So, now that I've nominally finished a first draft of the first act, I can for a brief minute see clearly how really bad the writing is. There are moments. Don't get me wrong. There are splashes of useful writing, but most of it has to be junked. Especially towards the end.
I was so caught up in trying to finish. In dashing for the finish line, I wasn't truly doing my best work or setting myself up to do my best work. It's frustrating how easy it is for the work to take over in importance from other things, and then when I'm not working, well, then all things go wrong.
But the first draft is done, and in my head now, based on the size and the projected edited size (which is 25-50 thousand words longer) of the first act, I'm thinking it'll have to be a trilogy. Three novels in three acts. 350-450 thousand words is waayy too long for one novel. They would have to be highly sequalated though. There's no way to make then totally resolved until after the third act. So the first two acts would be somewhat unresolved novels, which we know from experience is difficult for people looking for escapism.
But a competing desire is novelty. People want things that seem or are new as much as they want strong narratives, righteous heroes, or the escape. So, the slight alterations of the forms that I have in my head could be successful. Cross-platformality seems to be one of the paramount financial success factors, diversity in cultural dissemenation. A more democratic, more decentralized cultural creationary process is what I would like to see. Which we do see to a degree on the Net.
I won't get all up into all the crazy designs I have in my head about new ways to develop alternate perspectives on the same piece of art through alternate media, different forms. I'll just say that there are big ideas stewing. It's all just card castles and sand dreams, anyway. Big ideas blow around in the breeze. Sometimes they blow away.
Monday, May 25, 2009
Saturday, May 9, 2009
The process
All writers have their own process. All writers must find out for themselves what works for them. And what doesn't. They must wander in the wilderness (or maybe that was just my requirement) for all of eternity trying to make sense out of senseless worlds in a work of fiction that both makes sense but also shows how that sense is in direct conflict with prevailing culture mores or how it gives us a deeper sense of what the unburied, unbridled, unconstructed, and dismanipulatedness of the clear-viewed pure culture has, is, and will always be, remaining untroubled by the human manifestations of the sharply narrow views of that all encompassing, all embracing cultura. Just a reworking and remolding of the nature of humanity through the conscious attempts towards exploitation, vapid escape, and a decidedly narrowing process of human awareness.
So, the truth is that culture, can be glimpsed by art, music, film, TV, but that glimpse is just the atomic smash of denting, destroying, Thatonotic, twisting. [to be con'td at: A Hyperanaphlaxis Univeral Mean]
My process is one of facetly layered levels of interconnectedness with the true autobiographical elements of my life, but filtered through a philosophic imagination. That's kind of how this whole novel project came about. I was finishing up a pretty quick, 40ies style inde flick, and the end of the screenplay there's a character trying to write a novel.
And so it occured to me as I was writing some of the last narrative overlay from the actual film, it occurred to me that I should write a novel about a character who wants to write screenplays.
Early on the idea that he would enter into the scenes he'd written, and that that would play havoc on his life, as he was becoming a character in a film, the script of which he was writing himself.
Well, that's quite a condensation of the first act, but true. let's just say this before I get my podcasts up. I promise some top shelf podcasts of the story, probably through podiobooks.com.
And maybe my insights, possibly vid/blog of my ideas. I actually have a half hour breakdown of an early screenplay I wrote. I need to review that shiite and get it going.
So, the truth is that culture, can be glimpsed by art, music, film, TV, but that glimpse is just the atomic smash of denting, destroying, Thatonotic, twisting. [to be con'td at: A Hyperanaphlaxis Univeral Mean]
My process is one of facetly layered levels of interconnectedness with the true autobiographical elements of my life, but filtered through a philosophic imagination. That's kind of how this whole novel project came about. I was finishing up a pretty quick, 40ies style inde flick, and the end of the screenplay there's a character trying to write a novel.
And so it occured to me as I was writing some of the last narrative overlay from the actual film, it occurred to me that I should write a novel about a character who wants to write screenplays.
Early on the idea that he would enter into the scenes he'd written, and that that would play havoc on his life, as he was becoming a character in a film, the script of which he was writing himself.
Well, that's quite a condensation of the first act, but true. let's just say this before I get my podcasts up. I promise some top shelf podcasts of the story, probably through podiobooks.com.
And maybe my insights, possibly vid/blog of my ideas. I actually have a half hour breakdown of an early screenplay I wrote. I need to review that shiite and get it going.
Wednesday, April 29, 2009
How strange is the creative process?
I remember reading an interview with Haruki Marukami somewhere, and the jist of it was that he didn't really consciously develop the symbolism that shows up in his novels. It just kind of happens. Actually, I'm probably totalling reimagining all that from my own jangled brain, but the point I'm trying to get at here is that for all the planning and coordinating and structuring you do, when you actually sit down at the writing table, things can take completely unexpected turns that seem to come from nowhere.
I'm at this juncture in the work where it's essentially a transition, and I was really trying to get from point Q where we were to point R, which should have been a fairly simple move. And yet suddenly our protagonist has lost the ability to use his legs for no apparent reason, and I couldn't for the life of me tell you why that happened or where that came from or what it might symbolize or any of that shiite. I really don't know. It's just that wierd magic that happens when the blank page is in front of you, and you try to cross the jungle. It's a mysterious thing this creative process. Very strange indeed.
I'm at this juncture in the work where it's essentially a transition, and I was really trying to get from point Q where we were to point R, which should have been a fairly simple move. And yet suddenly our protagonist has lost the ability to use his legs for no apparent reason, and I couldn't for the life of me tell you why that happened or where that came from or what it might symbolize or any of that shiite. I really don't know. It's just that wierd magic that happens when the blank page is in front of you, and you try to cross the jungle. It's a mysterious thing this creative process. Very strange indeed.
Monday, April 27, 2009
re-triangulation
So, the truth is it's gonna be awhile before I get the vidblog stuff in full effect. The main problem is one of verbosity. I can't get 'em down below fifteen minutes, and that's working real hard at it. So, the vidblog stuff is still in development, but that don't mean I gotta maintain radio silence on the work.
I've been blocked, distracted, and generally incapable of sitting down to the writing table with even the most minute amount of confidence that I have any skill at writing whatsoever. So things have gone in fits and starts. I've been on the verge of finishing the first act for what seems like months now, and it's been killing me.
The problem really was that I got myself caught up in writing a film at the end of the first act. The idea was that our hero, Thomas, goes to a double feature, the first being Charles Vidor's Gilda. I had a great if very meticulously tedious time of retelling the film, for whatever reason.
Then came the second feature, which was entirely made up. From soup to nuts. I concieved a whole film noir set in Memphis in the 40ies, and practically wrote the whole dang thing. Of course, it wasn't formatted like a screenplay, it was all written like a story within the story of the film Thomas goes to see, and yet it was still more complicated than that. Thomas enters into the film. He becomes the camera. He becomes the liminal medium between the interior world of the film and the external world where an audience is watching this film.
At times Thomas was in both places, other times neither. All very wierd, but I made the push with a fourteen hour writing session, and I finished off the film in a very satisfying way. Now I'm down to the last chapter of the first act. Sort of.
There's actually a new aspect to the first act, which was there from the beginning (I just wanted to write that stuff after I'd finished the meat of the act), which requires me to go through the city of Boston and thru a kind of poetic, surrealistic, impressionistic writing follow Thomas as he goes from seeing Derrick Morgan at the Middle East Downstairs all the way into the first scene of the screenplay he's just written the first scene for.
Crazy, crazy. Should be fun.
I've been blocked, distracted, and generally incapable of sitting down to the writing table with even the most minute amount of confidence that I have any skill at writing whatsoever. So things have gone in fits and starts. I've been on the verge of finishing the first act for what seems like months now, and it's been killing me.
The problem really was that I got myself caught up in writing a film at the end of the first act. The idea was that our hero, Thomas, goes to a double feature, the first being Charles Vidor's Gilda. I had a great if very meticulously tedious time of retelling the film, for whatever reason.
Then came the second feature, which was entirely made up. From soup to nuts. I concieved a whole film noir set in Memphis in the 40ies, and practically wrote the whole dang thing. Of course, it wasn't formatted like a screenplay, it was all written like a story within the story of the film Thomas goes to see, and yet it was still more complicated than that. Thomas enters into the film. He becomes the camera. He becomes the liminal medium between the interior world of the film and the external world where an audience is watching this film.
At times Thomas was in both places, other times neither. All very wierd, but I made the push with a fourteen hour writing session, and I finished off the film in a very satisfying way. Now I'm down to the last chapter of the first act. Sort of.
There's actually a new aspect to the first act, which was there from the beginning (I just wanted to write that stuff after I'd finished the meat of the act), which requires me to go through the city of Boston and thru a kind of poetic, surrealistic, impressionistic writing follow Thomas as he goes from seeing Derrick Morgan at the Middle East Downstairs all the way into the first scene of the screenplay he's just written the first scene for.
Crazy, crazy. Should be fun.
Saturday, February 7, 2009
All access pass
So, I said in that last post (which at some point will appear behind the post of a vidblog because I'm gonna post that in a draft I've already started from a few weeks ago) that I wanted to really open up and document the process of writing this novel, Mythic Structures. And I'm within striking distance of the end of the first act, of which they'll be three. As you can see by the giant time jump between now and the last post (or the post before the last post depending on when yr reading this), I have been remiss in my intentions to document the creative process here on my blog or really anywhere else.
I have started twittering, god help me, and I can see how addictive it can be. I do want to do instant miniture flashes of the process as it's happening, which you really can't do here. Here you have to actively stop work on the novel and then write a blogpost about what you remember or recognize from what you've just done (write, concieve, edit, reconcieve, or my fav. storytelling [which is the absolute essence of art, even the plastic ones]). So they are two different processes, and it'll be interesting to watch and compare the process of documenting the process of writing through these various forms. So, just for the sake of shiites and giggles, here's my twitter link.
How did I get here? I keep asking myself that question, and my mind just goes blank, emptying out of anything resembling useful information in regards to this so basic of questions. I have no freaking clue.
Anyway, I've also started to explore other multi-media stuff. I got a vidcam for Christmas, and I've done several vidblogs and a reading of a chapter of the novel and general miscellaneous, nonsensical ramblings. I just gotta get my vimeo shasta in effect. I think I need to go ahead and pay the sixty bucks, because I gave up on the last video I tried to upload. It wasn't that big. Like two hundred megs, and I was getting nothing. Maybe I'm just way too impatient. That's probably it, but I'll join anyway cause I dig their scene. And I can see myself going way over the free upload limits. I've got a bunch of stuff to post there and here and over at AHUAM and even maybe some stuff for The Dancing Fool, which we'll have to see about.
Over there at The Fool I'm going to be documenting the process by which I lose the extra twenty or so pounds I've put on since last Oct, and get my dancing chops back into tight formation. So far it's a little sad and very embarrassing. I think I may have to post accompanying embedded audio commentaries where I shred on myself ruthlessly because that's the only way I'd feel good about putting that stuff out there. Now once I get back to my dancing weight, get my flexibility back, my stamina, and my cardiovascular strength...Yo, if I can get back into that effect, well, I think you'll be impressed. I do have the skills, even as they're as rusty as an old metal fencepost right now.
Okay, let's see, other stuff I wanted to say. Oh, I just got an upgrade for my digital voice recorder, and so once I rerecord my readings of the novel chapters, I'll post them. Basically have a podcast of the chapters of the first act of Mythic structures. I also want to start recording brainstorming and conceptual workouts for the novel (it is all and everything about the novel right now, as you'll see) and then posting that stuff.
Basically, my plan is to obsessively document as much of the process as possible from as many different media angles as I can, and then after it's all done, well, I can see just what a complete and utter waste of time the whole thing had been, and I can relive in the most minutest detail all of the blood, sweat, and toil that went into a novel that probably has very little chance of getting published because of the wierdness factor, the complicatedness factor, and the ultimately unresolvedness of a good bit of the stuff factor. Sorry to be vague there about stuff, but I'd hate to give away too much, too soon.
So, lots of multi-media stuff coming. And, well, I'll just call it for now.
I have started twittering, god help me, and I can see how addictive it can be. I do want to do instant miniture flashes of the process as it's happening, which you really can't do here. Here you have to actively stop work on the novel and then write a blogpost about what you remember or recognize from what you've just done (write, concieve, edit, reconcieve, or my fav. storytelling [which is the absolute essence of art, even the plastic ones]). So they are two different processes, and it'll be interesting to watch and compare the process of documenting the process of writing through these various forms. So, just for the sake of shiites and giggles, here's my twitter link.
How did I get here? I keep asking myself that question, and my mind just goes blank, emptying out of anything resembling useful information in regards to this so basic of questions. I have no freaking clue.
Anyway, I've also started to explore other multi-media stuff. I got a vidcam for Christmas, and I've done several vidblogs and a reading of a chapter of the novel and general miscellaneous, nonsensical ramblings. I just gotta get my vimeo shasta in effect. I think I need to go ahead and pay the sixty bucks, because I gave up on the last video I tried to upload. It wasn't that big. Like two hundred megs, and I was getting nothing. Maybe I'm just way too impatient. That's probably it, but I'll join anyway cause I dig their scene. And I can see myself going way over the free upload limits. I've got a bunch of stuff to post there and here and over at AHUAM and even maybe some stuff for The Dancing Fool, which we'll have to see about.
Over there at The Fool I'm going to be documenting the process by which I lose the extra twenty or so pounds I've put on since last Oct, and get my dancing chops back into tight formation. So far it's a little sad and very embarrassing. I think I may have to post accompanying embedded audio commentaries where I shred on myself ruthlessly because that's the only way I'd feel good about putting that stuff out there. Now once I get back to my dancing weight, get my flexibility back, my stamina, and my cardiovascular strength...Yo, if I can get back into that effect, well, I think you'll be impressed. I do have the skills, even as they're as rusty as an old metal fencepost right now.
Okay, let's see, other stuff I wanted to say. Oh, I just got an upgrade for my digital voice recorder, and so once I rerecord my readings of the novel chapters, I'll post them. Basically have a podcast of the chapters of the first act of Mythic structures. I also want to start recording brainstorming and conceptual workouts for the novel (it is all and everything about the novel right now, as you'll see) and then posting that stuff.
Basically, my plan is to obsessively document as much of the process as possible from as many different media angles as I can, and then after it's all done, well, I can see just what a complete and utter waste of time the whole thing had been, and I can relive in the most minutest detail all of the blood, sweat, and toil that went into a novel that probably has very little chance of getting published because of the wierdness factor, the complicatedness factor, and the ultimately unresolvedness of a good bit of the stuff factor. Sorry to be vague there about stuff, but I'd hate to give away too much, too soon.
So, lots of multi-media stuff coming. And, well, I'll just call it for now.
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)