On the banks of the River Meander

[ksmith]

First came naomikritzer's questions to folks who read her blog, which included why they visited and what they'd like to read there? Then came another of matociquala's posts about writing, which as usual contained much good discussion about setting and sense of place, but which also left me a little taken aback. Both posts taken together left me wondering, and not for the first time, what folks expect to see when they friend me or read my blog. The possible answers concern me, because when it comes to the subject of writing, you may not see what you expect.

I don't write about craft all that much, if at all.



I've tried, and haven't come up with much that I didn't consider derivative, trite, murky, or at best less than helpful. And this only describes the essays I've finished. Many are the paragraphs that bit the bug light when I decided halfway through that I was wasting my time, no one would be interested anyway, and gee, I haven't checked out iTunes in a while, have I?

I first became aware of this lack of craft-descriptive ability on a writing panel, which is not the time to experience such a revelation. I had just explained some aspect of something I did--can't recall what--and a man in the audience asked me "How do you know you've done it?" I couldn't answer his question, because I couldn't put the answer into words. All I could manage to say was "You just know." He regarded me quizzically, because of course I hadn't helped him one damned bit, and the writer sitting next to me--I think it was Pat Murphy--answered his question with two sharp, succinct sentences. The comprehension and relief broke over his face. It was a marvel--you could actually see it happen. He sat back, question answered. I sat back, wondering how in hell another writer could define so clearly something I couldn't begin to put into words.

This wouldn't be that big a deal, I guess, if it didn't sometimes cause me to question my competence as a writer. In the beginning, I devoured craft books like everyone else, and I recognized the value of being able to read, in black and white, the wheres and whatfors of what I was trying to do. And I grew to believe that if someone pays you to do something, like write, you're supposed to know what you're doing. And knowing what you're doing is often taken to mean that you can, on occasion, describe what you do to someone else. Not stand there like a twit going 'duhduhduh' while your questioner regards you with that 'you're a writer' arch to their brow before turning away and talking to someone lucid.

I think this lack of explanatory ability goes hand in hand to some extent with the way I write. I'll know something is wrong with a scene, but I won't be able to figure out what. The words are there, perfectly good words that impart the information needed at that particular moment. But the music is wrong. The beat of the phrases. The tone. It is like music with me at times, and like music it travels from senses to backbrain without so much as a one-finger salute to the part where the conscious thinking is done. I simply write lines, erase them, rewrite, erase, rewrite, until...it's right. At that point, I can feel the knot in my gut release, my head clear. The little voice in the back of my head says 'yes,' and I move on. And that's how I write a book. I compile a whole string of yesses.

This is not the most economical way to put words to paper. It's also a difficult system to explain to someone who asks you the best way to add more sensory detail to a scene, or the best way to gauge whether their scenes are doing two things, or only one, or all three.

I think that as in anything else, there is a spectrum, a gradient along which writers slot, from those who can explain things so well to those who can do it a little to those, like me, who dread the idea of critiquing because while they are able to determine that something is wrong with a given work, they'll be damned if they can put it into words. Because the work hasn't been rattling around in their head for months, and the answer isn't going to download into their brain at 5am. All they can say is that it's off-key, and the only way they can think of to fix it is a way that makes it too much theirs because the fix doesn't present itself in such a way that they can impart it to someone else. In a way, it's the old extroversion-introversion thing, but with writing instead of personality, and it's a pain in the ass at times because you tend to feel like you're a barnacle on the hull of your own writing ability with as much control over the course.

So, where is this going...? Words of wisdom! My words of wisdom to those of you out there who find yourself sitting on the fringes as others talk craft, thinking 'yes, I do all that, too' yet are unable to put it into words: it doesn't mean you're a friggin' imposter, a construct of spit and duct tape destined to fall to pieces Any Time Now. It doesn't mean you're less a writer. It doesn't mean you're more a writer--the first person to mouth the word 'artist' gets bitchslapped.

It just means you're a different kind of writer. And that's just the way it is. They may never ask you to teach or critique. But they may read your stuff, and like it, which in the end is pretty much the point of the exercise.

Comments

[torrilin.livejournal.com]

/shrug

I friend favorite authors for a simple reason. If I like their fiction enough to read it, chances are I'll like their nonfiction too. Don't much care *what* kinda nonfiction they write, just that I get more words :D. Sometimes they're wise, enlightening words about how one writes. Sometimes they're words that remind me that authors are real people too. Sometimes they're roll on the floor funny. Sometimes they're sad.

Course, my appetite for stuff to read is insatiable. I'll get something out of anything you care to write :).

[kristine-smith.livejournal.com]

Oh, well, thanks!

[torrilin.livejournal.com]

:) I like your journal cause you remind me that writers are real people, with day jobs and dogs and yards that need raking.

[kristine-smith.livejournal.com]

And on days like today, holiday lights that need to be put up.