Down from the Ledge
I decided several days ago that what I really needed to be doing is writing novels. Short stories be damned, I'm a novelist at heart. This is akin to me saying that I ought to race in the Indy 500 this spring, even though right now I can barely drive 3 blocks solo.
I am now over that delusion and will resume my regularly scheduled short story writing and revising. If anyone hears me talk about writing novels before I actually learn how to properly finish a short story, please laugh in my face and mention the word "hubris." Thank you.
I am now over that delusion and will resume my regularly scheduled short story writing and revising. If anyone hears me talk about writing novels before I actually learn how to properly finish a short story, please laugh in my face and mention the word "hubris." Thank you.
posted by tinatsu at 8:00 PM
8 Comments:
Eh, that was a good essay on writing, but I don't totally agree. Let's switch metaphors from cars to the sprint/marathon analogy, and now you have free rein to go practice running marathons.
(It doesn't therefore follow that your first marathon will be record-setting, merely that I think there is value in practicing running them. You can win the 50 meter dash and still not have the skillset to run 26 miles.)
Tina,
I agree that you could win the 50-meter without knowing how to run a marathon, but if you can't finish the 50-meter, there's no way you can finish a marathon. And the way you practice for a marathon is to run a little every day--which means, swtiching away from our analogy, writing shorter pieces. Me writing a novel right now would be like me practicing running marathons by trying to run 26 miles every day. I would either give up in defeat within a quarter mile the first day or seriously injure myself. I think it's a little more productive to practice consistently finishing--note: I did not say "winning"--shorter races before practicing longer distances. (I'm really trying to stick with your analogy here, but it's not coming out very clearly.)
Of course, I realize that you'd rather I focus on writing novels in order to eliminate some competition in the short story market. And I keep telling you, I'm not any sort of competition for you.
Argh! Dammit! Blogger ate my comment!
I had written that I think drafting a novel might be less painful than drafting a short story, since novels are kind of more, I don't know, accepting of the kitchen sink and other bitlets. Short stories are so demandingly rigorous, spartan, and unmeandering.
Getting a piece up to publishable quality, that's different. That's probably the reverse, in fact. But I find drafting longer work less difficult than drafting shorter work.
And Simmons, well, I have to disagree with him sometimes. He thinks you're not well-read if you haven't read Hemingway, for Chrissakes. (ie. If you're not well read in what he thinks you ought to be well-read in.) Some of his thoughts are worthwhile, others are... well...
Oh, and I also said BOO to the self-deprecation. You know, I'm just glad that most of what I've seen from you fits in a different bit of the genre ecosystem than my own stuff -- les competition for me.
Tinatsu - No, no, you mistake my evil plan - it's to have you become wildly successful so people will talk about that amazing Tina girl from CW06 and I will smile and nod and not say one word of correction.
Gord - I can see where novel-writing might indeed be easier for you. Maybe it all depends on whether you're more apt to toss in kitchen sinks or tear them out.
Huh. Somehow I also am not surprised that Gord finds it easier to draft longer works. Nor would I be surprised to find an actual kitchen sink hiding in one of his manuscripts.
Simmons is not the only person to say what he said; he's just the dousing of cold water that actually brought me back from airy-fairyland to face what I already knew. Namely, drafting a novel would be a wonderful way to avoid the harder work of getting my short stories to the level I want them. When writing a novel seems the hardest thing I could be doing, that's when I'll be ready to start writing one.
You know, Gord, admitting you aren't nervous because I don't write the same kind of stuff as you, makes me suddenly want to write some Egan-inspired hard SF. That is one of the hardest things I can think of doing...
Do it! Write some hard sf! If you do it, I'll write a fantasy story I can live with, with my name on it. I challenge you. The result would be of great quality, I am sure. :)
OK, I will. One serving of hard SF, coming up. Mind you, it will take a little while, as I have some other stuff in the pipeline. (Oh, and I need to think of an idea.) But as soon as I'm done, I'm holding you to your promise of writing a fantasy story. That will be something to see.
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