Guest blogger James Fouche on the writing life.
For the longest time my wife struggled intensely with the fact that she was married to someone who goes into a coffee shop and sits there for seven hours straight, then strolls out with two thousand words for the day. She couldn’t understand how easily things could distract me from completing a scene or why I had to be in a specific mood to tackle a specific scene. She couldn’t picture my ramblings and she couldn’t detach herself enough from life to imagine my fiction.
It’s only when she finally read my first novel, when she finished that last page and looked up at me with tears in her eyes, that my apparent madness became apparent ability. She finally understood what writing was all about, that seven years of slaving on a project could result in an end product, much like a farmer’s goods are finally packaged and sold at markets.
Authors live for depth and purpose. We tend to do a thorough research and our reasoning could be intense. This is our work. We reason, we analyze, we deliberate and we write it all down. How often have authors stumbled upon economic and business solutions or resolved political disputes by merely writing about them?
It is magic, this writing life, and James' perspective--his wife's tears upon reading--bring it magically to life.
ReplyDeleteWriters listen like crazy, too. I can sit in a restaurant and get ideas for where a character might go and, if I'm lucky, the resolution to a problem. My personal take on the writer thing is that writers are always writing. I was on a ferry awhile back, was very quiet and intent, and a friend said, "You're writing, aren't you?" As usual.
ReplyDeleteI once wrote a horror short story about a woman who plots to kill her husband on their anniversary. I left a draft of it on the printer and my husband, wanting to be supportive and encouraging, picked it up and read it. He came to me with a slightly concerned look in his eye and my manuscript in his hand. "Is there something we need to talk about?" he asked. I had to remind him that I wrote fiction. The lesson - don't leave your drafts lying around for people to accidentally read.
ReplyDeleteLovely post and so true.
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