Chuck Q & A - First Quarter 2005
*Covers Workshop topics 13 - 15.
1. From Loki_669:
Ok, in the horizontal versus the vertical you talked about "shitting out the coal." While I can fully understand that part of the essay, my question is in regards to the rewrite. After having finished the first draft, spent time away from it, took it everywhere and line edited it, where do you go from there? Specifically, do you start with a new blank screen and a copy of your previous version? Or is this more like just going in and cutting and inserting your new changes. That's where I tend to get lost, or maybe overwhelmed is more the correct term.
Chuck Responds:
At this point in your process, you probably have several copies of your manuscript, both paper and electronic. If you're like me, you've even started to carry a copy in your car, or stashed a copy at your job, just in case your house burns down. More important, the story is in your head most of the time. When you're least aware of your editing, someone will present something: a new way to demonstrate your theme, a gesture, a good "big voice" observation - and you'll be glad you had your hardcopy at hand. That way, when you sit down for the boring computer work, you'll have a stock of real-world ideas to spur your next pass through the manuscript. So, no, I don't re-key the entire book. I tend to cut and paste, but ruthlessly, scrapping scenes and chapters if they really don't serve the story. And adding everything I've harvested from the outside world and jotted in my hardcopy.
If you feel overwhelmed by the task, can you limit yourself to re-working each chapter, treating it as a short story so the task feels more contained? When I worked a full-time job while writing, I could never hold the whole equation of a book's plot in my head. That would be like imagining mile-by-mile the entire drive between Seattle and Los Angeles. Too much. But you can imagine the trip from Albany to Eugene - so get that part perfect. Then, do the next part.
2. From inkwell:
Topic 13, Punctuating with Gesture and Attribution, brought to mind an essay from several months ago -- On The Body description. How do these techniques work best together and how/where are they likely to clash?
Chuck Responds:
They do work well together. Keep in mind that you can use a bland task or gesture to pace out the delivery of aside or flashback information. Gesture reminds us that a character has hands and feet. Attribution is invisible, a bland pause. On-the-body moments are powerful little details you don't want to overuse. They're all little physical landmarks. In Chapter Six of Fight Club, the original short story, we're grounded in the bland setting and tasks of the conference room meeting: presentation slides, handshakes, talking. The "he says" attribution doesn't linger in your mind. But the on-the-body moments do - the stitches inside the narrator's cheek, the taste of blood in his mouth, the fight violence. The trick is to balance these three degrees of information so they contrast against each other, providing the reader with a short rest before the next on-the-body physical event.
3. From Darren:
In your discussion of Horizontal vs. Vertical, you repeatedly mention that you have to get past the first draft. You also mentioned how you threw out the first draft of "Diary" and rewrote it.
I notice that I usually cannot rewrite a piece, because I want to hang on to a lot of it. However, I can edit it, sometimes twenty times until it pretty much is a rewrite.
When you write a story, and you realize it's a mess, with lots of weak areas, what would the better approach be: editing, or rewriting?
Chuck Responds:
Rewriting is editing. I don't see any difference. When a piece starts to feel over-worked, like you've made too many tiny changes, fine-tuning it to death, consider more radical surgery. By really hacking something to pieces -- effectively shaving your head -- you can find some freedom and keep yourself interested in a long-term project. A story you're too attached to stops being fun to write. Then it's a burden. So fuck it. Everything is possible on the page. There's nothing fun and sexy about the idea of constantly "fixing" a story.
4. From JPledger:
I like abusing people for my own personal entertainment as much as the next person. But I was looking at AA meetings as a possible place to sit and write, then I started thinking that I'd just want to listen to people instead of working. How do you tune out the bad while still taking in the good? And, there's nothing wrong with... you know... using people like that, is there? BTW, the gnome is alive and well.
Chuck Responds:
I object to the idea that listening to people, being moved by them, documenting their experience without judgment or ridicule, and crafting that into a story that doesn't betray their identity… that any of that is "abusing." If you're there to judge and exploit people, you shouldn't be there. Maybe you shouldn't be writing.
What's more interesting is how you didn't even go. You talked yourself out of it before you tried. The test of the best stories is how they "stick" in your head. Forget about taking notes - the best stories will live in you like a parasite until you write them. Some stories won't resolate with you, or they might be told poorly, but no story is "bad."
5. From greyskellington:
Is it common, possible, or even productive to start a story in which you have the vertical story, yet no (or little) horizontal story in mind?
Chuck Responds:
You could do that, but it would go like this: "Last week, I was sad, then I felt happy. Today, I wised up." That's transformation, or vertical, without horizontal events to depict the process. Without a physical roadmap to follow, the reader can't appreciate the vertical progress.
6. From Boo:
I recently joined a writing group and as we were talking through our problem areas, several people kept referring others to various "how to" books to solve their problems. What are your feelings on "how to" writing books and are there any books of this type that you would recommend?
Chuck Responds:
There are a lot of how-to writing books and each seems to have a good section, but I've never found a book full of practical, effective craft advice. Bird by Bird by Annie Lamott is fine. So is On Writing by John Gardner, but you could boil down the best parts of each book to an essay. If you're looking for good advice on plot and staging scenes, you'd do better to check out screenwriting books, like the ones by Sid Fields. Tight plotting is something I've never seen a writing book tackle.
7. From Bateman:
You use a lot of "She says", "She says" behind each other. Always in a few small sentences, and never one big sentence, beginning with "she says". Why do you do that? It makes the reading a little bit choppy sometimes. What do you gain by writing like this?
Chuck Responds:
It creates a "pause" so you land harder on the actual phrase of dialogue that follows. You visually skip the attribution, but it's still the landmark you need to keep the speakers organized in your mind. It's supposed to make the dialogue choppy. Very few people speak in beautiful, slick sentences, and I don't trust them. That's too clever. If you read any of my dialogue without the pacing devices of attribution and gesture, the speeches would seem too fast and smooth to work.
8. From Sentinel:
In Topic 14 (The Horizontal vs. The Vertical) you mention that you renamed Diary twice before settling on the title. How important is the title of your work, and how much time do you spend on this? Should a title be strictly utilitarian, or should it have some underlying meaning relating to the story?
Chuck Responds:
It seems like the best titles have a literal meaning and a metaphoric one. "Choke" for example means to gag or to fail: "He choked on his last shot." Or, it's great if a title can contain a paradox. The words "fight" and "club" seem to create an oxymoron when you combine them. That kind of contrast generates curiosity. My personal fetish is to include sharp vowel sounds (fight, lullaby, diary) and avoid ending on a soft S, F or V sound.
9. From milehighmancini:
First off, thanks for the care package! The power necklace hangs on my reading lamp, always in sight, reminding my ass to write everyday.
Now, the question.
Do you find it easier to work through a first draft while attending workshop or do you go it alone and utilize the workshop environment for the rewrite strictly?
Glad you enjoyed the Radiohead covers CD!
Chuck Responds:
I use a workshop mostly in the early stages of a book. Then, I'm writing short story "scenes" that depict key events in the plot. The major plot premises and dynamics. I'll read each as a self-contained story to see how people respond. If they laugh or show interest. And to see if the general story idea creates a buzz of connected ideas. If a story idea is strong, then everyone in the workshop seems to relate to it and shares a similar story from their own life. This explodes an idea beyond my limited life, and gives me a dozen fresh avenues to explore while developing the idea. At some critical-mass point, the writing process speeds up and I quit taking it to workshop because that would involve too many pages. By then, the draft is completing itself based on the story's own dynamics and momentum.
But I do ask several workshop members to read the finished first draft and give their reactions.
Thanks for the CD!
10. From vigorous puppy:
I'm dying to ask about the "shopping for rural property" and "the dream of creating a writers retreat center" that "still lives," according to your most recent essay. I am envisioning people showing up on the porch with black socks and burial money. From within, the sounds of ministers, marketing gurus and sociology professors putting a captive audience into deep trance, while the burning powerful few manage to scribble their way into an alternate reality. Please tell us if you have a definite plan and timeframe for realizing the dream, and what is your actual vision for it?
Chuck Responds:
No, I have no time line. For now, I'm trying to collect what I know about writing - at least what I know about MY writing process -- to see if this is enough to create a course. I'm talking to Tom Spanbauer about co-authoring a writing book, and co-teaching. We've also talked about me leading some of his workshops so he can devote more time to his own writing. These are some of the possibilities.
This comes as a surprise, but some of my favorite writers have politely refused to talk about their writing process. Being too aware of the process, they say, ruins it. This is something I might need to keep in mind, myself.
The writers retreat or workshop will happen when it happens. That vision is still taking shape.
