So, I had a pretty rough last week as an aspiring writer. My re-write got bogged down and a few chapters seemed garbled and unmanageable. A large contributing factor to this was a minor fight scene. I hate writing fights so much it makes me want to punch somebody. Most of my Creative Writing training was in Screenwriting. You can’t really get away with saying “they fight” too often in a novel. This particular scene was tricky in that it was two allies fighting in completely different styles, at the same time, across an open square from each other. Timing was important for the scene’s resolution, but it just felt jumpy watching both of them strike and parry in alternating (nearly) paragraphs. It put me in a writing funk for a few days. I began to question my overall value as a writer.
I’ve been chided in the past for reading and writing primarily fantasy. I even had a program director at my university tell me that I needed to spend some time with “real” literature and that once I did, I would realize that fantasy was trash. This was AFTER I completed my Master’s Degree in English and was looking to focus my craft further with an MFA. I complained a bit about this in various places (Twitter, the Panels on Pages forums, to my wife and anyone else who would listen). Most offered intelligent discussion on the importance of overall knowledge, and the necessity to cave one’s own immediate desires in order to grow into a more desirable future self. Just as many people supported my righteous indignation. I only had one friend simply say, “Well, most fantasy is trash.” I’m sorry, but unless you’ve read at least 51% of all fantasy novels and hated every one of them, you cannot make that statement. I’ve read a lot of fantasy over the past decade. Sure, I’ve stopped reading a few books about halfway through because they were flat or lacked originality or didn’t make me care about the characters (or the world, for that matter). But for everyone I abandoned midstream, there were ten others I enjoyed. Maybe they weren’t the greatest “literary” works of the modern era, but they were intelligently written with new ideas or fresh spins on old ones. Some of them had strong, relatable characters or emotionally enveloping situations. What’s more… I enjoyed them.
Now, I’ve never really cared much for literary theory and criticism. In my graduate program, I did a study of Roland Barthes’ literary theories (mostly focusing on Mythologies and S/Z). I won’t go into details about all his contributions to the field regarding structuralism, readerly and writerly literature, or his study of semiotics… mostly because it’s pretty boring. Before the man had the misfortune of being hit by a truck, he had a brilliant revelation (now… this is my interpretation of his later writings, so don’t think I’m quoting him on this). Essentially, good literature is that with the reader enjoys. WOW! Talk about mind-blowing. Sadly, this would never get you through a series of courses (or even one for that matter) on literary criticism, so don’t try. It’s just amazing to me that it took him that long to realize it. What’s worse, too many academic types would throw this notion out as lazy.
I enjoy writing and I enjoy reading my writing. I like my characters and I like putting them through the grinder. I don’t ever expect to be included in someone’s idea of a literary canon or to be discussed in even the most fundamental 5th grade book report, but I know people who like what I write. And most of them aren’t even related to me. I’ve seen a lot of buzz lately about the giant shift to self-epublishing and how it’s not a good thing because it means anyone with a story to tell now has a platform to do so. So what? We don’t all expect to be the next Lewis Carroll or J.R.R. Tolkien. Heck, most of us don’t even think we’re the next Stephenie Meyer. And so what if a lot of people put out “trash” that is a poorly written copy of Eragon*. That just means writers will have to work even harder to make sure their work stands out from the pack. Since when is competition a bad thing? Sure, it’s easy to get wide-eyed and dream of selling 100,000 copies and being able to write full-time, but I’d be just as happy to see 1 person buy my book and really enjoy it (provided they then paid me the difference in sales**).
I realize these last two posts have dragged on a bit, so thanks for sticking with me. My new computer finally arrived and I hope to have a web-comic posted this Friday. Until then, thanks for reading.
*Don’t copy Eragon. It would be like making clones from clones.
** Denotes sarcasm… as opposed to the more internet-friendly :P
*** Please don’t count the number of parenthetical comments in this entry… it will just make you cry.
2 comments:
I'm certainly no writer and possibly the last thing someone would ever accuse me of is being a literary critic, but I think you make some really interesting and relevant observations. So many "experts" get hung up in the classics. Newsflash... maybe I don't like the classics, and if I don't like them I'm not going to base my work around them. I say do what you enjoy (especially when it comes to writing) because the odds are that's what you will be best at. I wonder if that Program Director would have criticized a guy like Stan Lee for writing too many stories about superheroes. Call me crazy but that seemed to work out okay.
Keep writing. Some people, including this one think you are darn good.
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