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April 16, 2006
Moving Forward Without Signposts and Guidelines
Quarter way through this second novel and I remember that this is the place I got stuck in Hibiscus Airport. Can't imagine it happening again but I did pause to consider the possibility. I rework and edit as I go which is supposed to be a no-no for a first draft, but I am going to try it this way, this time. And it will either work or it won't and I'll learn something out of it. I'm also going to drag a synopsis out of the novel-in-progress to use for my Lit Board funding application. I've missed a day or two of the daily writing routine from time to time and found it so hard to get back into the flow that I've vowed to avoid such breaks. So here I am, sick as a dragon, putting in my daily quota.
My sister, an alternative health practitioner, has been over to support us all--the whole family of dragons are in a bad way. I'd finished shoving some words together and had stopped for a mo and laid aside my laptop on the couch when she arrived. She put oils in my aura and gave me an Indian head massage, and a rainbow drop therapy for my son who had a bronchial wheeze and lent me her oil diffuser. She fixed the rest of the household and left with the cakes that had been leftover from the St Andrews market, a berry and almond tart, a pear and chocolate cake.
I felt like going to see a film to distract myself from bodily ailments but only if I had a magic carpet to take me there. Saw Dear Wendy. the Lars Von Trier film, on DVD last night and it was superb, arthouse. For action and thrills, we saw Inside Man on the big screen on cheap movie night Tuesday. You'd think it was the usual cops and robbers but it had great dialogue, some cool action, the usual star actors, and unusual secondary characters.
Friday night was passover and one of my mother-in-law's friends, a painter, told me she'd read one of my stories and that it read like a postmodern painting. It took me a while to work out that she was referring to the story, Twilight Sky Things Go Bump In The Night in last year BAS. Needless to say, she made my evening.
On another high note, my story Rockpools has just been accepted for the June issue of Southword, magazine of the Munster Literature Centre, and yet another one, microfiction, Man and Dog, to one of my favorite online magazines, Smokelong Quarterly, for their next issue.
I am not even sure if this blog entry is going to be interesting reading--coming as it does at the end of a hard day of illness, writing, and cooking for a family of dragons. Anyway, I promise to do better next time and plan to put together another of those wonderful discussions from a Zoetrope online room. Stay tuned on the blogosphere.
Posted by girija tropp at 10:13 PM | Permalink
April 02, 2006
The Road Well Travelled, The Novelist Hard at Work
We went to see V for Vendetta this evening (good movie); my son watched The Proposition on DVD (great movie); it will be Monday tomorrow and autumn; the mornings are chilly making it difficult to roll out of bed and into the novel. I'd also like to see Tristan and Isolde--if I can find some time, so I guess that's on the maybe list.
Clickables:
A new off-the-wall piece in elimae that will take a short minute to read In the Quiet, Don Quixote. Kim Chinquee has also a couple of lovely pieces in here.
Another thing thou must do is vote at Million Writers Award Notable Stories of 2005 The top ten stories have been announced and Pia Ehrdhart's Famous Fathers is in there. This week when I can scratch the time together I'll be reading through the list!
I have been steadily adding to my novel. However there's been a lot happening--the addition of a new laptop and a new screen and a network so I can send stuff to different printers. And troubleshooting! Howsa writer supposed to write in the midst of this muck?
By getting up at 4 am and reaching for the laptop.
I have made use of many of the methods suggested by the different writers in the discussion presented in my last entry. I find myself changing tactics. I am really enjoying the creation of this novel in a way that is different to the last one. I think I am willing for my first draft to 'feel' imperfect. And to carry on in the dark as the prose turns out totally different to how I imagined it.
I am now 3/4 into Louise Erdrich's novel The Painted Drum and I'm loving it. She did take a chance with all those first person narrators. Fabulous read even though I'm taking a long time to finish it.
One of the books I've taken off my bookshelf is The Writing Experiment by Hazel Smith. I like it. I like using it to warm up. It doesn't really add to my novel in any way but I can use some of the language experiments when I'm stuck; building text from word. Reading it makes me realize how I have come to use some of its strategies in writing by flailing in the dark all these years. However reading about the process does not bring me greater amounts of exciting prose but serves as an 'aha' experience. It also informs me that there seems to be a science to what I have discovered with all that moaning in the dark.
Posted by girija tropp at 10:44 PM | Permalink | Comments (3)