Novels vs Short Stories (was Re: Writing vs. Reading)
Christopher Jordan
pwred...@aol.com "PWrede6492" writes:
>If you don't *want* to write novels, that's fine. But if you are >not-writing
> novels because they look long and intimidating, or because you just can't
> picture yourself doing it, or because you don't feel "worthy" (no joke,
> somebody actually said this to me once -- "I'm not worthy to write a novel,
> because I haven't sold anything yet." I, um, found it difficult to frame a
> polite response that properly conveyed the energy of my feelings to the
> contrary) -- well, stop that immediately.
I _am_ going to write _and_ finish a novel (or die trying!) whether
I actually see it published or not. Just to see if I can do it. Not
to mention I _enjoy_ doing it!
CJ
-----
What? Where?
--Dorothy Heydt
Roger Carbol
>> novels because they look long and intimidating, or because you just can't
>> picture yourself doing it, or because you don't feel "worthy" (no joke,
>> somebody actually said this to me once -- "I'm not worthy to write a novel,
>> because I haven't sold anything yet." I, um, found it difficult to frame a
>> polite response that properly conveyed the energy of my feelings to the
>> contrary) -- well, stop that immediately.
It doesn't sound that unreasonable to me. If I've never picked
up a hammer, I might be a bit more inclined to try knocking a
few tables together before deciding to build a house.
.. Roger Carbol .. r...@shaw.wave.ca
PWrede6492
In article <36BDFE...@shaw.wave.ca>, Roger Carbol <r...@shaw.wave.ca>
writes:
>> In article <19990205162708...@ngol08.aol.com>
>> pwred...@aol.com "PWrede6492" writes:
>
>>> But if you are not writing
>>> novels because they look long and intimidating, or because you just can't
>>> picture yourself doing it, or because you don't feel "worthy" (no joke,
>>> somebody actually said this to me once -- "I'm not worthy to write a
>novel,
>
>It doesn't sound that unreasonable to me. If I've never picked
>up a hammer, I might be a bit more inclined to try knocking a
>few tables together before deciding to build a house.
That's what's so insidious about it -- "write short first" look very logical
and reasonable, because practically everything you learn in life starts by
doing the short-equals-easy stuff first, and then moving on to the
larger-equals-harder stuff. But short stories are not the bunny hill of
writing, and logic has very little to do with what works best for any
individual writer. As I think Pamela already pointed out somewhere.
Patricia C. Wrede
piranha
Roger Carbol <r...@shaw.wave.ca> wrote:
[short stories as "practice" for novels]
>
>It doesn't sound that unreasonable to me. If I've never picked
>up a hammer, I might be a bit more inclined to try knocking a
>few tables together before deciding to build a house.
it's not the same thing. it's a different artform. it
just happens to also be written, and there are some com-
munalities. but IMO using short stories to practice for
novel writing is akin to trying to learn to play the har-
monica as preparation for singing opera. they're both
music, and they have some communalities, but the goals
are different, and the expression is different. it's not
a standard upgrade path, a short story isn't a small no-
vel.
but you can certainly practice aspects of the craft by
writing short stories, if you can handle the form. heck,
you can practice those by writing vignettes. even use-
net posts, if you wanted to make the effort. :-)
-piranha
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Morgan E. Smith
On Sun, 7 Feb 1999, Roger Carbol wrote:
>
> It doesn't sound that unreasonable to me. If I've never picked
> up a hammer, I might be a bit more inclined to try knocking a
> few tables together before deciding to build a house.
And there you have it: the true difference between writing and
engineerin/construction.
Your failure to write a perfect novel does not endanger anyone or
anything. The fact that your novel doesn't hold together for longer than
five minutes won't do anyone any intrinsic harm: heavy objects will not
fall on you, or the reader. The gas main will not break as a direct
result.
And if you realize it's poorly constructed BEFORE you print it out, no
trees will die in the process.
Building a house nowadays is a job for trained and licensed tradesmen
under the direction of architects and engineers. Lots can go wrong, and
your neighbours, rightly, want to know that it's done properly from start
to finish.
The worst that writing a bad novel can do is depress the author, or be
rejected by an editor: what's to worry over that?
Morgan Smith
kens...@hotmail.com
d983...@mail.connect.usq.edu.au (Christopher Jordan) wrote:
>
> I _am_ going to write _and_ finish a novel (or die trying!) whether
> I actually see it published or not. Just to see if I can do it. Not
> to mention I _enjoy_ doing it!
This is a hell of a good reason to write a novel, obviously. I encourage
anyone out there who would like to write novels but isn't sure they can to
just sit down and try it. Don't shoot for greatness (or crap); just pick a
story you're pretty sure you can write a book out of. If it winds up being
great, swell. If not, you'll at least see that a novel isn't a dragon.
Personally, I don't write short stories unless I have to (and sometimes I have
to). Writing a short story is exhausting. Writing a book is fun.
John Kensmark
kens...@hotmail.com
-----------== Posted via Deja News, The Discussion Network ==----------
http://www.dejanews.com/ Search, Read, Discuss, or Start Your Own
Julian Flood
> The worst that writing a bad novel can do is depress the author, or be
> rejected by an editor: what's to worry over that?
Come, come, we have better imaginations than that! What about the writer
who produces a bad novel and gets it by a bad editor, which leads to a bad
book? All us wannabes then get depressed, furious, onto the net with flames
about how the hell did Don,... oops... that author manage to get in print
and I can't sob sob.
It produces much low grade evil, does bad writing. It should be regulated.
Excuse me. There's a knock on the door. I'll just go and see...
--
Julian Flood
jul...@argonet.co.uk
Life, the Universe and Climbing Plants can be found at www.argonet.co.uk/users/julesf. Don't ask about the Diddley Skiffle-folk.
Graydon
>>> In article <19990205162708...@ngol08.aol.com>
>>> pwred...@aol.com "PWrede6492" writes:
>>>> But if you are not writing novels because they look long and
>>>> intimidating, or because you just can't picture yourself doing
>>>> it, or because you don't feel "worthy" (no joke, somebody
>>>> actually said this to me once -- "I'm not worthy to write a
>>>> novel,
>>
>>hammer, I might be a bit more inclined to try knocking a few tables
>>together before deciding to build a house.
>
>logical and reasonable, because practically everything you learn in
>life starts by doing the short-equals-easy stuff first, and then
>moving on to the larger-equals-harder stuff. But short stories are
>not the bunny hill of writing, and logic has very little to do with
>what works best for any individual writer. As I think Pamela already
>pointed out somewhere.
My experience is that novels are much easier than short stories.
I'd also like to point out that building a _good_ table and a building
a _good_ house don't use the same skills even when they're both built
out of wood. (the table doesn't necessarily have anything in it that
requires a hammer to put there, frex.)
--
graydon@ | He either fears his fate too much,/Or his deserts are small,
lara.on.ca | That puts it not to the touch,/To win or lose it all.
-- James Graham, 1st Marquess of Montrose 1612-1650
Graydon
Julian Flood <jul...@argonet.co.uk> wrote:
> "Morgan E. Smith" wrote:
>> The worst that writing a bad novel can do is depress the author, or be
>> rejected by an editor: what's to worry over that?
>
> Come, come, we have better imaginations than that! What about the writer
>who produces a bad novel and gets it by a bad editor, which leads to a bad
>book? All us wannabes then get depressed, furious, onto the net with flames
>about how the hell did Don,... oops... that author manage to get in print
>and I can't sob sob.
God puts trials before good writers, for the sake they will in their
full strength of voice distract the angels, and He would not have this
be save as the distraction is worthy of its occupancy of time.
Rachael M. Lininger
On Sun, 7 Feb 1999, Roger Carbol wrote:
>> pwred...@aol.com "PWrede6492" writes:
>
>>> But if you are not writing
>>> novels because they look long and intimidating, or because you just can't
>>> picture yourself doing it, or because you don't feel "worthy" (no joke,
>>> somebody actually said this to me once -- "I'm not worthy to write a novel,
>>> polite response that properly conveyed the energy of my feelings to the
>>> contrary) -- well, stop that immediately.
>
>up a hammer, I might be a bit more inclined to try knocking a
>few tables together before deciding to build a house.
No kind of art is easy; they're just different kinds of hard. I mean,
if people are just reasoning by _scale,_ they should start with haiku,
move up to limericks, then sonnets... I mean, it's all just writing,
right?
Just because it works for me, doesn't mean it would for anyone else.
My poems started short, and then they started getting longer; the last
one didn't stop until 176 lines later. It wasn't any easier than a
fourteen-line sonnet, and the things I'd learned doing short stuff
didn't help overmuch.
Rachael
--
Rachael M. Lininger | "I said 'were there any oliphaunts?'
lininger@ | For if there was, I was going to take a look,
virtu.sar.usf.edu | risk or no." --Master Samwise
Morgan E. Smith
On Tue, 9 Feb 1999, Roger Carbol wrote: (among other things)
>
> Consider certain religious texts. Some might hold them responsible
> for any number of deaths.
>
> Although whether a work which convinces its readers to kill other
> people should be considered "bad" writing or not is perhaps
> getting a bit too semantic even for me.
Well, I think if one could actually demonstrate a direct link from the
writing to the killing, without any "interpretive" or other manipulation
on the part of the readers, it would be very effective writing, and in
that sense, good. Whether an intent is laudable or not, is another and
quite moral question entirely, and not at all something I feel equipped to
discuss, just now.
But how often do you hear "This book changed my life" as proof of the
inherent "good-ness" of the work? If I had the skill to influence directly
readers' behavior through my writing, I should think of myself as a pretty
brilliant writer.
Alas, I shall just hope that some readers will be subtly altered in
small, subconscious ways by my delicate prose.
Morgan Smith
Roger Carbol
> And there you have it: the true difference between writing and
> engineerin/construction.
I'm not convinced that writing in general, and even sf fiction in
specific, is not without its dangers.
Consider certain religious texts. Some might hold them responsible
for any number of deaths.
Although whether a work which convinces its readers to kill other
people should be considered "bad" writing or not is perhaps
getting a bit too semantic even for me.
.. Roger Carbol .. r...@shaw.wave.ca .. The Killing Joke
Roger Carbol
> In article <36BDFE...@shaw.wave.ca>,
> Roger Carbol <r...@shaw.wave.ca> wrote:
> >It doesn't sound that unreasonable to me. If I've never picked
> >up a hammer, I might be a bit more inclined to try knocking a
> >few tables together before deciding to build a house.
>
> it's not the same thing. it's a different artform.
I agree. If they were the same thing it wouldn't matter which
one did.
> it
> just happens to also be written, and there are some com-
> munalities. but IMO using short stories to practice for
> novel writing is akin to trying to learn to play the har-
> monica as preparation for singing opera. they're both
> music, and they have some communalities, but the goals
> are different, and the expression is different.
I concur.
Roger Carbol
> No kind of art is easy; they're just different kinds of hard. I mean,
> if people are just reasoning by _scale,_ they should start with haiku,
> move up to limericks, then sonnets... I mean, it's all just writing,
> right?
Yes, it is my opinion that they should start with haiku.
But not for *practice*, that would be just silly.
Consider: I'd rather write a haiku, or even a dozen, and realize
that I actually hate writing and would rather be a plumber, than
to write a novel or three and then make the same discovery.
That's my point, which apparently I've been less than clear
with: Writing a short story is generally less of an investment
of time than writing a novel. For a beginning writer, I'd
recommend investing less on a risky venture than investing more.
Of course one may wish to start with *trying* to write a novel;
that's likely considerably less risky than starting by
*writing* a novel. One might even want to just write chapters
at random.
Pamela Dean Dyer-Bennet
>Rachael M. Lininger wrote:
>> No kind of art is easy; they're just different kinds of hard. I mean,
>> if people are just reasoning by _scale,_ they should start with haiku,
>> move up to limericks, then sonnets... I mean, it's all just writing,
>> right?
>Yes, it is my opinion that they should start with haiku.
>But not for *practice*, that would be just silly.
>Consider: I'd rather write a haiku, or even a dozen, and realize
>that I actually hate writing and would rather be a plumber, than
>to write a novel or three and then make the same discovery.
You wouldn't *discover* that you hated writing. You'd discover that
you hated writing haiku. That's all.
>That's my point, which apparently I've been less than clear
>with: Writing a short story is generally less of an investment
>of time than writing a novel. For a beginning writer, I'd
>recommend investing less on a risky venture than investing more.
You aren't listening to some of us, how loud do we have to yell. IT
IS NOT! It is not a smaller investment of time if it's harder for you
in the first place, and it's a complete waste of time to write a bad
short story when you could have written half a decent novel.
Look, you can do whatever you want, but why do you have to make
sweeping generalizations about it?
--
"Moreover, fantasticality does a good deal better than
sham psychology." -- Virginia Woolf
-----------------------------------------------------------
Pamela Dean Dyer-Bennet pd...@ddb.com
Dan Goodman
Pamela Dean Dyer-Bennet <pd...@ddb.com> wrote:
>Roger Carbol <r...@shaw.wave.ca> writes:
>
>>Rachael M. Lininger wrote:
>
>>> No kind of art is easy; they're just different kinds of hard. I mean,
>>> if people are just reasoning by _scale,_ they should start with haiku,
>>> move up to limericks, then sonnets... I mean, it's all just writing,
>>> right?
>
>>Yes, it is my opinion that they should start with haiku.
>
>>But not for *practice*, that would be just silly.
>
>>Consider: I'd rather write a haiku, or even a dozen, and realize
>>that I actually hate writing and would rather be a plumber, than
>>to write a novel or three and then make the same discovery.
>
>You wouldn't *discover* that you hated writing. You'd discover that
>you hated writing haiku. That's all.
>
>>That's my point, which apparently I've been less than clear
>>with: Writing a short story is generally less of an investment
>>of time than writing a novel. For a beginning writer, I'd
>>recommend investing less on a risky venture than investing more.
>
>You aren't listening to some of us, how loud do we have to yell. IT
>IS NOT! It is not a smaller investment of time if it's harder for you
>in the first place, and it's a complete waste of time to write a bad
>short story when you could have written half a decent novel.
>
>Look, you can do whatever you want, but why do you have to make
>sweeping generalizations about it?
Assumptions which I _think_ are behind what you're replying to:
1) Logically, the time and difficulty involved in doing a piece of writing
are solely and entirely a matter of length.
2) The human mind operates on this logic.
Some people apply this to cookery. "That's a complicated recipe -- you
have to cook it for a long time." "That's an easy recipe -- it only takes
a few minutes." "Simmer it for five hours" doesn't seem complicated to
me, and recipes which require split-second timing don't seem easy to me.
But for some people, that's how the universe seems to work.
--
Dan Goodman
dsg...@visi.com
http://www.visi.com/~dsgood/index.html
Whatever you wish for me, may you have twice as much.
Roger Carbol
> readers' behavior through my writing, I should think of myself as a pretty
> brilliant writer.
It can't be that hard. Heavy metal lyrics drive kids to murder,
suicide, drug use, and wild sex. At least according to someone
I saw on tv last night.
Roger Carbol
>> That's my point, which apparently I've been less than clear
>> with: Writing a short story is generally less of an investment
>> of time than writing a novel. For a beginning writer, I'd
>> recommend investing less on a risky venture than investing more.
>
> You aren't listening to some of us, how loud do we have to yell. IT
> IS NOT! It is not a smaller investment of time if it's harder for you
> in the first place, and it's a complete waste of time to write a bad
> short story when you could have written half a decent novel.
>
> Look, you can do whatever you want, but why do you have to make
> sweeping generalizations about it?
You're right; I made the sweeping generalization that it takes
less time to write a short story than a novel. I apologize to
everyone who can write one hundred thousand words quicker than they
can write five thousand.
Jay Random
Crikey, you're being thick about this!
Me, I take a lot longer to write 100,000 words than 5,000. But the 100,000
words are likely to be salable; the 5000 words are either a crappy short story
or one twentieth of a decent novel -- neither one of which is any use to
anyone. If I had followed your advice, I'd have given up writing because I'm
lousy at short stories. Reason: my best ideas come in clusters; I don't write
a story about one boffo idea or one compelling character, but about the
complex interactions among many over time. That takes narrative space; it
takes discursive treatment; it takes the scope of a novel. I've known
approximately since I was twelve that I was a novelist _de métier_, & short
stories would be at best a sideline.
Which would you rather do: invest more on a risky venture, or invest less on a
venture that is _guaranteed_ to fail? If the latter, I have nothing more to
say; as my imaginary great-uncle Lafe used to say, you cain't learn a ijjit
nothin', so don't waste yer wind.
Graydon
Roger Carbol <r...@shaw.wave.ca> wrote:
>That's my point, which apparently I've been less than clear
>with: Writing a short story is generally less of an investment
>of time than writing a novel. For a beginning writer, I'd
>recommend investing less on a risky venture than investing more.
Only it isn't.
If one is not well suited to writing short stories, one will bounce
off and bounce off one's attempts, or produce dreadful drivel, where
one might quite possibly have produced a respectable first try at a
novel. (Or vice-versa, of course.)
Word count and time of composition don't seem to correlate really
well.
Graydon
Roger Carbol <r...@shaw.wave.ca> wrote:
>You're right; I made the sweeping generalization that it takes
>less time to write a short story than a novel. I apologize to
>everyone who can write one hundred thousand words quicker than they
>can write five thousand.
You know, Roger, assuming you mean 'words well structured in a
narrative format', I really have written a hundred thousand words
quicker than I've written a 3500 word short story. (I wrote more words
than that in both cases; I'm counting from time of starting until time
of tolerable complete draft.)
I just finished scene 48 of the current doorstop, which turns out to
be 15 000 words long. Took me about a week. (This was a very good
week, for anyone contemplating huring rotted fruit.)
The short story I recently started got to about 200 words three weeks
ago, and stopped, and got outright blessed stuck, because thinking of
what happens next when I'm not allowed to let ramifications ramify on
their own makes it almost impossible for me to write. I don't have a
ramification-constrainer setting that works for short stories, and I
have no very clear idea how I would go about obtaining such a setting.
So, apology accepted.
gur...@saruman.wizard.net
> In article <36BFA2...@shaw.wave.ca>,
> Roger Carbol <r...@shaw.wave.ca> wrote:
> >That's my point, which apparently I've been less than clear
> >with: Writing a short story is generally less of an investment
> >of time than writing a novel. For a beginning writer, I'd
> >recommend investing less on a risky venture than investing more.
>
> Only it isn't.
>
> If one is not well suited to writing short stories, one will bounce
> off and bounce off one's attempts, or produce dreadful drivel, where
> one might quite possibly have produced a respectable first try at a
> novel. (Or vice-versa, of course.)
But how will one know that one can't write short stories if one doesn't
try?
I'd recommend that newbies start off with short stories. If they have
trouble writing those, then they should try a novel. But, all things
being equal, "better" to start off with short stories than novels. IMHO,
YMMV.
[snip]
Doug Taylor
My problem is, none of my current ideas are short-story length. They're
all going to require at least a single novel, perhaps more.
Of course, if my novel-currently-being-sent-to-slush ever gets published,
then I could probably write some short stories about the main
character's further adventures. That might even be fun. But it won't
happen for a number of years yet. Got too many other things I've got to
get out of my head first.
--
Doug Taylor | Nothing real can be threatened.
The Ohio State University | Nothing unreal exists.
doug-t...@osu.edu | - A Course in Miracles
gur...@saruman.wizard.net
> Rachael M. Lininger wrote:
>
> > No kind of art is easy; they're just different kinds of hard. I mean,
> > if people are just reasoning by _scale,_ they should start with haiku,
> > move up to limericks, then sonnets... I mean, it's all just writing,
> > right?
>
> Yes, it is my opinion that they should start with haiku.
>
> But not for *practice*, that would be just silly.
>
> Consider: I'd rather write a haiku, or even a dozen, and realize
> that I actually hate writing and would rather be a plumber, than
> to write a novel or three and then make the same discovery.
One: A person does not blindly write two or three hundred thousand words,
then sit up and realize they hate writing. They'll reach the same
conclusion whether the write 10,000 words of a novel, or five 2,000 word
short stories.
Two: Haiku is completely different from writing a short story, which is
completely different from writing a novel. One might despise haiku, but
love writing stories. They don't equate.
Writing is a very broad field. It's like computers. Example: all things
considered, software is easier to get involved with than hardware; it's
easier to learn and is more forgiving (a software bug is a heck of a lot
nicer than a motherboard that overheats). So, should all computer
engineers start with software? And if they dislike software, should that
tell them that they're no good as computer technicians?
> That's my point, which apparently I've been less than clear
> with: Writing a short story is generally less of an investment
> of time than writing a novel. For a beginning writer, I'd
> recommend investing less on a risky venture than investing more.
In a way I agree with you, and in a way I think you're totally wrong.
Again, one does not sit down, blindly write a full novel, then realize one
hates writing. One wrangles with it for a chapter or three, then gives up
for awhile and tries shorts. Which work. Or maybe short-shorts, or
novellas work. Whatever.
OTOH, I do agree that writing short stories is a good place to start. In
general, it's better for students to start there. But not because it's
less risky, or because it'll teach them how to write a novel; because
*in general* it's preferrable to learn the art of writing a short story,
then be able to write a full-length novel and have the short story sales
under the belt. Obviously, a lot of people won't be able to do this, but
I'd recommend trying short stories *first*.
> Of course one may wish to start with *trying* to write a novel;
> that's likely considerably less risky than starting by
> *writing* a novel.
What's the difference?
AFAICT, writers do not sit down, put their fingers on their keyboards, and
start writing page one of Their Next Published Novel. It may turn into
that, but they have an idea for a story and start writing. Every time
they start, they're *trying* to write a novel. Whether they succeed or
not is another matter.
(and just for the record, that above paragraph is how I solve the
gender-neutral problem)
Ack!
::dodges thrown tomatoes::
Anyway, there's no risk difference, because there's no difference between
the two.
> One might even want to just write chapters
> at random.
Like many authors do regularly? I believe Robert Jordan writes this way,
in fact, though others here are welcome to prove me wrong.
It sounds like you're laboring under the belief that writers actually
write their novels from the first word to the last word consecutively,
then immediately print it out and send it off to a publisher.
Or perhaps you're not; maybe a fuller description of your beliefs
would help us understand more?
gur...@saruman.wizard.net
> Consider certain religious texts. Some might hold them responsible
> for any number of deaths.
But the texts are rarely responsible, it's people's interpretation of
those texts.
A good example from modern times: in the New Testament, one of Paul's
letters goes to a church that's having problems with gender conflicts in
leadership. IIRC, that entire town in fact is having gender issues
as well. Paul writes (I'm paraphrasing horribly), "If it were up to
me, I personally wouldn't have women in leadership." Upon reading the
entire passage, it's clear that he's speaking about their specific
conflict.
Well, for centuries people have used that to keep women from being
"leaders" in churches. That position is starting to come under fire
now (particularly as this is the only place in the entire Bible that such
a thing is suggested; it's a rather weak case).
More often than not, the "kill the infidels" mindset comes from people's
interpretation of holy texts for their own gain, rather than a direct
edict from that text. Indeed, most people point to the Crusades as an
example of a holy text killing people; 95% of the Western world had no
idea what the Bible said at that time (only the clergy could read it, or
read it aloud, so their interpretation became everyone's interpretation).
PWrede6492
>Consider: I'd rather write a haiku, or even a dozen, and realize
>that I actually hate writing and would rather be a plumber, than
>to write a novel or three and then make the same discovery.
What do you think writing haiku would tell you about how well you like writing
novels? So poetry is short; big deal. I don't like writing poetry. I do like
writing novels. They are not the same thing, and people don't react to writing
them in the same ways.
Saying "If you want to know whether you like writing, write something short
first" is like saying "If you want to know whether you like fruit, you should
eat an apple. If you don't like the apple, then you won't like fruit." which
leaves out oranges and bannanas and strawberries and everything else. Eating
an apple just tells you whether or not you like apples; you can like apples and
hate oranges, or hate apples and love bannanas. You can hate writing haiku and
love writing novels or short stories; you can hate writing haiku and love
writing lyric or epic poetry; you can love writing haiku and hate writing short
stories; ad infinitum.
>That's my point, which apparently I've been less than clear
>with: Writing a short story is generally less of an investment
>of time than writing a novel. For a beginning writer, I'd
>recommend investing less on a risky venture than investing more.
Your underlying assumptions are not as connected as you seem to think they are.
Writing *a* short story *is* less of an investment of time than writing a
novel, generally speaking. But not always, and for those of us who are natural
novelists, it is not nearly so much less of a time committment as the numbers
would make it look. A 10,000-word short story usually takes me two or three
months to write, minimum; 10,000 words of a novel usually takes me less than a
month, and in a pinch, for the right novel, I can do it in a week. I know
people who are capable of completing an entire novel in two weeks (not many
people, I grant you, but some).
Writing 10,000 words of a short story is, as has been pointed out *repeatedly*,
not equivalent to writing 10,000 words of a novel. Some people can write
10,000 words of short story much faster than 10,000 words of novel; others of
us can do 10,000 words of a novel *much* faster than a 10,000 word short story.
And *for the individual writer,* how fast they work appears to be related very
closely to the kinds of ideas they get and the story structure that best suits
the way their brains work -- in other words, natural novelists tend to write
novels more easily, better, and faster than they write short stories, and for
natural short story writers, the reverse tends to be true.
The amount of time invested in writing something depends on how hard or easy
that something is, not on how long it is. The longest book that I ever wrote,
in terms of word count, was about 95,000 words; it took me about a year. The
book that took me the most *time* to write was about 65,000 words, and took me
around four years.
And if one is going to hate writing and give it up, one can generally come to
this conclusion quite as easily by writing one chapter of a novel as by writing
one short story. Nothing says one must *finish* the novel. In my experience,
those who are going to give up don't ever even manage to finish a short story,
and the investment of time in writing the first three pages of *either* a short
story *or* a novel and then giving up is about the same.
Furthermore, the statement "For a beginning writer, I'd recommend investing
less on a risky venture than investing more" assumes that writing a short story
is neither more nor less risky than writing a novel. This is not correct,
either. It is a lot less risky to write something good-to-mediocre than it is
to write something bad-to-horrendously-awful. And length has nothing whatever
to do with quality; it has to do with the writer's abilities. Saying "it is
easier to write a good-to-medium short story than it is to write a
good-to-medium novel" is only true for those writers who happen to be better at
writing short stories than at writing novels...and that is by no means all of
them.
If YOU wish to start by writing short fiction, go ahead. But I wasted years
trying to follow that stupid, stupid, general advice you are promulgating --
"Write short stories first; then write a novel" bah, phooey! -- and I very much
resent seeing people *continue* to present it as one-size-fits-all
this-is-the-best-way-for-everybody-to-do-it advice. Because there are plenty
of writers out there who, like me, will be *WASTING THEIR TIME* if they try to
start by writing short fiction. For them, it is *not* less risky, it is *not*
less time-consuming, and it is *not* a good way to start writing.
Patricia C. Wrede
Marc Brutschy
>If one is not well suited to writing short stories, one will bounce
>off and bounce off one's attempts, or produce dreadful drivel, where
>one might quite possibly have produced a respectable first try at a
>novel. (Or vice-versa, of course.)
I would be interested to hear some examples of the reverse case--the
problems a natural short story writer might have in trying to write a
novel. I know that I find that the longer a work is, the harder it is
to keep the whole story in my head, and this causes me to need more
and more elaborate outlines. Another problem is that I have to reread
more pages of a longer WIP to get back in "the mood" required to work
on it.
Someone mentioned that Orson Scott Card (a natural short story writer)
wrote about his experience trying to write a novel. Does anyone know
where I could find that?
Marc Brutschy
PWrede6492
In article <Pine.LNX.3.96.990209...@saruman.wizard.net>,
<gur...@saruman.wizard.net> writes:
>But how will one know that one can't write short stories if one doesn't
>try?
>
>I'd recommend that newbies start off with short stories. If they have
>trouble writing those, then they should try a novel.
Having written, and deleted, four different and exceedingly annoyed responses
to this, I am embarking on a fifth that I hope will be postable.
*FOR THOSE BEGINNERS WHO HAVE NO CLUE WHETHER THEY PREFER SHORT OR LONG
WRITING*, this *may* not be particularly bad advice. One must, after all,
start somewhere. However, I've seen an awful lot of beginners, and in my
experience, what happens when you give beginners this advice is that people who
*clearly* have ideas best suited to novels will twist themselves and their
writing all out of shape to no purpose "because I'm supposed to start by trying
to write short stories." They don't really *want* to write short stories;
their ideas aren't *suited* to short stories; but they try anyway because
somebody convinced them that this was the way to go.
And what they end up with are mutilated novels, pieces of novels, plot outlines
for novels...*not* short stories. And they wouldn't have even thought of
wasting their time doing this if thay hadn't heard so many people saying they
*had* to, or that it was a *really good idea for everybody*, or that it *made
logical sense* for them to "invest less time and effort" in writing some
unsaleable, horrible thing whose only virtue is that it only killed 50
manuscript pages worth of trees to print out.
People who think they would *rather* write novels should start by trying to
write them, instead of focussing on writing short stories. They may end up
being just as wrong as the people who mistakenly start with short fiction, but
they'll probably have more fun finding out.
There is no One True Way. Encouraging would-be writers to follow any sort of
pre-set career pathway is somewhere between pointless and counterproductive.
Patricia C. Wrede
Geoff Wedig
> I would be interested to hear some examples of the reverse case--the
> problems a natural short story writer might have in trying to write a
> novel. I know that I find that the longer a work is, the harder it is
> to keep the whole story in my head, and this causes me to need more
> and more elaborate outlines. Another problem is that I have to reread
> more pages of a longer WIP to get back in "the mood" required to work
> on it.
Well, I don't know if I apply, or it's simply a matter of not having the
time to write very long works so far. I've found my stories range about 5k
and up for the most part, though, but novel length has so far eluded me.
Maybe I'm one of the lowest of the low, the natural Novella writer. :/
> Someone mentioned that Orson Scott Card (a natural short story writer)
> wrote about his experience trying to write a novel. Does anyone know
> where I could find that?
Hmmm, I'd be surprised, since he's said on more than one occasion that most
of his stories were novels that he didn't know were novels. And considering
the number of size-ups he has done (not a fix up, but a rewrite with new
stuff added) I'd be inclined to agree with him.
Geoff
gur...@saruman.wizard.net
> In article <Pine.LNX.3.96.990209...@saruman.wizard.net>,
> <gur...@saruman.wizard.net> writes:
>
> >But how will one know that one can't write short stories if one doesn't
> >try?
> >
> >I'd recommend that newbies start off with short stories. If they have
> >trouble writing those, then they should try a novel.
>
> Having written, and deleted, four different and exceedingly annoyed responses
> to this, I am embarking on a fifth that I hope will be postable.
>
> *FOR THOSE BEGINNERS WHO HAVE NO CLUE WHETHER THEY PREFER SHORT OR LONG
> WRITING*, this *may* not be particularly bad advice. One must, after all,
> start somewhere.
And that was what I was trying to say, which of course Patricia put much
better than I did.
> However, I've seen an awful lot of beginners, and in my
> experience, what happens when you give beginners this advice is that people who
> *clearly* have ideas best suited to novels will twist themselves and their
> writing all out of shape to no purpose "because I'm supposed to start by trying
> to write short stories."
Hmm, I should have clarified more. I mentioned something along these
lines further up in the thread, and didn't elaborate.
I'd prefer if teachers said, "Look. You can write novels, you can write
short stories, you can write whatever. I'd recommend you start by trying
your hand at short stories first. If you're dead-set on a novel, by all
means do a novel. If you're dead-set on haiku, by all means do haiku.
But if you're not sure, start with short stories."
> They don't really *want* to write short stories;
> their ideas aren't *suited* to short stories; but they try anyway because
> somebody convinced them that this was the way to go.
Which wasn't in my mind; I was saying this with the mental clarification
that the mentor would explain the difference between novels and short
stories.
(Of course, as has been pointed out in another thread, my intent is
meaningless. My apologies for not clarifying my position; I made that
annoying mistake of not defining my postulates.)
> And what they end up with are mutilated novels, pieces of novels, plot outlines
> for novels...*not* short stories. And they wouldn't have even thought of
> wasting their time doing this if thay hadn't heard so many people saying they
> *had* to, or that it was a *really good idea for everybody*, or that it *made
> logical sense* for them to "invest less time and effort" in writing some
> unsaleable, horrible thing whose only virtue is that it only killed 50
> manuscript pages worth of trees to print out.
>
> People who think they would *rather* write novels should start by trying to
> write them, instead of focussing on writing short stories. They may end up
> being just as wrong as the people who mistakenly start with short fiction, but
> they'll probably have more fun finding out.
Indeed. If they're set on doing a novel, there's certainly nothing wrong
with that. I'd just recommend short stories if the author isn't averse to
them. Again, it's worth finding out about, so one might as well start
there, unless one has the next Gone With The Wind in one's head.
> There is no One True Way. Encouraging would-be writers to follow any sort of
> pre-set career pathway is somewhere between pointless and counterproductive.
Well, encouraging them along one pathway, while making it clear that
that's not the only pathway, seems fairly reasonable to me. But I get
your point, and I agree; it's like saying everyone should outline their
stories, and do at least three drafts.
This is one annoying bit about my English education, with which I am
otherwise highly satisfied. They never really explained about writing.
They talked about how to build an outline, how to recognize good sentence
structure (not just *correct* sentence structure, but *good* structure),
and that sort of thing. Nothing about different writing styles, though.
A single creative writing class would have done wonders for me. But it
wasn't anywhere near a requirement. For one thing, it would have taught
me the difference between plot-oriented and character-oriented stories,
and saved me years of grinding out poor stories.
Brent P. Newhall
Editor of Papyrus
http://www.papyrus-fiction.com/
Dan Goodman
Geoff Wedig <we...@darwin.cwru.edu> wrote:
>Marc Brutschy <brut...@ix.netcom.com> wrote:
>> I would be interested to hear some examples of the reverse case--the
>> problems a natural short story writer might have in trying to write a
>> novel. I know that I find that the longer a work is, the harder it is
>> to keep the whole story in my head, and this causes me to need more
>> and more elaborate outlines. Another problem is that I have to reread
>> more pages of a longer WIP to get back in "the mood" required to work
>> on it.
>
>Well, I don't know if I apply, or it's simply a matter of not having the
>time to write very long works so far. I've found my stories range about 5k
>and up for the most part, though, but novel length has so far eluded me.
>Maybe I'm one of the lowest of the low, the natural Novella writer. :/
You and Stephen King. He couldn't get them published till after he'd
already sold novels and short stories.
>> Someone mentioned that Orson Scott Card (a natural short story writer)
>> wrote about his experience trying to write a novel. Does anyone know
>> where I could find that?
>
>Hmmm, I'd be surprised, since he's said on more than one occasion that most
>of his stories were novels that he didn't know were novels. And considering
>the number of size-ups he has done (not a fix up, but a rewrite with new
>stuff added) I'd be inclined to agree with him.
He had the worst of both worlds. He's apparently a natural novelist. But
he _had_ learned to write salable short stories. Learned it well enough
that his first "novel" was actually a batch of sort-of-related shorter
pieces.
And there are indications that he's actually a natural _series_ writer.
gur...@saruman.wizard.net
[snip]
> I would be interested to hear some examples of the reverse case--the
> problems a natural short story writer might have in trying to write a
> novel. I know that I find that the longer a work is, the harder it is
> to keep the whole story in my head, and this causes me to need more
> and more elaborate outlines. Another problem is that I have to reread
> more pages of a longer WIP to get back in "the mood" required to work
> on it.
Partially, the problem is with the idea for the story itself. Being the
lowest of the low, a novella writer, I tend to have ideas that require
quite a bit of character development, but which contain next to no side
plots.
I wrote a little sword-and-sorcery novella awhile back, thinking it would
be a novel. I simply ran out of steam; the whole story had been told (and
it wasn't much, and no it wasn't particularly good -- I recall the writing
being pretty good, but the basic plot was incredibly transparent, not to
mention rather dull).
I also have a problem, worrying that I blather too much. Do people really
want to read about what the protag thinks of the butterflies?
This was partially cured when I read my Mom's book, which is 80% exactly
that and a great read. I don't write like my Mom, but I'm encouraged that
that sort of thing is not necessarily boring.
[snip]
Dan Goodman
what length they'd be better to start with.
If you don't read short stories, and find them boring when you try to read
them -- that suggests you're a natural novelist.
If you don't read anything longer than novella length, then you're
probably not a natural novelist.
gur...@saruman.wizard.net
> In article <Pine.LNX.3.96.990209...@saruman.wizard.net>,
> <gur...@saruman.wizard.net> wrote:
[snip]
> >I'd recommend that newbies start off with short stories. If they have
> >trouble writing those, then they should try a novel. But, all things
> >being equal, "better" to start off with short stories than novels. IMHO,
> >YMMV.
>
> My problem is, none of my current ideas are short-story length. They're
> all going to require at least a single novel, perhaps more.
Then by all means, write a novel!
I evidently didn't explain myself thoroughly enough in my posts on this
subject, for which I apologize. If one has novel-length ideas, by all
means write novels. But if one doesn't know what kind of ideas one has,
start out with shorts. And, it's a good idea to at least try writing
shorts at some point.
Random
Marc Brutschy wrote in message <79pmvu$a...@dfw-ixnews12.ix.netcom.com>...
>gra...@lara.on.ca (Graydon) wrote:
>
>>If one is not well suited to writing short stories, one will bounce
>>off and bounce off one's attempts, or produce dreadful drivel, where
>>one might quite possibly have produced a respectable first try at a
>>novel. (Or vice-versa, of course.)
>
>problems a natural short story writer might have in trying to write a
>novel.
I think Howard Waldrop provides a good example. According to the
introductions to some of his stories in _All Strange Monsters of The Recent
Past_ and _Going Home Again_ he "writes" short stories in his head, working
out every detail, every turn of phrase, sometimes for months, and then types
it up as the penultimate step. The stories will get a rewrite a few months
later, or upon an editor's request. I doubt an engineer would call this a
very "efficient" method, but since entire continents quake under Howard's
feet because he is the best short story writer wandering the planet today,
his method works well.
However, he is, at best, a mediocre novelist. He wrote one novel _Them
Bones_ and collaborated on _The Texas-Israeli War: 1999_. Both novels are
short and lack much of the quality that make his short stories so damn good.
In addition to these two novels, he has been working on two others...for the
past 27 years. He hasn't made any mention of getting close to finishing
either of them.
Now, he apparently wants to write novels, or at least wants to wants to
write novels, since he could make a lot more money with them than he could
with his short stories. Howard lives in a shack in the Pacific Northwest and
often doesn't even have enough money to gas up his car and get to the
general store in Oso, where his mail is dropped off. But his ideas are
short story ideas (indeed, he claims that most novels written today are
based on short story ideas) and his production process is a short story
production process. _Going Home Again_ may still be in bookstores, so you
can read his introduction there.
Dorothy J Heydt
Roger Carbol <r...@shaw.wave.ca> wrote:
>You're right; I made the sweeping generalization that it takes
>less time to write a short story than a novel. I apologize to
>everyone who can write one hundred thousand words quicker than they
>can write five thousand.
Insert the adjective "readable" here and there and you've got it.
There really are those who can write one hundred thousand
readable words a lot quicker than they can, while trying to write
five thousand, write twenty thousand and groan and try to cut it
down to ten and that's still too long and start over and try to
keep it to five and wind up with a portion-and-outline for a work
of two hundred thousand; and start over and ...
And sometimes *never* come up with a readable five-thousand-word
work, not after ten years of struggle, because it just isn't their
style.
Dorothy J. Heydt
Albany, California
djh...@kithrup.com
http://www.kithrup.com/~djheydt
_A Point of Honor_ is out....
Dorothy J Heydt
>try?
The same, of course, goes for novels.
>I'd recommend that newbies start off with short stories. If they have
>trouble writing those, then they should try a novel. But, all things
>being equal, "better" to start off with short stories than novels. IMHO,
>YMMV.
You can certainly start with a short story. If you find you can
write shorts, write 'em. But if that doesn't seem to work, don't for
Pete's sake conclude with either (a) "I must keep working harder
on short stories and sell some before I dare aspire to a novel"
or (b) "I guess I'm not cut out to be a writer."
(Because all things usually aren't equal.)
Dorothy J Heydt
>>of time than writing a novel. For a beginning writer, I'd
>>recommend investing less on a risky venture than investing more.
>
>IS NOT! It is not a smaller investment of time if it's harder for you
>in the first place, and it's a complete waste of time to write a bad
>short story when you could have written half a decent novel.
Maybe I've got a better analogy. Suppose you are learning to
paint. You do not start by painting miniatures on two square
inches of ivory.
You might start with little sketches and move on to big canvases.
But you might find it easier to start on big canvases, where you
have room to move around, and learn as you go on to condense down
into pithy little sketches, not a single unnecessary line
included.
Dorothy J Heydt
Dan Goodman <dsg...@visi.com> wrote:
>
>Some people apply this to cookery. "That's a complicated recipe -- you
>have to cook it for a long time." "That's an easy recipe -- it only takes
>a few minutes." "Simmer it for five hours" doesn't seem complicated to
>me, and recipes which require split-second timing don't seem easy to me.
>But for some people, that's how the universe seems to work.
Particularly if you're a beginner, you're going to worry and fret
over the thing all the time it's cooking, whether it's a three-minute
egg where constant attention is appropriate, or a five-hour stew
which you could go off and leave for four hours, only you don't
dare.
Brenda
Roger Carbol wrote:
> > If I had the skill to influence directly
> > readers' behavior through my writing, I should think of myself as a pretty
> > brilliant writer.
>
> It can't be that hard. Heavy metal lyrics drive kids to murder,
> suicide, drug use, and wild sex. At least according to someone
> I saw on tv last night.
>
> .. Roger Carbol .. r...@shaw.wave.ca
And it's well known that Internet usage leads to child-porn and plotting to blow
up US government buildings with home-made ordinance.
Brenda
--
---------
Brenda W. Clough, author of HOW LIKE A GOD, from Tor Books
http://www.sff.net/people/Brenda/
Dan Goodman
Dorothy J Heydt <djh...@kithrup.com> wrote:
>In article <cjPv2.368$k22....@ptah.visi.com>,
>Dan Goodman <dsg...@visi.com> wrote:
>>
>>Some people apply this to cookery. "That's a complicated recipe -- you
>>have to cook it for a long time." "That's an easy recipe -- it only takes
>>a few minutes." "Simmer it for five hours" doesn't seem complicated to
>>me, and recipes which require split-second timing don't seem easy to me.
>>But for some people, that's how the universe seems to work.
>
>Particularly if you're a beginner, you're going to worry and fret
>over the thing all the time it's cooking,
I didn't and don't. What I'm likely to worry about is the _preparation_.
Is this bowl really suitable? Am I _sure_ this is the ingredient called
for?
whether it's a three-minute
>egg where constant attention is appropriate, or a five-hour stew
>which you could go off and leave for four hours, only you don't
>dare.
--
gur...@saruman.wizard.net
> In article <Pine.LNX.3.96.990209...@saruman.wizard.net>,
> <gur...@saruman.wizard.net> wrote:
[snip]
> >I'd recommend that newbies start off with short stories. If they have
> >trouble writing those, then they should try a novel. But, all things
> >being equal, "better" to start off with short stories than novels. IMHO,
> >YMMV.
>
> You can certainly start with a short story. If you find you can
> write shorts, write 'em. But if that doesn't seem to work, don't for
> Pete's sake conclude with either (a) "I must keep working harder
> on short stories and sell some before I dare aspire to a novel"
> or (b) "I guess I'm not cut out to be a writer."
[snip]
Which I wasn't advocating at all, and I apologize if that idea came
across. I simply meant that, if you're going to start writing, you might
as well start with a short story. If you have an idea for a novel, by all
means start writing a novel.
PWrede6492
In article <79pmvu$a...@dfw-ixnews12.ix.netcom.com>, brut...@ix.netcom.com
(Marc Brutschy) writes:
>I would be interested to hear some examples of the reverse case--the
>problems a natural short story writer might have in trying to write a
>novel.
As I recall the piece I read, the author began by taking a short story and
trying to "fluff it up" to a longer length. 50,000 extra words later, he had
an obviously padded, pointless, virtually plotless *thing* that worked neither
as the short story it had originally been, nor as the novel he was trying to
make it.
His next attempt involved stringing together a bunch of short stories that had
the same protagonist and some sort of chronology; this resulted in a
novel-length object that read like an anthology of short stories, despite the
connective material and breaking the thing into "chapters." IIRC, he got
something sellable after several tries, but its origins as a string of short
stories were still pretty evident.
I am still positive that this was Orson Scott Card, BTW, and I think it was in
his how-to-write book (the general one, not the one on "Characters" only), but
I can't lay hands on my copy to check. (I may be wrong, but I'm positive...)
I personally have observed two natural-short writers make the transition to
novels; one of them thrashed her way through *three* gigantic thingies (they
weren't short stories, not at 400+ pages each, but they sure weren't novels,
either) before she got the hang of plotting a novel. The other kept trying to
do her novel the way she did her short stories -- by working *everything* out
in her head, in advance, and then simply typing the whole thing all at once.
(My theory is that nobody's brain is big enough to hold a whole novel that way,
though I can think of one or two folks that make me cautiously phrase it as
"Hardly anybody's brain..."). She's still struggling with the differences in
*process* (as opposed to actual writing-skill-related stuff like pacing and
plotting and structure).
There are probably lots of other possible problems, but I'm a lot more familiar
with the ones that arise when one tries to go in the opposite direction.
Patricia C. Wrede
PWrede6492
In article <Pine.LNX.3.96.99020...@saruman.wizard.net>,
<gur...@saruman.wizard.net> writes:
>Which wasn't in my mind; I was saying this with the mental clarification
>that the mentor would explain the difference between novels and short
>stories.
Well, but an awful lot of beginners don't *have* a mentor. All they have is a
bunch of how-to-write books and/or well-intentioned friends who know no more
about the process than they do. That was certainly my case when I was
starting. And I read "I'd recommend you start by trying your hand at short
stories first. If you're dead-set on a novel, by all means do a novel, but if
you're not sure, start short" as containing the implicit assumption that it was
*better* to start with short stories, that *only* the most stubbornly committed
ought to try novels, that novels were inherently harder.
And since I was very unsure how any of this worked, and had no idea what I was
doing, I tried to follow the implicit advice in the writing books: write
short, then do the long stuff. Because I wasn't "dead-set" on writing a novel;
I just wanted to write my stories...which happened to be novel-sized, but
nobody ever so much as *hinted* that there was a difference, that not everyone
can take any old idea and build a short story or a novel around it with equal
facilty. And I wanted to learn to write the "best" way, the "right" way, and
when everybody I read said "I recommend that you start with short stories
first" the implication seemed pretty darned clear.
Which is why I do not *ever* say, in *any* form, "I'd recommend you start by
writing X length" unless the "you" in question is a specific person whom I've
heard talking about their writing for long enough that I feel I can make some
sort of judgement about whether *this specific writer* would do better writing
a novel or writing a short story. And why I object to this form when other
people do it, unless they add lots of caveats to it. Because even with dozens
of weasel-words and caveats attatched to it, there are people out there who
will shorten it up into a "rule" and then inflict it on their companions as
"Joe Famous Author *said* you *should* do it this way."
Patricia C. Wrede
Graydon
>try?
Becuase of how ideas acrete in their mind, of course.
See 'Cinderella at a Rock Concert', or, well.
"I will not help you kill the king."
A short story writer, handed that by a damn pushy character in an
excessive hat, would have written a piece that was the argument
between that character and their cousin about why, or why not, the
king ought to be killed, and got the dramatic tension in either
because someone else in the bar wanted to suppress their treason or
becuase it was caused to be seen to be _important_ if one of these
characters started attempting regicide.
A novel writer, well, I'm up to 181 kwords and they _still_ haven't
really decided what's going on with the regicide, some other stuff has
intervened and the cousin is _slowly_ letting go of the idea that it
must have been the king that killed his wife, under the press of
events that imply that he leapt to the wrong conclusion initially.
Empress of Blandings
>I'd prefer if teachers said, "Look. You can write novels, you can write
>your hand at short stories first. If you're dead-set on a novel, by all
But that's *terrible* advice. Short stories are very, very, very hard
to write. In a short story, *every* *word* matters. Short stories
are an elegant art form, much further from narrative tale-telling than
novels are.
--
____
Piglet \bi/ Momentum! A paying market for metrical poetry.
pig...@piglet.org \/ http://www.piglet.org/momentum
Empress of Blandings
>If you don't read short stories, and find them boring when you try to read
>them -- that suggests you're a natural novelist.
Good point. I recently bought both Starlight 2 and the Avram Davidson
Treasury (thanks, all!). Good as the stories in Starlight 2 are, I
often find myself baffled at the end of them --- huh? What happened?
Whuh?
I'm always tricking myself into reading through, too --- I'll look
ahead to the end of the story, and hold my finger there to mark the
end as I read the whole thing.
Yikes, if this analogy holds true, I see I shall have to set my sights
a little higher --- I'm clearly intended to write multi-volume serial
novels. Ah, well, one scene at a time. I'm still trying to get Jenny
to the computer room seamlessly. (There's a body there.)
Empress of Blandings
>.... A 10,000-word short story usually takes me two or three
>months to write, minimum; 10,000 words of a novel usually takes me less than a
>month, and in a pinch, for the right novel, I can do it in a week. I know
>people who are capable of completing an entire novel in two weeks (not many
>people, I grant you, but some).
Richard and Francis Lockridge?
Patricia Novak
On Tue, 9 Feb 1999 gur...@saruman.wizard.net wrote:
> A good example from modern times: in the New Testament, one of Paul's
> letters goes to a church that's having problems with gender conflicts in
> leadership. IIRC, that entire town in fact is having gender issues
> as well. Paul writes (I'm paraphrasing horribly), "If it were up to
> me, I personally wouldn't have women in leadership." Upon reading the
> entire passage, it's clear that he's speaking about their specific
> conflict.
I think your paraphrase might be missing the mark just a bit. Paul was
generally more forceful in his opinions than that.
The Epistle you are referencing is 1 Corinthians. At the opening, Paul
discusses some quarreling in the community. I do not recall that the
quarreling was related to gender issues per se, but rather that it related
to which religious figure the community members felt they owed allegiance.
("For while one saith, I am of Paul; and another I am of Appollos. .. " 1
Cor 3:4 )
The quote about women in the churches (1 Corinthians 14:34 and on) is:
"Let your women keep silence in the churches; for it is not permitted unto
them to speak; but they are commanded to be under obedience, as also saith
the law. And if they will learn any thing, let them ask their husbands at
home; for it is a shame for women to speak in the church."
I think it is easily possible to interpret Paul's admonition in a general
way, even after reading and studying the entire epistle, especially in
light of a passage in Ephesians.
From Ephesians (5,22 and on): "Wives, submit yourselves unto your own
husbands, as unto the Lord. For the husband is the head of the wife, even
as Christ is the head of the church, and he is the savior of the body.
Therefore as the church is subject unto Christ, so let the wives be to
their own husbands and everything. Husbands, love your wives, even as
Christ also loved the church and gave himself for it. . . .so ought men
to love their wives as their own bodies."
When I was a Peace Corps volunteer, I heard a Zairean minister give an
outstanding sermon on this passage, emphasizing the dual nature of the
instructions. It was a most enlightened view -- directed mostly at the
men who, he felt, were misusing this passage in a tyrannical way. This
minister had, I believe, about a third or fourth grade formal education,
but a tremendous natural intelligence.
> Well, for centuries people have used that to keep women from being
> "leaders" in churches. That position is starting to come under fire
> now (particularly as this is the only place in the entire Bible that such
> a thing is suggested; it's a rather weak case).
There are other Biblical passages one can quote for the same end, if one
has a mind to do it -- particularly the Genesis material.
Of course, people tend to pick and choose what they want out of the Bible.
For example, a number of people who use Leviticus and Dueteronomy to
justify certain moral views don't appear to have a problem with eating
shellfish or mixing fabrics in clothing, which are also condemned in the
OT. I read a humorous letter in a magazine (People?) lately that said
that by those standards playing football should be considered immoral
because it involves touching the carcass of a pig.
It is interesting to note that even in Paul's epistles there are a few
references to women who do appear to be leaders in the early churches. At
the opening of Corinthians itself, he mentions the "house of Chloe." There
are three or four other references to seemingly important early Christian
women, but I can't recall offhand where they are.
Regards,
Patricia
Jo Walton
pig...@panix.com "Empress of Blandings" writes:
> <gur...@saruman.wizard.net>, in article <Pine.LNX.
> 3.96.9902091237...@saruman.wizard.net>, dixit:
> >I'd prefer if teachers said, "Look. You can write novels, you can write
> >short stories, you can write whatever. I'd recommend you start by trying
> >your hand at short stories first. If you're dead-set on a novel, by all
> >means do a novel. If you're dead-set on haiku, by all means do haiku.
> >But if you're not sure, start with short stories."
>
> But that's *terrible* advice. Short stories are very, very, very hard
> to write. In a short story, *every* *word* matters. Short stories
> are an elegant art form, much further from narrative tale-telling than
> novels are.
Every line, I'd say. Every word is poetry.
Also a lot of people have a better idea of how to shape novels because
they read novels frequently and only rarely read short stories. One of
the ways people unconsciously learn to write I think is by absorbing what
they read, and wanting to do the same, or do better. I happen to like
reading short work but I know lots of people who never read short stories,
they don't like to invest in getting to know a character for that length
of experience. There was a thread about this on rasfw a year or so ago
and there were a _lot_ of people saying they never read short work and
more saying they rarely do. If you don't like to read short stories then
it seems unlikely they'll be what you like to write. Not impossible, but
unlikely.
--
Jo - - I kissed a kif at Kefk - - J...@bluejo.demon.co.uk
First NorAm Public Appearance: Imperiums to Order, Kitchener, March 20th
Freshly UPDATED web-page http://www.bluejo.demon.co.uk - Interstichia;
RASFW FAQ, Reviews, Fanzine, Momentum Guidelines, Blood of Kings Poetry
Dan Goodman
Empress of Blandings <pig...@panix.com> wrote:
>dsg...@visi.com (Dan Goodman), in article <EH_v2.490$k22....@ptah.visi.com>, dixit:
>>If you don't read short stories, and find them boring when you try to read
>>them -- that suggests you're a natural novelist.
>
>Good point. I recently bought both Starlight 2 and the Avram Davidson
>Treasury (thanks, all!). Good as the stories in Starlight 2 are, I
>often find myself baffled at the end of them --- huh? What happened?
>Whuh?
It's not clear whether this is your reaction specifically to the stories
in Starlight 2, or general to sf short stories. If you're not sure, try
reading a couple of best-of-year anthologies -- each by a different editor
or editors.
>Yikes, if this analogy holds true, I see I shall have to set my sights
>a little higher --- I'm clearly intended to write multi-volume serial
>novels. Ah, well, one scene at a time. I'm still trying to get Jenny
>to the computer room seamlessly. (There's a body there.)
If you're sure you work better getting that one scene right before you go
on to the next, then disregard the following:
Sometimes, even people who think they need to get each scene right in the
first draft can actually do better by writing something like:
"What's-her-name goes to the computer room for some reason and finds the
dead elephant under the desk. There's a reason why no one else found it
first; or maybe they saw it and decided not to say anything."
And then going on to the next important scene.
Morgan E. Smith
can be lethal. While there are places and times where specific advice of a
technical nature is really important, there are other points where not
being told a particular "rule" or "wisdom" can generate great stuff.
ANECTDOTE ALERT! IRRELEVANT ANECTDOTE ALERT! ANECDOTE ALERT!
In second year, when you take your first intensive class in lithography
at the Alberta College of Art, you're given assignments that stress
individual techniques, one of which is called "wash" technique. This is so
you have an understanding of as many different things you could do, as
many as they can cram into the semester. They know you'll just settle on a
few things that work for you, or fit your style; the point is to give you
as many chances at finding that technique(s) as quickly as possible.
Wash techniques became my stock in trade. They are still my little litho
trademark - I always have a lot of it, in everything I do.
In fourth year, the graduating students did a road trip down to see a
vast collection of lithographic prints at the University of Lethbridge
(which had, btw, an acknowledged _world-class_ print collection, well
worth seeing).
Our instructor and the curator hauled out all kinds of great stuff for
us: Picassos, a Goya, just terrific stuff, from every era since Sinefelder
invented lithography, on through to last week, from every major
print-house in the world.
After four hours and about two hundred prints, I remarked offhandedly
that there didn't seem to be much use of wash techniques, especially from
the masterprinters like Tamarind Studio.
I was then treated to the curator's lecture on how amazingly difficult
wash techniques were, how hard it was to maintain edition integrity, and
how even well-known master printers wouldn't trust themselves to do even
quite small editions using very much of the technique, and dissuaded
artists from using it in the original works.
I turned to my instructor and said, in that case, it was damned lucky he
hadn't mentioned that to me in second year.
The instructor, to his credit, then spent a half an hour explaining to
the curator that I had recently done an edition of fifty prints for the
college, which had been sold, via the Glenbow Museum, to raise money for
the college. All predominantly wash technique, and closely scrutinized by
the department head for edition integrity, before being delivered for
sale.
Over lunch, the curator grilled me on technical data, and came to the
conclusion that what she'd been fed in art history classes was probably
erroneous, and that the real reason printers don't like wash technique is
that you really do have to maintain edition integrity: it's do-able, but
requires extreme anal retentativeness and a willingness to be ultra-picky,
as the least little variation _will_ show. Other techniques have a lot
more fudge factor, that's all.
If someone had told me that wash techniques couldn't be held properly
through an entire edition, my entire artistic output would have been
utterly different, and possibly unsuccessful.
As for my writing: No one told me anything about writing before I wrote.
I'm very glad of that, too.*
Morgan Smith
* - I didn't ask, either.
Morgan E. Smith
On Tue, 9 Feb 1999, Dorothy J Heydt wrote:
>
> Maybe I've got a better analogy. Suppose you are learning to
> paint. You do not start by painting miniatures on two square
> inches of ivory.
>
> You might start with little sketches and move on to big canvases.
> But you might find it easier to start on big canvases, where you
> have room to move around, and learn as you go on to condense down
> into pithy little sketches, not a single unnecessary line
> included.
Really, really good and true.
My hat is off to you.
Morgan Smith
Empress of Blandings
>Dan Goodman wrote:
>> Assumptions which I _think_ are behind what you're replying to:
>> 1) Logically, the time and difficulty involved in doing a piece of writing
>> are solely and entirely a matter of length.
>Close. I've assumed that the time involved in doing a piece of
>writing are primarily a matter of length.
Then you've never actually written anything, yourself? Writing is not
typing.
Empress of Blandings
>Dorothy J Heydt wrote:
>> You might start with little sketches and move on to big canvases.
>You might also find it more expensive.
Yes, the paper for a novel is infinitely dearer than paper for a short
story.
Empress of Blandings
>In article <79q6o3$6r7$1...@panix7.panix.com>,
>Empress of Blandings <pig...@panix.com> wrote:
>>dsg...@visi.com (Dan Goodman), in article <EH_v2.490$k22....@ptah.visi.com>, dixit:
>>>If you don't read short stories, and find them boring when you try to read
>>>them -- that suggests you're a natural novelist.
>>Good point. I recently bought both Starlight 2 and the Avram Davidson
>>Treasury (thanks, all!). Good as the stories in Starlight 2 are, I
>>often find myself baffled at the end of them --- huh? What happened?
>>Whuh?
>It's not clear whether this is your reaction specifically to the stories
>in Starlight 2, or general to sf short stories. If you're not sure, try
>reading a couple of best-of-year anthologies -- each by a different editor
>or editors.
Oh, it's short stories in general. There are a few authors whose
short stories I reliably enjoy (Avram Davidson is turning out to be
one such). Beyond that, they're just not long enough?
I'm in the midst of musing about why this is so; I haven't any insight
at the moment.
>>Yikes, if this analogy holds true, I see I shall have to set my sights
>>a little higher --- I'm clearly intended to write multi-volume serial
>>novels. Ah, well, one scene at a time. I'm still trying to get Jenny
>>to the computer room seamlessly. (There's a body there.)
>If you're sure you work better getting that one scene right before you go
>on to the next, then disregard the following:
>Sometimes, even people who think they need to get each scene right in the
>first draft can actually do better by writing something like:
>"What's-her-name goes to the computer room for some reason and finds the
>dead elephant under the desk. There's a reason why no one else found it
>first; or maybe they saw it and decided not to say anything."
>And then going on to the next important scene.
Excellent advice. I like the dead elephant bit particularly.
I'm not so much concentrating on getting the scene right as I am
playing around with ways to handle the scene, and experimenting to see
what I think works. I got lots of ideas from the feedback (THANK YOU,
EVERYONE!!), and have had more and more as I've been working on it.
I'm trying not to do the re-writes as re-writes qua re-writes, but
rather starting with a blank piece of paper and my imagination of the
scene, and taking it in a new direction each time. Which sounds
infinitely more disciplined than it is in practice.
piranha
Roger Carbol <r...@shaw.wave.ca> wrote:
>
>Consider: I'd rather write a haiku, or even a dozen, and realize
>that I actually hate writing and would rather be a plumber, than
>to write a novel or three and then make the same discovery.
hm. but since they're different artforms, how _can_
i know that i hate "writing" if i end up hating wri-
ting haiku? i personally _don't_ write poetry, and
i don't like it; most poetry doesn't speak to me. i
have never felt good about writing poetry when i was
forced to in school. but that dislike doesn't trans-
late into other forms, i love writing essays and use-
net posts and letters and stories. don't know yet
about novels.
>That's my point, which apparently I've been less than clear
>with: Writing a short story is generally less of an investment
>of time than writing a novel. For a beginning writer, I'd
>recommend investing less on a risky venture than investing more.
i am not sure that i see writing as an investment at
all. it's not like i was actually losing something
when i practiced writing poetry, i learned that i
stink at it and that i don't even care to get better.
what would i lose if i sat down to write a novel now?
i have a number of ideas that i think have enough meat
for a novel-length work, but indeed, i have never
written a novel, or even a novella, i am a natural
short story writer. what exactly would i lose by get-
ting 40,000 words into it and then finding out that
this isn't the right thing for me? i haven't actually
invested any money, i write in my free time. i've in-
vested some emotion, but learning experiences don't
count as wasted in my book.
>Of course one may wish to start with *trying* to write a novel;
>that's likely considerably less risky than starting by
>*writing* a novel. One might even want to just write chapters
>at random.
i'm not sure i catch the difference there. it's al-
ways about trying for me when i do something new; i
don't know yet whether i can do it.
btw, i don't start writing stories at the beginning
either. sometimes i have an idea for the end, more
often the idea is somewhere in the story. rarely do
i know the actual beginning. i suspect that if i
tried a novel that indeed, i'd not proceed in linear
fashion either, at least not for large chunks of it.
-piranha
------------------------------------------------------------------------
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Empress of Blandings
>In article <79qmfu$dom$1...@panix7.panix.com>,
>>>Dan Goodman wrote:
>>>> Assumptions which I _think_ are behind what you're replying to:
>>>> 1) Logically, the time and difficulty involved in doing a piece of writing
>>>> are solely and entirely a matter of length.
>>>Close. I've assumed that the time involved in doing a piece of
>>>writing are primarily a matter of length.
>>Then you've never actually written anything, yourself? Writing is not
>>typing.
>It's quite possible that he _has_ written a fair amount, and that _for
>him_ it works that way.
I disbelieve that anyone's writing as context-free as that. A
condolence note just plain takes longer than an RSVP, similar word
counts notwithstanding.
The particularly astute reader will note that I am replying to
something Roger has written, therefore clearly Roger has written
something. Roger, did it take as long to write those 19 words as it
has ever taken you to write any 19 words?
Empress of Blandings
>In article <19990209202401...@ngol07.aol.com>,
>PWrede6492 <pwred...@aol.com> wrote:
>>In article <79q6v5$715$1...@panix7.panix.com>, pig...@panix.com (Empress of
>>Blandings) writes:
>>>Richard and Francis Lockridge?
>>Who?
Sorry, there I go again, switching genres without warning.
>Mystery writers, once well-known; I believe they produced a lot of books.
From 1940 until Frances' death in 1963, they produced 45 mysteries and
half a dozen non-fiction works. Richard kept writing after Frances
died, turning out another 25 mysteries before dying in the early 80's.
Durned prolific. Light reading, Pam & Jerry North, somewhat like Nick
& Nora Charles. I don't know how they've held up, but I was
excessively fond of them as a child. And what an understanding of
Westchester county highways they imbued in my impressionable little
mind! When I first moved to the area, I kept having flashbacks, "Oh,
so *this* is the Saw Mill River Parkway. Oh, and look, there's the
state trooper's HQ, right off the Taconic, whaddayaknow."
Wendy Shaffer
d983...@mail.connect.usq.edu.au (Christopher Jordan) wrote:
> *BEGIN COMPLETLY OFF-TOPIC SIDELINE **BEGIN COMPLETLY OFF-TOPIC
> SIDELINE***
>
> Since we've been throwing around various titles of 'how-to' books,
> etc., in this and other threads, I thought to toss my hat into the
> ring at this juncture and ask Patricia and all:
>
> Are there any *good* books on *plotting* or *pacing* or *sturcture*
> (etiher together in one book or seperate) in regards to novel writing
> for the beginning/aspiring/newbie/etc writer that anyone has
> bought/read/agreed with/disagreed with/etc, in the past/present?
>
> *END COMPLETLY OFF-TOPIC SIDELINE **END COMPLETLY OFF-TOPIC
> SIDELINE***
>
One book that I found rather interesting and thought provoking was
Al Zuckerman's _Writing the Blockbuster Novel_.
It's not a perfect book - it's specifically geared toward mainstream
commercial bestsellers, and some of its advice is rather narrowly
prescriptive. (Things like "a bestseller should have between 2 and
5 viewpoint characters," for example.)
But one interesting thing that Zuckerman does is present a series of
working outlines used by Ken Follet in writing _The Man From St.
Petersburg_ (Zuckerman is Follet's agent.) And he goes through each
outline and explains how getting rid of this subplot, or combining
this character with this other character, or beginning the story at
a particular point instead of another, improves the story.
The book really hammered home for me the idea that perfect novel
plots do not spring fully formed from their authors' minds, but are
things that can be tweaked and tinkered into shape.
I'd really love to see a similar thing done with an SF slant, and
perhaps a slightly less ruthless view toward commerciality above all.
Still, it's a book worth taking a look at, as long as you think
critically about the advice given.
---wendy
--
Wendy A. Shaffer
wsha...@uclink4.berkeley.edu
Zeborah
> Pamela Dean Dyer-Bennet wrote:
>
> > You aren't listening to some of us, how loud do we have to yell. IT
> > IS NOT! It is not a smaller investment of time if it's harder for you
> > in the first place, and it's a complete waste of time to write a bad
> > short story when you could have written half a decent novel.
> >
> > Look, you can do whatever you want, but why do you have to make
> > sweeping generalizations about it?
>
> You're right; I made the sweeping generalization that it takes
> less time to write a short story than a novel. I apologize to
> everyone who can write one hundred thousand words quicker than they
> can write five thousand.
Anyone can write five thousand words quicker than a hundred thousand,
but that doesn't guarantee that they'll be *good* words, and it
certainly doesn't guarantee a good story.
Some people *can* right a 100K word novel quicker than a 5K word short
story. There are writers here who *have had* that experience, so please
respect that it's a valid one. It is the case. But for the sake of
argument, let me try and explain *why* it's the case:
Ms Novel is told that she's a beginner writer so should start writing
short stories before she progresses to novels. She shrugs and sits down
to write a short story. She writes the first chapter of a novel and
realises that she's almost at the 5K word mark already and hasn't even
introduced one of the main characters, and certainly isn't ready to
finish.
So she looks at the chapter and thinks. She thinks, "Well, I suppose I
could take out that scene and replace it with a couple of lines
summarising it." Unfortunately she underestimated a little; the couple
of lines turn into a scene only slightly shorter than the one she just
cut out and lead on to a very important subplot in chapter two, which
she proceeds to write. She's then at the 8K word mark, which is clearly
getting too long and is in no way ready to be finished.
So she looks at her two chapters and thinks. She thinks, "Well, I
suppose that character isn't really vital to the story. And if I take
him out I could get rid of those scenes, too." Unfortunately, while
she's rewriting to get rid of the minor character, she realises that
those scenes gave some vital information about her protagonist which
she'll now have to put across some other way. The other way involves
several new scenes and an ongoing thread during chapter three. She's at
the 12K word mark and beginning to despair of ever cutting this thing
back down to a 5K short story.
If you really want, I can keep going right up until Ms Novel finishes
her novel; but you should be able to see from that that she simply
*cannot* write a short story. Her brain is optimised for novels; that's
who she is. If she weren't so sensible, but instead kept trying for a
short story it'd go something like:
January
Wrote 10K words. Way too long; deleted them and started again.
February
Wrote 10K words. Way too long; deleted them and started again.
March
Wrote 10K words. Way too long; deleted them and started again.
April
Wrote 10K words. Way too long; deleted them and started again.
May
Wrote 10K words. Way too long; deleted them and started again.
June
Wrote 10K words. Way too long; deleted them and started again.
July
Wrote 10K words. Way too long; deleted them and started again.
Dammit, obviously I'm never going to make it as a writer.
Which is rubbish; she probably won't make it as a short story writer,
but she could make a perfectly good novelist.
Zeborah
Roger Carbol
> Assumptions which I _think_ are behind what you're replying to:
>
> 1) Logically, the time and difficulty involved in doing a piece of writing
> are solely and entirely a matter of length.
Close. I've assumed that the time involved in doing a piece of
writing are primarily a matter of length.
I haven't commented on difficulty. Heck, if I was going to give
advice about how to do something *easy*, it'd be to forget about
writing entirely and try something simple like brain surgery.
> 2) The human mind operates on this logic.
My advice has been that it might be helpful to operate from
this logic. Advice typically deals with what one *should* be
doing, as opposed to what one *is* doing.
Roger Carbol
> Which would you rather do: invest more on a risky venture, or invest less on a
> venture that is _guaranteed_ to fail?
If someone knows that they would fail if they wrote a short story,
then I can't fathom why they might seek advice as to whether they
should write a novel or a short story. Nor can I imagine why they
might follow it if it were given.
Roger Carbol
> If YOU wish to start by writing short fiction, go ahead. But I wasted years
> trying to follow that stupid, stupid, general advice you are promulgating --
> "Write short stories first; then write a novel" bah, phooey! -- and I very much
> resent seeing people *continue* to present it as one-size-fits-all
> this-is-the-best-way-for-everybody-to-do-it advice.
I don't think I am promulgating that advice.
In general, I think people must take some responsibility for
following bad advice. I'm sure it's easier psychologically to
believe that all those Wasted Years are all the Fault of Those Bad
People who gave one Bad Advice, Curse their Bones!
I don't have a lot of sympathy for someone who would blindly
follow the advice of anyone. Advice that isn't working. For years.
Maybe I'd feel differently if I knew the Writing Police were
roaming the streets, ready to break the head of anyone foolish
enough to start by writing novels. Maybe I'd feel differently if
the government handed out Writing Licenses, and only Licensed
Writers were allowed to write under law. But neither of those
things are true.
If someone wastes years of their life following bad advice, then
I suspect they are actually spending those years learning something
very important.
Roger Carbol
> You might start with little sketches and move on to big canvases.
> But you might find it easier to start on big canvases.
You might also find it more expensive.
Marc Brutschy
>Sometimes, even people who think they need to get each scene right in the
>first draft can actually do better by writing something like:
>"What's-her-name goes to the computer room [...]
I change characters names a lot using find/replace--of course, that
won't work unless the story is being written on a word processor.
What I find really difficult to change is the character's age, gender,
and other personal details. I needed to switch a character from
17-years-old to 25--years-old... find/replace didn't help much.
I've read that this sort of problem comes up in Hollywood a lot, with
television executives asking the writer at the last minute to "just
make the lead role 20 years older," as if that's an easy thing to do.
It can make script writers tear their hair out.
Marc Brutschy
Roger Carbol
>>Close. I've assumed that the time involved in doing a piece of
>>writing are primarily a matter of length.
> Then you've never actually written anything, yourself?
I have. Perhaps my style of writing is different than your own.
> Writing is not typing.
It's not only typing, no.
PWrede6492
In article <79q65g$6ht$1...@panix7.panix.com>, pig...@panix.com (Empress of
Blandings) writes:
>But that's *terrible* advice. Short stories are very, very, very hard
>to write.
*SIGH*
Look, short stories are very, very hard to write FOR SOME PEOPLE. Not for
other people. There are other people for whom short stories are *easy*, and
compared to novels, they're *very, very* easy. THOSE are the people who ought
to be starting with short stories.
*You* may find short stories very, very hard to write. *I* certainly do. But
it is still not something that can be generalized with any accuracy. SOME
people find *novels* "very, very, very hard to write," particularly compared to
short stories. They ought not to be told that "they ought to write novels
because novels are easier" any more than we ought to be told that we "ought to
write short stories because short stories are easier." Because neither one is,
not inherently. *It depends on the writer.*
Maybe I should just get one of those automatic spam-generator programs to post
this every day, and save myself the cramping fingers.
Patricia C. Wrede
PWrede6492
In article <79q6v5$715$1...@panix7.panix.com>, pig...@panix.com (Empress of
Blandings) writes:
>Richard and Francis Lockridge?
Who?
Patricia C. Wrede
Dorothy J Heydt
Roger Carbol <r...@shaw.wave.ca> wrote:
>
>Close. I've assumed that the time involved in doing a piece of
>writing are primarily a matter of length.
And of course, while length does enter into it, it's not the only
factor. If you can type 50 words per minute, it doesn't mean you
can sit down at the keyboard and finish a page every three
minutes, from 8 to 12 and 1 to 5. There are all these intervals
where you have to stop and think *what* to type next.
Here's a passage from Elizabeth Peters's _Naked Once More_, which
is not about what you think.
"How's the book coming, Mrs. Kirby?"
"There is no sensible answer to that question,"
Jacqueline said irritably. "Nor to 'how far along are you'?"
"Damned if I can understand why." Paul's dark brows drew
together. "A book consists of a certain number of pages, right?
Don't you know how many pages you have written, and how many more
you have to write?"
Well, Paul, ... no.
There are too many other jokers in the deck, beginning with the
question about "Why am I writing this thing, anyway?"
Dorothy J. Heydt
Albany, California
djh...@kithrup.com
http://www.kithrup.com/~djheydt
_A Point of Honor_ is out....
Marc Brutschy
to write a short story:
>So she looks at the chapter and thinks. She thinks, "Well, I suppose I
>could take out that scene and replace it with a couple of lines
>summarising it." Unfortunately she underestimated a little; the couple
>of lines turn into a scene only slightly shorter than the one she just
>cut out and lead on to a very important subplot in chapter two, which
>she proceeds to write. She's then at the 8K word mark, which is clearly
>getting too long and is in no way ready to be finished.
This vignette, as well as other comments in this thread, have been
very enlightening. I now realize that the way I currently approach
fiction makes me a short story writer. I work from detailed outlines
in which every plot point and all the foreshadowing are already worked
out before the first sentence is written. I have never sat down and
written 8K words, or even 500 words, without knowing exactly where I
was trying to go.
So... a *very* big thank you to everyone who has described out how
natural novel writers work. If I attempt a novel, I'm going to shift
my paradigm for writing to more closely match how other people do it.
Or at least try to.
I wonder if that's the difference between the two type. The ultimate
short-short story writer would assemble every detail about the story
in his or her mind before beginning to write. The ultimate novelist
can create those details on the fly and get everything to tie up in
the end.
Years ago I watched a TV interview with Mickey Spillane. He said he
wrote mystery novels without even knowing who the murderer was. In
fact, he wrote the book so that _no one_ could have commited the
murder. Then, as he wrote the last few pages of the novel, he would
figure out whodunnit and make it work. Nice! If I did that, I'd end up
with 2000 pages of birdcage liner.
So here's what would have happened to me, trying to write a novel the
way I write short stories...
Think of an idea *big* enough for a novel... hmmm, how big is that?
Well, let's try outlining an idea it to see if it will fly for 324
pages, which is how long Orbital Decay was, and I really liked that
novel a lot. Next, I'll divide the outline into sections, one for each
chapter--lets' say 23 chapters, because that's how many were in
Citizen of the Galaxy, my favorite novel of all time. Now, that gives
us chapters that are 14 pages long. Next, think up ideas for each
section that sound about 14 pages long and fill in the details in the
outline...
Sounds to me like I'd end up with 23 short stories strung together.
But hey... Zenna Henderson did it... James White did it....
God help me.
Marc Brutschy
(hey... I just thought up a clever way to describe my character's home
planet... what chapter do I have to insert that into...?)
Dan Goodman
>Blandings) writes:
>
>>Richard and Francis Lockridge?
>
>Who?
Mystery writers, once well-known; I believe they produced a lot of books.
--
Graydon
>>Dorothy J Heydt wrote:
>>> You might start with little sketches and move on to big canvases.
>>> But you might find it easier to start on big canvases.
>
>>You might also find it more expensive.
>
>story.
And that's only if you print it; electrons is _cheap_.
--
graydon@ | He either fears his fate too much,/Or his deserts are small,
lara.on.ca | That puts it not to the touch,/To win or lose it all.
-- James Graham, 1st Marquess of Montrose 1612-1650
Dan Goodman
>
>> Assumptions which I _think_ are behind what you're replying to:
>>
>> 1) Logically, the time and difficulty involved in doing a piece of writing
>> are solely and entirely a matter of length.
>
>writing are primarily a matter of length.
Inaccurate. Ever hear the bit -"I'm sending you this long letter because
I don't have time to write a shorter one"-?
>I haven't commented on difficulty. Heck, if I was going to give
>advice about how to do something *easy*, it'd be to forget about
>writing entirely and try something simple like brain surgery.
>
>> 2) The human mind operates on this logic.
>
>My advice has been that it might be helpful to operate from
>this logic. Advice typically deals with what one *should* be
>doing, as opposed to what one *is* doing.
One of the bits of advice I give most frequently is: "Don't should on
yourself."
It is my contention, and I believe that of several others who've
contributed to this thread, that writing advice which "deals with what one
*should* be doing" is often worse than useless.
The choice isn't between what you are doing, and what logic, custom, and
precedent say you should be doing. It's between what works _for you_ what
doesn't work nearly as well.
What works best for you may be something you haven't tried yet; it may be
what you're already doing and feel confident about; or it may be what you
would be doing if you weren't trying to do it the right way.
In this area, logic and what seems reasonable are about as reliable as
Soviet economic statistics.
Dan Goodman
>>Dan Goodman wrote:
>>> Assumptions which I _think_ are behind what you're replying to:
>>> 1) Logically, the time and difficulty involved in doing a piece of writing
>>> are solely and entirely a matter of length.
>
>>Close. I've assumed that the time involved in doing a piece of
>>writing are primarily a matter of length.
>
>typing.
It's quite possible that he _has_ written a fair amount, and that _for
him_ it works that way.
--
Christopher Jordan
Roger Carbol <r...@shaw.wave.ca> wrote:
That's my point, which apparently I've been less than clear
with: Writing a short story is generally less of an investment
of time than writing a novel. For a beginning writer, I'd
recommend investing less on a risky venture than investing more.
Christopher jordan wrote:
And your advice to me would stall me forever. You see, I'm a novel
writer. And, like everyone else has been patiently pointing out to
you since you posted, that is what I am suited to.
I _cannot_ write 100K words _faster_ than I can write 5K words. Your
statement is entirely correct.
I _cannot_, however, write 5K words that actually _say_ anything.
I _can_ write 100K words that tell a story.
Do you see what eveyone is trying to say, here? The actuality of
place words down on paper, then counting them up and devising a timed
amount is not in dispute. Almost anyone can _write_ 5000 words
faster.
Whether or not they actually _say_ anything is what's in dispute.
HTH
-----
What? Where?
--Dorothy Heydt
Dan Goodman
Christopher Jordan <d983...@mail.connect.usq.edu.au> wrote:
>
>Roger Carbol <r...@shaw.wave.ca> wrote:
>
>That's my point, which apparently I've been less than clear
>with: Writing a short story is generally less of an investment
>of time than writing a novel. For a beginning writer, I'd
>recommend investing less on a risky venture than investing more.
>
>Christopher jordan wrote:
>
>And your advice to me would stall me forever. You see, I'm a novel
>writer. And, like everyone else has been patiently pointing out to
>you since you posted, that is what I am suited to.
Not everyone who's been pointing it out. Then again, I can't honestly say
I've been _patiently_ pointing it out.
>I _cannot_ write 100K words _faster_ than I can write 5K words. Your
>statement is entirely correct.
>
>I _cannot_, however, write 5K words that actually _say_ anything.
>I _can_ write 100K words that tell a story.
>
>Do you see what eveyone is trying to say, here? The actuality of
>place words down on paper, then counting them up and devising a timed
>amount is not in dispute. Almost anyone can _write_ 5000 words
>faster.
>
>Whether or not they actually _say_ anything is what's in dispute.
>
>HTH
>
>
>
>
> -----
>
>What? Where?
> --Dorothy Heydt
Dan Goodman
>>In article <79qmfu$dom$1...@panix7.panix.com>,
>>Empress of Blandings <pig...@panix.com> wrote:
>>>r...@shaw.wave.ca, in article <36C0E2...@shaw.wave.ca>, dixit:
>>>>Dan Goodman wrote:
>>>>> Assumptions which I _think_ are behind what you're replying to:
>>>>> 1) Logically, the time and difficulty involved in doing a piece of writing
>>>>> are solely and entirely a matter of length.
>
>>>>Close. I've assumed that the time involved in doing a piece of
>>>>writing are primarily a matter of length.
>
>>>Then you've never actually written anything, yourself? Writing is not
>>>typing.
>
>>It's quite possible that he _has_ written a fair amount, and that _for
>>him_ it works that way.
>
>condolence note just plain takes longer than an RSVP, similar word
>counts notwithstanding.
For everyone? You're sure about that? As sure as, say, some people are
that short stories are always easier to write -- for anyone -- than
novels?
>The particularly astute reader will note that I am replying to
>something Roger has written, therefore clearly Roger has written
>something. Roger, did it take as long to write those 19 words as it
>has ever taken you to write any 19 words?
>--
> ____
>Piglet \bi/ Momentum! A paying market for metrical poetry.
>pig...@piglet.org \/ http://www.piglet.org/momentum
Christopher Jordan
Brutschy) wrote:
>dsg...@visi.com (Dan Goodman) wrote:
>
>>Sometimes, even people who think they need to get each scene right in the
>>first draft can actually do better by writing something like:
>
>>"What's-her-name goes to the computer room [...]
>
>I change characters names a lot using find/replace--of course, that
>won't work unless the story is being written on a word processor.
>What I find really difficult to change is the character's age, gender,
>and other personal details. I needed to switch a character from
>17-years-old to 25--years-old... find/replace didn't help much.
It shouldn't.
You can simply use *find*, rather than *find/replace* to do this.
Allowing that you have used *17* throughout, not slipping in the word
*seventeen*, it would simply be a matter of finding *17*, changing it
to *20*, then moving on to the next *17*. This way you have the
option to change/not change as you move along through your ms.
If it finds the *date* 1176, you have the option of simply moving to
the next *find*. If you use *find/replace* only, then yes, it will
not only change the stand alone numbers you are looking for (ie 17-the
age), but it will change the example (date) given to 1206.
This will take more time that a quick *find/replace*, but it is well
worth it. If not sure whether you used the numeral *17* or the word,
start over with the word and see what your wp finds.
>
>I've read that this sort of problem comes up in Hollywood a lot, with
>television executives asking the writer at the last minute to "just
>make the lead role 20 years older," as if that's an easy thing to do.
>It can make script writers tear their hair out.
As I've pointed out above, that would be simpler that you think if the
script-writer has the ms on disk (and he most likely would).
In the day of the type-writer, many script writers had balding
patches... <g>
>
>Marc Brutschy
Roger Carbol
>>Close. I've assumed that the time involved in doing a piece of
>>writing are primarily a matter of length.
>
> Inaccurate. Ever hear the bit -"I'm sending you this long letter because
> I don't have time to write a shorter one"-?
I've heard it, but I don't subscribe to it. In any case, it would
appear we've clarified what are mutual assumptions are.
> It is my contention, and I believe that of several others who've
> contributed to this thread, that writing advice which "deals with what one
> *should* be doing" is often worse than useless.
What sort of advice doesn't deal with what one should be doing? Is
it your belief, then, that all writing advice is worse than useless?
If you could provide a piece of writing advice which is better
than useless, and doesn't deal with what one should be doing, then
perhaps that would clarify things.
Dan Goodman
Christopher Jordan <d983...@mail.connect.usq.edu.au> wrote:
>On Wed, 10 Feb 1999 01:19:36 GMT, brut...@ix.netcom.com (Marc
>Brutschy) wrote:
>
>>dsg...@visi.com (Dan Goodman) wrote:
>>
>>>Sometimes, even people who think they need to get each scene right in the
>>>first draft can actually do better by writing something like:
>>
>>>"What's-her-name goes to the computer room [...]
>>
>>I change characters names a lot using find/replace--of course, that
>>won't work unless the story is being written on a word processor.
>>What I find really difficult to change is the character's age, gender,
>>and other personal details. I needed to switch a character from
>>17-years-old to 25--years-old... find/replace didn't help much.
>
>It shouldn't.
>
>You can simply use *find*, rather than *find/replace* to do this.
I think you've missed the point. Marc wasn't talking about changing the
number in the manuscript. He was talking about changing the character
from a realistic person of one age to a realistic person of another age.
[snip]
>>I've read that this sort of problem comes up in Hollywood a lot, with
>>television executives asking the writer at the last minute to "just
>>make the lead role 20 years older," as if that's an easy thing to do.
>>It can make script writers tear their hair out.
>
>As I've pointed out above, that would be simpler that you think if the
>script-writer has the ms on disk (and he most likely would).
Again, you're missing the point.
Empress of Blandings
>In article <79r2us$hv9$1...@panix7.panix.com>,
>Empress of Blandings <pig...@panix.com> wrote:
>>dsg...@visi.com (Dan Goodman), in article <j27w2.602$k22....@ptah.visi.com>, dixit:
>>>In article <79qmfu$dom$1...@panix7.panix.com>,
>>>Empress of Blandings <pig...@panix.com> wrote:
>>>>r...@shaw.wave.ca, in article <36C0E2...@shaw.wave.ca>, dixit:
>>>>>writing are primarily a matter of length.
>>>>Then you've never actually written anything, yourself? Writing is not
>>>>typing.
>>>It's quite possible that he _has_ written a fair amount, and that _for
>>>him_ it works that way.
>>I disbelieve that anyone's writing as context-free as that. A
>>condolence note just plain takes longer than an RSVP, similar word
>>counts notwithstanding.
>For everyone? You're sure about that? As sure as, say, some people are
>that short stories are always easier to write -- for anyone -- than
>novels?
How sure am I that context matters more than length? Hugely. How
sure am I that my specific example will hold true across multiple
people or even the same people within different situations? Not at
all --- in fact, my thesis is that they will differ, from person to
person and from situation to situation. My example was merely
illustrative, one kind of situation in which one might expect, for the
same word count, wildly different composition times.
For another example, I bet this post took me a lot less time to write
than did any of my college application essays, similar length
notwithstanding.
Christopher Jordan
>
><snip>
>
>I personally have observed two natural-short writers make the transition to
>novels; one of them thrashed her way through *three* gigantic thingies (they
>weren't short stories, not at 400+ pages each, but they sure weren't novels,
>either) before she got the hang of plotting a novel.
*BEGIN COMPLETLY OFF-TOPIC SIDELINE **BEGIN COMPLETLY OFF-TOPIC
SIDELINE***
Since we've been throwing around various titles of 'how-to' books,
etc., in this and other threads, I thought to toss my hat into the
ring at this juncture and ask Patricia and all:
Are there any *good* books on *plotting* or *pacing* or *sturcture*
(etiher together in one book or seperate) in regards to novel writing
for the beginning/aspiring/newbie/etc writer that anyone has
bought/read/agreed with/disagreed with/etc, in the past/present?
*END COMPLETLY OFF-TOPIC SIDELINE **END COMPLETLY OFF-TOPIC
SIDELINE***
> The other kept trying to
>do her novel the way she did her short stories -- by working *everything* out
>in her head, in advance, and then simply typing the whole thing all at once.
>(My theory is that nobody's brain is big enough to hold a whole novel that way,
>though I can think of one or two folks that make me cautiously phrase it as
>"Hardly anybody's brain..."). She's still struggling with the differences in
>*process* (as opposed to actual writing-skill-related stuff like pacing and
>plotting and structure).
>
>There are probably lots of other possible problems, but I'm a lot more familiar
>with the ones that arise when one tries to go in the opposite direction.
>
>Patricia C. Wrede
Roger Carbol
> Roger, did it take as long to write those 19 words as it
> has ever taken you to write any 19 words?
No, but I can assure you that it was quicker than any 1900 words
I've written.
As you've pointed out, though, watching the clock from the time
one starts typing to the time one types in "THE END" is perhaps
not a really accurate way to measure how fast one "writes." Of
course pretty soon that leads one to realize that one has been
writing everything since the moment of birth, which might be
accurate, but not all that useful for the purposes of discussion.
Roger Carbol
> And your advice to me would stall me forever. You see, I'm a novel
> writer. And, like everyone else has been patiently pointing out to
> you since you posted, that is what I am suited to.
Why would you ask my advice on whether you should write short
stories or novels if you already know you're a novel writer?
More importantly, what would ever possess you to follow my advice
on such a subject?
Dan Goodman
>>>writing are primarily a matter of length.
>>
because
>> I don't have time to write a shorter one"-?
>
>I've heard it, but I don't subscribe to it. In any case, it would
>appear we've clarified what are mutual assumptions are.
No. We have clarified some assumptions which are _not_ mutual. If you
don't understand this, look up "mutual" in a dictionary.
>
>> It is my contention, and I believe that of several others who've
>> contributed to this thread, that writing advice which "deals with what one
>> *should* be doing" is often worse than useless.
>
>What sort of advice doesn't deal with what one should be doing?
1) Advice given in effective 12-step groups
2) Advice given in Toastmasters evaluations
3) Career counseling, if it's any good
4) The advice Patricia Wrede gives in this newsgroup.
And, of course, any kind of advice which says "Try this" or "Think about
this" -- rather than "This is what you should be doing."
Is
>it your belief, then, that all writing advice is worse than useless?
Of course not.
>If you could provide a piece of writing advice which is better
>than useless, and doesn't deal with what one should be doing, then
>perhaps that would clarify things.
"Try writing short stories." As distinguished from, and contrasted with,
"You should start by writing short stories."
Now, you may wonder what kind of advice I would give someone who did
something -- like playfully pointing a gun at me -- which I thought no one
should ever do. The answer is, I wouldn't give advice.
I would say "Don't do that again!" -- probably somewhat less politely.
That is not advice.
Rachael M. Lininger
On Tue, 9 Feb 1999, Roger Carbol wrote:
>Rachael M. Lininger wrote:
>> No kind of art is easy; they're just different kinds of hard. I mean,
>> if people are just reasoning by _scale,_ they should start with haiku,
>> move up to limericks, then sonnets... I mean, it's all just writing,
>> right?
>
>Yes, it is my opinion that they should start with haiku.
>
>But not for *practice*, that would be just silly.
>
>Consider: I'd rather write a haiku, or even a dozen, and realize
>that I actually hate writing and would rather be a plumber, than
>to write a novel or three and then make the same discovery.
Haiku are a bitch to write. I hate them. I know lots of other very
good poets who hate them; they're not even an English form, and ideas
in English just don't fit smoothly most of the time. If I'd made
myself write haiku, instead of writing sonnets and vilanelles and
nonce forms, I'd not be a writer. Nor would I have poems in three
different magazines, at consideration in a few others, and encouraging
words on my short stories.
And really, someone writing a novel who doesn't like writing is going
to find that out pretty quickly. You don't look back on a year's work
and say, 'You know, I really hated that,' without having some notion
beforehand that maybe this wasn't the brightest idea.
>That's my point, which apparently I've been less than clear
>with: Writing a short story is generally less of an investment
>of time than writing a novel. For a beginning writer, I'd
>recommend investing less on a risky venture than investing more.
You keep assuming that finished word count = investment. It doesn't.
Not in time, not in effort, not in art. Beginning writers should
write whatever they feel comfortable writing, because gods know it's
difficult enough without trying to make yourself do something that
doesn't fit.
This isn't the stock market. Really.
>Of course one may wish to start with *trying* to write a novel;
>that's likely considerably less risky than starting by
>*writing* a novel. One might even want to just write chapters
>at random.
Writing chapters at random isn't going to help with the novel-specific
parts of novel writing.
It's not a matter of putting words in order. Any writer worth zir salt
can put words in order. Word count doesn't matter a damn if you're
trying to write a sweeping epic in five thousand words, or if you're
trying to stretch a perfect tiny tableau into fifty thousand. It's
_structure;_ and some people have the skill to make little inlaid-wood
boxes, and some have the skill to make elegant Shaker chairs, and some
have the skill to build mansions. I wouldn't try to claim that any was
a greater artist than the other, and I wouldn't try to get the
mansion-builder to start with little inlaid-wood boxes.
Of course, the mansion-builder can trade down, or the box-maker trade
up, or they can switch, or whatever; but it has to be because the
_writer_ decided to work in the new form, because zie had something
that just didn't fit in the old one.
Writing isn't ideas. It isn't even individual words. Its many many
words that fit together, and the scale on which they fit together
isn't something that can be forced, or pretended to, or anything but
_done._
Rachael
--
Rachael M. Lininger | "I said 'were there any oliphaunts?'
lininger@ | For if there was, I was going to take a look,
virtu.sar.usf.edu | risk or no." --Master Samwise
Matt
d983...@mail.connect.usq.edu.au (Christopher Jordan) wrote:
>
> And your advice to me would stall me forever. You see, I'm a novel
> writer. And, like everyone else has been patiently pointing out to
> you since you posted, that is what I am suited to.
I've been following this thread with great interest so far, and now I'll
toss my hat into the ring.
I used to think this exact same way, Christopher. I was a _novelist_,
dammit. I wrote my first (and only) two in less than six months. Then I
learned that I needed to sell some shorts before I could sell novels
(nevermind wheter this is true -- it's what I learned, so it was true to me
at the time). So I started in on some shorts. As I look back on them, I
learn how truly awful they were. I kept writing. Got better. Enjoyed it
more. Made some sales. Made some better sales.
Now, I look back on my two novels and just cringe. I really thought they
were good when I wrote them. They remain dear to me, but I no longer
consider them good. I've tried recently to go back to novel writing, and it
is not going well. Let's just say I have a handful of Chapters One, and not
much else. Meanwhile, my short fiction keeps selling, and my craft keeps
improving. I do want to write the great novel one day, but I'm going to
hang back for now, because I don't think I'm ready yet.
This may or may not apply to you, of course. Obviously I cannot judge what
kind of writer you are. I'm just urging you to keep an open mind. My dream
when I began writing was to one day to be able to walk into Barnes & Noble
and find my work there. I can do that now, through the medium of short
fiction (and poetry, which is another story). I'm not sure I could say the
same if I'd never forced myself to experiment with the short stuff.
Of course, I'm of the mind that you (the generic "you") should only write
because of a passion, regardless of any ultimate publication goals. We
probably all slip into that write-for-publication mode on occasion, but
it's the passion that keeps us going. On that note, if you cannot work up a
passion for shorts, then maybe it's best for you to skip them.
Best of luck, whichever course you choose.
Matt Doeden (wondering how many times he jumped the fence in that post)
Christopher Jordan
Trying for the third time to write this response!
>On Tue, 9 Feb 1999, Roger Carbol wrote:
>
>> Rachael M. Lininger wrote:
>>
>> > No kind of art is easy; they're just different kinds of hard. I mean,
>> > if people are just reasoning by _scale,_ they should start with haiku,
>> > move up to limericks, then sonnets... I mean, it's all just writing,
>> > right?
>>
>> Yes, it is my opinion that they should start with haiku.
>>
>> But not for *practice*, that would be just silly.
>>
>> Consider: I'd rather write a haiku, or even a dozen, and realize
>> that I actually hate writing and would rather be a plumber, than
>> to write a novel or three and then make the same discovery.
>
>One: A person does not blindly write two or three hundred thousand words,
>then sit up and realize they hate writing.
This is an opinion and generalisation. For this comment to make any
sense you need to place 'might' or 'might not' in front of your
assertaions.
>They'll reach the same
>conclusion whether the write 10,000 words of a novel, or five 2,000 word
>short stories.
This is an opinion and generalisation. For this comment to make any
sense you need to place 'might' or 'might not' in front of your
assertaions.
>
>Two: Haiku is completely different from writing a short story, which is
>completely different from writing a novel.
>One might despise haiku, but love writing stories.
Or despise writing ss, but love writing haikus. Or love writing ss,
but hate writing novels. Or love writing novellas, but hate writing ss
and novels. Or...where is this point going?
> They don't equate.
>
>Writing is a very broad field. It's like computers. Example: all things
>considered, software is easier to get involved with than hardware;
Tell this to a computer programmer.
> it's
>easier to learn and is more forgiving (a software bug is a heck of a lot
>nicer than a motherboard that overheats).
Not if the software bug erases your 200K WIP. At least if your
motherboard overheats, you can still access your hard drive and save
your WIP. Doesn't work the other way around. Hardware can be
replaced.
>So, should all computer
>engineers start with software?
Most do. Most computer engineers learn their software long before
deciding to become computer engineers.
> And if they dislike software, should that
>tell them that they're no good as computer technicians?
>
>> That's my point, which apparently I've been less than clear
>> with: Writing a short story is generally less of an investment
>> of time than writing a novel. For a beginning writer, I'd
>> recommend investing less on a risky venture than investing more.
Why. If that 'beginning writer' is a natural novelist (and perhaps a
good one), then 'a short story is generally less of an investment
of time than writing a novel' would be bad advice, as they might punch
out a *very good* 300K word novel in *less* time than they would spend
frustratingly putting together a *very bad* ss.
>
>In a way I agree with you, and in a way I think you're totally wrong.
>
>Again, one does not sit down, blindly write a full novel, then realize one
>hates writing.
And again, this is an opinion and generalisation. For this comment to
make any sense you need to place 'might' or 'might not' in front of
your assertaions.
> One wrangles with it for a chapter or three, then gives up
>for awhile and tries shorts.
Sorry, I don't buy that. 1) You are blindly genralising again. There
are no facts to back this statement up. 2) *I* wrangle with many a
chapter, give up for a day, a week, even a month, then go back and
revise or re-write said chapter and move on. A simple set-back in the
writing process does not force me (a novelist) to take up ss.
>Which work.
Do you have the statistics to back this statement up. I would like to
see them if you do.
>Or maybe short-shorts, or novellas work. Whatever.
Right. Therefore, according to your reasoning, one could start out
with either poetry, ss, novellas or novels and come to the same
conclusion through the process of eleimination. Why, then, are you
convinced that ss is the 'ideal' starting point. As others have
pointed out (repeatedly), there is no *template* or 1-2-3 of writing
as you are attempting to stipulate.
>
>OTOH, I do agree that writing short stories is a good place to start.
Why? Why is it a better place to start than, say, poetry? Or novellas?
Or Novels?
>In general, it's better for students to start there. But not because it's
>less risky, or because it'll teach them how to write a novel; because
>*in general* it's preferrable to learn the art of writing a short story,
This statement confuses me. Are you a widely-successful published
author? A graduate or instructor at Clarion, perhaps? By what
authority do you make these claims? Do you have proof that this is in
fact the preferred method? The method 'that works' above all? I'm
confused.
>then be able to write a full-length novel and have the short story sales
>under the belt.
I would postulate that the many published (novel) authors who've 1)
never published (or perhaps) written a ss, but are widely successful
and good novel writers would disagree 2) some first-time novelists
will go on to sell their novels (and become hugely successful in that
feild) without having any 'short story sales under the belt.'
> Obviously, a lot of people won't be able to do this, but
>I'd recommend trying short stories *first*.
>
Once again, why?
>> Of course one may wish to start with *trying* to write a novel;
>> that's likely considerably less risky than starting by
>> *writing* a novel.
>
>What's the difference?
>
>AFAICT, writers do not sit down, put their fingers on their keyboards, and
>start writing page one of Their Next Published Novel.
Tell that to David Gemmel, Ray Feist, Sharon Penman, etc.
(Disclaimer: Of course these (and many others) do a bit of *or a lot
of* research, plotting, outlining, *whatever works* before actually
'putting their finger on the keyboard,' but when the above is done
they do, in fact, 'sit down, put their fingers on their keyboards, and
start writing page one of Their Next Published Novel.')
> It may turn into
>that, but they have an idea for a story and start writing. Every time
>they start, they're *trying* to write a novel. Whether they succeed or
>not is another matter.
Yet none of the aboved mentioned names *needed* to follow your
method of 'writing ss *first*.'
>
>(and just for the record, that above paragraph is how I solve the
>gender-neutral problem)
>
> Ack!
>
>::dodges thrown tomatoes::
<g> ::spilling coffee::
>
>Anyway, there's no risk difference, because there's no difference between
>the two.
>
>> One might even want to just write chapters
>> at random.
>
>Like many authors do regularly? I believe Robert Jordan writes this way,
>in fact, though others here are welcome to prove me wrong.
>
>It sounds like you're laboring under the belief that writers actually
>write their novels from the first word to the last word consecutively,
>then immediately print it out and send it off to a publisher.
Every writer writes in his/her own fashion. Patricia C. Wrede
mentioned this, as well as Dorothy and Brenda. I believe it was the
thread I started about the correct way of writing....can't remember
what is was. Either way, I got a lot of very good advice out of it.
But that's also how I took it...advice. Not, 'Oh! If Patricia, Branda
and Dorothy think I shoud...' As they say (over and over) writing is
not a 1-2-3, 12-step program.
>
>Or perhaps you're not; maybe a fuller description of your beliefs
>would help us understand more?
>
>
Best of Luck.
Lucy Kemnitzer
>In article <F6wB7...@kithrup.com>,
>Dorothy J Heydt <djh...@kithrup.com> wrote:
>>In article <cjPv2.368$k22....@ptah.visi.com>,
>>Dan Goodman <dsg...@visi.com> wrote:
>>>
>>>Some people apply this to cookery. "That's a complicated recipe -- you
>>>have to cook it for a long time." "That's an easy recipe -- it only takes
>>>a few minutes." "Simmer it for five hours" doesn't seem complicated to
>>>me, and recipes which require split-second timing don't seem easy to me.
>>>But for some people, that's how the universe seems to work.
>>
>>Particularly if you're a beginner, you're going to worry and fret
>>over the thing all the time it's cooking,
>
>I didn't and don't. What I'm likely to worry about is the _preparation_.
>Is this bowl really suitable? Am I _sure_ this is the ingredient called
>for?
>
>whether it's a three-minute
>>egg where constant attention is appropriate, or a five-hour stew
>>which you could go off and leave for four hours, only you don't
>>dare.
This food metaphor doesn't work for me. The only food that ever
through me into a tizzy to make was gnocchi, and it never ever worked.
Lucy Kemnitzer
Christopher Jordan
>On Tue, 9 Feb 1999, Roger Carbol wrote:
>[snip]
>> Consider certain religious texts. Some might hold them responsible
>> for any number of deaths.
>[snip]
>
>But the texts are rarely responsible, it's people's interpretation of
>those texts.
>
>A good example from modern times: in the New Testament, one of Paul's
>letters goes to a church that's having problems with gender conflicts in
>leadership. IIRC, that entire town in fact is having gender issues
>as well. Paul writes (I'm paraphrasing horribly), "If it were up to
>me, I personally wouldn't have women in leadership." Upon reading the
>entire passage, it's clear that he's speaking about their specific
>conflict.
>
>Well, for centuries people have used that to keep women from being
>"leaders" in churches. That position is starting to come under fire
>now (particularly as this is the only place in the entire Bible that such
>a thing is suggested; it's a rather weak case).
>
>More often than not, the "kill the infidels" mindset comes from people's
>interpretation of holy texts for their own gain, rather than a direct
>edict from that text. Indeed, most people point to the Crusades as an
>example of a holy text killing people; 95% of the Western world had no
>idea what the Bible said at that time (only the clergy could read it, or
>read it aloud, so their interpretation became everyone's interpretation).
>
>
It's a wonder why God even puts up with us. The way the human race
goes around mangling the Bible...
Christopher Jordan
wrote:
>> If I had the skill to influence directly
>> readers' behavior through my writing, I should think of myself as a pretty
>> brilliant writer.
>
>It can't be that hard. Heavy metal lyrics drive kids to murder,
>suicide, drug use, and wild sex. At least according to someone
>I saw on tv last night.
>
>
>
>.. Roger Carbol .. r...@shaw.wave.ca
And the Christian Coalition...
Christopher Jordan
wrote:
>
>
>On Tue, 9 Feb 1999 gur...@saruman.wizard.net wrote:
>
>> A good example from modern times: in the New Testament, one of Paul's
>> letters goes to a church that's having problems with gender conflicts in
>> leadership. IIRC, that entire town in fact is having gender issues
>> as well. Paul writes (I'm paraphrasing horribly), "If it were up to
>> me, I personally wouldn't have women in leadership." Upon reading the
>> entire passage, it's clear that he's speaking about their specific
>> conflict.
>
>I think your paraphrase might be missing the mark just a bit. Paul was
>generally more forceful in his opinions than that.
>
>The Epistle you are referencing is 1 Corinthians. At the opening, Paul
>discusses some quarreling in the community. I do not recall that the
>quarreling was related to gender issues per se, but rather that it related
>to which religious figure the community members felt they owed allegiance.
>("For while one saith, I am of Paul; and another I am of Appollos. .. " 1
>Cor 3:4 )
>
>The quote about women in the churches (1 Corinthians 14:34 and on) is:
>"Let your women keep silence in the churches; for it is not permitted unto
>them to speak; but they are commanded to be under obedience, as also saith
>the law. And if they will learn any thing, let them ask their husbands at
>home; for it is a shame for women to speak in the church."
And this is the God you follow?
>
>I think it is easily possible to interpret Paul's admonition in a general
>way, even after reading and studying the entire epistle, especially in
>light of a passage in Ephesians.
I think that's the problem with religion in general. Everybody going
around 'interpreting' passages to suit their own purposes.
>
>From Ephesians (5,22 and on): "Wives, submit yourselves unto your own
>husbands, as unto the Lord.
Uh-hu...
> For the husband is the head of the wife, even
>as Christ is the head of the church, and he is the savior of the body.
I take it this was written by a man?
>Therefore as the church is subject unto Christ, so let the wives be to
>their own husbands and everything. Husbands, love your wives, even as
>Christ also loved the church and gave himself for it. . . .so ought men
>to love their wives as their own bodies."
>
>When I was a Peace Corps volunteer, I heard a Zairean minister give an
>outstanding sermon on this passage, emphasizing the dual nature of the
>instructions. It was a most enlightened view -- directed mostly at the
>men who, he felt, were misusing this passage in a tyrannical way. This
>minister had, I believe, about a third or fourth grade formal education,
>but a tremendous natural intelligence.
>
>> Well, for centuries people have used that to keep women from being
>> "leaders" in churches. That position is starting to come under fire
>> now (particularly as this is the only place in the entire Bible that such
>> a thing is suggested; it's a rather weak case).
I feel a religous war coming on...
>
>There are other Biblical passages one can quote for the same end, if one
>has a mind to do it -- particularly the Genesis material.
>
>Of course, people tend to pick and choose what they want out of the Bible.
>For example, a number of people who use Leviticus and Dueteronomy to
>justify certain moral views don't appear to have a problem with eating
>shellfish or mixing fabrics in clothing, which are also condemned in the
>OT. I read a humorous letter in a magazine (People?) lately that said
>that by those standards playing football should be considered immoral
>because it involves touching the carcass of a pig.
God forbid <no pun intended> that good, clean Christian men should
be kept from watching Monday Night Football!
...uh, but I'm sure they agree with all the other stuff in the Bible.
>
>It is interesting to note that even in Paul's epistles there are a few
>references to women who do appear to be leaders in the early churches. At
>the opening of Corinthians itself, he mentions the "house of Chloe."
Not to worry. Chloe was indeed a man. He just had impeccable taste in
clothing!
> There
>are three or four other references to seemingly important early Christian
>women, but I can't recall offhand where they are.
I think it had something to do with the Spice Girls...
>
>Regards,
>
>Patricia
Christopher Jordan
Of course. You are right again, Dan.
I never got past, '... to change is the character's age.'
I think I need to rest, my eyes are going....
Christopher Jordan
wrote:
>Christopher Jordan wrote:
>
>> And your advice to me would stall me forever. You see, I'm a novel
>> writer. And, like everyone else has been patiently pointing out to
>> you since you posted, that is what I am suited to.
>
>
>Why would you ask my advice on whether you should write short
>stories or novels if you already know you're a novel writer?
Sigh. This was a hypothetical answer, putting myself in the place of
an aspiring writier listening to you tell me that I should write ss
first. This will prepare me to write novels. Perfecting 'my art.'
>
>More importantly, what would ever possess you to follow my advice
>on such a subject?
Double sigh. <Shakes head in wonderment.>
>
>
>
>
>.. Roger Carbol .. r...@shaw.wave.ca
-----
What? Where?
--Dorothy Heydt
Christopher Jordan
wrote:
>In article <36c0f66a...@news.usq.edu.au>,
>d983...@mail.connect.usq.edu.au (Christopher Jordan) wrote:
>
>>
>> And your advice to me would stall me forever. You see, I'm a novel
>> writer. And, like everyone else has been patiently pointing out to
>> you since you posted, that is what I am suited to.
>
>I've been following this thread with great interest so far, and now I'll
>toss my hat into the ring.
>
>I used to think this exact same way, Christopher. I was a _novelist_,
>dammit.
Right. But I'm not saying I *can't* write ss. I'm saying I *enjoy*
writing novels, and am far better suited to the novel length than the
ss format. My ss idea's eventually turn themselves into novels.
*But,* if I were to follow Roger's advice (hypothetically, me being a
*aspiring writer,*) and he convinced me that ss was 'The Rule'(tm) for
begining writers...
> I wrote my first (and only) two in less than six months. Then I
>learned that I needed to sell some shorts before I could sell novels
And this is my point. *Why* do you *need* to 'sell some shorts
before you could sell novels?' That is a ludicrous statement. If
there is proof of this, I'd love to see it.)
>(nevermind wheter this is true
Why?
>-- it's what I learned, so it was true to me
>at the time).
And this is *exactly* what Patricia was try to explain. People trying
to (and succeeding in) convincing aspiring writers that there is a
rigid set of rules to be followed. There isn't.
> So I started in on some shorts. As I look back on them, I
>learn how truly awful they were. I kept writing. Got better. Enjoyed it
>more. Made some sales. Made some better sales.
Your *writing* got better. Not the fact that you switched to ss and
'made some sales...' Practice, practice, practice. Write, write,
write. THAT'S what made you a better writer, not the fact you
switched to ss. However, *you* may be a natural ss writer and *not*
a novelist. Or you could be good (or bad) at both.
>
>Now, I look back on my two novels and just cringe. I really thought they
>were good when I wrote them.
Don't we all. <g>
> They remain dear to me, but I no longer
>consider them good.
As David Gemmel said in an interview about his first *sale* (a
short story...I believe he was asked to review his writing style then
as opposed to now) "It could curdle milk at 50 paces."
> I've tried recently to go back to novel writing, and it
>is not going well. Let's just say I have a handful of Chapters One, and not
>much else. Meanwhile, my short fiction keeps selling, and my craft keeps
>improving. I do want to write the great novel one day, but I'm going to
>hang back for now, because I don't think I'm ready yet.
So, you are a natural ss writer. Most writers want to write that
'great novel' that will top the NYT Best Seller List and make them
rich and famous. Nothing wrong with that.
>
>This may or may not apply to you, of course. Obviously I cannot judge what
>kind of writer you are. I'm just urging you to keep an open mind.
I'm only disagreeing with Roger on his statement that new writers
should start with ss and 'get a few sales under the belt' before
tackling novels. I also disagree with his assumption that writing ss
will make me a better novelist.
> My dream
>when I began writing was to one day to be able to walk into Barnes & Noble
>and find my work there.
I think we can agree on that dream!
> I can do that now, through the medium of short
>fiction (and poetry, which is another story). I'm not sure I could say the
>same if I'd never forced myself to experiment with the short stuff.
>
>Of course, I'm of the mind that you (the generic "you") should only write
>because of a passion, regardless of any ultimate publication goals. We
>probably all slip into that write-for-publication mode on occasion, but
>it's the passion that keeps us going.
The passion keeps us going, but we all write for publication.
> On that note, if you cannot work up a
>passion for shorts, then maybe it's best for you to skip them.
True. I can't. So I will. <g>
>
>Best of luck, whichever course you choose.
To you as well.
>
>Matt Doeden (wondering how many times he jumped the fence in that post)
CJ
Jim
Brutschy) wrote:
>I now realize that the way I currently approach
>fiction makes me a short story writer. I work from detailed outlines
>in which every plot point and all the foreshadowing are already worked
>out before the first sentence is written. I have never sat down and
>written 8K words, or even 500 words, without knowing exactly where I
>was trying to go.
>
>So... a *very* big thank you to everyone who has described out how
>natural novel writers work. If I attempt a novel, I'm going to shift
>my paradigm for writing to more closely match how other people do it.
>Or at least try to.
>
Just to be obstreperous, my approach to writing is exactly the
opposite of yours (I rarely know more than one or two sentences ahead
what is going to happen, or why, or to whom), and that's why I
consider myself a 'natural' short story writer -- it's impossible (at
least for me) to carry on this way for more than a couple of thousand
words without an ending sauntering by and getting shanghaied.
To construct a novel, IMO, you have to create an outline, expand on
it, flesh it out, etc. etc. etc. until it's written. (Ugh, that sounds
too much like work.)
>I wonder if that's the difference between the two type. The ultimate
>short-short story writer would assemble every detail about the story
>in his or her mind before beginning to write. The ultimate novelist
>can create those details on the fly and get everything to tie up in
>the end.
Or vice-versa?
J.Michael
____________________________
Don't play stupid with me --
I'm better at it!
Geoff Wedig
> How sure am I that context matters more than length? Hugely. How
> sure am I that my specific example will hold true across multiple
> people or even the same people within different situations? Not at
> all --- in fact, my thesis is that they will differ, from person to
> person and from situation to situation. My example was merely
> illustrative, one kind of situation in which one might expect, for the
> same word count, wildly different composition times.
Well, the same word counts *can* take me wildly different times, but I've
found that's more a matter of subject matter than format, at least for me.
I actually keep track of word counts in my database, and my average words
per minute for novels and for shorter works tends to be the same overall.
Now, that's with a number of caveats. First, I've never finished a novel,
though I have novellas around 20k. I may 'stall out' somewhere in the
novels I'm working on now (I already did once on one of them, but have come
back to it) and they may amount to nothing. I also don't include 'thinking
time' which happens everywhere and when I go, so it's really hard to track.
It also may be done over a period of years before the first word goes down
on paper. It also only tracks my fiction output. Usenet and email may be
very different for me. I don't know.
Other caveats: I've not sold anything yet. Therefore one or both formats
may be utter garbage and unsaleable. It may be that I can churn out
material at the same rate, but the quality is vastly different. I don't
think this is so, and maybe my crit group could tell me, having seen both a
short story (albeit one that's quite possibly part of a larger work) and a
novel segment from me, but as they are vastly different in storyline, I'd
not trust even that opinion.
But given all that (which may make this statement null for you, I don't
know) when actually composing, when actually typing out what I want to say,
yes, I can say that yes, I write the same speed, the same amount of 'stuff'
goes down on paper regardless of project length.
I find both formats difficult, different, but difficult. But that may be
because, as I've mentioned before elsewhere, I'm in-between for natural
length. It may take me a fair amount of trying to get *either* format to
work for me. I haven't found a lack of ideas for either format though, and
I enjoy reading both.
Geoff
Geoff Wedig
I think that the assumption you're making, that hasn't been talked about a
lot so far is that "you have to finish". It doesn't matter if you write a
5k story or 5k of a novel. They may take you wildly different times
depending on your natural inclinations. But that's not important because
*at the end of that 5k* you'll know something about your writing. You don't
have to *finish* a 100k novel to know that novels are not for you. You
don't even have to finish a short story to know that short stories aren't
for you. You have to give them a chance, certainly, but IMO it really isn't
format that's important. It's *time*.
Lemme see if I can explain this. A newbie writer sits down at their writing
device of choice. At this point, they have an idea for a story that they
want to write. Ideally, they shouldn't worry about *what length* that story
is. They should just start writing it. If they try to shoehorn it into
some format or other, it likely won't work, but if they just write it down,
then look to see what they've got at the end, they'll *know* what it is.
Now, our newbie writer doesn't need to *care* what it is, at least at this
point. If they find that the story finishes after 5K, they know they've got
a short story and more power to them. If after 5K, they're thinking "Well,
that's the first character. Now what's this person doing" they may have a
novel or a novella on their hands. But they shouldn't *worry* about that.
They should just write.
And if, after 5K (or more likely, 1-2K) they think "Gods, this is *hard
work*" and put down their pen (or keyboard, or voice recognition device, or
thought transfer helmet) then they've realized that writing isn't for them,
*irrespective of length* which is what they really want to know.
Getting caught up in this whole Short Story vs. Novel debate is really a red
herring. For a new writer, it *just doesn't matter*. What matters is
*writing* and seeing what works and what they come up with. There's plenty
of time for figuring out what to do with it, what it *is*, once IT *exists*.
Until then, it's all hot air, so why pigeon hole?
Geoff
PWrede6492
In article <36c10515...@news.usq.edu.au>, d983...@mail.connect.usq.edu.au
(Christopher Jordan) writes:
>Are there any *good* books on *plotting* or *pacing* or *sturcture*
>(etiher together in one book or seperate) in regards to novel writing
>for the beginning/aspiring/newbie/etc writer that anyone has
>bought/read/agreed with/disagreed with/etc, in the past/present?
Well, it's not about *novel* writing, but MAKING A GOOD SCRIPT GREAT by Linda
Seger is the thing that springs to the top of my head. It's about
scriptwriting and movies, and is very clear about the typical three-act
structure thereof, which transfers fairly readily to novels. It's not by any
means the *only* way of plotting and structuring things in a novel, but she
doesn't claim it is -- after all, she's talking about movies, not novels.
Oh, and John Gardner has some stuff about plotting in one of his books; it
annoys me enormously because he *does* say that this is the best-and-only way
to come up with good novels, but as long as one keeps in mind that it's *a*
method, not *the* method (no matter what he says), then it's a pretty good
description of one way to go about it.
I'll have to check through my other things to see what else I'd recommend, and
get back to you later.
Patricia C. Wrede