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Writing for Longevity

November 13, 2013 0 General Advice , , , , Permalink 0

Linkoping, Ostergotland, Sweden

Last week, I blogged about Kurt Vonnegut’s “Eight Rules for Writing a Short Story.” As many of you may know, Vonnegut passed away six years ago at the age of 84.

He lives on through his many works:

  1. Player Piano (1952)
  2. The Sirens of Titan (1959)
  3. Canary in a Cathouse (1961)
  4. Mother Night (1961)
  5. Cat’s Cradle (1963)
  6. God Bless You, Mr. Rosewater (1965)
  7. Welcome to the Monkey House (1968)
  8. Slaughterhouse-Five (1969)
  9. Happy Birthday, Wanda June (1971)
  10. Between Time and Timbuktu (1972)
  11. Breakfast of Champions (1973)
  12. Wampeters, Foma, and Granfalloons (1974)
  13. Slapstick (1976)
  14. Jailbird (1976)
  15. Palm Sunday (1981)
  16. Deadeye Dick (1982)
  17. Galapagos (1985)
  18. Bluebeard (1987)
  19. Hocus Pocus (1989)
  20. Fates Worse Than Death (1991)
  21. Timequake (1997)
  22. Bagombo Snuff Box (1999)
  23. God Bless You, Dr. Kevorkian (2000)
  24. A Man Without a Country (2005)
  25. Armageddon in Retrospect (2008)
  26. Look at the Birdie (2009)
  27. While Mortals Sleep (2011)

To create such a body of work, it goes without saying that Vonnegut dedicated a lot of time to writing, but what might go unnoticed is the importance he placed on exercise. In an excerpt from a letter to his wife, Jane, dated September 28, 1965, he describes his daily routine:

I awake at 5:30, work until 8:00, eat breakfast at home, work until 10:00, walk a few blocks into town, do errands, go to the nearby municipal swimming pool, which I have all to myself, and swim for half an hour, return home at 11:45, read the mail, eat lunch at noon. In the afternoon I do schoolwork, either teach or prepare. When I get home from school at about 5:30, I numb my twanging intellect with several belts of Scotch and water ($5.00/fifth at the State Liquor store, the only liquor store in town. There are loads of bars, though.), cook supper, read and listen to jazz (lots of good music on the radio here), slip off to sleep at ten. I do pushups and sit-ups all the time, and feel as though I am getting lean and sinewy, but maybe not.

Similarly, another one of my favorite writers, Haruki Murakami, places a huge importance on establishing a writing routine and pairing it with exercise. In Haruki Murakami and the Music of Words, Jay Rubin writes:

By 1999, Murakami had run 16 full marathons and so completely identified himself with physical fitness that one magazine ran a 25-page spread on the connection between his running and his writing. ‘You’ve got to have physical strength and endurance,’ he said, ‘to be able to spend a year writing a novel and then another year rewriting it ten or fifteen times.’ He decided that he would live as if each day were 23 hours long, so that no matter how busy he might be, nothing would prevent him from devoting an hour to exercise. ‘Stamina and concentration are two sides of the same coin… I sit at my desk and write every day, whether it’s painful or enjoyable. I wake up at 4 a.m. and usually keep writing until after noon. I do this day after day, and eventually–it’s the same as running–I get to that spot where I know it’s what I’ve been looking for all along.

Murakami is the author of numerous books in his own right; most of them have been translated into English:

  1. Pinball, 1973 (1985)
  2. Hear the Wind Sing (1987)
  3. A Wild Sheep Chase (1989)
  4. Hard-Boiled Wonderland and the End of the World (1991)
  5. Dance Dance Dance (1994)
  6. The Elephant Vanishes: Stories (1994)
  7. The Windup Bird Chronicle (1997)
  8. Norwegian Wood (2000)
  9. South of the Border, West of the Sun (2000)
  10. Underground: The Tokyo Gas Attack and the Japanese Psyche (2000)
  11. Sputnik Sweetheart (2001)
  12. After the Quake: Stories (2003)
  13. Kafka on the Shore (2005)
  14. After Dark (2007)
  15. Blind Willow, Sleeping Woman (2007)
  16. What I Talk About When I Talk About Running (2008)
  17. 1Q84 (2011)

Take these two literary giants as primary examples.

If you hope to write for the long haul, not only do you need a writing routine, but you will also need to take care of your physical health. If you take care of your body now, you will hopefully add more years to your life, so, like Kurt Vonnegut and Haruki Murakami, you can write your heart out well into your golden years.

 

Photo credit: Swedish National Heritage Board / Foter

When Characters Dream

September 11, 2013 0 Rules for Writing , , , Permalink 0

Sector 9While dreams in real life may provide windows into our subconscious, they don’t always. Sometimes our dreams are more likely influenced by that late night snack we ate prior to “hitting the hay.” And other times, we might not even remember dreaming at all.

As writers, if we include dreams in our stories, we must approach them with caution. They are a delicate matter.

Fiction writers can never include dreams just for the sake of dreams. This would be a waste of space, similar to including scenes that do nothing for the overall story. We’d eventually leave these on the editing room floor because our readers are smart; they assume every element of a story matters, and if these assumed elements prove otherwise, we will frustrate them or potentially lose them as readers.

So when we write dreams, they need to somehow tie in with our characters on a subconscious level. It has to mean something. If handled incorrectly, this can feel heavy-handed to readers, so lots of writers will create incredibly abstract dreams that are incredibly difficult to analyze.

From an interview with The New York Times, one of my favorite writers, Haruki Murakami, describes a dream he had personally that reads like one of these examples:

In the dream, a shadowy, unknown figure is cooking him what he calls ‘weird food’: snake-meat tempura, caterpillar pie and (an instant classic of Japanese dream-cuisine) rice with tiny pandas in it. He doesn’t want to eat it, but in the dream world he feels compelled to. He wakes up just before he takes a bite.

I often say, “Write your heart out.” But in this case, when it comes to writing dreams, it’s probably better to avoid writing them altogether. What do you think?

Why or why not? Please leave me a comment below.

Thanks for reading!

 

Photo credit: logan.fulcher / Foter.com / CC BY

Judging Books by Their Titles

August 21, 2013 0 General Advice, Modern Writer v1.0 , , , , Permalink 0

Banned Books Week Banner

It probably goes without saying that strong titles are absolutely necessary to catch the attention of editors and readers alike.

A while ago, I read somewhere that people purchase books after first studying their covers and then reading their titles. (Though this doesn’t account for the power of positive reviews and word of mouth!)

If you’re like me, you probably spend a lot of time worrying about the titles of your stories/books. And it seems like every writer approaches titles a little differently: Some will create a title from the very beginning of a new writing project; it just comes to them. Others will wait until the project is completed.

I fall into the latter category. I hardly ever have the foresight to name my work before it’s finished.

Here are a few of my thoughts on this tricky business:

  1. List all of your favorite titles from your favorite authors. Analyze what they have in common. See if you can find patterns to steal. More than likely, each title uses active, specific language. You should, too! (I particularly like titles from Kurt Vonnegut and Haruki Murakami.)
  2. If you’re having real trouble naming your story/book, it could be that it just isn’t quite finished yet. Generally, when a story knows itself, it’s easier to name.
  3. Scan your work for a line or phrase that you could use as a title. Listen to what your characters say or think.
  4. Your title should give a hint as to what it is about, but it should also give a slight indicator of its tone. The most important aspect, though, is its ability to intrigue readers.
  5. Sometimes editors will rename your book to something that has more promise of selling.
  6. On a similar note, short story collections are not always titled by the best story in the collection. I used to spend lots of time analyzing title choices of some of these books, only to hear authors uncandidly confess that weaker stories often supplied a collection its title just because it sounded cool.

For an alternative approach to titling a book, you can also use Lulu’s Titlescorer. It will score the likelihood of commercial success for your book by referencing data from past bestsellers’ titles. (Although I’ve played around with this, and some of my favorite books fail to score well by its standards.)

So how about it? Do you place a high importance on titles for your work, or the books that you read? What are some of your favorite book titles? Please send me a comment or two below, and thank you for reading.

Write your heart out!

 

Photo credit: DML East Branch / Foter.com / CC BY-NC-SA

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