Hearts & Guns 1
Monday, July 13th, 2009 at 3:10 pmWell, here I go starting off to make a collection of stories. I’m calling it Hearts & Guns as a working title, because it sounds snazzy and I can imagine it with a cool tattoo-art style cover. The eventual title — if there is one, that is; I’ll still need to find a publisher when all this is done — will probably be something completely different. Sea Hare, maybe. Sea hares do very little, but they release ink when disturbed, which makes me think they might be my totem animal.
Or I could take the metal route and call it Bacterial Hemorrhage or Horseshoes for Satan or Smoking the Corpse of Christ in the Boys Room. I kind of wish I wrote the sort of stories that would justify a title like that. Anyway, thinking of titles is very pleasant and I could do it all day.
This morning I worked on The Art of Dying, trying to drive it somewhat off Wardour Street, fix some naively portentous dialogue, and work out how exactly they are all jammed in that carriage anyway. And where that river or canal is going, if not over the cliff. I think it had better go over the cliff. Also wondering how open to leave it. The original version is very open, but in at least one later version I let the characters have more thoughts as to the meaning of what happens in the story. I’m pretty sure I’m going to take that out again. I don’t think the characters should be shaping the whys and wherefores of this, other than obliquely.
I’m very fond of this story, and it’s clear to me now that I’m going to spend a lot of time fucking around with it. So in order to get — hopefully — some actual progress made, I’d better look at something else this afternoon.
Next up today is The Love of Beauty, my second published story, from 10 or 11 years ago. I’ve only rewritten it once, and only slightly, so I don’t have 6 or 7 versions to compare as I do with TAoD. It’s also rather gothic, a take on a fairytale, and has (I think!) quite a straightforward narrative (let’s not say plot; have I ever written a plot?).
Hmm, one version is 1500 words longer than the other. What on earth did I add? I could have sworn I only made a couple of small changes. Hmm, again… And why did I change his name from Seaming to Shipton? Seaming was just right. Hmm the third…
July 15th, 2009 at 8:54 am
It’s great that you’re going over your old stuff, discovering that there’s life in them yet.
I’ve been doing that lately and uncovered enough for a novel-length collection of horror stories. Who knew? I may call it Poison Apples.
(let’s not say plot; have I ever written a plot?).
The P word scares me. I know I’ve actually written them but I’ve probably mentally suppressed the process out of sheer trauma.
July 15th, 2009 at 10:36 am
Plot! What is this “plot”? I have never heard of it.
July 16th, 2009 at 5:45 am
Kirby – oh, awesome! Are you finding that you want to rewrite them quite a bit, or do they still work for you as you originally wrote them?
Laurie: Kai of the Brunnen G says, “The dead do not plot.” How this relates to me I’m not sure, but he definitely says it…
July 16th, 2009 at 6:29 am
Some work, some don’t. I’m finding that my style has changed a lot since I wrote some of these. I’m more…what’s the word? I’m definitely harder to please in my writing. I’ll get halfway through an old piece and go “oh this is rubbish” and clip 5k words from the story. I think the kernel ideas mostly work. It’s the execution I’m not pleased with.
I’ve set a really modest word count per day, so I’m not worried about not finishing the collection, but some days (like today) it doesn’t pay to get out of bed. I fully believe in throwaway-days, where you open your eyes and realize; “Today is the day where nothing can be accomplished”, so you order pizza and watch movies.
July 16th, 2009 at 3:11 pm
Going over old stuff is great.
Recently i was given a computer with a whole bunch of files left on it. after veiwing all the files that i found some old stories of mine that my friend (previous owner of the computer) had recorded as sound files after hearing some of my old plots i gave up sleep and typing into the wee hours of the morning.
i have compared them against the old files that i had written for these plots scenes and other twisted mental manifestations.
Thus far with between 2 and 10 years of seperation from these old writtings i have been able to advance the stories and fill in the “plot” holes.
I don’t plan on doing anything with them other then just finishing them.
July 17th, 2009 at 8:18 am
Kirby – “think the kernel ideas mostly work. It’s the execution I’m not pleased with.” – That’s pretty much where I am, too. I can see flow issues, all kinds of weak spots, dialogue that’s just too gothic and mannered (although I thought it was cool at the time I wrote it, and if I recall right, was deliberately going for that effect). I don’t tend to judge the ideas themselves, really. Often they’re rather nebulous, but I’ve had enough good reactions to nebulous ideas that I don’t worry too much.
Colin – just finishing them would be a fine thing in itself. I’ve also found that coming back to stories after a few years shows up inconsistencies and plot holes that I didn’t catch even with several revisions near the time of writing.
July 19th, 2009 at 2:36 pm
Enjoyed catching up on yr blog K – in bed and poorly is perfect opportunity to see what’s up with you. Sounds like writing mojo is flowing (helped along by the power of vegemite!). I like the story titles very much. I know what you mean by creating expectation in a title that’s hard to live up to. The title of my thesis changed at least 5 times before it was done…
July 21st, 2009 at 3:38 pm
Ing, I don’t know about you, but I get a pacifying, satisfying sort of pleasure out of playing with titles, particularly when the work’s stuck or, even better, when I haven’t written so much as a first sentence. There’s a sense that the title alone, once thought of and mentally caressed for a little while, creates a whole work in a virtual place somewhere beyond mortal ken… I have one title, ‘The Brass Gardens of Winterhouse Street’, to which I’ve never been able to attach the slightest wisp of story. But I’m convinced it’s a lovely, haunting, surreal yet perspicuous novel, with a predominantly lavender cover.