Consider This: Moments in My Writing Life After Which Everything Was Different

by Chuck Palahniuk

Whatever the saying, it acknowledges an impasse and creates the permission to introduce a new idea. In my novel Invisible Monsters, it’s the two sentences, “Sorry, Mom. Sorry, God.” In the original short story that grew to become Fight Club, it’s the repetition of the rules. The goal is to create a chorus appropriate to the character. In a documentary about Andy Warhol, he said that the motto of his life had become “So what?” No matter what happened, good or bad, he could dismiss the event by thinking, So what? For Scarlett O’Hara it was, “I’ll think about that tomorrow.” In that way, a chorus is also a coping mechanism. It hides the seams in narrative the way a strip of molding hides the junction where walls and floor meet. And it allows a person to think beyond each new drama, thus moving the story forward and allowing unresolved issues to pile up and increase tension. If