Inkabout L. Darby Gibbs

Science Fiction & Fantasy author

Writing

Lu Chi’s Wen Fu

by

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)

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

by

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.

Breaking news: Scrapper draft done

by

Today I completed my draft of “Scrapper.”  This is one of the key stories in my anthology Gardens in the Cracks.  Now I have to decide which of the others I should redraft.  I am leaning towards the title story, but may go after one of the shorter pieces as I am getting close to the end of the school year, and that is always a busy time for me and my students.  But the point here is:  Scrapper is drafted and in pretty good shape. 

I approached it in a different manner than I usually do. I wrote the beginning 18,000 words, then wrote the end because I just had it all laid out before me ready to churn out.  I normally write from start to the finish, so this was awkward. But I feel it actually came out better because I was writing when I was passionate about the events happening.  It was just that bridging between the two that was the tough part.  However, I had set a level of writing and that forced me to continue at that level.

When the writer inside them says, “I am here.”

by

As a teacher of creative writing, I at this time of the year always enjoy the moment when my students suddenly look to each other and say, “Your writing has changed.”  They mention detailed images, strong word choice, developed characters, etc.

This is what they have been working towards all year and most of them didn’t realize it.  They thought they were just getting to write all the time about any idea that came into their heads.  They have grumbled about the redrafts, scrambled for reasons to miss deadlines, gotten excited about a prompt or a day they could just dedicate to writing whatever fell into their heads.  They reminisce about the walks around campus we have taken looking for interesting images skulking about the place in unexpected corners, inside the book room or under the mats by the doors.

wild about writing

At the start of the year, they did not expect they needed to improve or that anyone would notice if they did.  But here it is. That moment when someone finishes reading what he or she wrote in response to the prompt, and then epiphany:  “Your writing has changed — and mine too.”  When this happens, I do not say, “Ah, here is a teaching moment.”  I remain silent and listen to the writers inside them say, “I am here.”

Tuesday prompt: 2012 #13

by

Inspirational frog and teacher.

Write a letter of thanks to the person you hold most responsible for your writing ability.  Explain what that person gave to you that added to who you are as a writer.

My most responsible person was a third grade teacher named Miss Mann.  She was stern, creative, formidable, knowledgeable and caring.  She started out as my first grade reading teacher and then turned up as my third grade classroom teacher.  She taught me to appreciate books and then taught me the desire to write. At the end of my first grade year, she made me promise to write her stories over the summer. She supplied me with her address, and she wrote back each time. She would send her letters written on fanciful writing paper and suggest that I write a story about whatever was pictured on it. I only remember one, a giant green bullfrog whose mouth supplied her writing space.  I don’t remember what I wrote, but I do remember what her reply was.  Write another story and be kind to your little brother.  I suspect the frog ate him.

So Miss Mann, wherever you are out there, Thank you for developing my imagination, for being the person I knew would always read what I wrote and tell me to do it again.

Seeking simplicity in writing

by

Simplicity of a flower

I have been reading Steve Jobs a biography by Walter Isaacson and have become enthralled with Jobs’ pursuit of simplicity.  His idea that as one simplifies there is a point when the object you seek to reduce to simplest terms becomes complicated again.  So one must search deeper for the release of a greater simplicity. And he did this by constant pursuit of epiphany, the moment of recognition that he had found “it.”  So as I am reading this book, I am thinking about how this applies to writing.  Simplicity and the reader reaching an epiphany together in the form of story.  Ezra Pound did this.  His production of the poem “In a Station at the Metro” is all about simplicity.  He started out with many images, and 30 lines of poetry.  Pound whittled down and streamlined his poem until only two lines remained of one intense image and all that the image carried to his reader. This is what I think of:  How to write with simplicity in mind?  How to come to that moment of epiphany, when the writer knows the story has been told.