Hartley: That’s right.

Lawrence: We are not happy in it.

Hartley: I am. It’s better than a nasty, dark, little trench.

Lawrence: Then you’re a big noble fellow.

Hartley: That’s right.

Potter arrives.

Lawrence: Ah, here is William Potter with my newspaper.

Potter: Here you are, tosh.

Lawrence: Thanks. Would you care for one of Corporal Hartley’s cigarettes?

Potter: Ta.

Potter helps himself to a cigarette.

Hartley: Is it there?

Lawrence: Of course. Headlines. But I’ll bet it isn’t mentioned in The Times. “Bedouin tribes attack Turkish stronghold.” And I’ll bet that no one in this whole headquarters even knows it happened. Or would care if it did. (To Potter) Allow me to ignite your cigarette.

Potter: Sure.

Lawrence lights Potter’s cigarette with a match. A messenger comes in.

Messenger: Mr Lawrence?

Lawrence: Yes?

Messenger: Flimsy, sir.

Lawrence: Thank you.

Lawrence extinguishes the match he used to light Potter’s cigarette between his bare fingers with a show of flair.

Hartley: You do that once too often. It’s only flesh and blood.

Lawrence: Michael George Hartley, you are a philosopher.

Potter: And you’re barmy.

Lawrence reads the note the messenger has brought and Potter decides to try Lawrence’s trick of extinguishing a match with his fingers.

Potter: Ooohh, it damn well hurts!

Lawrence: Certainly it hurts.

Potter: Well, what’s the trick then?

Lawrence: The trick, William Potter, is not minding that it hurts.

*****

The punchline appears again in All the President’s Men when Bob Woodward discusses Gordon Liddy, eventually discovered to be a key figure in the Watergate scandal. Woodward and Liddy are also real people and Liddy was renowned for telling this story himself. It seems to be used here as evidence of Liddy’s sociopathic personality.

*****

Woodward has arranged to meet with Deep Throat, a high level but extremely confidential source, in a car park in the middle of the night.

Deep Throat: I saw the flag signal. What’s up?

Woodward: Nothing, that’s the problem. The story’s gone underground.

Deep Throat: You thought I’d help out on specifics? I’ll confirm what you get, try to keep you on the right track, but that’s all. Are you guys really working? How much?

Woodward: I don’t know, maybe sixteen, eighteen hours a day. We’ve got sources at Justice, the FBI, but it’s still drying up.

Deep Throat: Then there must be something, mustn’t there. Look, forget the myths the media’s created about the White House. The truth is these are not very bright guys and things got out of hand.

Woodward: If you don’t like them, why won’t you be more concrete with me?

Deep Throat: Because the press stinks too. History on the run, that’s all you’re interested in. You come up with anything?

Woodward: John Mitchell resigned as head of CREEP to spend more time with his family. That doesn’t exactly have the ring of truth. Howard Hunt’s been found. There was talk that his lawyer had $25,000 in cash in a paper bag.

Deep Throat: Follow the money. Always follows the money.

Woodward: To where?

Deep Throat: Go on.

Woodward: This man, Gordon Liddy. He’s going to be tried along with Hunt and the five burglars. We know he knows a lot, we just don’t know what.

Deep Throat: You changed cabs? You’re sure no one followed you?

Woodward: I did everything you said but it all seemed…

Deep Throat: Melodramatic? Things are past that… Remember, these are men with switchblade mentalities who run the world as if it were Dodge City.

Woodward: What’s the whole thing about, do you know?

Deep Throat: What I know, you’ll have to find out on your own.

Woodward: Liddy, you think there’s a chance he’ll talk?

Deep Throat: Talk? Once, at a gathering, he put his hand over a candle. And he kept it there. He kept it right in the flame until his flesh was seared. A woman who was watching asked, “What’s the trick?” And he replied, “The trick is not minding.”

*****

The reference also appears in Prometheus because one of the main characters is obsessed with Lawrence of Arabia. David, a robot designed to look like a human, is caretaking on the Prometheus, a scientific exploratory vessel, while the rest of the crew are kept in stasis during the nearly two-and-a half year journey to the planet they are heading to. He has spent this time deconstructing a huge number of ancient languages to their roots to enable him to communicate with whoever or whatever the crew will find when they arrive at their destination.

In his spare time, he watches Lawrence of Arabia and particularly the famous scene described above while dyeing the roots of his hair to match the blond of the actor portraying Lawrence in the film. He styles his hair in exactly the same way. And he repeats the famous words – “The trick, William Potter, is not minding that it hurts.” – over and over, seeming to test them for different nuances.

In Prometheus, it is used to demonstrate David’s obsessive personality. It is also interesting in the context of the fact that he is a robot searching for his identity, particularly since all he seems to be doing is adopting someone else’s identity.

*****

So… homage, parody or something else (plagiarism)? The basic test is that homage cites its source, parody mocks its source and plagiarism denies there ever was a source. Lawrence of Arabia and All the President’s Men are depictions of real people and there’s no telling where TE Lawrence and Gordon Liddy came across their party trick. Prometheus is clearly an homage and Ridley Scott, the director, has acknowledged as much, saying it was a personal tribute to one of his favourite films.

If you’re ever in a position to have an homage paid to or a parody made of your work, it probably means you’ve already achieved something great. (So the trick is not minding, although why would you?) But plagiarism? That’s something else again. And the trick is no mercy.

How Many Different Types of Writer Have You Been? How Many Will You Be?

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Last week, I posted a list of forty-four types of writing jobs and reading through them made me realise how many different types of writer I’ve been. I’ve been paid to write:

*Advertisements (copywriter)

*Case studies and marketing materials (corporate writer)

*CVs (CV writer)

*Articles for journals (essayist)

*Someone else’s book (ghostwriter)

*Non-fiction books (non-fiction writer)

*Novels (novelist)

*Proposals (proposal writer)

*Scripts (screenwriter)

*Speeches (speechwriter)

*Website text (web content writer)

I’ve also been an unpaid:

*Blogger

*Critic

*Poet

The best paid writing job I’ve ever had was also the worst writing job I’ve ever had: being a corporate writer. There were multiple reasons including an expectation from the people I was writing for that I would be happy to lie in the copy I was writing (I wasn’t) and also a business model that relied heavily on exploiting workers in third world countries (something I didn’t find out until I was working there).

The second best paid writing job I’ve ever had was much more enjoyable: being a ghostwriter. There were multiple reasons for that including an employer who treated me well because he recognised I was going to make him look like a much better writer than he was and who gave serious, respectful consideration to areas we disagreed over. Plus there was a published book at the end of it. (What writer doesn’t love that?!)

The longest writing job I’ve ever had I enjoyed to start with but enjoyed less towards the end: being a proposal writer. I was given a lot of autonomy and for the first few years, there was plenty of variety and encouragement. But after a few years, the same proposals rolled around again and it became clear that there was no path for advancement.

The proudest moments in writing I’ve ever had were all unpaid (at least to start with): publishing each of my books and two articles posted on LinkedIn that have each had nearly 10,000 views.

And – perhaps unsurprisingly – the most enjoyable of all the writing I do is the writing I choose to do: my novels and my blog.

So how many different types of writer have you been? And how many will you be?

What Kind of Writer Do You Want to Be?

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Hi, all. This is another chapter for my writing book for children. Any feedback is much appreciated.

*****

Saying you want to be a writer is a bit like saying you want to be an athlete. There are lots of different kinds of sports. And there are lots of different kinds of writing. Most kids start out by writing fiction (such as stories about aliens or adventures or animals) and non-fiction (such as essays about what you did over the summer). But by the time you’re all grown up, you’ll realise that there are a lot more – sometimes very specific – options for the kind of writer you might want to be.

Here are a few that you will have heard of and maybe a few that you’ve never even thought about.

Academic writer: To be an academic writer, you need to choose a subject to focus on such as medicine, physics, psychology or geology and become an expert. Then once you know everything about your subject, you do research to try to discover new things that nobody else knows yet. An academic writer usually works for a university and has to write about what new things they have discovered.

Agony aunt or uncle: An agony aunt or agony uncle asks people to send in a story of a problem they are having in their life (something they are “agonising” over) and will respond by providing advice on what they should do (like your “aunt” or “uncle” might do).

Biographer: A biographer tells the story of someone’s life. Usually, the person they are writing about is famous (such as a politician, an athlete or a businessperson) or has done something amazing that readers are interested in reading about (such as being an astronaut, surviving a disaster or climbing a really tall mountain).

Blogger: A blogger is someone who writes a blog, which is a personal website. They can write about anything they want to. They can write about themselves, about their favourite hobby, about their favourite TV show, anything! Anyone can set up a blog.

Did you know…? There are over 500 million blogs on the internet as of 2019 and bloggers post over two million blog posts daily.

Columnist: A columnist usually writes for a newspaper or magazine (named after the “columns” that their writing was formatted to fit into when newspapers and magazines were printed) and they mostly write their opinions about the topics that everyone is talking about.

Did you know…? Even though a columnist appears in a newspaper or magazine like a journalist, they are very different from journalists. A columnist’s job is to tell you what they think. A journalist’s job is to tell you what other people think.

Comedy writer: A comedy writer tries to make us laugh by writing jokes and funny stories. They might write these jokes or funny stories for a stand-up comedy routine, for a sketch show, for a sitcom on television or for a comedy movie.

Did you know…? “Sitcom” is short for “situational comedy” and the term is usually used to describe a half-hour television show that follow the lives of a group of people and contains a lot of jokes.

Comic writer: A comedy writer and a comic writer might sound almost like the same thing but they are very different. A comic (which can also be known as a graphic novel) tells a story using words and pictures (like a picture book but for adults). Batman, Superman and most of your favourite superheroes all started out in comics.

Copywriter: Copywriters prepare smaller pieces of writing, usually for advertising purposes.

Corporate writer: Big businesses need writers for a variety of types of writing so a corporate writer could work on proposals (also known as bids or tenders), reports, case studies, articles, prospectuses, speeches, newsletters, websites, brochures and other general marketing materials. A corporate writer’s main goal is to make the business they work for look good and deliver the messages the business wants to convey.

Critic: A critic is someone who writes reviews – what they liked and what they didn’t like – about restaurants, movies, books, television shows, holidays and other things to help readers to decide if they would like to eat at a restaurant, see a movie or television show, read a book or go on a holiday.

CV writer: A CV writer writes CVs. What’s a CV? CV stands for curriculum vitae, which is Latin for “the course of my life”. A CV is also known as a résumé, which is French for “summary”. A CV or a résumé is a short description of you, your education, any work you’ve done and other interesting things about yourself that you give to an employer when you are applying for a job. A lot of people write their own CVs but a CV writer knows how to do it really well to make you look amazing!

Diarist: A diarist is someone who keeps a diary, usually with the intention of publishing it as a book later on.

Encyclopedist: An encylopedist helps write and put together an encylopedia.

Essayist: An essayist is someone who writes essays. Essays are a common assessment tool used in high school and university but they are also used in the broader writing world to present thoughts or arguments in a reflective, often literary manner.

Food writer: A food writer writes about food and recipes. They will often write about going to restaurants and where certain types of food come from. If the food writer is also a good cook, they might even write a cook book.

Ghostwriter: A ghostwriter is given a story and asked to write it on behalf of the person who had the idea. When the book is published, they won’t be listed as the writer of the book. A lot of people who aren’t very good at writing but who have a story that they want to tell will use a ghostwriter to help them do it.

Grant writer: A grant is money available to fund research or support artists or projects. There are more people wanting grants than there are grants available, so applications must be written and submitted so the government departments, charities, foundations and corporations offering the grants can decide who to give the money to. Grant writers work with the people wanting to be awarded the grant money and prepare the grant applications on their behalf.

Greeting card writer: A greeting card writer comes up with the messages on the front and inside of birthday cards, get well cards, congratulations cards, mother’s day cards, father’s day cards, Christmas cards and all those other cards that you see in the store. They work closely with designers so that their messages get matched up with the right pictures.

History writer: History writers write about important events in the past. There is a famous saying that history is written by the victors so sometimes history writers have to do a lot of research to discover true history. History doesn’t change but often our understanding or perspective of history can change as society changes and as additional information comes to light.

Journalist: A journalist usually writes for a newspaper or a magazine about what is going on in the world each day. There are many kinds of journalism including politics, crime, sports, health, transport, entertainment, environment, science and many others. Journalists play a very important role in keeping the general public informed, making sure people in positions in power follow the rules and giving a voice to people who aren’t in positions of power.

Lexicographer: A lexicographer writes dictionaries. “Lexicon” is another word for “dictionary”.

Did you know…? Samuel Johnson was one of the most famous lexicographers. In 1746, he started writing A Dictionary of the English Language and in 1755, it was published (yes, it took him nine years and he wrote it all by himself). It was considered the best English dictionary for over 150 years until the Oxford English Dictionary was published.

Medical writer: A medical writer writes about medical stories and issues and is usually a doctor, a nurse or a medical researcher. A writer who writes about medical stories but doesn’t have medical qualifications is more likely to be referred to as a health writer.

Memoirist: A memoirist is like a biographer but writes about their own life (they are also known as an autobiographer).

Non-fiction writer: Non-fiction is a very broad subject area but is basically everything other than fiction. Journalists, history writers, medical writers, biographers, true crime writers and travel writers all write non-fiction.

Novelist: A novelist (also known as an author) writes made up stories that are usually quite long and there are many novel genres including crime, science fiction, fantasy, horror, historical, western, comedy, romance, thriller and mystery.

Obituary writer: An obituary writer writes mini biographies about well-known people when they die.

Did you know…? Obituary writers sometimes write obituaries for famous people – such as presidents and pop stars – and for well-known people who are sick or do risky things before they die so they have them ready to publish as soon as the news of their death becomes public.

Picture book writer: A picture book writer writes picture books for children. Sometimes a picture book writer will write the words and draw the pictures and sometimes a picture book writer will write the words and work with an illustrator who draws the pictures to go with the words.

Playwright: A playwright is someone who writes plays, which are then performed on a stage in a theatre with live actors (as opposed to a movie which is filmed previously with actors and shown on a screen in a theatre).

Did you know…? The reason it’s spelled “playwright” and not “playwrite” is because “wright” is an old English word for a craftsman or a builder. So a playwright is someone who crafts plays.

Poet: A poet writes poems. Some of the oldest writing that still exists in the world is in the form of poetry. Poems are hard to describe but they are like songs without music.

Proposal writer (aka bid writer or tender writer): Governments and big businesses request proposals from potential suppliers outlining what they can provide, how much it will cost and why they should be chosen to supply it. Proposal writers compile all the required information from the specialists in the business and write any additional information needed, then finalise and submit the proposal.

Report writer: Big businesses, especially those with multiple shareholders, have to write reports to keep their investors and business regulators informed on how their business is going. Report writers are specialists in preparing this kind of information, especially for annual reports.

Satirist: A satirist uses writing to poke fun, usually at people in positions of power like politicians and especially when they do things that regular people don’t think they should be doing. Wikipedia describes satire as a genre “in which vices, follies, abuses and shortcomings are held up to ridicule, ideally with the intent of shaming individuals, corporations, governments or society itself into improvement”.

Screenwriter: Screenwriters write films and televisions shows. It is a unique form of writing because it is not written to be read, it is written as a set of instructions to be interpreted by actors, set designers, lighting designers, location scouts, producers, directors and all the people involved in making films and television shows.

Short story writer: A short story writer is like a novelist but prefers to write things that are quicker to write and read. They write stories that don’t need as many words as a novel needs. Short stories are more likely to be published in magazines and journals or as part of a collection of short stories in a book.

Social media writer: Do you read messages on Facebook, Twitter and Instagram? Well, somebody has to write them. Yes, a lot of them are from your friends and family but companies and organisations are on social media as well and they need someone to write their messages for them. A social media writer is usually part of a marketing team.

Songwriter: A songwriter (also known as a lyricist) writes the words for songs. A songwriter will need to work very closely with a musician or composer to make sure the words and the music fit together perfectly.

Speechwriter: A speechwriter writes speeches, usually for other people like business leaders, politicians, kings and queens, and activists. These people often have important messages they want to convey to those listening to their speeches and to ensure their speech is impressive and has a lasting impact, they hire someone who is a specialist in writing speeches.

Technical writer: A technical writer writes instructions on how to do something, like learning how to use new software or how to apply for a home loan.

Textbook writer: All classes need textbooks and all textbooks are written by textbook writers. To write a textbook, you need to be an expert in your special subject and you need to be able to explain your special subject in a way that makes it easy to learn.

Translator: A translator is someone who speaks and writes and reads another language well enough to be able to translate a piece of writing from one language into another. This book is written in English. For people who don’t read English to be able to read it, it would need to be translated into a language they can read and that is what a translator does.

Travel writer: A travel writer visits places all over the world and writes about them so we can decide if we would like to go on holidays in that place.

True crime writer: A true crime writer writes about real-life crime (as opposed to a crime novelist who writes about pretend crime). Reports about real-life crime usually appear at first in newspapers or on television but true crime books delve deeply into all the details to tell the complete story from the history of the person committing the crime, the victims, the crime itself, how it was solved, the resulting court case and the verdict.

Video game writer: A video game writer works closely with video game designers to write the scripts for video games. This kind of writing is very collaborative because you rely on others to bring your vision to completion.

Web content writer: Web content writers prepare the text for web pages. They will work closely with website designers to make sure it goes together well with the images and the format.

Does Your Book Pass the Bechdel Test? Does It Need To?

The Bechdel test was developed in 1985 in –perhaps unusually – the comic strip of Alison Bechdel, an American cartoonist and 2014 recipient of a MacArthur “Genius Grant”. In it, two women discuss going to movies and one of them outlines her requirements for seeing any of the films being shown. They have to meet three criteria:

*The movie has at least two female characters.

*The two female characters talk to each other.

*The conversation is about anything other than a man.

Bechdel credits the idea to her friend Liz Wallace, who was in turn apparently inspired by some of Virginia Woolf’s writing. Twenty-five years later, the Bechdel test gained mainstream recognition (maybe a sign of the times).

Approximately half of all films meet the requirements of the Bechdel test, including Alien and Aliens, All About Eve, Die Hard, Gone with the Wind, The Matrix, Raiders of the Lost Ark, The Silence of the Lambs, Singin’ in the Rain, Some Like It Hot, The Terminator and Terminator 2: Judgment Day, and The Wizard of Oz. So we can keep watching many of our favourites without feeling like we’re contributing to gender inequality.

However, if about half of all films meet the Bechdel test, this also means that about half of them don’t. Some of the films that we might think would – considering their kick-ass female characters – but don’t include The Avengers, The Blind Side, Breakfast at Tiffany’s, Lara Croft: Tomb Raider, Run Lola Run and the original Star Wars trilogy (A New Hope, The Empire Strikes Back and Return of the Jedi).

And some films that we might think shouldn’t pass what is essentially a feminist test (a very basic one) but do include Anchorman: The Legend of Ron Burgundy, 50 Shades of Grey, Goodfellas, How to Lose a Guy in Ten Days, Transformers and Weird Science.

The Bechdel test is something I’ve only become familiar with in the past few years and the vast majority of my fiction writing was done before that so I’ve had to go back and do some self-assessments to decide if my writing passes it. I’m pleased to say that I think almost everything I’ve written passes with flying colours.

It’s a very low bar so it’s not that hard. But having said that, there are some very valid reasons for why some writing might not pass the Bechdel test. Alien 3, in which Ripley’s shuttle crash lands on a penal colony, doesn’t pass the test because she’s the only woman in what is essentially a men’s prison, the only thing left on a planet that was abandoned by all other inhabitants. In Gravity, Sandra Bullock’s character, Dr Ryan Stone, is the only woman on a space mission. In a variety of movies based on the battlefields of historical wars, are we really going to be surprised that two women don’t pop up and have a conversation? And in the romance genre, which we read specifically to see relationships develop, are we going to criticise two women discussing a man? Usually, these conversations are a means of advancing the plot.

Still, there are lots of measures we use to assess our writing (plot, pacing, character development, etc) and there’s no reason why this can’t be one of them. Not the only one but part of a holistic process. Sometimes it will prove useful. Sometimes it won’t. But think about it like this. Readers can pick up on the teeniest, tiniest details they don’t like and base entire bad reviews around them. If you can remove the possibility of not passing the Bechdel test, then why wouldn’t you?