Writing
You’ve finally decided you want to be a writer. Great! You didn’t want to be a day trader or a comedian anyway. Can you imagine the work you would have had to put in? Awful compared to the joy of writing. That plus: the short story you wrote last week was amazing and it was only your first try. So, the decision came easily.
The world’s happy to have your voice too, considering Great American writing is in need of a revival.
You sigh in relief now that you’ve put other silly career paths to bed.
Handing in your resignation letter (you don’t, you draft a two-sentence email to HR that allows three months’ notice in case anything changes, and you refrain from sending), you reflect some more on your choice because why not. It was such a good choice.
First, you imagine your writer’s retreat. You love Tokyo, so it’s there. You and your girlfriend took a trip after graduating college and have been obsessed since. But then you realize that’s movie deal money and movie deal money probably isn’t coming until your third or fourth book. Movie deals are a crap shoot anyhow, and you know this because of the internet. Tokyo can be a pied-a-terre. No, your writer’s retreat needs to be closer to home, and home will be New York City. You’re torn between a cottage in New York State to the North, and New York State to the East, both such popular haunts with the 20th century greats. And you also weigh Connecticut as an option, as it would be off the beaten path. You safely rule out New Jersey.
Then you realize you’ve gotten ahead of yourself again, silly. Writer’s retreat money isn’t in the cards quite yet. Certainly not until book one has cleared the advance pay. So, you picture your life as a teacher. You know you’ve got the talent to make it college-level but would be plenty happy with private high school to start. And the life’s romantic, isn’t it? Lecturing the Great Gatsby, Vonnegut. A summer home on Long Island. Somehow, that teacher’s salary looks six figures in your head.
For inspiration, you re-read that story you wrote last week. When you wrote it, you were at work, shirking your duties, toiling at craft while the gluttons spoke of agendas and pitch decks. And dear God, the story’s still amazing.
You know your girlfriend will like it, so sending it would be a mere formality, fishing for validation. You send it anyway.
She’s at work, stitching the safety net. It’s a finance job, not investment role, but substantial enough to not worry. The partner of a financier needs rarely worry. In fact, your only worry is that her status will one day alienate you from the experience of common folk. As if your whole life hasn’t already achieved that end. You just used the phrase common folk. This thinking sets you back a minute, but your girlfriend straightens you out with a quick response, “pretty good.”
That’s right it’s pretty good, and it’s an unedited story at that. You know that all good writers have shitty first drafts, so if this is your starting point…
You remember that Great American writing needs a revival.
You’re ready to write and to affirm your biggest life choice to date, and so you do. The story is about a man, a man who fashions himself a modern cowboy, and it begins with muscular prose, “Now the Earth has shattered, and all men have been forced unto this wired land without hope of rescue.”
The line sits on the page. Occasionally, you occupy the space next to the period.
It’s been some while with nothing beyond the first sentence. And re-reading it, you yourself lose hope of rescue. That’s not the kind of sentence your heroes write, not to start a piece. That line is too big, too on the nose.
So, to salvage the attempt, you write something completely different. It’s autobiographical – it’s practically nonfiction. It’s about your girlfriend and your jealousy for her money. This comes easily.
It’s 500 words, so that counts for the day. It’s not good.
Your choice to pursue writing remains feebly intact.
This time you stick to what the books recommend. You prime your mind to writing by visualizing the story, not by reading your own work. You outline the plot. You know why you’re writing about this specific character, on this specific day, in this specific place. You will tackle the story bird by bird. Yuck.
It’s about Johnny, the modern-day cowboy you dreamt up earlier. Johnny’s whole life, he moved around. He had divorced parents, his mom bouncing from job to job, and his dad, being a military man, restationing every four years. Now, Johnny’s finally settled, but trouble at work has given him that old feeling of: got to go. You believe you share this feeling – you’re three years shy of 25 and work also sucks. You find it worthy of big literature.
Johnny’s having trouble explaining this feeling to his partner, who he also wants to get away from as they’ve taken to aggressive fits of drinking. There are plot points that fill in later, and details to reveal, but the story starts here.
You write into the bottom of your notes: the story is about disentangling from the world and the first bold steps into authenticity. Next to this note, there’s an arrow that points to: Texas.
Your confidence is returning, and you commit to writing like you’re the only human left alive.
And then you begin again.
Editing
It’s bad, real bad.
But you remember that all authors have shitty first drafts. So far, you’ve gotten to the point where Johnny and his partner have split. That took about two sessions. Again, it’s bad, but you’ve got a kernel of excitement for where this can go. There are lofty ideas you haven’t yet fit in, and almost all these ideas orbit masculinity. You believe masculinity is an important subject, one that might earn you some recognition as a forward thinker. And in conversations with socially minded friends, you frame this theme as a selling point. Not that your characters are good enough for it yet.
But you push this thought aside. You’ve got masculinity to dismantle.
Lifting your fingers for an additional 250 words – an achievable mark – you realize that you’re sapped from writing. You can put words down, but hardly a line makes grammatical sense. This is a new feeling, one you understand that other writers suffer from, but not one you’ve imagined for yourself. Weren’t you excited just minutes ago?
You decide that tomorrow is for editing. This flies in the face of advice you’ve read. And then you let tomorrow pass.
While on an idea-generation walk, you listen to a lecture from your favorite author. He suggests that good writing is, as you suspected, about the practice of good editing. And given the state of your future-masterpiece, you feel it’s important to edit the voice into shape before proceeding. Once this first portion is correct, the rest will flow. You’re certain of this. You remember that this is what Zadie Smith does, and you feel in good company.
Your favorite author, who shall remain nameless for fear of comparison (it’s George Saunders), continues to suggest that editing happens when writers approach their work with a kinder and more sympathetic version of themselves. Meaning: remove that opinionated dickhead from the rough draft. Meaning: take care with the shortcomings of each character. He suggests that if you do this repeatedly, if you hold your story more tenderly with each pass, the final product will emerge. It’ll be apparent once you’ve got no more good left to add.
Later, at drinks, your friends ask how writing is going. You tell them, “perhaps the better question is: how is editing going?” Then you pass off that author’s ideas as your own. They nod and then talk about themselves, too.
Your girlfriend is tired from work, so you stay-in and cook her dinner. She deserves more kindness than this, but it’s the most you can give in one night. After dinner, she pets your stomach and cries at movie trailers. She asks about your writing, and once more, you pass off that author’s thoughts on editing. Her eyes fall and you ask if she needs sleep, and then her eyes smile in your direction, and you help her to bed. You understand that she deserves more kindness than you can give in one lifetime.
The thought occurs to you, though, “would you mind taking a look at this story?”
She’s nestled into her pillow but manages, “I’d love to.”
It’s that short, autobiographical piece about her job. It’s risky. It takes cheap shots. It says finance is slimy and the money is corrupting. It’s not even that good. Nevertheless, your finger hovers over the send button. You bite your nail and look over at her and she’s precious and you’re aware of just how immature this is.
For some reason, you’re compelled it send it anyway.
You’re finally editing the first part of the damn Johnny thing.
It’s got this broken line type of line, “Johnny wore a neckerchief, tight pinstriped slacks, and an oversized white shirt. And he entered, confidently, a fake confidence that he hoped others would perceive as authentic, the bar.”
It’s got paragraphs of this stuff, “Booths, leather strapped and saddled with old men, and carrying scratches and etch marks like memories, beckoned Johnny to their mysteries.”
You don’t have an MFA but you’re writing MFA bullshit. You do descriptions in groups of three. Your piece has an airy feel and it’s partially about place even though you grew up rich. What’s your interesting place? A second home? The way you write it, place seems mere word count, a stand-in for story.
You try to take the advice – to be kinder to yourself, to remove the opinionated dickhead from right now. It’s OK that you write MFA bullshit, who doesn’t? You half believe the pep talk.
You trim descriptions to one adjective, at most, and take out all the saccharin stuff about booths. The piece breathes. It’s not good, and that’s still a reflection on you, but it’s got room. Maybe the piece didn’t need the immediate editing, but you did.
Your girlfriend is mad about the piece you sent. Mad like: is that really what you think of me? Of my job? You know I take my career seriously. And: even if it’s all true, what made you think I needed to see it?
This is over text and you’re at work, sitting dumb and mute. The worst part is she’s right. The worst part is you knew all this and still sent it. The worst part is you did think she needed to see it. You can’t identify the worst part. It is the worst.
A week or two ago, you were lauding the benefits of a successful girlfriend. Today, you can hear Freud approaching. What was that about dismantling masculinity?
Your girlfriend is working late, per usual, so you retreat into Johnny. You’ve done this the past few nights. This is the healthiest writing practice you’ve ever had.
So far, Johnny has kicked his partner out of the home and quit his job. It’s been messy. He’s wondering if he burned too many bridges, if he meant everything he said, and that’s infected his confidence in the grander plan. Does he really need to up and leave? Will the West solve his problems? Or was it that he needed a new partner and job, and was too prone to romantic solutions? So to say, Johnny’s realizing he might be up shit’s creek. That and: his partner was drunk and threatened to kill him.
You’re on the cusp of climax and you know where you want to go. Johnny’s partner will follow through with his threats, and release Johnny from the predicament. But you’re unsure how to handle it. The outline provides no refuge. So rather than write, you go back and edit. The story is long, like Joyce Carol Oates long, and you make line edits throughout. Of course, you see structural fixes but those would be too much work. If you wanted to put in the work, you’d have been a comedian or day trader.
New Ideas
Things have been going so-so, and your mind wants to rest in comfortable corners. Corners like the Theories on Writing Corner.
There, you have a thought: every writer is just a bad writer trying to prove they have taste. Or maybe: we all start as bad writers and then some of us learn to stop pulling our punches.
You start by writing, “Johnny held the knife, gleaming under the pale kitchen light, tight in his white knuckled fist. It stood resolute in front of him, square between the eyes, the uneasy appendage of his stiff, outstretched arm. Though his assailant, his former partner, drew nearer, Johnny’s eyes were caught elsewhere. They were locked into a reflection in the marble countertop. They sighted a quaking man with a knife. A knife the quaking man wouldn’t use.”
Then you cut it considerably to, “Johnny held the knife tight in his fist, and though his assailant drew nearer, Johnny’s eyes were caught in a reflection. They sighted a quaking man with a knife he wouldn’t use.”
Then it occurs to you that you still hate it. When you’re drunk, you talk about how language ought to carry characterization. This certainly doesn’t do that. Plus, it’s the climax and it doesn’t progress the story as you intended.
That isn’t all. It sounds bad, it completely lacks in taste. You realize the fix isn’t, as you believed a minute ago, character-driven language. The fix is: a new writer. A writer who actually gets it, a writer like James McBride. And James McBride is already published, he’s out there sounding like you, so what’s the point of continuing to write?
You put Johnny down for the day.
Your girlfriend informs you that she’s seeing friends tonight and suggests you don’t sleep over. So that’s another night without seeing her. You’re thinking that the whole thing smacks as dramatic, but then you read the piece again. It’s damning.
The Theories on Writing Corner calls. In response to that idea on taste, it sends a memo across your desk, titled: What Is Art? This is a familiar briefing and you’re excited to receive this edition. It’s a briefing you can spend enjoyable hours over while evaporated into your own asshole. It begins, “What can we learn about art itself through the process of art making?” And then continues with a long, windy meditation on creation, and you take this meditation to the shower where you really start feeling yourself. It concludes with, “How ought I make art? It’s simple. I ought to make art I enjoy, because what else are we doing here besides having fun?
“Therefore, if the process of art making ought to be enjoyable, then the art itself – the product of that process – ought to be enjoyable too.”
Jesus. You nailed it again.
You reconsider that piece about Johnny and, eventually, you reach that wooden line about the knife, and the whole thing starts to read like chewed gum.
You rework it to, “Johnny held the knife tight, though his end drew near.”
That’s not it.
You take that missive on enjoyable art and argue about it with friends. Preferably, these aren’t artist friends, that way you win the argument easily. That way you’re living comfortably inside your own asshole.
Only issue is: your art doesn’t live up to the standard. It’s not always fun to write.
So, you test the theory on more and more people, some of them artist friends. Some of the theory rings true, but its flaws become apparent. You haven’t established anything besides the fact that you like fun books. And then you feel a bit crazy because, this past week, you haven’t put down anything meaningful about Johnny. The only thing you’ve done is talk about a crackpot theory on art that no one wanted. And it strikes you that there is something in this craziness. It lingers. Feeling crazy is the closest you’ve ever gotten to good writing.
You and your girlfriend have plans to meet Mom for dinner, and you haven’t yet had time to discuss that short piece. You ask how her week has been, and she says, do you really want to know? You’re silent and she shakes her head.
“The bummer is that I had a good week,” she says. “Whatever you think that means.”
The other bummer is that Mom is totally obsessed with your girlfriend, and she doesn’t know you’re screwing it up. Had you told Mom, she’d tell you to stop writing bad short stories. If only.
While at dinner, your girlfriend lands an interview at a prestigious bank. She’s excited and Mom is through the moon and orders champagne. You want to share in the excitement, but you’re worried it’ll come out fake. Mom congratulates your girlfriend endlessly and all you do is muster a tight-lipped smile. Your girlfriend gives you a sideways look. Mom nudges your shoulder to say something. Your girlfriend gets up to take a call from the bank.
You find yourself sitting dumb and mute again.
You’re home again and fucking sick and tired of this Johnny story because you know it sucks and that means you suck. And you’re still not even James McBride. What you really mean to say is: “Johnny wanted to throw the knife down but couldn’t because every bone in his body was stuck to the idea of the man he wasn’t.”
Oh.
Recursive Feedback Loop
Years later, you submit the above for a workshop reading. Well, a trimmed down version. There aren’t the parts about your girlfriend, the whole finance story and subsequent fallout. And there is much less about Johnny. It’s more a big joke about writing, and you think it does a good job of lampooning ego. This might be true, not that it matters.
And yes, by workshop, you are referring to a writing program that condones and perpetuates MFA bullshit. You fastidiously avoid this trap.
The feedback is many things. You want to say it’s incorrect, but it’s not. The story does need something to glue it together, perhaps more on Johnny and the girlfriend. You determine to add those elements in (and voila, you have!).
You tell the class that the piece is nonfiction and, curiously, many reject this possibility.
In reference to the narrator, they say things like “the character you’ve created” or “this version of you.” This is where the feedback gets hurtful. This is where the feedback wants the story to be a fiction because the feedback says: there’s nothing to sympathize with this character. Or: I’m finding myself rooting against the narrator most of the time. Or: you have to assume the relationship didn’t last. Or: he’s not very likeable.
In fairness, that was how you wrote yourself. It was meant to be funny…
You wish you weren’t so self-deprecating. There’s no way to mediate yourself beyond jokes and jokes only find the bad bits interesting. Sure, life is funny, but that truth only registers as a serious matter every now and then. Rather, you’re constantly turning over stones and finding the worms and pointing and laughing. It’s always gotten a rise out of folks. You hope that writing is a better, kinder way to get a reaction.
And then you think, quit the sob story. This clearly isn’t a sob story.
Well then, what is it?
Here’s how that dinner with your girlfriend (soon to be fiancé) ended:
Your girlfriend returns from her call and says she has an interview scheduled for tomorrow afternoon, so Mom motions for a check. You know that saying nothing is hardly an option. You know that your anger over your girlfriend’s career and money was a mask. You wanted to love destitution. You wanted to be a writer. You were prone to romantic solutions, and you weren’t even good at the execution.
So, you take your girlfriend’s hand and deliver a serious line.
You say that you want her to succeed and to be happy in her success. That you’re sorry for being quiet. You wanted to mean what you said, which you know you’re not always good at.
Mom goes, well OK. Very nice. Waiter?
But your girlfriend takes your hand back.
Slowly and over years, you work to earn this space she gave you.
You start a new book and this time it’s written from a woman’s perspective to avoid any autobiography. This fails, every few pages or so, because you’re quite effeminate. Nevertheless, you like writing as a woman. You couldn’t have done this when you started.
It’s a better book and more honest. It’s still not good, but that’s why you write. In the book, Johnny is a side character, a failed boyfriend past. You write him as a cautionary tale, ever the problem with masculinity, and then you edit him into a tragic tale, ever the problem. He comes home from a failed voyage West and complicates your narrator’s life. But he’s no more than a bump in the road. Your narrator is beyond Johnny.
You’re back in the Theories on Writing Corner, which you visit with less frequency but maintain as a guilty pleasure. An old one comes back to you: every writer is just a bad writer trying to prove they have taste. But no, that’s not it any longer. Every writer is trying to tell the world: don’t you hear it? Don’t you hear it too?
In class, you suggest that, just as your favorite author recommends, you remove the opinionated dickhead from the piece. This gets a thoughtful nod from your professor and that’s more than enough.
So, once home, you re-read the thing. You try to remove the dickhead. But it’s not possible. Tail to toe, he’s everywhere, that opinionated dickhead. You laugh because these past few years, you’ve worked at forgetting him. You’ve thought that the opinionated dickhead is vestigial. Now you grasp that he’s fundamental. He’s been on the page this whole time.
And then you’re weak and in awe because this means that your friends still love him. Your girlfriend (very soon to be fiancé) still loves him. You’re weak and in awe because it’s time to wrap an arm around his shoulder and take him indoors.