I once ran an evening class in Creative Writing. I didn’t particularly enjoy it because some of the students were very strange indeed. There was one man, for example, who reminded me of an autistic Sherlock Holmes. He was in his thirties, tall and thin with very straight brown hair, a high forehead, prominent cheekbones and an aquiline nose. He hardly said a word but every week he came to the class with a slightly different version of the same story, each time apparently convinced that he had written something quite new.
The story generally started something like this: ‘I hear a key turn in the lock. The door creaks open and they enter the house.’ He would then go on to describe a group of people of varying number, but always at least two, walking slowly and carefully up the stairs of a suburban terraced house which he often protrayed in immense detail, right down to the pattern of the wallpaper. They never spoke; all were too intent on their purpose. In their hands they clutched knives and forks.
The narrator who was clearly in a state of great agitation, grew more and more terrified as he chronicled the progress of these mysterious individuals, through each of the bedrooms in turn. Only when they finally stood outside the door of the uppermost bedroom, did it become clear that he was telling the story while strapped to a bed inside and that the silent individuals who stood ready to enter the room were members of his own family whose purpose was to eat him alive. See what I mean when I say, strange?
I asked him once what inspired this story. Christmas, he told me.
Well I hope your Christmas wasn’t too much like his. Mine was very, very relaxed. Nice food, music, dvds and pleasant company. I didn’t turn the computer on for two days. But I could hear it calling to me all the time, whispering my name in the dead of night.
There would have been no point, of course. Writing is all about concentration and I find it impossible to concentrate for at least a week before or after Christmas. It’s a writer’s wasteland: a great swathe of the imagination blanketed in snow.
But a thaw is coming. I can hear the sound of trickling water. And so I have turned my computer back on and I am looking forward to returning to work. No one has eaten me alive, I’m pleased to say. And I very much hope the same is true for you.
Saturday, 27 December 2008
Tuesday, 23 December 2008
The Most Disappointing Book I Ever Bought
The most disappointing book I ever bought was a collection of short stories produced by the Arts Council of England many years ago. At that time they used to publish an anthology of new writing annually in a thick paperback edition. I would buy it as soon as it came out, keen to see what was happening at the cutting edge of literature.
In those days I was at the start of my career, married with two small children, and struggling to pay the rent on our flat in a fairly insalubrious part of South-East London. We couldn’t afford a washing machine so once a week I would make a pilgrimage to the laundrette with my washing in a black plastic sack and sit there reading while it tumbled round and round in one of the huge old machines that looked like they had been designed and built in the Soviet Union a decade earlier. It was not a chore I enjoyed. The place had an air of ingrained poverty and was frequented mostly by misfits and oddballs of one kind or another
On this occasion I set off as usual with my washing and my box of detergent, feeling a little less reluctant for I had my brand new anthology with me. When I got to the laundrette I saw with considerable pleasure that the place was empty. For a brief interval the daily struggle to feed, entertain, bath and put to bed two impossibly lively children could be forgotten, or at least exchanged for an hour’s uninterrupted reading. Bliss! Whistling to myself, I emptied the clothes into the washing machine, selected the wash I wanted, put in my coins and sat down to begin – only to discover that somehow I seemed to have forgotten my book. I was so cross I could have kicked myself, and the ensuing hour passed unbearably slowly.
At last, however, the washing cycle was finished. I opened the door of the machine and began to take out the clothes. But what on earth had happened to them? They all seemed to be covered in a slimy grey film. It took me a surprisingly long time to work out that I had not, after all, left my book behind. Instead I had impregnated all my clothes with the most exciting new writing that England had to offer.
In those days I was at the start of my career, married with two small children, and struggling to pay the rent on our flat in a fairly insalubrious part of South-East London. We couldn’t afford a washing machine so once a week I would make a pilgrimage to the laundrette with my washing in a black plastic sack and sit there reading while it tumbled round and round in one of the huge old machines that looked like they had been designed and built in the Soviet Union a decade earlier. It was not a chore I enjoyed. The place had an air of ingrained poverty and was frequented mostly by misfits and oddballs of one kind or another
On this occasion I set off as usual with my washing and my box of detergent, feeling a little less reluctant for I had my brand new anthology with me. When I got to the laundrette I saw with considerable pleasure that the place was empty. For a brief interval the daily struggle to feed, entertain, bath and put to bed two impossibly lively children could be forgotten, or at least exchanged for an hour’s uninterrupted reading. Bliss! Whistling to myself, I emptied the clothes into the washing machine, selected the wash I wanted, put in my coins and sat down to begin – only to discover that somehow I seemed to have forgotten my book. I was so cross I could have kicked myself, and the ensuing hour passed unbearably slowly.
At last, however, the washing cycle was finished. I opened the door of the machine and began to take out the clothes. But what on earth had happened to them? They all seemed to be covered in a slimy grey film. It took me a surprisingly long time to work out that I had not, after all, left my book behind. Instead I had impregnated all my clothes with the most exciting new writing that England had to offer.
Monday, 22 December 2008
The Poisoned Curtains
Arthur Miller said that a good play should have the economy of a dream. Nothing is unnecessary in a dream, he added. When I first heard this remark, I was puzzled since dreams often seem to be such a lot of nonsense when one remembers them the next morning. However, I think he was talking about the intensity with which the dreamer experiences the dream, and the way that levels of meaning are condensed into the dream imagery.
Recently, I dreamt that I was walking down the street and I saw a house with some velvet curtains hanging in the window. I thought to myself, ‘I’d like to eat those curtains. The next thing I knew I was inside the house and I’d just finished eating the curtains. (I can still remember what they tasted like!). Then, I went outside again and there was my wife. She said, ‘You haven’t just eaten those curtains, have you?’
‘Yes,’ I said. ‘What’s the problem?’
She pointed to a sign in the window which I had somehow missed previously. In large, bold letters it read, ‘Warning. Poisoned Curtains.’
What makes this dream significant for me is that when I was growing up my parents were fairly poor. Not destitute, just hard-working immigrants who struggled to make their place in the world. They sent me to a school run by Catholic priests which was very big on Latin and I developed a real taste for Latin poetry. But I’d never learned Greek and I suspected that this might be even more enjoyable. So when I was sixteen, I went to a Summer School to learn the language of Homer. Everyone else there came from very wealthy backgrounds. I soon began a relationship with another student and she invited me to her house. Frankly, I was shocked when I went there by how luxurious it was. In particular, I remember looking at the velvet curtains and thinking that when I grew up that was what I wanted. And indeed, I now have blue velvet curtains in my living room (although they were bought second hand).
I felt the dream was about my own death. It was telling me that when you achieve all your goals, there is only one thing left to do and that is to die. But obviously it’s open to a number of different interpretations. That’s the point that Arthur Miller was making, I believe. If I could write a story which has the same level of resonance for the audience as that dream has for me, then I would be a great writer. The question is: how much longer have I got before the curtains kill me?
Recently, I dreamt that I was walking down the street and I saw a house with some velvet curtains hanging in the window. I thought to myself, ‘I’d like to eat those curtains. The next thing I knew I was inside the house and I’d just finished eating the curtains. (I can still remember what they tasted like!). Then, I went outside again and there was my wife. She said, ‘You haven’t just eaten those curtains, have you?’
‘Yes,’ I said. ‘What’s the problem?’
She pointed to a sign in the window which I had somehow missed previously. In large, bold letters it read, ‘Warning. Poisoned Curtains.’
What makes this dream significant for me is that when I was growing up my parents were fairly poor. Not destitute, just hard-working immigrants who struggled to make their place in the world. They sent me to a school run by Catholic priests which was very big on Latin and I developed a real taste for Latin poetry. But I’d never learned Greek and I suspected that this might be even more enjoyable. So when I was sixteen, I went to a Summer School to learn the language of Homer. Everyone else there came from very wealthy backgrounds. I soon began a relationship with another student and she invited me to her house. Frankly, I was shocked when I went there by how luxurious it was. In particular, I remember looking at the velvet curtains and thinking that when I grew up that was what I wanted. And indeed, I now have blue velvet curtains in my living room (although they were bought second hand).
I felt the dream was about my own death. It was telling me that when you achieve all your goals, there is only one thing left to do and that is to die. But obviously it’s open to a number of different interpretations. That’s the point that Arthur Miller was making, I believe. If I could write a story which has the same level of resonance for the audience as that dream has for me, then I would be a great writer. The question is: how much longer have I got before the curtains kill me?
Saturday, 20 December 2008
Th City Of Invention
In Books Do Furnish A Room, the tenth book in Anthony Powell’s A Dance To The Music Of Time sequence, one of the characters observes that books are a non-convertible currency. They matter only to those to whom they matter.
Almost every day this point is hammered home to me by the reactions of people on finding out what I do for a living. Some are hugely impressed and want to know all the details. But these are usually people who nurture their own literary ambitions or are in some way already committed to the community of letters. Others, like the man who delivered coal to my mother in Ireland, are openly scornful.
‘That’s an awful soft kind of a job,’ he told me.
‘Maybe you should have a try at it,’ I suggested.
He shook his head, gave me the kind of look reserved for the simple-minded and emptied a bag of coal over my shoes.
It’s not always easy to bridge the divide between these two groups of people – those who value writing and those who do not. Fay Weldon tries to do so in a marvellous book called Letters To Alice which she addresses to a fourteen year old niece who is being made to read Jane Austen at school and cannot see the point. What novelists do, Fay Weldon declares, is to build Houses of the Imagination and where houses cluster together there is a city. This is how she describes that city:
It glitters and glances with life, and gossip, and colour, and fantasy: it is brilliant, it is illuminated, by day by the sun of enthusiasm and by night by the moon of inspiration. It has its towers and pinnacles, its commanding heights and its swooning depths: it has public buildings and worthy ancient monuments, which some find boring and others magnificent. It has its central districts and its suburbs, some salubrious, some seedy, some safe, some frightening. Those who founded it, who built it, house by house, are the novelists, the writers, the poets. And it is to this city that the readers come, to admire, to marvel and explore.
Even if the brickwork is a bit dodgy in places, even if there are holes in the roof and some of the rooms are uninhabitable, and even if it will never be as grand as the great castles built by writers like Shakespeare and Milton - to know that I have built my own house in the City Of Invention is enough for me.
Almost every day this point is hammered home to me by the reactions of people on finding out what I do for a living. Some are hugely impressed and want to know all the details. But these are usually people who nurture their own literary ambitions or are in some way already committed to the community of letters. Others, like the man who delivered coal to my mother in Ireland, are openly scornful.
‘That’s an awful soft kind of a job,’ he told me.
‘Maybe you should have a try at it,’ I suggested.
He shook his head, gave me the kind of look reserved for the simple-minded and emptied a bag of coal over my shoes.
It’s not always easy to bridge the divide between these two groups of people – those who value writing and those who do not. Fay Weldon tries to do so in a marvellous book called Letters To Alice which she addresses to a fourteen year old niece who is being made to read Jane Austen at school and cannot see the point. What novelists do, Fay Weldon declares, is to build Houses of the Imagination and where houses cluster together there is a city. This is how she describes that city:
It glitters and glances with life, and gossip, and colour, and fantasy: it is brilliant, it is illuminated, by day by the sun of enthusiasm and by night by the moon of inspiration. It has its towers and pinnacles, its commanding heights and its swooning depths: it has public buildings and worthy ancient monuments, which some find boring and others magnificent. It has its central districts and its suburbs, some salubrious, some seedy, some safe, some frightening. Those who founded it, who built it, house by house, are the novelists, the writers, the poets. And it is to this city that the readers come, to admire, to marvel and explore.
Even if the brickwork is a bit dodgy in places, even if there are holes in the roof and some of the rooms are uninhabitable, and even if it will never be as grand as the great castles built by writers like Shakespeare and Milton - to know that I have built my own house in the City Of Invention is enough for me.
Friday, 19 December 2008
Five Ways To Ruin A Good Manuscript
As I’ve said before, I work with a lot of developing authors and I see a lot of the same problems re-occurring, problems I grappled with myself when I first started out trying to become a writer. So I thought I’d mention five of the most common, along with some possible solutions.
I’m doing so in the hope that someone reading this might find it helpful but if these are problems you don't recognise, or if the solutions strike you as untenable, then don’t give them a second thought. And, please bear in mind that I’m describing extremes. All these behaviours can be perfectly acceptable when used appropriately and there are any number of examples from great literature to show this.
Ignoring the inner lives of the central characters
Some authors forget to shed light on the internal world of their characters. They concentrate so much on what the characters do, that they neglect to tell the reader about their thoughts, dreams, hopes, and fears. One possible solution to this might be to try showing your character remembering a key incident that had particular significance for his or her view of himself, or the rest of the world.
Telling the reader directly about the characters’ faults and virtues
It’s always so much better to allow readers to draw their own conclusions about characters than to spell it out for them. If you find yourself wanting to tell the reader what to think, try shifting some of those judgements to other characters. Show them reacting to your protagonist, in dialogue or in behaviour, rather than using the authorial voice to make your point.
Ladling out description of character in indigestible lumps
Some authors seem to think it’s necessary to introduce a character by providing a lengthy pen portrait. This can work, of course, but it’s very easy to over-do it. It’s often better to release the information slowly, like paying out rope, thereby giving the reader an incentive to keep turning the pages. One possible solution is to make it a rule to deal with physical description the first time you introduce a character but to allow personal history to bleed out slowly during the remainder of the narrative
Changing voice when dealing with backstory.
This is usually caused by the need to condense material when filling the reader in about what has happened in the past; there is so much information to convey to the reader, that you end up sounding like you’re writing an entry for Wikipedia. Of course, it helps if you don't construct plots that require vast amounts of backstory. If that’s unavoidable, try using dialogue rather than narrative to gradually reveal your characters' pasts. Remember, the reader doesn’t have to find out everything at once. A little bit of puzzlement can often keep him or her reading.
Losing track of the voice with which you started the novel.
I think every writer must be familiar with this. You start out with one kind of novel and end up with a different one entirely. It’s not surprising. Novels are such enormous endeavours, after all. It helps to keep reading back over your work. Remember, no voice is ever really natural – we change the way we speak all the time depending on who we’re speaking to (friends, parents, children, people in authority, people we dislike). So all voice is a kind of acting. It’s just a matter of getting back into role.
These points may all seem very obvious to you. If so, then pat yourself on the back because, I promise you, a huge number of the manuscripts I see from aspiring authors show one or all of these tendencies to a greater or lesser extent.
I’m doing so in the hope that someone reading this might find it helpful but if these are problems you don't recognise, or if the solutions strike you as untenable, then don’t give them a second thought. And, please bear in mind that I’m describing extremes. All these behaviours can be perfectly acceptable when used appropriately and there are any number of examples from great literature to show this.
Ignoring the inner lives of the central characters
Some authors forget to shed light on the internal world of their characters. They concentrate so much on what the characters do, that they neglect to tell the reader about their thoughts, dreams, hopes, and fears. One possible solution to this might be to try showing your character remembering a key incident that had particular significance for his or her view of himself, or the rest of the world.
Telling the reader directly about the characters’ faults and virtues
It’s always so much better to allow readers to draw their own conclusions about characters than to spell it out for them. If you find yourself wanting to tell the reader what to think, try shifting some of those judgements to other characters. Show them reacting to your protagonist, in dialogue or in behaviour, rather than using the authorial voice to make your point.
Ladling out description of character in indigestible lumps
Some authors seem to think it’s necessary to introduce a character by providing a lengthy pen portrait. This can work, of course, but it’s very easy to over-do it. It’s often better to release the information slowly, like paying out rope, thereby giving the reader an incentive to keep turning the pages. One possible solution is to make it a rule to deal with physical description the first time you introduce a character but to allow personal history to bleed out slowly during the remainder of the narrative
Changing voice when dealing with backstory.
This is usually caused by the need to condense material when filling the reader in about what has happened in the past; there is so much information to convey to the reader, that you end up sounding like you’re writing an entry for Wikipedia. Of course, it helps if you don't construct plots that require vast amounts of backstory. If that’s unavoidable, try using dialogue rather than narrative to gradually reveal your characters' pasts. Remember, the reader doesn’t have to find out everything at once. A little bit of puzzlement can often keep him or her reading.
Losing track of the voice with which you started the novel.
I think every writer must be familiar with this. You start out with one kind of novel and end up with a different one entirely. It’s not surprising. Novels are such enormous endeavours, after all. It helps to keep reading back over your work. Remember, no voice is ever really natural – we change the way we speak all the time depending on who we’re speaking to (friends, parents, children, people in authority, people we dislike). So all voice is a kind of acting. It’s just a matter of getting back into role.
These points may all seem very obvious to you. If so, then pat yourself on the back because, I promise you, a huge number of the manuscripts I see from aspiring authors show one or all of these tendencies to a greater or lesser extent.
Wednesday, 17 December 2008
What Publishers Want
A question I get asked all the time by people who are trying to break into writing as a career is this: how do you know what publishers are looking for? An aspiring author was asking me this only recently. It’s all right for established authors, she complained, they can talk to their editors and keep up to date with publishing trends. But if you’re not inside the magic circle how are you going to find out whether you’re even on the right track? It’s just a matter of luck.
Well actually it’s not just a matter of luck. There’s an absolutely guaranteed way of discovering what publishers are looking for and it’s called researching the market. It works like this. You find out what is being published right now and you read it. That’s all there is to it. But note, when I say right now, I really mean right now. Not three years ago. Not even last year. Now.
A lot of would-be authors think it’s enough to read the classics. And I’m not saying you shouldn’t. But if you want to discover the cutting edge, this will not do by itself. Your writing has to be informed by what your peers are doing. This requires commitment; it involves systematically buying new books, not getting them out of the library, scouring the charity shop book-bin, or putting the occasional title on your Christmas list. This is a costly business but no whinging! When you get published won’t you want people to buy your books?
Publishing is an industry and like all industries, indeed like all aspects of human behaviour, it is subject to changes in fashion. If I wanted to be a car-designer and I produced a design for a car based on something that was in vogue ten or fifteen years ago, I wouldn’t get very far, would I? One of my favourite cars was the Morris Minor. My aunt used to collect us at the station in hers when, as children, my brothers and I went to stay with her for our Summer holidays. It was a lovely, friendly vehicle with indicators that emerged from the side of the car like little wings. But no automobile manufacturer would produce one now. People want cars with heaters that work properly, air-bags in case of accidents, assisted braking systems, state of the art hi-fi systems and anything else that the manufacturers are prepared to offer.
So it is with fiction. You cannot turn out last year’s model and hope to prosper. You need to study what is making waves right now. I’m not suggesting that you should try to reproduce that. To do so would be to produce something derivative and unoriginal. Just use it to seed your imagination. Out of that process something new will hopefully grow, informed by the best writing of the past, the best contemporary writing and your own, as yet unheard, voice.
Sunday, 14 December 2008
Cabin Fever
Following the operation on my foot I have been completely housebound and not enjoying it at all. It makes me feel about a hundred years old. Recently I got Rosie, my wife, to drive me to the post office to return a contract to my agent. Was that a weird experience! After a week indoors the high street of my little corner of South-East London was hyper-real.
Students and other disaffected young people don’t realise how much money they could save by dispensing with recreational drugs. Just stay at home for a week and then venture forth into big wide world once more. Take it from me: it really hits you in the eye.
London being London, there was absolutely nowhere to park. So Rosie dropped me at the post office and said she would go round the block a few times and pick me up when I was finished. But the queue in the post office was much shorter than I had expected. So I came out very quickly and there was no sign of her. As I stood there with my bandaged foot exposed to the world, I suddenly realised how hopelessly vulnerable I was.
The area where I live can be a pretty unsalubrious place. A man ran amok with a machette in the local supermarket a couple of years ago and was shot dead by police, there’s been a drive-by shooting and an armed siege. Nevertheless, on the whole it’s friendly enough and normally I don’t think twice about walking around. But to a man who cannot move quickly, who could be hospitalised by someone treading on his toe, it suddenly seemed like the jungle. My god! What if my wife didn’t come back at all! How would I get home? These thoughts flashed through my mind in the brief panic-stricken interval before Rosie pulled up beside me and I climbed gratefully back into the car.
Perhaps I’m not quite as well as I thought I was!
Students and other disaffected young people don’t realise how much money they could save by dispensing with recreational drugs. Just stay at home for a week and then venture forth into big wide world once more. Take it from me: it really hits you in the eye.
London being London, there was absolutely nowhere to park. So Rosie dropped me at the post office and said she would go round the block a few times and pick me up when I was finished. But the queue in the post office was much shorter than I had expected. So I came out very quickly and there was no sign of her. As I stood there with my bandaged foot exposed to the world, I suddenly realised how hopelessly vulnerable I was.
The area where I live can be a pretty unsalubrious place. A man ran amok with a machette in the local supermarket a couple of years ago and was shot dead by police, there’s been a drive-by shooting and an armed siege. Nevertheless, on the whole it’s friendly enough and normally I don’t think twice about walking around. But to a man who cannot move quickly, who could be hospitalised by someone treading on his toe, it suddenly seemed like the jungle. My god! What if my wife didn’t come back at all! How would I get home? These thoughts flashed through my mind in the brief panic-stricken interval before Rosie pulled up beside me and I climbed gratefully back into the car.
Perhaps I’m not quite as well as I thought I was!
Friday, 12 December 2008
What The Bartender Said
Quite by chance, while wasting time one afternoon watching tv when I should have been writing, I happened upon an old black and white movie that dealt very pithily with the thorny question of how writers see themselves. So I thought I’d share it with you.
The movie wasn’t really about the existential angst of writers at all. (Just as well – what a grim affair that would have been!) No, it was a Western, the story of the last days of a desperate gun-slinger. But the narrative perspective was not solely that of the gun-slinger. Much of the film was seen from the point of view of a character who was following him around, carrying an ancient typewriter in a travelling case, with the intention of making himself famous by writing the gun-slinger’s biography. Does anyone else remember this film?
The point in the film that deals with the question of the validity of an author’s status comes when the would-be biographer walks into a bar and orders a drink. The grizzled old bartender asks him what he does and he replies with great enthusiasm that he’s a writer.
‘Oh yeah,’ the bartender replies, looking completely unimpressed. ‘Had any books published?’
‘Not yet,’ the would-be biographer,’ tells him, ‘but I’m going to have.’ And he launches into an account of his great project.
But the bartender stops him in his tracks. ‘Listen son,’ he says, putting a glass of whisky down on the bar, ‘when someone else tells you you’re a writer, then you’re a writer, but not before.’ Then he spits into a bucket and turns away.
I think the screenwriter had a lot of fun putting that scene in
The movie wasn’t really about the existential angst of writers at all. (Just as well – what a grim affair that would have been!) No, it was a Western, the story of the last days of a desperate gun-slinger. But the narrative perspective was not solely that of the gun-slinger. Much of the film was seen from the point of view of a character who was following him around, carrying an ancient typewriter in a travelling case, with the intention of making himself famous by writing the gun-slinger’s biography. Does anyone else remember this film?
The point in the film that deals with the question of the validity of an author’s status comes when the would-be biographer walks into a bar and orders a drink. The grizzled old bartender asks him what he does and he replies with great enthusiasm that he’s a writer.
‘Oh yeah,’ the bartender replies, looking completely unimpressed. ‘Had any books published?’
‘Not yet,’ the would-be biographer,’ tells him, ‘but I’m going to have.’ And he launches into an account of his great project.
But the bartender stops him in his tracks. ‘Listen son,’ he says, putting a glass of whisky down on the bar, ‘when someone else tells you you’re a writer, then you’re a writer, but not before.’ Then he spits into a bucket and turns away.
I think the screenwriter had a lot of fun putting that scene in
Thursday, 11 December 2008
A Break In The Clouds
Today I wrote a thousand words, I received a contract in the post from one publisher and a royalty payment from another for a book that has been out of print in this country for over twenty years but is still selling remarkably well in other parts of the world. So I’m feeling pretty damn pleased with myself.
Now don’t run away with the wrong impression. I’m not in this for the money. If I wanted to get rich I would certainly not have chosen to be a children’s writer. Indeed, for most of the last twenty five years I’ve been hopelessly broke. You know how they say that someone was so anxious they were tearing their hair out? Well at the beginning of my career I can remember literally pulling a lump of my hair out because I was so worried about money. But it didn’t stop me. Because writing is a kind of affliction. You do it because you have to do it and that’s the long and the short of it. It’s simply the kind of person you are. Some people are naturally talkative; some are naturally quiet; some have to write. That’s the way I see it, anyway.
Nevertheless, it does cheer you up tremendously when a cheque for something you wrote so long ago you can’t even remember the plot, and a contract for works yet to be forged in your imagination, both land on the doormat on the same day. It’s like getting a Valentine’s Day card from a secret admirer
Writing is an invisible business. The path of your career only takes on substance with each step you take, and sometimes not even then. That’s why writers are always googling themselves, And they are, believe me. It’s practically an occupational disease, like tennis elbow or housemaids knee. Author’s googlemania, they should call it.
Another writer – it might have been Adele Geras – once said to me, ‘We authors are all the same: huge egos and tiny self-esteem.’ It’s perfectly true and it’s the reason for the publisher’s stereotype of the ‘difficult’ author. We’re all suffering from deep-rooted status anxiety. Even the really successful authors. One writer of my acquaintance has become both hugely popular and tremendously respected over the last few years and you should see the toll it’s taken on him! His brow is furrowed; he can’t get a sentence out without a sigh; he worries that his next book won’t be as well received as the last one. The truth is that being successful can be as agonising as being unsuccessful.
But there are moments along the road when the sun seems to come out from behind a cloud just to light up your path. That’s what it felt like this morning when I opened the post. It won’t last. In fact, it’s fading even as I type. Nevertheless, just for a little while, the god of writers loves me and I love him or her back.
Now don’t run away with the wrong impression. I’m not in this for the money. If I wanted to get rich I would certainly not have chosen to be a children’s writer. Indeed, for most of the last twenty five years I’ve been hopelessly broke. You know how they say that someone was so anxious they were tearing their hair out? Well at the beginning of my career I can remember literally pulling a lump of my hair out because I was so worried about money. But it didn’t stop me. Because writing is a kind of affliction. You do it because you have to do it and that’s the long and the short of it. It’s simply the kind of person you are. Some people are naturally talkative; some are naturally quiet; some have to write. That’s the way I see it, anyway.
Nevertheless, it does cheer you up tremendously when a cheque for something you wrote so long ago you can’t even remember the plot, and a contract for works yet to be forged in your imagination, both land on the doormat on the same day. It’s like getting a Valentine’s Day card from a secret admirer
Writing is an invisible business. The path of your career only takes on substance with each step you take, and sometimes not even then. That’s why writers are always googling themselves, And they are, believe me. It’s practically an occupational disease, like tennis elbow or housemaids knee. Author’s googlemania, they should call it.
Another writer – it might have been Adele Geras – once said to me, ‘We authors are all the same: huge egos and tiny self-esteem.’ It’s perfectly true and it’s the reason for the publisher’s stereotype of the ‘difficult’ author. We’re all suffering from deep-rooted status anxiety. Even the really successful authors. One writer of my acquaintance has become both hugely popular and tremendously respected over the last few years and you should see the toll it’s taken on him! His brow is furrowed; he can’t get a sentence out without a sigh; he worries that his next book won’t be as well received as the last one. The truth is that being successful can be as agonising as being unsuccessful.
But there are moments along the road when the sun seems to come out from behind a cloud just to light up your path. That’s what it felt like this morning when I opened the post. It won’t last. In fact, it’s fading even as I type. Nevertheless, just for a little while, the god of writers loves me and I love him or her back.
Tuesday, 9 December 2008
Putting My Best Foot Forward
Twenty four hours after returning from hospital it dawned on me that this business of having my left foot swaddled in bandages and looking like an old colonel with gout was not going to change in a hurry. This is me now for the next month or two and it’s taking some getting used to. My normal mode is fast or very fast. But now the switch is stuck on crawl. If I go downstairs and forget my glasses, retrieving them is like the ascent of the North Face of the Eiger.
And having a bath or a shower involves putting my foot in a plastic bin liner and taping it to my leg. That part’s not so bad but getting the tape off again (and the eye-watering depilation that this involves) fills my heart with a new pity for the female of the species.
I am trying to wrench my mind back to the business of writing but it doesn’t want to know. It believes it’s owed some kind of treat in compensation for the pain it’s been having to put up with. It’s been insisting that I watch lots of tv. But that has got to stop. It’s time to get that foot up on the desk next to the computer screen and start easing myself back into the current piece of fiction.
One never really wants to write. That’s what all the people who say, ‘It must be marvellous being a writer’ fail to realise. Most of the time it isn’t fun at all; it’s an effort and you have to make yourself do it. Once you warm up, of course, it’s fine; you begin to enjoy it. It’s just that initial reluctance you have to deal with when the whole thing feels lilke starting a second hand car on a frosty morning.
One thing I can tell you: It’s no good waiting to feel inspired. You won’t produce much like that. A very slim volume at best. No, you have to treat it like brushing your teeth. Nobody waits to feel inspired before they do that. They just squeeze the tube, open their mouths and start jiggling those bristles. It’s exactly the same. You turn on the computer, start reading through what you’ve already written and, after a while, you find you’re writing again without even noticing it. Okay, at first you might not be writing very well but you can always edit that bit out later on.
Unfortunately, this does not fit with the romantic notions that some people have about writing. And boy, do they have romantic notions. When people ask me about my writing habits and I say that I start at eight and work through to four with an hour off for lunch, they always look at me open-mouthed. ‘So it’s like…(pause, while they try to consider what it is like), like a job?’ they say in amazement. ‘Yes,’ I agree. ‘That’s exactly what it’s like. A job.’
And having a bath or a shower involves putting my foot in a plastic bin liner and taping it to my leg. That part’s not so bad but getting the tape off again (and the eye-watering depilation that this involves) fills my heart with a new pity for the female of the species.
I am trying to wrench my mind back to the business of writing but it doesn’t want to know. It believes it’s owed some kind of treat in compensation for the pain it’s been having to put up with. It’s been insisting that I watch lots of tv. But that has got to stop. It’s time to get that foot up on the desk next to the computer screen and start easing myself back into the current piece of fiction.
One never really wants to write. That’s what all the people who say, ‘It must be marvellous being a writer’ fail to realise. Most of the time it isn’t fun at all; it’s an effort and you have to make yourself do it. Once you warm up, of course, it’s fine; you begin to enjoy it. It’s just that initial reluctance you have to deal with when the whole thing feels lilke starting a second hand car on a frosty morning.
One thing I can tell you: It’s no good waiting to feel inspired. You won’t produce much like that. A very slim volume at best. No, you have to treat it like brushing your teeth. Nobody waits to feel inspired before they do that. They just squeeze the tube, open their mouths and start jiggling those bristles. It’s exactly the same. You turn on the computer, start reading through what you’ve already written and, after a while, you find you’re writing again without even noticing it. Okay, at first you might not be writing very well but you can always edit that bit out later on.
Unfortunately, this does not fit with the romantic notions that some people have about writing. And boy, do they have romantic notions. When people ask me about my writing habits and I say that I start at eight and work through to four with an hour off for lunch, they always look at me open-mouthed. ‘So it’s like…(pause, while they try to consider what it is like), like a job?’ they say in amazement. ‘Yes,’ I agree. ‘That’s exactly what it’s like. A job.’
Friday, 5 December 2008
My greatest fear
Well I’ve had my operation but I think they must have given me too much wake up juice after the anaesthetic because it’s three in the morning and I cannot sleep, no matter what I do. So I have given up trying and am writing this with my wounded leg up on the desk.
First of all I’d like to put this into context. One of the editors at my publishing house has just returned to work after treatment for breast cancer. She had the lot: surgery, chemotherapy and radiotherapy and there she was at the great heaving, champagne-guzzling swarm that is the Christmas party, a hat on her head to disguise her baldness (she told me it had taken her three quarters of an hour to choose it that morning), looking pale and fragile but coping admirably. So, by comparison, making a fuss about a minor operation on my foot seems about as self-obsessed as you can get. But the thing is, I am a writer. So what can I do but write?
I have to admit to a niggling little voice which began to sound in my head about twenty four hours before the operation. What if they overdid the anaesthetic? It does happen sometimes and I am particularly sensitive to drugs. Supposing I didn’t wake up? Don’t be so ridiculous, I kept telling myself, but the nearer I got to the operating theatre, the louder the voice became. Finally, it started coming out with its message plainly and simply: you might die, Brian.
After more than thirty years of marriage I am deeply and passionately in love with my wife and the idea of being separated from her was utterly appalling but I felt certain that she would probably cope better than I would without her. She is a capable and resourceful woman, after all. I was a little worried that she was not quite tall enough to open the trapdoor to the loft but I imagined that she would resolve that difficulty easily enough.
The very sound of my daughters’ voices on the telephone makes me want to dance with delight but I felt sure that they, too, would manage without me. They are both in long-tem relationships with lovely men, they both have fulfilling careers and plans for the future.
I was also not really worried about myself. I know it’s deeply unfashionable but I believe in the after life. I had a wonderful friend at university called Jim. We used to play guitar together and even made a record. Mercifully, all copies of it have long disappeared for the truth is that although Jim was a fine musician, I was absolutely hopeless. He was just too kind to point it out.
Anyway, a few years after we left university I was devastated to learn that Jim had drowned in a freak accident. Not long afterwards, however, I had a dream in which I was standing on the shore beside a mass of water wondering how I came to be there when I saw Jim walking towards me. ‘Jim!’ I said, ‘I thought you were dead.’
‘I am dead,’ he assured me, ‘but I’ve just come to tell you that it’s okay.’ And here he laughed his characteristic laugh. ‘Being dead is okay,’ he joked.
We talked a little more. Afterwards, I couldn’t remember this part of our conversation but then Jim announced that he had to go. He showed me a cave at the base of the cliffs. ‘I have to go in there,’ he said, ‘it’s going to close up shortly.’
‘But will I see you again?’ I asked.
‘Of course,’ he said. ‘But not for a long time’ And then he went into the cave.
Now I don’t, obviously, believe in a literal underworld that is approached through a cave but I do think that my friend Jim was using the imagery of my dream to communicate with me. You may feel that this is just a kind of comforting process engendered by my own imagination and that’s fine by me. I haven’t the slightest wish to convert anyone to my point of view. I’m just explaining that this dream strengthened my already existing conviction that there is more to our great adventure than this life.
So I wasn’t really worried about my family, or about being permanently extinguished. Nevertheless, as they began injecting me with the anaesthetic the voice in my head rose to a shrill panic-stricken crescendo as it reminded me that I was half way through a novel and contracted to write another. ‘What about your stories?’ it demanded. ‘What about your stories? What about….
First of all I’d like to put this into context. One of the editors at my publishing house has just returned to work after treatment for breast cancer. She had the lot: surgery, chemotherapy and radiotherapy and there she was at the great heaving, champagne-guzzling swarm that is the Christmas party, a hat on her head to disguise her baldness (she told me it had taken her three quarters of an hour to choose it that morning), looking pale and fragile but coping admirably. So, by comparison, making a fuss about a minor operation on my foot seems about as self-obsessed as you can get. But the thing is, I am a writer. So what can I do but write?
I have to admit to a niggling little voice which began to sound in my head about twenty four hours before the operation. What if they overdid the anaesthetic? It does happen sometimes and I am particularly sensitive to drugs. Supposing I didn’t wake up? Don’t be so ridiculous, I kept telling myself, but the nearer I got to the operating theatre, the louder the voice became. Finally, it started coming out with its message plainly and simply: you might die, Brian.
After more than thirty years of marriage I am deeply and passionately in love with my wife and the idea of being separated from her was utterly appalling but I felt certain that she would probably cope better than I would without her. She is a capable and resourceful woman, after all. I was a little worried that she was not quite tall enough to open the trapdoor to the loft but I imagined that she would resolve that difficulty easily enough.
The very sound of my daughters’ voices on the telephone makes me want to dance with delight but I felt sure that they, too, would manage without me. They are both in long-tem relationships with lovely men, they both have fulfilling careers and plans for the future.
I was also not really worried about myself. I know it’s deeply unfashionable but I believe in the after life. I had a wonderful friend at university called Jim. We used to play guitar together and even made a record. Mercifully, all copies of it have long disappeared for the truth is that although Jim was a fine musician, I was absolutely hopeless. He was just too kind to point it out.
Anyway, a few years after we left university I was devastated to learn that Jim had drowned in a freak accident. Not long afterwards, however, I had a dream in which I was standing on the shore beside a mass of water wondering how I came to be there when I saw Jim walking towards me. ‘Jim!’ I said, ‘I thought you were dead.’
‘I am dead,’ he assured me, ‘but I’ve just come to tell you that it’s okay.’ And here he laughed his characteristic laugh. ‘Being dead is okay,’ he joked.
We talked a little more. Afterwards, I couldn’t remember this part of our conversation but then Jim announced that he had to go. He showed me a cave at the base of the cliffs. ‘I have to go in there,’ he said, ‘it’s going to close up shortly.’
‘But will I see you again?’ I asked.
‘Of course,’ he said. ‘But not for a long time’ And then he went into the cave.
Now I don’t, obviously, believe in a literal underworld that is approached through a cave but I do think that my friend Jim was using the imagery of my dream to communicate with me. You may feel that this is just a kind of comforting process engendered by my own imagination and that’s fine by me. I haven’t the slightest wish to convert anyone to my point of view. I’m just explaining that this dream strengthened my already existing conviction that there is more to our great adventure than this life.
So I wasn’t really worried about my family, or about being permanently extinguished. Nevertheless, as they began injecting me with the anaesthetic the voice in my head rose to a shrill panic-stricken crescendo as it reminded me that I was half way through a novel and contracted to write another. ‘What about your stories?’ it demanded. ‘What about your stories? What about….
Wednesday, 3 December 2008
A word of encouragement
The writer Jill Dawson once told me that she went to the doctor about some ailment and the doctor, upon learning that she was a writer said, 'I'm going to write a book when I retire.' Whereupon, Jill with considerable sharpness, replied, 'That's interesting because I'm going to be a doctor when I retire.'
I always wish I could come out with a reply like that. But I never do. However, I thought I would regale you with a collection of some of the encouraging comments which I've heard over the last thirty years. So here they are.
1. When I was working as a teacher
Parent: Can’t you get him to read, Mr Keaney. He won’t read for me. I stand over him and I say, ‘You read that book!’ but he won’t.
Me: What are you reading at the moment?
Parent (scornfully): Oh, I haven’t got time for reading!
2. Senior Publishing Executive shortly after ordering a £45 bottle of wine with company credit card.
Have you any idea how much it costs to get a set of posters designed and printed, Brian?
3. Junior Marketing Assistant at party
Your new book seems to be doing well. Must be the cover.
4. Senior Marketing Assistant at same party.
Your new book seems to be doing well. Must be the cover.
5. Same Junior Marketing Assistant at same party but now quite drunk.
I’m glad I don’t work in editorial. You know what authors are like. Oops, sorry, I forgot! You are an author. (Giggles)
6. My brother
Brian doesn’t have a proper job.
7. Teacher whose class I am about to address
Teacher: Now I know that Mr Keaney is going to tell us all about how we should improve our writing by adding lots of lovely describing words. And we know what they’re called, don’t we? Hands up.
Pupil: Adjectives, miss.
Teacher: Very good, Siobhan! Adjectives are the words that make writing come to life and I know that when we listen to Mr Keaney’s writing we’re going to hear lots of exciting adjectives that we can use in our own writing.
8. Bossy middle class father
Do children actually read books any more?
9. Unpublished poet who mysteriously asked me to talk to her writing group
But do you really think there’s any point in books for teenagers? I mean I went straight from children’s books to Jane Austen and George Eliot. Don’t you think we should be encouraging them to read proper literature?
10. Everybody and his uncle
I bet you wish you made as much money as J K Rowling
I always wish I could come out with a reply like that. But I never do. However, I thought I would regale you with a collection of some of the encouraging comments which I've heard over the last thirty years. So here they are.
1. When I was working as a teacher
Parent: Can’t you get him to read, Mr Keaney. He won’t read for me. I stand over him and I say, ‘You read that book!’ but he won’t.
Me: What are you reading at the moment?
Parent (scornfully): Oh, I haven’t got time for reading!
2. Senior Publishing Executive shortly after ordering a £45 bottle of wine with company credit card.
Have you any idea how much it costs to get a set of posters designed and printed, Brian?
3. Junior Marketing Assistant at party
Your new book seems to be doing well. Must be the cover.
4. Senior Marketing Assistant at same party.
Your new book seems to be doing well. Must be the cover.
5. Same Junior Marketing Assistant at same party but now quite drunk.
I’m glad I don’t work in editorial. You know what authors are like. Oops, sorry, I forgot! You are an author. (Giggles)
6. My brother
Brian doesn’t have a proper job.
7. Teacher whose class I am about to address
Teacher: Now I know that Mr Keaney is going to tell us all about how we should improve our writing by adding lots of lovely describing words. And we know what they’re called, don’t we? Hands up.
Pupil: Adjectives, miss.
Teacher: Very good, Siobhan! Adjectives are the words that make writing come to life and I know that when we listen to Mr Keaney’s writing we’re going to hear lots of exciting adjectives that we can use in our own writing.
8. Bossy middle class father
Do children actually read books any more?
9. Unpublished poet who mysteriously asked me to talk to her writing group
But do you really think there’s any point in books for teenagers? I mean I went straight from children’s books to Jane Austen and George Eliot. Don’t you think we should be encouraging them to read proper literature?
10. Everybody and his uncle
I bet you wish you made as much money as J K Rowling
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