Steven Pressfield's Blog, page 44

On Sharing

From the Archives: This one is from December 31, 2010—almost eight years ago. Not much has changed, other than the social media piece, which we’ve still not jumped into whole hog, preferring to invest with readers one on one, rather than relying on social media to connect us. Takes more time, but it’s worth it—and the relationships will last longer than Facebook. There’s only one change that really matters. We said goodbye to Carroll LeFon, a.k.a “Neptunus Lex.” His was one of the first blogs I followed and then I had the honor of corresponding with him about books and family. I still have his e-mails and remember the conversations. As kind as he was knowledgeable—and he could write. Still very much alive. ~Callie

Steve’s blog was created to serve as a vehicle for sharing his video series “It’s the Tribes, Stupid.” His goal was to share information about a common thread that had presented itself throughout his years of research. He wasn’t interested in financial gains or promoting his books through this outreach, so we focused on sharing rather than selling. The lessons we learned led us to where we are with the blog and outreach today.

How We’ve Shared

With Steve’s projects, we’ve tried to get to the point and share information that is relevant to the individuals and outlets receiving it.

We’ve avoided generic e-mail press release blasts and postings. Instead, we’ve approached individuals and outlets one by one, with tailored information that speaks to the work they’re doing. The one-by-one approach takes time, but it’s worth it. It’s also a way of showing respect—that we’ve taken the time to learn about the work and interests of others, rather than blanketing everyone with the same release.

Saying thank you is a big part, too. Authors and publishers wouldn’t survive without readers. Though we’ve never expected something in return, more often than not, when we’ve said thank you to someone, they’ve had a valuable lesson to share—about publishing, outreach, blogging, readers’ interests, and so on. Jonathan Fields, Jen Grisanti, Mark McGuinness, Justine Musk, Jeff Sexton, and Barbara Winter are just a few of the people we’ve learned from this past year.

Sharing via Facebook and Twitter involved a bit of trial and error. Steve’s blog posts are automatically posted to both. Soon after setting up his Twitter account, Duane Patterson (@radioblogger) schooled Steve on hashtags, shortening links, and other Twitter to do’s, and Steve tackled his first Twitter Chat, via @litchat. This past year, though, Steve’s  been on a strict schedule finalizing his next book, so I dove into Facebook and Twitter in his name. I always shared info with him about those I contacted, but it was weird. It was important to keep things “real” with his readers, and tweeting and posting as Steve was as far from real as it gets. In an effort to get Steve into social media, I made a huge mistake, by taking Steve outside the “keeping it real” realm. Today, I thank people under my Twitter account, while Steve’s Twitter account is used as a way to share his blog posts. Steve is on Facebook. You can catch him in there from time to time, replying here and there and posting. I remain a HUGE fan of Twitter and Facebook as vehicles for sharing, but if someone is tweeting or posting for you, be clear about that up front.

End of day, how we share comes down to treating others how we’d want to be treated—Karma marketing/outreach/whatever you want to call it.

Who We’ve Shared With

For the launch of the blog, we approached friends, colleagues, and journalists with which we’ve worked in the past. Steve didn’t have any contacts with bloggers at that point, but they were the first to weigh in on the video series.

Some of the responses were positive, some critical and some straight-up nasty. We expected and were open to comments criticizing Steve’s project/effort, but the personal stabs at Steve, by people who’d never met him, were a surprise.

Michael Yon, who is used to being loved, then hated, and back and forth, offered a critical piece of advice:

People who post those comments are like bar-room brawlers. They’re looking for a fight. Even if you’re just defending yourself, by engaging, you end up getting dirty, too. Ignore them.

We took Michael’s advice. The cost of wading into the muck wasn’t worth it.

We thanked the individuals who provided positive feedback and started contacting those who offered constructive criticisms. One of  the first bloggers we approached was Mark “Zenpundit” Safranski. Mark was critical, but he was a professional—he made his points without encasing them in crap.

We had a great first call—during which he pointed out things we could be doing better on the blog (including content that needed more development), and then he and Steve started corresponding. We’ve learned a lot from Mark. He’s always honest and will tell us if an effort is off-mark—and he always does it with respect. His input played into Steve’s first Writing Wednesdays post.

As Steve got to know other bloggers, we found that they were more willing and able to help share than traditional outlets. This isn’t a knock on the traditionals. As mentioned in last week’s “Elephant in the Room” post, there’s only so much column space and air time via traditional outlets. Steve is still interested in working with the traditionals, but working with bloggers has helped him direct-connect with readers—whether those bloggers are independents such as Neptunus Lex and Black Five or are connected with traditional outlets, such as At War and Mouth of the Potomac.

Bringing It All Together

As we continued the outreach for the video series, we were approached by a growing number of bloggers interested in Steve’s books. Steve wasn’t actively promoting his books at the time, but wanted to reach out to the readers who had e-mailed him or posted about the books. Enter Writing Wednesdays.

With the addition of Writing Wednesdays, we knew we needed to mesh Steve’s static site and blog, to present all of his work in one place.

While some of Steve’s readers are interested in all of his books, there are a number who are interested only in The War of Art or in his novels. Steve was almost finished with The Profession and we knew that we’d need to give it a home, too.

More to come on Bringing It All Together.

It Ain’t Pretty

About a year ago I wrote a series of posts titled “Report From the Trenches.” They were about a particularly ugly run of months when I was struggling to make a book-in-progress work.

The good news is that in the end (I think) the process succeeded.

The bad news is I’m back in that same place on the next book.

Paul Bettany as a Wall Street exec in “Margin Call”

I never learn.

I forget each time how back-breaking it was the time before.

One of my favorite movies of the past few years is Margin Call, written and directed by J.C. Chandor. It’s roughly about the market crash of 2008, as seen from the inside—from the point of view of the execs at a giant Wall Street firm who make the decision to tank the U.S. economy to save their own company’s ass.

One of the pivotal characters is played by Paul Bettany, another fave of mine. At one point in the dark hours of the story, a junior exec (played by Zachary Quinto, who was also one of the producers on the film) asks Bettany what top management intends to do.

“It ain’t gonna be pretty,” says Paul Bettany.

The creative action in writing (or any art) is like giving birth.

It’s not pretty.

There’s blood.

There’s chaos.

Weird-looking tools and implements are involved.

People who love each other dearly are cursing each other’s guts.

By the time the baby has safely made his or her entry into the world, the floor of the room is littered with bloody gauze compresses, sodden towels, sanitary wrappers, not to mention bodily fluids that not even the delivery nurses can identify.

It ain’t pretty.

My days of writing right now start with me plunging into scenes in which I have no idea what is going to happen (beyond an outline that I’m now cursing furiously because it isn’t helping me at all) and end, a few hours later, with me clicking the SHUT DOWN panel and staggering out to the pantry for a stiff drink.

This, I’m afraid, is the way it works.

Universes come into being amid collapsing stars and exploding supernovas.

Nations are born in brutal revolutions and counter-revolutions.

Even the cutest litter of kittens spills forth to daylight in a slippery, sanguineous pile of slop.

We need to remember this, you and I, when working events take a turn for the misshapen and the unlovely.

It ain’t pretty.

 

File Under “What Not To Do, Lesson #1”

I emailed a company with a question about their product.

I didn’t receive a response.

I emailed a second time, in case the first email opted for a Sunday stroll instead of delivery.

Still no response.

I tried to contact them on Facebook.

Their response?

They posted a reply saying someone would be in contact—then my comment and their reply were deleted, and I was blocked from commenting on their Facebook page.

I tried to contact them on Twitter.

No response.

I went back to their Twitter page. They had blocked me.

I have a valid question as well as documentation that led me to be concerned.

I’m not calling them names or trolling or anything of the like. I’m simply trying to obtain answers to questions about one of their products.

Their response? Delete, block, avoid.

If you make a mistake or are in error, or someone questions you or your product, don’t hide.

The greatest relationships are forged in the fire of errors/mistakes/misunderstandings and so on.

I learned this from Bob Danzig, whom I’ve written about before on this blog (see “Thank You Bob Danzig” “Endless Possibilities“).

When Bob was a young salesman at the Albany Times-Union, desperately trying to increase advertising, and decrease ad dollars going to the rival paper, Bob managed to convince the head of a large supermarket that was opening in the area to take out a full page ad in the Sunday edition, for the weekend the store was opening.

On the day the ad was supposed to run, Bob opened his own paper with glee, looking forward to seeing the ad himself.

It wasn’t there.

Bob rushed down to the paper’s office and pulled out the order for the ad, only to find that the ad was scheduled for the next Sunday—and that the handwriting for that order was his own. He’d messed up the date for the opening of a major supermarket and messed up his paper’s opportunity to dominate the ad dollars made available by the supermarket.

Bob could have started looking for a new job that moment, but instead he raced to the home of the head of the supermarket. The gentleman was just returning from church and had not yet seen the paper. Bob told him what had happened and then shared a plan for how his paper would run an advertising campaign, what it would look like, the number of pages, and dates, and so on, at no cost to the supermarket.

Bob kept his job and later became publisher of that paper. However, on that particular day, Bob received a thank you from the head of the supermarket, for acting like a partner and showing that he cared about doing the right thing and taking care of customers.

Bob ran toward instead of away from the problem, and in return saved his career and helped his paper turn a corner. Not too many years later, his paper had taken so many ad dollars from its rival that the rival shut down.

Failing to return e-mails and blocking individuals on Facebook and Twitter isn’t an answer. It’s a delay tactic. At some point we all have to face errors/mistakes/misunderstandings/etc. Better to run toward them than to let them fester. The toxic cleanup that comes with festering isn’t worth it.

Side note: This practice applies to your work with an editor or critic, or anyone else in your industry of choice. Your editor sees a problem with your manuscript and suggests cuts? You can hide and fight all the way or you can face the problems and work with the editor to sort them out. The critic? You don’t have to address them or even listen to them, but . . . The good ones (I’m not talking the Amazon reviewer still living in his parent’s basement), the ones who know the industry, often have insights worth paying attention to, even if they sting. Learn from them.

The faster—and sooner—you run toward the problem, the faster—and sooner—it will be behind you.

The Pain Zone

John Naber won four swimming gold medals at the ’76 Olympic Games in Montreal, each in world-record time. He said something in an interview once that sticks with me to this day.

John Naber, deep in the Pain Zone

A reporter asked Naber, “What’s the difference between a good swimmer and a great swimmer?”

Here’s how Naber answered (I’m paraphrasing from memory):

The thing about competitive swimming is that the instant you hit the water, you enter the Pain Zone. Your heart is hammering, your lungs are on fire, your muscles are straining to their maximum. It’s hell.

The difference between a good swimmer and a great swimmer is that the great swimmer has the capacity to go a little bit deeper into the Pain Zone … and to stay there a little bit longer.

I’m just now finishing a novel—filling the blank pages on the climactic chapters—and I am deep into the Pain Zone. Resistance is kicking my ass. I think of John Naber every day.

Gloria Steinem once said

I don’t like to write. I like to have written.

It helps me a lot to remind myself first that there is a Pain Zone, and second, that it’s universal. Every one of us hits that wall. Every one feels our lungs burning, our heart about to explode out of our chest. Every one of us wants to quit. Every one wants to back off, just a little, so this damn struggle will stop hurting so much.

I keep thinking back to John Naber.

The difference between a good swimmer and a great swimmer is that the great swimmer finds a way to go a little bit deeper into the Pain Zone … and to stay there a little bit longer.

Connecting

The simple things don’t require connections to people who have already “made it.”

Last week I touched on the power of simple hand-written notes.

Some of the responses I’ve received have been along the lines of not being able to obtain the contact information of well-known, “made” individuals or not physically being able to do the handwriting.

I get the latter. As I age, my hands tire. Gripping the pen is harder. Typing is easier. The point is just to connect. One reason I like Brett McKay so much, and often find myself referring people to his site “The Art of Manliness” is because every now and then I’ll receive an email from him, asking what’s up. How are things going? What’s new? It’s a bonus that what he shares on his site is great information. Who am I to Brett other than a publicist wanting to pitch clients, but . . . He keeps in touch and I very much appreciate the kindness.

As far as reaching out to made individuals goes . . . Don’t start there.

Start with a neighbor.

Start with a friend.

Start with a relative.

Don’t be fake.

Build a relationship with them. Don’t do it because you’re building up for an ask. Do it because it is a good thing to do. Friends and relatives and neighbors can be a great source of feedback in addition to being great supporters.

Invite them into your life—and take a genuine interest in their lives.

Over the past 17 years of working in a home-base office, this is the piece that I’ve struggled with the most. It takes time and energy—and when you’re working at home, you’re the employee and the boss, the secretary and the cleaning service, and so much more.

You have to be the relationship builder, too.

Go to lunch with a friend.

Meet a neighbor for coffee every now and then.

Call that aunt you haven’t seen since your were 8.

Create your own community and you’ll find that they’ll be there for you when it counts. Just be genuine and remember that it goes both ways.

AND THEN .  .  . After all that, expand your community. You’ve got to build a base first.

It All Starts With the Writer

The actress reads a book or screenplay and says, “I want to do this.”

William Goldman, screenwriter of “All the President’s Men,” “Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid,” and author of “Adventures in the Screen Trade”

We applaud her vision.

The editor discovers a manuscript and publishes it.

We salute his taste.

The director, the producer, the financier find a hot property and scoop it up.

We give ’em an award.

I’m not saying these artists don’t deserve their plaudits.

All I’m saying is

It all begins with the writer.

The fun starts with you and me.

Everybody else waits downstream.

Everyone else comes late to the party.

Others may interpret. They may mount, they may discover, they may finance, underwrite, refine, support, reconfigure. They may “bring to life.”

But the material they work with had its genesis with you and me.

At the moment of conception there are only two entities in the room—you and your Muse.

William Goldman said famously in Adventures in the Screen Trade

Nobody knows anything.

Lemme propose an amendment.

Before the writer, nobody has anything.

I wrote in The Artist’s Journey that the artist enters the void with nothing and comes back with something.

A machine can’t do that.

A supercomputer packed with the most powerful AI can’t do that.

In all of creation, only two creatures can do that.

Gods.

And you and I.

Keep this in mind, brothers and sisters, when some agent or manager or producer disrespects writers or the writing process.

Before the writer, nobody’s got nothing.

 

 

 

 

Small. Simple. Powerful.

This week I received a postcard from Chewy.com.

It was handwritten and hand-addressed.

It was personalized.

It led me to place another order.

The handwritten message and hand-addressed portion made a difference, because I know how much time that takes.

I throw away a chunk of holiday cards every year just because I write them by hand, in pen, and if I make a mistake, I do it again. Crossing out words and continuing on as I did as a kid writing letters to my grandmother isn’t acceptable. If you’re representing a company, product, etc., the message and its spelling need to be on target. No crossed out words.

The addressing made a difference, because I wasn’t just another generic label. Someone had to write out my name and address—and my last name is a hard one, so they had to go letter by letter to make sure they got it right.

The personalization mattered because someone took the time to recognize my purchase and to say thank you.

I placed another order, just as I’m sure Chewy.com hoped I would.

I could shop anywhere, but they did something that I recognize takes time and thought.

These are the little things that count.

Small.

Simple.

Powerful.

Here’s something else:

From time to time, I’ve received thank you notes and postcards from readers of www.StevenPressfield.com and customers of www.BlackIrishBooks.com.

I track who sends them and I remember them, because they did something kind and spent their time on me. Time is valuable and valued.

And while I’m not buying everyone’s books and painting and albums, I’m more inclined to check out the creations from the individuals who contacted me before they had something to pitch.

There’s a lot of power in just a note, in just a thank you, in just a little personalization, and giving your time to someone else.

“This Will Change Your Life.” Really?

 

If you’re an aspiring writer (or even an established one), you’ve seen websites and seminars and workshops that promise to “help you write a bestseller.”

I’ve read and attended some of these myself. And I’ve learned from them. They haven’t been a complete waste.

William Holden as Pike Bishop in “The Wild Bunch”

But let’s dig a little deeper and ask ourselves what’s going on in our minds when we buy into such a promise.

“Bestseller” in this lexicon equals “success.”

The promise between the lines is

 

“This will change your life”

 

Fill in the blanks for what you imagine that means. Money. Fame. A better class of friends/lovers/whatever.

Write a bestseller and [XYZ Good Stuff] will materialize in your life.

Really?

I was having dinner with a friend the other night, a long-established and extremely successful writer both critically and commercially. He was saying how he had noticed lately that he wasn’t getting the same rush out of a new contract or a deal or a collaboration as he once did.

We theorized that the element of “this will change your life” had gone out of the equation.

Okay, okay … if you and I were in a rock band and we had a hit that took us from playing intimate venues to stadiums and arenas … yeah, I agree, that might be credibly said to “change your life.”

Like getting called up to the major leagues.

Or getting appointed to the Supreme Court.

Those would change your life.

But you and I are not rock stars or ball players or politicians.

We’re writers.

Whatever success or celebrity we may attain on Day 249, when the alarm goes off the next morning, we’re back right where we were on Day 248.

We’ll grab the same cup of coffee, stumble into the same office, plop down before the same keyboard, and face the same dragon.

No Big Five contract will make that fight any easier.

No position on the bestseller list will guarantee that our next book won’t be, as they say on Get Shorty, “shite.”

In other words, the core challenges (and satisfactions) of our life are not going to change, even when something life-changing happens to us.

The blank page remains.

Our demons stay the same.

The struggle never goes away. It never gets easier.

That’s our life, yours and mine.

We’ve chosen it and we stick by it.

There’s a great scene in the Sam Peckinpah movie, The Wild Bunch (screenplay by Peckinpah and Walon Green).

Ernest Borgnine as Dutch Engstrom

William Holden plays Pike Bishop; Ernest Borgnine is Dutch Engstrom. They’re the two senior members of the outlaw gang that includes Warren Oates and Ben Johnson and as Lyle and Tector Gorch, with Jaime Sanchez as Angel and a great Edmund O’Brien as Freddie.

It’s night, a campsite in an abandoned adobe, after a day in which a long-planned holdup has gone catastrophically awry and the Wild Bunch, with heavy losses, has barely escaped. Now they’re regrouping, trying to figure out where to go and what to do next.

Holden and Borgnine have tucked into their respective blankets and sleeping gear. They’re leaning back on their saddles, which they’re using as pillows.

PIKE

I’d like to make one last score and back off.

Dutch absorbs this skeptically.

DUTCH

Back off to what?

The rueful expression on Pike’s face shows he grasps the fatuity of what he has just said. He and Dutch speculate about what heist they might try next. Steal an army payroll maybe. Rob a train.

DUTCH

They’ll be waiting for us.

PIKE

I wouldn’t have it any other way.

Another exchange or two passes. At last Dutch rolls onto his side and pulls his blanket up around his shoulders, preparing for sleep.

DUTCH

Pike …

PIKE

Yeah?

DUTCH

I wouldn’t have it any other way either.

More Iron Filings

After Oprah made the decision to interview Steve, we met a few of her team members. There was the TV show, but also the magazine, and the site, and promotions related to all three.

I spoke with someone at the magazine and gave her the quote from Steve that I’ve seen shared more than any other: “Put your ass where your heart wants to be.” She declined and said that their audience wouldn’t like the language. Fast forward to the airing of the interview and the clips shared online and guess which quote Oprah discussed. Yep. Ass and all.

The quote was known by the TV team and the magazine team, but they went in different directions.

This is an example of when a sure thing isn’t even a sure thing, which brings me to the name of this column, “What It Takes,” and my realization that I don’t really know what it takes.

I 100% know what it doesn’t take—what doesn’t work—but . . . What it takes? No. Not 100%.

Look at Oprah’s interview with Steve. Her team members were provided the same books and information and yet, different decisions were made. During the interview, Steve brings it up, not Oprah, but her team could have edited it out, but they didn’t. Oprah could have redirected, but she didn’t. She went with it. When the team pulling clips for the site and social media made its decisions, it didn’t have to go with that section, but it did.

Is it because magazine readers are more offended by “ass” than TV viewers or social media followers? I don’t think so. I think it’s about that force I was struggling with in last weeks “What It Takes” post, about different forces being at play.

I want to go back to the iron filings and bar magnet.

How much control do we really have? How much of it is us having what it takes and how much of it is another force?

I read an interview with Barbra Streisand this week, during which she said, “These times give me energy.” Maybe our times are the magnets—the force—whether it is Babs writing this new album or Bob Dylan penning his classics. Maybe it’s the same force thundering toward poet Ruth Stone or Steve when the Muse visits. But what—or who—is the force or who is manipulating the force? God? A muse? Or something as simple as a magnet? And can it’s explanation be expressed as a theorem, so that we could reproduce the force on any given day?

There’s an unending supply of courses on how to write a bestseller or promote a bestseller or how to become a millionaire or how to ___________ (insert whatever it is here).

If it was as simple as following those steps we would all be millionaires with bestselling books, perfect marriages, extraordinary kids, yada, yada, yada. But that’s not how it is.

I could even hand you all the materials I’ve written for bestselling authors and the names and contact information for the journalists and producers and others who have helped propel my clients toward great heights, but you know what? It might not be what it takes for you. Maybe it’s you or maybe it’s the world and where it’s at at the time.

Would On the Road or Catcher in the Rye receive the same reception if they were published today? Same with Anna Karenina and Pride and Prejudice. Extraordinary writing all around—and all exploring timeless themes—but would there be the same reception today if they were from unknown writers? Would Sherlock Holmes be published as a series of blog posts by a guy named John Watson? What of Mark Twain? His wit and writing live strong, but would his stories’ original dressings be of interest if presented for the first time today?

I’ve been reading The Odyssey with my son and it’s been a slog. If that came out today, what would we all say? The first few pages are kin to diving into George R. R. Martin’s A Song of Fire and Ice series, starting with book three—or diving into the Game of Thrones HBO version of the series, starting with season four. Who in the world are all these characters?

Or was The Odyssey written and preserved because the magnet underneath it was stronger than the rest and that same magnet was needed to bring us other classic on the road stories, like On the Road or that of Huck and Finn?

Along those same lines, was Dickens the magnet or force for Tolstoy, so that at their dinner, Levin could talk to Oblonsky of “some external power that has seized me” and just a few minutes later, Oblonsky could say, “It’s all very well for you to talk like that—it’s like that gentleman in Dickens, who with his left hand threw all difficult questions over his right shoulder.” And how much of it was the time, with Dickens being born not quite 20 years before Tolstoy? Tolstoy might have needed Dickens to create Levin.

And is there a theorem that could express any of this?

x historical events + y genre, multiplied by z flawless writing, and then all of it divided by who the author is and where he or she lives or was raised, and then, once you get to that point, you multiply it by the artist’s education (her knowledge of Dickens or Picasso or Schubert).

But . . . There’s one more thing. The fire is part of it. How much do you want it? How willing are you to do whatever it takes?

A few weeks ago, we reposted Shawn’s “Cheat Sheet” post. In it, Shawn tells of seeking advice from an industry leader. He tells the guy about a project he wants to do and expects to get a roadmap. Well, the guy didn’t give him a roadmap.

However, the guy did ask him what he wanted.

How much did Shawn really want it?

The one thing I know for 100% certain, when it comes to what it takes, is this: You have to want it. You have to be one of those people who are moved by the force. If that magnet hits you, you have to react. You have to move. You have to do something.

In that interview with Oprah, just after Steve explained his “ass” quote, Oprah brought up Nike’s Just do it. That’s who you have to be—someone who just does it. You have to move with the force.

Ins and Outs in a Love Story

Remember The Way We Were, the 1973 blockbuster starring-vehicle for Barbra Streisand and Robert Redford? The theme song, sung by Babs, won an Oscar; the film itself was rated by AFI as #6 on the list of Greatest Love Stories of All Time.

Barbra Streisand and Robert Redford in “The Way We Were”

But let’s focus, you and I, on the THEME and how it is expressed in the Opening and Closing Images. Remember our third rule of In and Outs Club:

The opening and closing images must be on-theme.

The In to The Way We Were is the titles sequence. It’s a montage of quick scenes of students at a college, apparently somewhere in the East, just before the U.S. entered World War II.

The sequence introduces us to Katie Morosky (Streisand) and Hubbell Gardiner (Redford), both students at this college. We see Hubbell sprinting in a track meet, throwing the javelin, pulling campus pranks, dating gorgeous cheerleaders. Clearly he is the Golden Youth, a carefree got-it-made All-American boy.

Katie? Not so much. We see her passionately demonstrating against fascism (of the Spanish Civil War), working at the campus malt shop, mimeographing radical literature, studying hard and holding down half a dozen part-time jobs. Katie is clearly the Campus Commie, a curly-maned Jewish girl either literally from Brooklyn or from some Brooklyn of the mind.

What has this In told us?

Since the movie is titled The Way We Were (emphasis on “were”), we in the audience can make a pretty good guess that …

Katie and Hubbell will somehow fall in love.

Their love will be special in a way that is political and moral as well as romantic.

Their love will be doomed.

The lovers are clearly opposites, not just ethnically but politically and perhaps morally as well. These factors will be, we suspect, what draws Katie and Hubbell together … and ultimately, we fear, what will tear them apart.

We may also surmise, from the era in which the story is set, that Katie and Hubbell’s romantic trajectory will parallel and be a metaphor for the American political narrative of the war and the postwar.

If we were forced to make a guess at the movie’s theme based exclusively on the In, we might venture something like

Two opposite Americas will unite passionately and with great hope for the future and then, with painful regret, revert to their previous antithetical state.

Now let’s turn to the Out.

Remember our first two rules of Ins and Outs Club.

The opening and closing images should resonate with one another. They should look as alike as we can make them within reason.

But at the same time, our In and Out should be as far apart emotionally and narratively as possible, to show how much the hero (or heroes) have changed.

The Closing Scene of The Way We Were takes place outside the Plaza Hotel in New York City. We see Katie, twenty or thirty years older and looking in-her-leftish-radical-element as a native New Yorker, crossing toward the hotel from the fountain that fronts Fifth Avenue.

Suddenly Katie draws up. She has spotted Hubbell. He is exiting the hotel with his attractive blonde wife. From Katie’s reaction we realize this sighting is a complete surprise—and more, that Katie probably hasn’t seen Hubbell in years. Both Hubbell and his wife are impeccably attired in prosperous-looking, conventional business-type suits. A doorman has hailed them a taxi; they’re about to step aboard.

The moment when Katie spots Hubbell outside the Plaza Hotel

Hubbell sees Katie now. She is smiling and crossing toward him. She comes up. Hubbell and Katie embrace as Hubbell’s wife looks on. It’s a polite, non-passionate clutch. Katie and Hubbell exchange forced pleasantries. Hubbell reveals that he’s writing for a TV show now. Katie smiles bravely, but clearly with disappointment for Hubbell. She declares she is married and doing fine.

KATIE

The only David X. Cohen in the phone book.

HUBBELL

What’s the ‘X’ for?

KATIE

(laughs)

The only David X. Cohen in the book.

Katie breaks off this painful encounter with a smile and a wave. She trots across the plaza to a row of tables set up on the sidewalk. These are manned by politically-active-looking matrons and plastered with BAN THE BOMB placards. Katie checks in with one of the ladies and picks up a sheaf of pamphlets, ready to take her shift as a demonstrator.

Hubbell moves into frame. He has crossed alone from the taxi stand. Hubbell indicates the literature in Katie’s hand.

HUBBELL

You never give up, do you?

KATIE

Only when I’m absolutely forced to.

The lovers embrace a second time. This time each hangs onto the other. The poignancy of the moment is clear. When the pair separates, Hubbell asks about their daughter. “She’s beautiful,” says Katie. “You’d be so proud of her.” Katie invites Hubbell to come with his wife to join her and her husband for dinner.

HUBBELL

(with profound regret)

I can’t.

Katie acknowledges this heartbreaking reality.

The lovers part for the final time.

The film now cuts to Katie in “long shot,” in front of the Plaza, holding up her anti-war pamphlets …

KATIE

Ban the Bomb! Take a stand for Peace Now!

See how this ending adheres to our three principles of Ins and Outs?

The Out is a visual bookend for the In. Katie protesting on campus, Katie advocating for peace on Fifth Avenue. Hubbell riding his golden birthright at college, Hubbell cruising the path-of-not-so-great-resistance into an affluent-but-unsatisfying sunset.

At the same time, the Out is as far away emotionally and narratively from the In as possible. One is a set-up for a great love about to happen; the other is the excruciating knell of its finish.

Thematically the film declares

Love alone does not conquer all. Some gulfs are too wide to bridge.

And it asks

Is this not just Katie and Hubbell’s story, but America’s as well?

The great love/union-of-opposites that was waiting to happen in the Opening has had its run, failed, and been extinguished by the Close.

Even if we don’t know the middle of the story (of the Hollywood Ten, HUAC, McCarthyism, of Jews and Gentiles and principled resistance) we get the essence of this tragic love story just from the In and the Out.

Oddly enough (or maybe not so oddly), the arc of The Way We Were is almost identical to that of The Godfather and of Shane, two other movies we’ve cited in this series. In all three films, the protagonists enter the narrative believing they can change their lives and alter the order of their universes. In all three, by story’s end the heroes realize they can’t. Of the films we’ve talked about in this series, only Good Will Hunting has a “happy” Out. It’s the only one in which the characters’ world actually changes.