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A Partially Weeded Garden
November 4, 2014
In my last post I talked about ‘weeds’ in writing – extra adverbs, dangling plot threads and so on. They’re all derided almost universally as pests, and able to overrun your garden of words if left unchecked. That post was the practical advice – the list of things to watch out for to prevent your garden and lawn being turned into an unappealing landscape of thickets.
Does this seem like a common theme? That’s because it is. Adverbs in particular – it’s practically fashionable to hate them.
But what if we stepped outside of that viewpoint for a moment?
Weeds, talking literally for a moment, aren’t always straight-out villains with no purpose other than ruining a perfectly manicured lawn. Some common weeds can be used for medicinal and health purposes – just a few examples in this article if you’re interested – and sometimes they can have a beneficial impact on the soil. They still ruin the garden if left to grow unchecked, but single-mindedly running them over with a mower may be ignoring their possible virtues. You can even make wine from dandelions – God knows how it would taste, but it’s a done thing.
The catch is that any visitors who see a dandelion in the backyard will instantly assume you’re a messy gardener – or at least one who doesn’t fit in with their perspective of the basic rules in maintaining a garden. The same is true for writing. Drop a ‘suddenly’ into a sentence and many professional readers and editors will treat it with derision, as an amateur’s fallback.
The unconventional can sometimes be irrelevant, or even part of a particular book’s charm. Raymond Chandler’s The Big Sleep is a favourite of mine. It’s full of dangling plot threads, and a pretty central scene with a murder that ends up being a total and jarring dead end. Chandler later admitted he had no idea who killed that chauffeur, and it’s a scene that modern editors would ravage for its lack of utility.
Despite this and what other flaws may be picked out of the book, The Big Sleep often features in top 100 lists for books written in the 20th century. What it did get right – the tone and atmosphere, the characters, the loose but weighty narrative voice – outweighed the smaller faux pas and the otherwise crippling mishandling of plot elements. That’s a great big weed to have to work around without just ripping the damn thing out altogether. And yet it’s now part of the garden. Not everyone likes it, but it’s there and the garden has plenty of admirers nonetheless.
And as far as the structure of expressing detail is concerned, the long and winding history of writing and literature are filled with examples of where new tricks have been implemented. Have a quick look at this article to see how some household names in classic literature have used punctuation in ways that would still be considered novel, or at least not standard. Whether you like these particular books or not is a moot point if their less conventional methods of handling detail has something to offer in your writing.
The lesson here is that there are always new ways to express things, and sometimes more maligned elements of one’s writing style can be turned into an advantage. If we all blindly follow every small rule that is proliferated without question or variance – kill every instance of ‘suddenly’, shun the passive voice, regulate your characters to fulfil certain roles and requirements – then we face a growing culture of institutionalisation in literature.
Always look for new ways to express things, and don’t shy away from incorporating some dandelions or nettle in your grand scheme if it fits. If you can find ways to use the weeds to your advantage, or to integrate them so well into your writing that they’re part of the package, then by all means experiment and see what you come up with that can bend the unwritten rules a little. It’s the same as any discipline – the rules and guidelines are there for a reason, and moving away from their guidance is a risk. But innovation can’t occur without some risk.
As always, there’s the word of warning: don’t necessarily expect the result to be marketable. Maybe it will be. But it might also get savaged by an editor for playing with fire on adverbs or passive language. Your garden is your own. Never stop dreaming of ways to make it both appealing on a base level to guests, and identifiably unique. How so-called weeds can fit into that scheme and create a unique style of writing is something that will require a dedicated spirit of experimentation. And maybe a glass of dandelion wine to get the creative juices flowing.
Beau Hillier | Editor, page seventeen
The Shape of Writing
October 30, 2014
Here’s a writing exercise to try before this blog unfolds in earnest: write a scene in which your protagonist comes home and finds the corpse of their beloved partner lying in a pool of their own blood.
Try it.
See how you go.
Well?
As writers, we have a number of tools at our disposal to tell our story. Our primary tools are words. We find the right word to fit what we want to say. The right combination of words in a sentence conveys an idea. Sentences unfold in paragraphs, paragraphs into pages, pages into chapters – and on and on we go to create our world into which, if we do it right, we suck the reader.
But something we need to give thought to is how we shape our words, our, sentences, our paragraphs, etc. It’s easy to obey the laws of English as a guideline, but sometimes we need to manipulate it to serve our needs, and thus the needs of our story.
Again, let’s go back to the original premise: your protagonist finds their partner dead.
You may try something like this:
- He came into the kitchen, then stopped. Gloria lay on the floor, her body twisted unnaturally, blood pooling from a wound to her head, her temple indented like her skull had collapsed.
That would be the simplest way of writing a scene like this, but is this scene in any way distinguished from the rest of the narrative? Presumably, it flows as normal, even though our character is now in an extraordinary and shocking situation. Imagine you were in this situation. Would your digestion of what’s going on flow normally, like all you were doing was going out to pick up the morning paper from the veranda?
In all likelihood, you’d be in shock. Your mind would be overwhelmed, unable to process what’s happening the way it might normally. With this being the case we need to convey a similar disconnectedness in our narrative.
- He came into the kitchen. Stopped. Gloria. Lay on the floor. Body twisted. Blood. So much blood. Pooling from her temple.
Note the difference – now, we’re using short, sharp sentences to illustrate the way the protagonist takes in the scene. Even the word choice is important. Do you go for something fancy? Or something simple, if not blunt? The choices you make here determine the impact your writing makes in this situation.
Here (in our example), everything jars. He sees specifics, like flashes of cognition. Through this, we get that his perception has changed, and it demonstrates the shock of what’s occurring, as well as provides a contrast from the rest of the narrative.
Good narrative takes the reader on a ride through the story. If it’s done well, the reader won’t know they’re on a ride. They’ll just follow the prompts unthinkingly, and in following the prompts unthinkingly you’ll create for them the world of your story.
Every now and again, though, the ride may need to change its course or pacing – like a rollercoaster. A rollercoaster that kept going up, or only went down, or only ran straight, would soon get boring. So you have peaks and troughs, which helps build anticipation or provides a burst of excitement.
Think about how you shape your narrative, as it controls the ride you’re taking your reader on. Life isn’t a singular-paced ride. Sometimes, it’s nothing but fragments. Other times it might run long and uninterrupted. Just as life has ups, downs, and rhythms, you can impress the same cadences into your narrative just by the way you shape your words and sentences.
LZ.
P17 Issue 11 Reflections – Tom O’Connell and Jacob Edwards
October 28, 2014
The P17 launch date is fast approaching – not long now until the latest issue of page seventeen is available!
It’s an open invitation to come on down to our launch event and open mic night at the Busybird workshop – 2/118 Para Rd, Montmorency – from 7pm onwards on 19 November.
In the meantime, a couple more of the Issue 11 contributors have offered a little more insight into what went into the latest P17 edition.
* * *
Tom O’Connell on ‘The reunion’
My inspirations for ‘The reunion’ are threefold.
Firstly, this story was written in response to the Murakami short ‘All God’s children can dance’, wherein a young man, lied to about his supposed birth by Immaculate Conception, searches for his true biological father. The search culminates on an empty baseball diamond, a final image which has remained with me.
Years ago, I took regular evening walks around the streets of Northcote. On these walks, I often passed sporting grounds where local AFL teams had their weeknight training sessions. During training, the stands and grounds would be empty. The field would be lit, but only coaches and a dozen or so players were present. (I love how this contrasts the bustle of Game Day. Empty sporting grounds are so serene.)
One night, I noticed a hooded figure watching the boys train. The stands were unlit, so he was shrouded in darkness. I passed another night and he was there again. He came regularly. No one paid him any notice. He was probably one of the boys’ fathers, but that didn’t stop me turning over the possibilities. What if he was a spy, or homeless, or generally unhinged? (Amusingly, an earlier draft emphasised this angle.) The idea developed and he became an absentee father.
Finally, I suppose this story was written, in part, to satisfy an innate curiosity about my biological father, whom I have no relationship with. Paternal bonds often figure into my fiction, though never usually this explicitly.
Tom O’Connell is a writer, editor and tea-enthusiast. He is currently studying for a Bachelor of Writing and Publishing and has been published in [untitled], n-SCRIBE, Vine Leaves and Crack the Spine. Follow his writing at artofalmost.wordpress.com.
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Jacob Edwards on ‘Parking only’
On deck for the Hilton shanty
Sometimes poetry sprouts like a plant captured in time-lapse, starting out from a single, hidden seed and shooting up while clouds flit skittishly overhead. The bud eventually blossoms into something bearing little resemblance to its progenitor. On other occasions poetry just sails in from life’s oceans, then has to be picked apart and carefully reassembled within the poetic confines of whatever bottle you choose to preserve it in.
‘Parking only’ is of this latter type. It is a true story, and one that struck me as peculiar enough to warrant a place on the mantelpiece, rather than entrusting it solely to memory’s keeping. We did indeed book a room at the Hilton (I was told, after the transaction was made but before we arrived) with some fanciful notion of running into Richard Dawkins in the lobby. He did, through dint of happenstance, check in right next to us; and, due to an ongoing kerfuffle about ‘accessible’ bathrooms, we did nearly allow him to pull off a Mr Snuffleupagus and slip by unnoticed. The confusion, which for me at least remains ongoing, stems from the Hilton’s apparent reluctance to use the word ‘wheelchair’ in conjunction with ‘accessible’. If anything were to be found offensive, I’d have thought it would be the act of omission, as per disabled parking only. What do they have against wheelchairs, I wondered, that they would excise the term and render the phrase nonsensical? Thus a thought came to be bottled.
Jacob Edwards writes creative and academic non-fiction, short stories, reviews and poetry, and has appeared in journals, magazines and anthologies in Australia, New Zealand, England, Canada and the US. He lives in Brisbane with his wife and son, and may be found online (conspicuously not blogging) at www.jacobedwards.id.au.
‘Joffa’
October 23, 2014
Several months ago, we were sitting on the veranda (of the Busybird Studio ~ Gallery) having lunch and talking about football, when the topic of Joffa came up.
If you follow the AFL, even loosely, you’ll know that Joffa is a member of the Collingwood Cheer Squad, and when it looks as if Collingwood’s won the game, he’ll put on a gold jacket to celebrate the victory. During Collingwood games, cameras will often cut to Joffa for a reaction, particularly if Collingwood isn’t doing too well.
The public perception of Joffa – at least from those who don’t know him – is he’s an inarticulate, loud-mouthed bogan. Actually, Joffa suffers on two fronts: one, the personal stereotyping people impose on him simply by virtue of appearance and, two, because of the stereotyping applied to Collingwood supporters in general.
This was a matter that came up during lunch, and Kev and Blaise – the co-owners of Busybird, as well as supporters of the Hawthorn Football Club – were also curious about his public image. I’d met Joffa in 2001, and had sporadic contact with him pre-game for a couple of years, and then enough to exchange a ‘hello’ and a bit of a chat during games if I bumped into him, and I explained (to Kev and Blaise) that the Joffa who’s portrayed in the media doesn’t reconcile with the real person, and media play up the hoon angle because it makes for better copy.
Kev remarked that he’d recently read an article about Joffa, which talked about his early life where he’d been homeless, and that he now did a lot of charitable work, so it sounded like he had an interesting life. Blaise commented it was surprising nobody had done a book with him, a biography, and then suggested that was something we could maybe approach him about.
It was only a few days later that Joffa came into the studio to talk about the possibility of the book. His concerns were the ability to tell his story in a medium as big as an autobiography, admitting he could be repetitive, and that grammar and punctuation weren’t amongst his best assets, and, more importantly, that he would appear egotistical.
The nature of the book that Busybird wanted to pursue with Joffa was about more than football and the Collingwood Football Club, although obviously they would appear in it by virtue of Joffa’s association with both. But everybody has a story to tell, and Joffa’s life is about more than football, involving a number of elements (abusive upbringing, homelessness, a daughter who has epilepsy) that would appeal to any readers interested in a completely human story.
One of the agreements of the book was that 10% of proceeds would go to the Epilepsy Foundation. At Busybird, several of our books have altruistic outcomes, with a portion of proceeds being donated to various causes, so it was helpful that Joffa felt that a book about him could contribute to helping those with epilepsy (outside of the other charitable work he does himself, that is).
As an aside, we met with the Epilepsy Foundation about the book, who spoke glowingly about Joffa’s involvement with them, his capacity to engage with people, and his fundraising, working tirelessly and uncomplainingly, and often refusing reimbursement for expenses. It’s a far cry from the public image of Joffa, or from the way many would want to portray him.
In any case, a diffident Joffa left that first meeting about whether he could carry out the task. We’re not sure what happened in the ensuing days, but an excited Joffa contacted us not long afterward, eager to tackle the undertaking. Since, he’s steadily delivered chapters, ranging from being about his life to being about football. Our interns have been sorting through the material before it goes to editing, and have been moved by some of the events of Joffa’s life.
The book will be launched in May 2015, but we would like everybody to know that we have a crowd-funding campaign up at Pozible: Joffa Pozible Campaign. The work and expense that goes into a book is not something to be underestimated, and pledges come with great rewards. We also have a Joffa page up on our website now, too: Joffa Book Page.
Keep a look out for ‘Joffa’.
LZ.
Postscript: You can now subscribe to the Busybird blog, which means you can have our blogs emailed directly to you. Just enter your email address in the light-blue ‘Sign up for the Busybird Blog’ subscription box in the sidebar and his Subscribe!
P17 Issue 11 Reflections – Maggie Veness, A E Cochrane and Eril Riley
October 21, 2014
It’s now less than a month until we unleash the latest page seventeen upon the world. Don’t forget, Issue 11 is available from November 19!
In the meantime, some of the Issue 11 contributors have a little more to share on what went into their latest work.
* * *
Maggie Veness on ‘Cicada’
While I’m not a big fan of science fiction I enjoy reading Vonnegut – I admire the way the ordinary and the fantastic sit together so comfortably in his stories. His posthumously published collection, Look at the Birdie, inspired me to write a story where genres overlapped.
The shorter the story the less time a writer has to develop a character, and dialogue helps enormously to reveal character. However, when we meet my young protagonist, Ali, she doesn’t have the ability to speak. While this meant I needed to work hard on the narrative, the old adage ‘actions speak louder than words’ also came to the fore.
As both reader and writer I enjoy left-of-centre endings. Although Ali’s life is harsh and dismal she doesn’t have a mean bone in her body. I wanted Ali to maintain her gentle persona but still give her story a take that ending.
The way we process ideas at a subconscious level is wonderfully odd, and this sci-fi newcomer had to come up with something more original than little green men! Fortunately, the physical form of the other-worldly characters who rescue Ali seemed to assemble independent of me.
The feedback I’ve received about Cicada is humbling and inspirational. I’m no historian, nor creative writing university graduate; I’m someone who fell in love with writing, who writes in order to explore the human condition. I hope to remain as curious and grateful as I am right now.
Comments welcome: maggies_place_@hotmail.com (please type P17 in the subject line.)
Maggie Veness’s quirky, contemporary stories often challenge categorisation. Her knack for placing cogent characters in situations rarely talked about makes for compelling reading. With countless stories now in print across seven countries, she continues to work toward a published collection of her own. She lives on the northern coast of NSW.
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A E Cochrane on ‘The story of who I am’
My poem is a musing on the ultimate pointlessness of stories. We are obsessed with them, but in the end we are not our stories, they just get in the way of who we are.
I wrote this poem while walking down St Kilda Road. The first stanza is about the Shrine, the second about the Arts Centre, the third about Government House, the forth about the office blocks and the fifth is the Odyssey in the Botanic Gardens.
A E Cochrane works as a technician backstage at various theatres around Melbourne.
* * *
Eril Riley on ‘Onshore, offshore, unsure’
What propels people to escape their homeland and risk their life seeking asylum in another country? The notion perplexes as much as it does disturb. To feel the necessity to flee and leave all that is familiar, including loved ones, is difficult to comprehend and in writing Onshore, Offshore, Unsure, I aimed to travel as an asylum seeker.
To experience sufficient fear, terror and angst that one would risk one’s life and often the life of children, is almost unimaginable to those who are fortunate enough to reside here in Australia. To endure weeks, months or years of uncertainty whilst moving through various countries not knowing if the destination would ever be reached, must certainly attack the hinges of one’s sanity. The journey is fraught – physically, psychologically and emotionally. It is one that requires resilience, determination and desperation. One begins onshore, navigates offshore and is always unsure of one’s fate.
Living within a sneeze of the Dandenong Ranges offers sustenance and inspiration for writing – an innate drive for Eril Riley, who retired from cartooning to concentrate on the written word. Several awards have prompted manic keyboard pirouetting.