January 4, 2007

For the time being

Life for the next three months is going to be like it never will be again. I’m in the final semester of my Creative Writing MA, and all my academic work is done. My job for the next while is to fill empty days with reading and writing, and I’m not sure I’ll be lucky enough to have such freedom again. Though I’ve paid for such freedom, but still, that only makes it a priority. I am enormously grateful for this privilege.

January 3, 2007

Short

I’ve taken a one-week break from my long project to write short stories– two or hopefully three. Concurrently, I’m reading Cathedral and listening to my new Badly Drawn Boy CD for inspiration.

January 2, 2007

A tricky business

Now, chewing gum is a tricky business, and so ultimately disposable and therefore dispensable that in a troubled economy it’s usually one of the first sectors to suffer. I worked in Product Development under Great Mind Peter Davenport who, with his knack for innovation, had been charged with maintaining the vitality of the Gollingham Gum brand throughout the economic down-turn. In addition to typing, my work with Peter involved the chewing of prototypical varieties of gum throughout the day and subsequently completing thorough surveys regarding their tastes, textures and flavours— long lasting or otherwise. I grew awfully fond of the new peppermint, and I credit Peter for saving what was left of the Gollingham economy with it.

January 2, 2007

Francine Prose: Reading Like a Writer

I must recommend Reading Like a Writer: A Guide for people who love books and for those who want to write them as the most practical writing book I’ve ever come across. Prose uses contempory texts and classics to demonstrate effective techniques for developing character, writing dialogue, using details and also taking advantage of structure– word by word, sentence by sentence and with paragraphs. She expounds upon the importance of close reading and supports her emphasis with examples. I learned a lot from her advice– particularly about dialogue. But what I liked best about this book was Prose’s “anything goes” attitude.

For example, you should use long paragraphs, she says. Or short ones. Or none. You should have a consistant point of view. Or ever-changing. Have your narrator die mid-text. Write from the point of view of an amoeba. Don’t tell us what characters look like. Or describe every bit of their apparel. Her contradictory advice is not confusing in the slightest, because each guideline is given in the context of a working example, and as readers we see that different things work in different situations and toward different ends.

Prose believes one learns to write by reading successful works, rather in workshops in which students take on the role of critic towards works which aren’t even developed yet. And, she writes, “Reading can give you the courage to resist all of the pressures that our culture exerts on you to write in a certain way, or to follow a prescribed form.”

I was surprised to find her chapter on reading Chekhov (who I’ve never read) one of my favourite parts of this book. Prose writes of a workshop she was teaching, and the advice she was dispensing, and how as she’d ride the bus home after her class she’d read one of Chekhov’s stories and see him working very effectively against just what she had been advising (that characters musn’t have similar names, that a story must belong to a certain character, that something must be resolved by the story’s end, etc etc). The point of all this, says Prose, is that there are no rules, and a writer only learns this singular rule and how to use it by reading. Carefully.

January 2, 2007

Obit

Philippa Pearce who wrote Tom’s Midnight Garden, one of the seminal works of my childhood.

December 31, 2006

What is left over

Here for Archie Andrews in Vanity Fair. Heather Mallick gives us the saints and standouts of 06. On foresaking the gym for reading poetry. In the Books Blog for on the library debate. By the great Booklust, I was directed to Kimbooktu, which is a books gadget blog! And it’s fantastic. Incidentally, I finished book 172 and am getting through 173 (but it’s not very long). And now I must go and prefer for my New Years Blow Out. Which is not so much of a blow-out, you will probably realize, when I inform you that my first stage of preparation involves baking a carmelized apple cake. But still. The eve promises to be most excellent and bursting with friends.

December 30, 2006

The Monkees – Randy Scouse Git

December 30, 2006

New Goal

My new goal is to get through my life without seeing an image of SH’s corpse. I really am not sure it’s possible but I am going to try my darndest.

December 30, 2006

The Finish Line

And so my bookish goal this year was to read 200 books, and mine has been a triumphant failure. A failure, because alas I’ve only managed 171, but a triumph all the same because I really don’t imagine I could have read any more than that. And I remain ambivalent about stupid reading marathons, because while I’m so glad I read all these books, I know I read some quick. Though my Great Summer Rereading Project did make up for that (and I will continue to hold such projects each summer in the future). But maybe my husband would like to see my face once in a while, rather than just my eyebrows. But it was an absolute joy to be consumed by reading, and to be consuming reading at once. The stack on my bedside was never too too overwhelming.

There is a slight chance I will get to 172 by finishing The Voyage Out by tomorrow, but I don’t think so. My NY Res is to read a mite slower this year, and I’m starting now. (I think Reading Like a Writer will help to underline my pact.) Anyway, it is with great joy that I’ve kept finding friends turned up on my doorstep the last few days, and it’s quite rude to read while hostessing.

What I have found worthwhile without a doubt, however, is keeping a list of books read. “Books Read Since 2006” says mine, and I’ll maintain it long into the future. It’s an excellent reference and archive, and like a diary of sorts. Moreover, it detects patterns I may not have noticed, and makes clear the gaps in my bookish endeavours. Though perhaps I’ve just got a thing for catalogues.

December 29, 2006

Soundtrack of our Lives

There was always a radio playing somewhere when I lived in England, and I’ve got a ridiculous attachment to the soundtrack from those days. I remember getting drunk watching Pink sing “Just Like a Pill” on Top of the Pops my first weekend there, when Girls Aloud got the Christmas Number One in 2002, walking down Nottingham Road listening to “Clocks” by Coldplay on my walkman. “The Tide is High (Get the Feeling)” by Atomic Kitten, which drove me to tears of joy on one of my first dates with Stuart (though I was deranged then). Daniel Bedingfield, Sugababes, Will and Gareth. A word about my weakness– I’m totally addicted to bass. Darius and Busted (who switched on the Christmas Lights in Market Square in November 2002 and I was in the crowd). DJ Sammy, which our favourite DSS neighbour used to blast out her windows (until someone smashed them and after that the plywood panes sort of muffled the sound). Robbie Williams and “Feel”. Nelly and Kelly’s dilemma, Big Bro’s Nu Flo, and Xtina when she was dirty. Do you see? I’m absolutely obsessed. Part of it was that that time was so formative; it’s when I fell in love with my husband. Regardless, the point of all of this is my new favourite wikipedia entry: the marvelously thorough 2002 in British Music. And don’t worry, this continues into 2003, when R Kelly’s “Ignition” dominated the charts, Junior Senior with “Move Your Feet”, 50 Cent, Black Eyed Peas and Westlife got to number one with a cover of “Mandy.” Etc. etc. etc. Were there ever old days any gooder?