I have been teaching creative writing for about six years now. The things my students write can be revealing, intriguing and by far inspiring. Many start at the beginning of the year just writing about the frustration they feel about a friend’s actions or the awful/amazing feeling they have about the person they are dating. But as the weeks progress, the writing gets deeper. They write each day, and each day they are a step deeper in making a writing corner of their own. The student begins to see what is behind their writing; they grow and what comes out is magical, not because suddenly there is a Pulitzer prize forming in the room, but because they have grasped some essential understanding. Instead of writing about their frustration, they write about frustration. They examine it for its bitter taste, sallow color, caustic odor and suddenly they know frustration. I love that day and the days that follow. This week two of my writers graduated and I wept to see them go. My last words: don’t forget to write.
Writing Meditations
Revision, revision, revision
Back to Lu Chi’s Wen Fu: The Art of Writing
In Chapter VII. “The Key,” the last three stanzas are referring to searching out the best words and revising.
What wants to continue must not end;
what has been fully stated is itself a conclusion.
However each sentence branches and spreads,
it grows from a well-placed phrase.
Restrain verbosity, establish order;
otherwise, further and further revision. (lines 5-10)
The ideas in these stanzas are so important to completing a work. A writer seeks precision, to make the “well-placed phrase.” And when it is said well, the reader understands. The difficulty comes in deciding if what is written met the demand. I trust my instincts. I have been working on an anthology (which I have mentioned in prior posts) and have been going through each story. Two stories continue to make me hesitate to include them, so I finally pulled them out of the work. What is left is strong, but still in need of revision. And so, I am off to “further and further” revise.
A writer’s platform: A scary propostion
So I have been working on my “platform” (please grimace while saying this, cringe a little, then reset shoulders more firmly). I have a Twitter (@LDarbyGibbs) account and an Indie Writer’s account, a Google+ something or other and a Facebook page (which I still have not figured out after three months of ownership. It didn’t help that it changed format just when I was getting less nervous about what I should do with it.) But Twitter is less overwhelming by far than any of them. After all, a writer should be able to write a sentence or two on the fly.
My most difficult problem is friend requests. I don’t get them often, but when I do, I have no idea how to respond. Mostly I think, “Why do you want to be my friend? What about me caught your attention?” If I can look at their blog, profile or information, I’ll see if we have anything in common, or if I find them interesting. But I don’t just say, “Sure, join the party.”
Follow me, I’ll follow you: those just make me crazy. It seems kind of like little kids collecting stickers. My daughter, when she was little, loved to collect stickers. She would smile gleefully when she received one. Stick it to something, didn’t matter what, or give it away to someone she liked just to see them smile, but she never asked about it again or searched out where she had stuck it. Followers are like that if they are just returning a follow. Sure, I want followers, but I want to earn them, not buy them.
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| Writer’s platform just coming into visibility |
Where was I: oh, yes, platform. Mine is in the just-coming- into-visibility stage. That is if it were a tangible thing, at this point, you would see a vague outline of wood planks, with darkened circular shapes, probably bolts, notable in pairs at the ends and about halfway along each plank. I work to build solid stuff, but it’s not finished. So, invisible man kind-of-thing just starting to be made solid appearing, but not yet. This blog is one of those planks, and it is one of two that appears like you could step on it and not fall through. My book is the other solid looking plank. And see that one over there, off to the right at the top of this foundation? That one is the anthology I am working on. The last short story is getting fleshed out. Then it is heavy duty revise and edit for the lot of them. Maybe by late June, early July it will debut. And one more plank will appear. A person could lay a towel down and get suntanned perhaps.
Lu Chi’s Wen Fu
When I was in college, one of the books a professor required we purchase was Lu Chi’s Wen Fu. Just reading the introduction convinced me this was a book for me. The book is written in poetry, but reads like a guide you climbed to the top of a mountain to sit with in silence, growing knowledgeable just through association. Though it is geared toward the poet, any writer can gain insight from it.
“The poet stands at the center of the universe
contemplating the enigma,
drawing sustenance
from masterpieces of the past. (“The Early Motion” lines 1-4)
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| Lu Chi’s Wen Fu |
This simple book walks the writer through all the agonies of creation, the selection of the right word, bright epiphanies and the moments of satisfaction. Frequently, it reminds the reader that contemplation and study of master works is the road to writing well. I remember reading this book and nodding in agreement with each line. I also recall finding every time the professor brought this book into discussion in class that I knew what he was saying almost before the words left his mouth. There was an instant connection to the professor’s words, this little book and my own understanding of the art of writing, however much a novice I was (and will always be as we are forever evolving in this craft).
If you are a writer, get this book. Read it in small bits. Breath it. Contemplate it and then read the masters. Then read the book again, whole, part, in sequence, out of order. Grab snatches of it and return to it often. Each reading is a new understanding, a new breath in writing.
Writing and kayaking: where worlds overlap
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| Meandering rivers & minds |
This past weekend I went kayaking with my husband and daughter. We parked by a little lake and proceeded to launch our kayaks. Ready to go exploring, we had all been eying the source creek to our left.
We didn’t get far into the creek before the lake disappeared and all sounds common to a lake full of campers were so dimmed that only the birds, movement of water and occasional flying wasp were heard. I had deliberately let my husband and daughter slide on ahead of me and pass beyond the next curve just so I could take in that feeling that I was somewhere far from civilization.
Along the banks were tight growths of trees, many of which have been undercut by resent high water flow, some having fallen partially across the creek added to the untouched feel of the place. The cardinals and black ducks complained at our presence, and the fish were well camouflaged by the turbid water.
I allowed the pretense of being utterly alone soak in. Much of the sky was blocked by the canopy of trees overhead, but what showed was pale blue with occasional slashes of white clouds. We had set out on a windy day, yet on that creek, no breeze stirred the trees, and along some lengths of the meandering river even the water was torpid and silty, where slender, curved leaves floated in stillness.
This same sense of being alone and in a untenanted place happens when I write. The rest of the room I am in disappears and just the images filling the screen in front of me and the soft clack of the keyboard are my world. I suppose that is why I enjoy kayaking alone so much, even if only a turn in the river up ahead creates the illusion. The two experiences mirror each other. I am exploring an unknown space of my own creation, my imagination building up a world. But like the turn of the river ahead, a turn of my chair brings family up close again.
I am going to sit here and mull this over a bit.
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| Working in my own backyard. |
I’ve been chatting with another blogger about how to increase traffic on her site. I was looking at her blog, I was noting what I thought was really good about her site. It is a cleanly laid out blog. Not too busy and it has a bright feel to it. I read a few of her posts and thought about how she could improve them, what she was probably working to create in her blog. And I thought of some suggestions I could give her. In fact, I kept thinking about things I could suggest and realized: heck, I need to look at my own blog and see what is good about it, what my visitors note when they stop by, and what I hope to create with it.
Over the past few months, I have made changes here and there, added things, determined that my focus is geared to writers, published or comfortably creating without expectation to publish, and I have tried to create a place that will draw and hold attention. But still, I don’t think I have made major inroads in devising a clear sense of purpose or creating a set audience. So in that moment of thinking of another idea for this other blogger, I realized I need to give my own spot more focused attention, more than just posting regularly and following my opening plan. So though I have no ideas for immediate change right now. I am going to be thinking about change. And if anyone has suggestions, make a comment. I am interested in what a new eye sees upon arrival at To Begin With.... And I am even more interested in knowing what I could do to improve.
So drop in, stop a while and give me some feedback.
And if you still feel like wandering, go to Nicole’s site, http://fireflyreadit.blogspot.com/. I owe her for making me think more about my own.