Pushing on with GloPoWrMo

I was hoping to get all inspired with Global Poetry Writing Month and work on some half finished poems or start new ones, but I really haven't had a chance to focus at all on poetry, needing to turn back to fiction and my novels. I was finally able to get back to my writing group so had to prep my submission for that and then edit and rewrite the section a few days after their response.

I also submitted a query letter to a publisher for my first novel and received a request to send them the first 50 pages and then the whole novel, so I had to quickly proof-read that and fight my printer to send out a hard copy. 

Now I have a builder with a min-jackhammer working in the room next to where I write, so poetry has taken a bit of a back seat this last week.

But it's never too late to start on new writing. I've found an old file with notes that could be developed into a poem. I've also taken a prompt from Judy Reeve's The Writer's Book of Days and begun to just free write around it with the theme of my notes in mind. 

It always amazes me to watch stream-of-conscious writing happen, especially my own. How my thoughts jump from one subject to the next, the dark corners I explore without meaning to, the jewels that are exposed in the process. The questions that come up are often too difficult to explore in one piece of writing, but are worth using for more writing practices even if I never do anything with them. 

Students who have never done this sort of writing are often worried when they go off theme, but I believe that is where you find the truth of what you want to write. I don't believe you should push a poem to be something you want, when your creative voice is demanding to say something else. It's been my experience that those words will continue to try an come out as much as you want to ignore them. 

I need to listen to my own advice. The dark corner that was revealed with this last writing practice should be explored, but I will do it in my own time. Difficult subjects or moments don't have to be broached immediately and definitely don't need to be shared, but it's worth doing some private writing about them, to see where they take you. 

My list of 'Things I Want to Write' I made back in January is almost all ticked off. I have one poem that's almost finished and one that's still in the sketching stage. I have a vague note about a poem I'd like to write in the future, but not ideas about how to approach it, so that will be transferred to a new list. So I think that will be part of my focus for my writing practice tomorrow, a new 'To Write' list. 

What are you doing for GloPoWrMo?

Reading to Write

You have to read to be a good writer, read constantly. Authors you love, envy, even those who you dislike but have got a certain style or knack of doing something right (Hemingway falls into this category for me). I find that I can't read a lot of fiction when I am writing first drafts, but I read as much as I can before and after. 

You can also read to learn to improve your writing. There are lots of books for writers out there that can all be helpful in their own ways, you just need to decide what style you need. 

Warning: don't spend all your time reading how-to-write books instead of writing. These books are meant to supplement your writing, inspire it and help improve it. Reading all the books in the world won't help you write if you don't pick up a pen or sit at the laptop (and not surf FB).

I fall between liking books that giving me lots of writing prompts and those that are about specific craft problems. I struggle with plots, so often seek out books specifically on that topic. But some days I just need a kick up the bum and then I will dip into some old favourites to get me going again.

One book that really inspired and helped me early on was Writing Down the Bones by Natalie Goldberg. Published in 1986 it has become a creative writing bible. It promotes the idea of writing exercises and writing everyday which really clicked with me. Mixed with references to meditation and Zen Buddhism it is a bit new ageish, but they are not overwhelming. Natalie's main focus is to get you writing. I've read some of her follow-up but they didn't really push me in a way that Bones did. 

Anne Lamott's Bird by Bird, 1994, was a good follow-up to Goldberg's book, dealing with some of the troubles that pop up when you make writing a daily habit. Her religious undertones were a bit much for me, but on a practical side the book is very helpful. 

A book focusing on poetry that really struck a chord with me was The Triggering Town, 1979 by Richard Hugo. I was living in the Pacific Northwest at the time, Hugo's stomping ground, and I could see so much of my surroundings in Hugo's work, but also I loved his idea of a triggering town, using a subject or word as a trigger to start off the reader's journey into the world of the poem, real or imagined, focusing on the language and its music once they are drawn in. Hugo's gentle self-effacing tone was a lovely introduction of workshopping and owning your poems for me. 

I think I have previously mentioned A Writer's Book of Days, 1999, by Judy Reeves which has hundreds of writing prompts to help you find inspiration for your daily writing exercises or for when writer's block hits.

On the fiction side I have turned back many times to The Art of Fiction by John Gardner, 1991, based on his lecturers to beginning creative writing students over the years. It contains some analysis, some practical exercises and lots of things to look out for. 

There are also practical books like Elements of Style by William Strunk Jr and E B White published first in 1918 which discusses grammar and usage rules for writing in English. Dry, but it's a good reference for editing. 

There are very technical books like Mary Oliver's A Poetry Handbook, 1994 which breaks down the elements of poetry with lots of examples of styles. It's great for getting started but if you've studied literature or been writing poetry for a while it may feel very basic. 

There are lots of good books I haven't read. I keep meaning to pick up Stephen King's 2000 memoir On Writing. I've heard it mentioned many places as inspiring and helpful, but I've never had the chance to pick it up. Here's a hint of his rules for writing to get us all started. 

It's best to dip in and out of these books rather than spend lots of time reading them. I often try the writing exercises or editing ideas out as I read, so that they just don't become filler.

Any suggestions for new books or old favourites always welcomed here. 

Happy autumn. 

Fiction and Poety

I mostly write poetry, but I have written/am writing 2 novels. I've discovered I can't write short stories. Not sure why, they just never work. I've never really tried much else except journal/diary and blog writing.

I have another novel idea percolating, but it's still nowhere solid enough for me to really start working on it, but I do write about it occasionally. I have two writing journals: one where I write whatever I'm working on and one where I write about my writing. 

This second journal is all about my novels and contains ideas, sketches of plotlines, information about characters, details about their past. I also ask questions and remind myself to expand and write about certain things. Often I just journal about what I'm currently doing. I have misplaced the one I used for my first novel and my first draft of my second and I miss it terribly. It was the chronicles of writing those first novels: raw, hopeful and frustrated. I hope it's stashed in the loft in Scotland as I hate losing writing. 

Fiction and poetry writing are very different processes for me. When I was working on the first novel I got a SAC grant to write it and it was almost like a full time job, I wrote every morning for hours, then had lunch and went to the allotment and spent a few hours there, sometimes writing if the weather was poor and then I'd come home and type up what I wrote and did some rereading and editing. Then it'd be time to make dinner. I did this for a month, I think and I really enjoyed it, but it was hard work. Editing and rewriting the first draft was even harder. I need longer blocks, much more time and commitment for fiction.

Poetry I can do in small parcels of time. I rarely sit and write a whole poem or finish one in a day or even a few days. I write a line or two here, go and edit another poem that's still in progress. I do some free writing around the subject and then pick out the good phrases that could be used as the backbone of a new poem. Poems take months, sometimes years to feel solid. And then I still reexamine and edit them a bit before I submit them for publication. 

Rewriting and editing happens as I write poetry, I'm always tinkering with lines, where I usually leave big edits in fiction until I've finished the complete project. 

Two books I'd recommend for getting started with writing is Natalie Goldberg's Writing Down the Bones and John Gardener's The Art of Fiction. They are very different in style, but both equally useful in their own way. 

Goldberg's is more to do with starting from scratch and getting into the habit of writing. It's good if you're a beginner or if you have a project you're starting. It's less about technique but more about state of mind and getting your bum of the seat. She's more 'spiritual' about writing, but is still all about doing the work.

Gardener's book is more about craft: technical and more academic. It starts with an essay and then moves to common problems and techniques. It also has a section on plotting which I found invaluable as it's not my strong point. 

You have to be wary about buying and reading books about learning to write. I don't believe anyone can teach you, but they often can give you inspiration, direction and assistance. But it's easy to spend a lot of time (and money) buying and reading these books rather than writing. 

I prefer the more practical books that have lots of exercises or writing prompts. My favourite for myself and for when I was teaching creative writing was A Writer's Book of Days by Judy Reeves. It had a hundreds of prompts that worked for poetry and fiction and could be used to just get into the habit of writing but to also work on a piece already started. 

I've actually just put it in my basket for my next book order as my copy has been in Scotland for 7 years and it has now been revised so a new copy is definitely needed to help me get back into the swing of things.