I inhale books and generally have between two and four going at a time.
I enjoy reading about books and reading.
I'm a book nerd. When I was a teen, II inhale books and generally have between two and four going at a time.
I enjoy reading about books and reading.
I'm a book nerd. When I was a teen, I read paperbacks while washing dishes. (My books approved but did not come out on the other side unchanged.)
Anne Bogel described numerous ways that bookworms approach the process. Her lists made me smile.
I didn't enjoy her reading of her voice (I listened to an audiobook). She has a warm, pleasant voice, but her reading tended toward sing-song, with "commas" thrown in at random points: "Um dum de dum, dum de, um um de, dum de." I would have returned it to my library and gotten out the kindle book, but I worry about overusing library resources. (To be clear, I dislike the reading of about half the audiobooks I get out and try to only get them when I'm traveling.)
I wish I'd realized that this book was available on Kindle Unlimited. I would have downloaded it, and it might have earned another star....more
This is the second book on Philippine's Rodrigo Duterte and his war on drugs that I've read in the last year. It's also the second written by journaliThis is the second book on Philippine's Rodrigo Duterte and his war on drugs that I've read in the last year. It's also the second written by journalists at Rappler (the other is Maria Ressa's How to Stand Up To a Dictator). I did not plan this, but both journalists impressed me with the courage of Rappler's staff. I love reading anything written by passionate, courageous authors excelling at what they do. Ressa won a Nobel Prize for her work as a journalist.
Although the Philippines has a drug abuse problem half that of the world average, Dutarte called a war on drugs: "“Hitler massacred three million Jews,” he said. [It was more like six million Jews and five million Soviets, Romany, Jehovah Witnesses, communists, and homosexuals.] “Now there are three million drug addicts. I’d be happy to slaughter them”" (p. 12). He was not calling for their capture and imprisonment, but for outright slaughter on the streets, what has been called extrajudicial killings (EJK).
So is it the goal (removing drug abuse) or the means (slaughter or imprisonment) that matters? In the US, we have engaged in mass imprisonment as a strategy for clearing the streets and, while it is not as despicable as EJKs, the impact on families and communities has also been horrific.
Duterte has been a popular president, although this has been a popularity built on lies. "“I have no pretensions,” he said. “I am a small-town boy,” he said. “I am an ordinary Filipino,” he said. “I know the sentiment of the ordinary people. I can talk to them because that’s where I come from.”" (p. 61). And yet, he had enjoyed a privileged upbringing, surrounded by guns and bodyguards, flying his father’s plane, and hanging out with the sons of the local elite in his Jesuit-run boys’ school. Who was the real Duterte?
To believe in Rodrigo Duterte, you had to believe he was a killer, or that he was joking when he said he was a killer. You had to believe in the specter of a narco state, or you had to believe that he was only playing to the crowd. You had to believe drug addiction is criminal, that drug addicts are not human, and that their massacre can be considered acceptable public policy. You had to believe he could make crime and corruption and illegal drugs disappear in three to six months. You had to believe that a mayor who kept peace by ordering undesirables out of his city could succeed in a country where undesirables were citizens too. You had to believe the intended dead would be drug lords and rapists, only drug lords and rapists, and not your cousins who go off into Liguasan Marsh to pick up their baggies of meth. You had to believe there would be a warning before the gunshots ring out. (p. 118).
One of the things I liked best about Some People Need Killing was Patricia Evangelista's focus on language. Were speakers using passive or active voice – and what were the implications of that choice? Who and what was the sentence's subject and object? What words were chosen? ""They would be drowned, stabbed, shot, buried, dropped into Manila Bay, fed to fishes, and sent to purgatory, and none of it would be murder because it was not murder, only justice…. “Simple justice,” he said. “Not murder-murder"” (p. 147).
And, it was not just Duterte who played with language. We are all guilty of Crimes Against Language, when it is convenient.
In Filipino, maganda means “beautiful.” It can also mean “good.” It was unclear what the president meant that afternoon in August, but there was a reason every English-language local news organization chose to use the word good instead of beautiful. Good, as egregious a judgment as it was, was far less outrageous than beautiful. Beautiful would have offered an element of pleasure, a romanticizing of brutality, the impression that the commander in chief of a democratic republic was not just pleased but delighted by the ruthless killing of his citizens. (p. 168).
[image] The Philippine "Pietà": Jennelyn Olaires holding her husband, killed as an alleged drug dealer. Source: Philippine Daily Inquirer / Raffy Lerma
We must see the humanity of the people killed before we can say no: ""You know, he’s a young kid,” Jason says. An innocent boy who didn’t look like an addict, didn’t look like a squatter, was a student who could have been Jason’s brother or sister or son. “And that’s when I had to look back,” he said. “I had to question how many of those who died before, like the Pietà, were similar to Kian [a 17-year-old killed, who only wanted to complete his homework]—even if they didn’t look like Kian.” (pp. 318-319)
None of us are immune: “We love your adherence to democratic principle,” Vice President George H. W. Bush raising a toast to President Marcos (p. 26). ...more
"You're of Indian origin, were born in London, raised in America. You write books in English. What does Italian have to do with any of that?" (Chapter"You're of Indian origin, were born in London, raised in America. You write books in English. What does Italian have to do with any of that?" (Chapter 1)
When I read Jhumpa Lahiri's translation of Domenico Starnone's Ties in 2018, I asked that very question (and others). Why Italian? Why is she translating someone else's work?
Listening to Lahiri's Translating Myself and Others answers these and other questions about translation. Clearly, the translation process is not as straightforward and easy as I had imagined. How do you choose among different meanings of a word? How do you find another in a different language that carries the same meanings (and baggage) as in the author's language? How do you handle the author's (intentional?) repetition of a word or alliteration? When an author such as Ovid uses multiple names for the same character, how do you maintain clarity? How do you describe sexual violence in 21st century language? These are thorny questions for Lahiri, who must end up with highly annotated originals and well-thumbed dictionaries and thesauri?
I love watching anyone do something that they are highly skilled at. Lahiri was no exception here.
Lahiri discussed the difficulties and joys of self-translation (Dove mi trovo): "Italian translation, for me, has always been a way to maintain contact with the language I love when I am far away from it. To translate is to alter one’s linguistic coordinates, to grab on to what has slipped away, to cope with exile" (Chapter 6). For her, though, it was also a way of further exploring the text, of noting errors, and ultimately revising the original Italian.
"Reading, writing, and living in Italian, I feel like a reader, a writer, a person who is more attentive, active, and curious." (Chapter 1)
Lahiri includes frequent Italian or Latin quotations, which I would have glanced at or skipped over if I had read this as text. She has a lovely voice and her Italian made clear why she would fall in love with this language – I doubt that many who listen to English are converted.
By the end of Translating Myself and Others I was (unskillfully) translating with her and paying attention to the process of translation in my daily life....more
William Safire's How Not to Write: The Essential Misrules of Grammar is short and sassy: 50 very short chapters, 50 "fumblerules." What's a fumbleruleWilliam Safire's How Not to Write: The Essential Misrules of Grammar is short and sassy: 50 very short chapters, 50 "fumblerules." What's a fumblerule? "[A] mistake that calls attention to the rule. The message: See how wrong this looks? Do as I say, not as I do" (Kindle 59). For example, Chapter 3's fumblerule is "A writer must not shift your point of view." I said sassy. Safire concludes his discussion of this fumblerule with
If you have chosen a frog’s point of view, do not suddenly leap over to the mind of the princess. Stick to your person, stay in your place and you will discover how a frog of a writer, kissed by consistency, can become a prince. (Kindle 126).
How Not to Write was written in 1990, so it was interesting how much of American grammar has stayed the same – and to note the places where things have changed (e.g., moving from male pronouns as an inclusive pronoun).
The following quotations are here just because they made me smile while making me think:
* "When you find yourself in a preposition-ending pickle, be like a Broadway producer with a recalcitrant star: Recast." (Kindle 1018)
* "But when the softening or prettifying panders to prudishness, or is motivated by commercial deception or bureaucratic obfuscation, the euphemism deserves termination with extreme prejudice." (Kindle 925)
* "Like brief-forms in shorthand, save-gets in computer programming or prefabricated modules in homebuilding, clichés are evidence of thought-free writing." (Kindle 1038)...more
I read when I'm exercising, at bedtime, when I wake in the middle of the night, when I need to lax in the middle of the day. I read for long periods aI read when I'm exercising, at bedtime, when I wake in the middle of the night, when I need to lax in the middle of the day. I read for long periods and when waiting in queue. I often read different things in different places, though, and choose boring for middle of the night reads.
I'm not a Stephen King junkie, but I would have assumed that On Writing would put me back to sleep. No.
On Writing is a patchwork of a book aimed at fiction writers – it doesn't always make sense to me. I would cut the enjoyable first and fifth parts – C.V. and On Living – and move them to a writing memoir or I would highlight how these life events directed his writing career. But I especially enjoyed the more "down to business" parts of the book (Parts 2-4) and would have moved his example of editing pages from 1408 to follow those. His son's article on creating audiobooks for his father and the interview with his other son are interesting and entertaining – as is the whole book – but I would put them and his reading lists in a series of appendices.
It sounds like I didn't like On Writing, but that's not true. His voice is vivid, quite readable, and often humorous without aiming for cheap laughs: "In many ways, Eula-Beulah prepared me for literary criticism. After having a two-hundred-pound babysitter fart on your face and yell Pow!, The Village Voice holds few terrors" (pp. 20-21). He argued fear is at the base of most bad writing.
His advice is often best-suited for fiction writers, but those of us who write nonfiction can still profit from advice like the following: * "Description begins in the writer’s imagination, but should finish in the reader’s." (p. 174). * "The key to good description begins with clear seeing and ends with clear writing, the kind of writing that employs fresh images and simple vocabulary." (p. 179). * "The job boils down to two things: paying attention to how the real people around you behave and then telling the truth about what you see." (p. 189) * "Some of this book—perhaps too much—has been about how I learned to do it. Much of it has been about how you can do it better. The rest of it—and perhaps the best of it—is a permission slip: you can, you should, and if you’re brave enough to start, you will." (p. 270)
King is death on adverbs. (He used an occasional one, although frequently apologized for doing so.) This admonishment will be among the tools that I carry around with me in my journey to become a clearer, more effective writer.
Joe Hill, King's son: I’ve always thought that my dad’s stories sold bravery, that they essentially were making an argument that, yeah, things might get really bad. But if you have some faith and a sense of humor, and if you’re loyal to your loved ones, sometimes you can kick the darkness until it bleeds daylight. (p. 312)...more
I enjoy reading about how to write well, but I wasn't the target audience for Kiss My Asterisk. Several things made this book unpalatable:
(a) Kiss MyI enjoy reading about how to write well, but I wasn't the target audience for Kiss My Asterisk. Several things made this book unpalatable:
(a) Kiss My Asterisk starts with material I'm really not interested in (i.e., choosing among homophones), then moved to the more interesting stuff (more interesting to me) at the end. Put the homophone and word usage in an appendix at the end of the book.
(b) Jenny Baranick frequently uses sexual humor to illustrate grammatical issues (I should have known based on the title).
If I could change one thing about myself, what would it be? Well, that’s an interesting question. I could certainly go for some longer legs. Increasing a cup-size would be nice. I’ve always kind of wanted green eyes and longer eyelashes and a flawless complexion and . . . (Kindle 1034)
I'm not sure who Baranick's target audience is. Would her language be appropriate with high school students? College students? Maybe those working on their GED?
(c) Baranick talks a lot about her husband – always positively – but in a way that reminds me of a former professor who talked about his wife all of the time – until he stopped. (They had divorced.) That may be a completely inappropriate connection, but I expect that if I Googled her, I would learn of her divorce.
(d) Baranick also fairly frequently writes in disrespectful ways about her students and colleagues. I wouldn't want her writing about me as she writes about others, and it further irritated me.
I wanted to like Kiss My Asterisk but couldn't get past the above. I read 42% and decided that life is to short to read books that annoy, even when learning things in the process....more
Published well after Kurt Vonnegut's death (in 2005), Pity the Reader was collected and collated by Suzanne McConnell, a former student from the Iowa Published well after Kurt Vonnegut's death (in 2005), Pity the Reader was collected and collated by Suzanne McConnell, a former student from the Iowa Writers' Workshop, using considerable original material from Vonnegut's fiction, letters, and interviews. Pity the Reader is not a typical writing manual. It is also writing coach, with a dab of memoir/biography thrown in for good measure. This combination would be deeply satisfying for some, while irritating others. I was satisfied.
First, the writing manual was characterized by these pieces of advice first published in 1980 in a New York Times column:
1. Find a subject you care about. 2. Do not ramble. 3. Keep it simple. 4. Have the guts to cut. 5. Sound like yourself. 6. Say what you mean to say. 7. Pity the readers.
McConnell expanded on these themes, drawing on his writing, exemplars from others (including his daughter's letter to a disgruntled customer complaining about the service received from another waitress), and some of his and others' revisions of his work. It can be dispiriting for aspirants who believe that their gods have always been successful.
Vonnegut's goals in teaching young writers was broader than helping young writers learn to string words together. As McConnell observed:
Vonnegut’s assignments at the Writers’ Workshop now, I see that more importantly than the craft of writing, they were designed to teach us to do our own thinking, to find out who we were, what we loved, abhorred, what set off our trip wires, what tripped up our hearts. (p. 19)
Vonnegut believed that teaching young writers should be thought of holistically, that writers should know themselves to help others change. Kilgore Trout responded to the question, "What is the purpose of life?" with the following poem:
To be the eyes and ears and conscience of the Creator of the Universe, you fool. (from Breakfast of Champions)
All of the above offered a very human and humane view of Vonnegut. We read what he said when teaching, including his advice to and mentoring of aspiring writers (McConnell and others). He also shared the difficulties, as very few writers only get good news from the get go.
Pity the Reader was an engaging read – and makes me consider going back to reread Vonnegut. I mostly read him (obsessively) in high school/college, and lately have set him aside as something to have read early in life. The Vonnegut I read in Pity the Reader is still a writer for when I need a fun and cheering read, but I also now see that he is a writer who inspires, who raises and responds to difficult questions....more
The ability to read and write – even as I do here – is a privilege, or as Virginia Woolf asserts, "intellectual freedom depends upon material things"The ability to read and write – even as I do here – is a privilege, or as Virginia Woolf asserts, "intellectual freedom depends upon material things" (Kindle 30979). I would argue that money and a room of one's own is necessary for all sorts of intellectual pursuits – Maslow's hierarchy and all that. Can one really write, read, and think without a modicum of safety, physical and otherwise (Viktor Frankl excepted)?
And, then, what is the impact for women with limited opportunities? Imagine Shakespeare's "extraordinarily gifted sister." Woolf was pessimistic: "any woman born with a great gift in the sixteenth century would certainly have gone crazed, shot herself, or ended her days in some lonely cottage outside the village, half witch, half wizard, feared and mocked at" (Kindle 30169). Or, she might hide that she is a woman and write or paint under a pseudonym (e.g., Currer Bell, George Eliot, George Sand).
And, even if she was able to write or paint or excel in some other academic realm,
Her books will be deformed and twisted. She will write in a rage where she should write calmly. She will write foolishly where she should write wisely. She will write of herself where she should write of her characters. She is at war with her lot. How could she help but die young, cramped and thwarted? (Kindle 30452).
Can we afford to lose the gifts of so many? Reading A Room of One's Own got me thinking about open and closed doors and ways that we close them without even recognizing that we've done so.
This is (unfortunately) my first reading of A Room of One's Own, yet Woolf's arguments are so much a part of our culture at this point that I believe my teachers – grade school, high school, college – threaded her arguments throughout their discussions. I am lucky that was part of my experience. My teachers wondered why we talk about wars rather than women's experience. They talked about the contexts of the writers and artists we discussed. They questioned why paintings of war or biblical events more important and valued than Mary Cassatt's paintings of mothers and their children. [image] Mary Cassatt, Matertiny
As I said in another review, I am reading Nicholas Kristof and Sheryl WuDunn's Tightrope, which considers problems experienced by the working poor as stemming from a lack of good education, meaningful employment, and lack of hope. They looked at Kristof's childhood friends and concluded that his "success" and his friends' "failures" stemmed, in part, from pure luck (good or bad). Did personal choices play a part in their successes and failures? Of course. But we have also created a series of systemic barriers to success and created unfair advantages for others (e.g., sending drug offenders to prison – unless they are executives of Purdue Pharma).
Woolf asked for equality, nothing more. She would have appreciated social justice – as Kristof and WuDunn want. As I said before, can we afford to lose the energy and creativity of so many?
Lynda Barry's Syllabus was not what I expected – but that's a good thing. I bought this soon after it first came out in 2014, really focusing on how iLynda Barry's Syllabus was not what I expected – but that's a good thing. I bought this soon after it first came out in 2014, really focusing on how it might help me think about how to write and present a syllabus in a way that engaged students. Syllabus has the regular content of syllabi, as in this first photo, although it is somewhat idiosyncratically presented.
[image]
If this was all that Syllabus did, it would be interesting, but not worth more than a quick read. Syllabus is as much or more about teaching writing and facilitating creativity. As much, it's a philosophy/demonstration of teaching effectively.
Syllabus is drawn from Barry's syllabi, assignments, and student drawings from six of her classes between 2012-2014. If this book is at all representative of her teaching – and I believe it – her classes would be an exciting and engaging place to be. She does not just talk about how to write and draw, but provides a series of exercises and homework assignments throughout the semester that create a scaffold allowing this to happen.
[image]
Barry's students may initially think these assignments are silly – drawing tight spirals; coloring and leaving as much crayon on the page as possible; making lists of what they did, saw, and heard – and yet, she has designed these exercises to help her students pay attention, really pay attention, and let down their defenses that prevent them from taking the kinds of risks that allow them to be creative.
Teaching, even relatively straightforward teaching, is not necessarily transparent to students; what we see as intentional, they often see as busy work. Barry talks about what she is doing with her students: "Part of what we are doing in this class is NOTICING what we NOTICE and NOTICING MORE, but doing it in a natural way as we move through our day." (p. 83).
[image]
I see Barry's insistence on good process (e.g., spending enough time on drawings), her descriptions of why she's doing what she's doing, and her genuine love of her students' work as respectful. If I had Barry as a teacher, I would lap up everything that she said and open like a flower.
I want to remember and use the best of what Barry does in my own very different teaching.
All photos are from Lynda Barry's Syllabus....more
Language should be played with. Scrabble, crossword puzzles, and The Devil's Dictionary.
I'm sure you really need to know that absurdity could be defiLanguage should be played with. Scrabble, crossword puzzles, and The Devil's Dictionary.
I'm sure you really need to know that absurdity could be defined as A statement or belief manifestly inconsistent with one's own opinion (p. 5). Or bigot as One who is obstinately and zealously attached to an opinion that you do not entertain (p. 14).
You need to know that I is the first letter of the alphabet, the first word of the language, the first thought of the mind, the first object of affection (p. 57).
Ambrose Bierce's definitions are accurate, cynical, and tongue in cheek. You would have wanted to invite him to your next party. Who else would recognize that loquacity is A disorder which renders the sufferer unable to curb his tongue when you wish to talk (p. 78)? Maybe he could keep the other guests under control?
Bierce includes a fair amount of prose and poetry to further elucidate his vocabulary. I skipped most of these, as I don't like a lot of poetry, especially his choice in poetry. But his definitions, oh his definitions!
In this age of tariffs, his definition of tariff seems apropos as a place to end: A scale of taxes on imports, designed to protect the domestic producer against the greed of his consumer (p. 131).
Who'd think that a book about lexicography would be fun? Kory Stamper describes herself as a word nerd and socially awkward, but Word by Word had me lWho'd think that a book about lexicography would be fun? Kory Stamper describes herself as a word nerd and socially awkward, but Word by Word had me laughing – and thinking – and wanting to read passages aloud. This doesn't mean it's a light book, but it certainly was a pleasure to read. Disclaimer: I read dictionaries and encyclopedias as a child.
A job where you read all day can be a pleasure, to be sure, but it can also ruin you. Words cease to be casual, tossed off, and able to be left alone. You are that toddler on a walk, the one who wants to pick up every bit of detritus and gunk and dead insect and dog crap on the sidewalk, asking, “What’s that, what’s that, what’s that?” while a parent with better things to do tries to haul your over-inquisitive butt away. (p. 92)
So words are an obsessive pleasure, but if you're a lexicographer you can't skim; you also can't find yourself absorbed by what you're reading and miss the language. It means having to follow up on words that you know aren't real words (e.g., irregardless), but you have to get to the bottom of things, even if that may means admitting that perhaps they are. (True story.) It means admitting that English isn't static and made from cement, but a living and breathing thing – although sometimes growing in a direction you don't want. It means defining words in boring and noncontroversial ways. You can't, for example, define "president" by saying: Mr. Obama was the 44th president of the United States. You can't say Mr. Trump, for that matter. Either would draw unwanted attention.
It is a hard life, but an obsessive and a passionate one.
Even the footnotes and Acknowledgements had me guffawing (in a completely nerdy way). From the Acknowledgments:
won·der \ˈwən-dər\ n -s 1 : a cause of astonishment or admiration : MARVEL 2 : MIRACLE /I can never say enough about Josh Stamper, my husband, friend, and co-laborer in creative endeavors, who is for me a daily wonder./ (p. 264)
Ursula Le Guin said in her introduction to Steering the Craft: A Twenty-first-Century Guide to Sailing the Sea of Story that it "is not a book for begUrsula Le Guin said in her introduction to Steering the Craft: A Twenty-first-Century Guide to Sailing the Sea of Story that it "is not a book for beginners. It’s meant for people who have already worked hard at their writing." I think Le Guin sold her book short. I am not a serious writer, even though I often spend hours many days writing. I certainly don't write fiction. Nonetheless, I learned a lot in the course of reading Steering the Craft, both about writing and teaching, as it is an opportunity to sit and listen to a masterful teacher – skilled in her craft and teaching both.
Even people who are not writers or interested in strengthening their writing can read, enjoy, and profit from Steering the Craft. It is not only about writing well but is beautifully written. It is like spending the afternoon in your favorite coffee shop, eating a luscious but not overdone dessert, with your coffee's aromas tickling your nose, and good people chattering and music playing in the background. Dessert is perhaps not the best metaphor, as it's not rich chocolate cake with dark chocolate icing, but ratatouille, deeply flavored, chock full of umami. I wanted to leave her words melting on my tongue so I could savor them longer.
Each of Le Guin's ten short chapters is focused on a single idea (e.g., the sound of your writing, punctuation and grammar, point of view and voice, changing point of view). Chapters begin with a discussion of the focal concern and followed by several prose examples (from Twain, Dickens, Neale Hurston, Woolf, and others), then by one or more exercises and variations on these, and things to consider while critiquing. In the point of view chapter, for example, she retold the same story (150 words or so) from different perspectives: first person, limited third person, detached author, omniscient author, etc. Her exercises make her points clearly and succinctly. For example:
First: Tell your little story from a single POV, that of a participant in the event— an old man, a child, a cat, whatever you like. Use limited third person.
Second: Retell the story from the POV of one of the other people involved in it. Again, use limited third person. (p. 72)
She provided multiple iterations of each exercise, in effect, laying out breadcrumbs for the reader to follow to their goal.
Perhaps the most interesting aspect of the book is where Le Guin offered strategies for critiquing a writing exercise:
In critiquing these exercises, you might talk about how well the shifts work, what’s gained (or lost?) by them, how the piece might have differed if told from one POV only.
For a while afterward, when reading fiction, you might take a moment to consider what POV is being used, who the viewpoint character is, when the POV shifts, and so on. It’s interesting to see how different writers do it, and you can learn a great deal from watching great artists of narrative technique such as Woolf and Atwood. (p. 93)
She is a gifted teacher and her workshops must have been masterful and exciting.
I have read several books by Le Guin from different genres in the last year (and will probably read more). We lost a wise and witty guide this year. RIP, Ms. Le Guin. Thank you for leaving so much of yourself behind.
Second reading: I reread this because the POV choices the authors I've been reading has been niggling at me. Some books do not stand up to a reread. This one felt as fresh as the first time. Maybe the next time I will actually respond to the exercises. Maybe not....more
I spent my college years reading Ray Bradbury, but probably haven't read anything of his since. My loss. Reading Bradbury again, in this case his writI spent my college years reading Ray Bradbury, but probably haven't read anything of his since. My loss. Reading Bradbury again, in this case his writing memoir, Zen in the Art of Writing, reminds me both of that time – and also gives me a peak at his views on creativity and his writing process.
What's his process? He sums it up as:
WORK. That’s the first one. RELAXATION. That’s the second. Followed by two final ones: DON’T THINK! (p. 103)
Bradbury worked hard, day in and day out. He is credited with 27 novels and 600 short stories – as well as plays and screenplays. The man was prolific.
Bradbury was also passionate and excited, relaxed and mindful in his writing. As he said,
If you are writing without zest, without gusto, without love, without fun, you are only half a writer. It means you are so busy keeping one eye on the commercial market, or one ear peeled for the avant-garde coterie, that you are not being yourself. You don’t even know yourself. For the first thing a writer should be is — excited. He should be a thing of fevers and enthusiasms. Without such vigor, he might as well be out picking peaches or digging ditches; God knows it’d be better for his health. (p. 2)
Bradbury's excitement is infectious – I chose to read Zen in the Art of Writing at bedtime rather than the novel I was reading. When that happens, it says something.
I finished Zen in the Art of Writing during the middle of the night and was thinking about a friend's dislike of science fiction (which I think she conflates with space opera). Her loss. As Bradbury observed:
All science fiction is an attempt to solve problems by pretending to look the other way....Science fiction pretends at futures in order to cure sick dogs lying in today’s road. Indirection is everything. Metaphor is the medicine. (pp. 77-78)
Science fiction helps us see doors rather than only walls.
An observation. Many of the reviews of Zen in the Art of Writing are in Arabic, where he seems to be resonating with readers and writers. I'm not sure what this means, but it's interesting. I'm not surprised he resonates there, but Zen in the Art of Writing deserves to resonate to the same degree here. ...more
Kameron Hurley's The Geek Feminist Revolution is a sharp, thoughtful, often (appropriately) angry book on writing, writing science fiction, and changiKameron Hurley's The Geek Feminist Revolution is a sharp, thoughtful, often (appropriately) angry book on writing, writing science fiction, and changing the world.
Maybe science fiction isn't your cup of tea – I haven't read any of Hurley's novels (yet). If you like reading about the process of writing, like I do, than you will enjoy Hurley's essays. She hates the ways that many of us create barriers to writing. She clearly argues that being good, being talented, is the easiest part of this business. That’s just when things really get started (p. 26). For most successful writers, writing is hard-work: you aren’t going to get it right the first time, but that doesn’t mean that your efforts were failures (p. 45).
Hurley confesses to working hard: full-time as a marketer, a novel a year, 1500-3000 words a day on her blogs and fiction each day. Most of us don't know this level of "hard." Carol Dweck has written persuasively about the roles of growth and fixed mindsets in success at any task; Kameron Hurley should be the poster girl for growth mindset.
Hurley's feminism informs every essay. She unpacks the messages in what she reads – and writes – to consider what it means: Let’s be real: if women were “naturally” anything, societies wouldn’t spend so much time trying to police every aspect of their lives (p. 111). As a result, she looks for the ways that we limit people in our writing (and thinking).
Hurley challenges herself and is open to admitting her mistakes – both to herself and her readers. Her first published novel included a bisexual bounty hunter with the brute sensibilities of Conan and grim optimism of a lottery junkie (p. 98). Nyx lived in a world where bisexual and lesbian women was the norm. If it was the norm, Hurley wouldn't need to comment on this. That she did, that her editor noticed that she did, indicated that she was writing with a straight white male gaze in mind. I was writing with the idea that her desire was somehow other, something that had to be explained to a reader who viewed straight as default (pp. 98-99).
I don't read as much science fiction as I would like, partly because I get pulled in and forget to do anything else. Still, one reason that I read it is to help me see my world and other possible world more clearly. She would remind us that the emperor wears no clothes.
It’s easier to tell the same stories everyone else does. There’s no particular shame in it.
It’s just that it’s lazy, which is just about the worst possible thing a spec fic writer can be.
Oh, and it’s not true. (p. 262)
Like other feminist bloggers, Hurley has received threats of sexual assault and death. And still she writes.
What are we risking by speaking up? Everything, certainly. But the far riskier business is not speaking up at all. The riskier future is the one where we all fear a madman incensed by something he read online plowing a car into our house more than we fear being hit by a random bus on the street. (p. 16)
Hurley asks that we be honest and courageous. When someone is this honest in hers, it's hard not to promise to try....more
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