Dennis Cass Wants You To Be More Awesome

Thanks to vita.mn for choosing my story Eve as third runner-up in their Summer Story Contest 2009.

Also, a big congratulations to Kelli Billstein for her winning piece Sky Pesher. Very nice.

You can read about last night’s reading at Brave New Workshop and check out the other runners up here.

Cheers to all.

In the delightful and essential HOW FICTION WORKS, James Wood writes about the concept of “getting in.” (Wood is quoting someone else, but I lent out my copy so the real credit will have to wait.)

The idea is that not only must we draw our characters well, but also quickly.

Over the course of the story, a character may take us on the emotional/psychological/literary equivalent of climbing K2, but we can’t go anywhere with them without that first firm foothold.

I was thinking about this concept the other day while watching In a Lonely Place, a 1950 film noir drama directed by Nicolas Ray and starring Humphrey Bogart. Check out how screenwriter Andrew Solt gets Bogart’s character in.

SCENE:

A warm night in Los Angeles. A convertible (driven by BOGART) stops at a light next another convertible (driven by a BIG LUG). In the passenger seat is a LOVELY BETTY.

LOVELY BETTY

Dick Steele! How are you?

BOGART

[Reaction shot as he draws a blank.]

LOVELY BETTY

Don’t you remember me?

BOGART

Sorry. I can’t say that I do.

LOVELY BETTY

Well, you wrote the last picture I did. At Columbia.

BOGART

Well, I make it a point to never see pictures I write.

BIG LUG

You! Stop bothering my wife.

BOGART

Oh . . . you shouldna done it, honey. No matter how much money that pig’s got.

BIG LUG

You pull over to the curb!

BOGART

What’s wrong with right here?!?

BOGART gets out of his car in the middle of the street ready to THROW DOWN, but the BIG LUG drives off.

Now isn’t that just lovely?

The “you wrote my last picture” bit is a tad clunky, but it’s immediately redeemed by the next line, which not only establishes Bogart as a self-hating screenwriter, but also a misanthropic self-hating screenwriter who has zero interest in playing the game. (He could have easily recovered with a lie or some Hollywood-style ass kissing.)

But the real treat is that final exchange. A lesser (or at least a modern) writer would have padded the scene. We’d have our post-modern tentativeness and our blustery one-liners. Instead we get a character who is so spoiling for a fight he can barely get his car in park.

All that in nine lines. In a novel you could get all that done in fewer than two pages.

My challenge to you:

Take a look at the key people in your current project. Are you getting them in fast enough? Are you getting them in hard enough?

Good luck.

A reader writes:

I’m applying for a grant to help me complete the final revision of my book. The idea was tossed out there that because my proposal doesn’t use as much as the funds as are available to me should I be awarded that I also request money for seeking publication of the novel. How much should could it cost to mail out the manuscript to several places and make phone calls? How many hours are really spent on this aspect by rookies who get the contracts?

Read the grant guidelines to make sure you can use the funds for this purpose. Some grants are very specific about how you’re supposed to use the funds. Others are for more general development.

That said, submitting your manuscript isn’t going to cost you that much money because a lot happens electronically. Before I turned in my first book, I had this fantasy about printing out the manuscript, boxing it up and shipping it to New York.

Instead I submitted it as an attachment.

If I were you, I’d look elsewhere for ways to pad your funding request.

A reader writes:

I have a complete fantasy novel manuscript, but no one wants it yet. Slush piles have turned up nothing, so I’m trying agents. The only problem is, my Writer’s Market doesn’t have agent listings, and I have no idea where to start looking! Where should I start looking for spec. fiction agents? Do they have their own directory? Is there a reliable agent directory with a sub-listing for fantasy and sci-fi market agents? Is there a way to get a feel for an agent before querying them? My story is somewhat unusual compared to most fantasy novels, and I have no idea how to make sure the agent I’m sending to is the sort who is willing to take a chance on something new. Any advice on the matter of speculative fiction agents would be tremendously appreciated and would go a long way towards my further awesomeness. Thank you very much for your time.

I put “speculative fiction” agent into our friend Google and got this nifty link right here as the first return. I hope this gets you started in terms of the information you need.

But, as always, what I’m really interested in is the question behind the question, or the problem behind the question, which in your case (and correct me if I’m wrong) is that you’re out there doing this entirely on your own.

If you were part of a network (virtual or otherwise) of speculative fiction writers, then you wouldn’t be asking me about finding an agent. You’d be asking them.

I’m happy to help, but I’m no substitute for a group of like-minded peers. We recently discussed ways to find people to give you feedback on your work. Writers who are ready to publish or are starting to get published might not need the feedback, but they still need the community.

Some things to consider:

Take an excerpt from your novel and rework it as a short piece

Short pieces aren’t going to make you rich and famous, but they do build audience, mark territory and send secret messages to your peers.

Start a writing group

You don’t have to read each others work. Get together, talk about stuff (or things) and stay in touch. Then help each other out when your careers start to break.

Make something happen

If you’re not interested in going to a conference, perhaps you’d like to work at one. Contributing to your genre’s scene (even if it’s just taking tickets at the door) gets you in front of people and behind the scenes.

As I’ve said before (and if I haven’t, please pretend that I have) the road to publication is painfully long. The worst thing you can do is passively wait. What’s more, if you’re out there stirring things up, you just might find that the agents will start coming to you.

A reader writes:

Longtime lurker, first-time writer. I was compelled to write based on a recent entry about how to start your writing career — I was intrigued by your advice, by the parameters you suggested for the hypothetical first project. I am a writer. I make my living as one (on staff, but not at a media company). I’ve long thought writing was a good fit for me, personality-wise. It afforded me the opportunity to explore and examine my varied interests. Over the past year or so, however, I’ve been concentrating on a particular area and am finding myself less drawn to the writing than to the area itself and the ideas it suggests to me. This isn’t necessarily a problem: My job affords me the opportunity to concentrate on this area. The problem is that as I try to strategize career-wise, I find that my strengths lie more in these ideas and less in my writing on them; I’m being recognized more for my thoughts, in other words, than for my writing. I feel in some sense that I’m taking on more of a curatorial position, building a body of work whose value lies in the sum of its pieces. I’ve thought lately that I could improve my brand by realizing those ideas in different ways: organizing a speaker’s series in my city, for example; I’m actually at the very, very, very early stages of a “book” project that I envision as a collection of images and an introductory essay — again, a work that I value for the ideas behind it and it being something nobody’s yet collected (or curated), and not something that will advance me as a writer (when I discuss this project with other writers, they’re very dismissive since, as I said, it’s not a “book” book).

I’m not quite sure what I’m asking for here, and I apologize if that’s frustrating. I guess I’m curious as to your thoughts on a path with no model in terms of form (writer, painter, filmmaker, etc.), but one guided by a defined yet intangible topic area. It seems a bit terrifying because there seems to be no firm goal to work toward — no novel or New Yorker staff position or Academy Award-winning film — other than gaining the opportunity to work in the ideas and issues and topics that interest me. And who knows how or if I could even monetize that. Am I naive to think a formless path is possible?

Your site is a real treasure. I appreciate your work on it.

Thank you the kind words and for de-lurking. I hope others like you follow suit.

As for taking the Formless Path, I don’t think you’re naive at all. When I’m with my writer friends all we talk about is the Formless Path. The Formless Path is killing us, and what’s extra infuriating is the fact that the Old Path (writer, painter, filmmaker, etc.) was ALREADY PRETTY F*CKING FORMLESS TO BEGIN WITH.

Frankly, I think the big decision facing every artist right now is not about the Nature of the Path, but what you expect to get out of the Path.

• Do you need to write/paint/make films for a living?
• Does the writing/painting/filmmaking need to be your identity?
• Does the product of your creativity need to make sense to other people (i.e. my friend Dennis writes books that teach kids about famous artists)?

Your writer friends are thinking critically not creatively. Your book project doesn’t sound like a book to them. What do they know? It’s all up for grabs and there isn’t a creative professional alive who can tell you what they’re going to be doing five years from now or if they’ll be making any money doing it.

So do your book. Do your speaker’s series. Get yourself out there and collaborate and meet people and experiment and play. If you’re any good it will make sense over time, even if you have idea what to make of now.

I do my best not to dude out on you, but once in a while something comes along that brings out the 12-year-old boy in me.

Watch this and then immediately start writing whatever comes to mind:

A reader writes:

Where is the line nowadays for writing about friends? I’m talking as a journalist, although another friend of mine the other day had the classic question about writing about family (personal essay) that we each must answer, too. My line so far goes like this: I am happy to quote my friends as sources in part of a larger piece that is not about them. I’m less comfortable pitching a story *about* a good friend’s new business with me as the writer. But am I wrong about this? To me, I can hardly be objective about someone that I know really well, and that I expect to continue to hang out with — i.e., I want to remain friends with that person. On the other hand, I know someone who pitched and wrote a profile of a filmmaker friend for City Pages.

The answer to this question depends a lot on the nature of the story.

If you’re writing an essentially promotional piece, then I don’t think friendship is an issue.

Are the editors of the Times Sunday Style section assiduously combing New York City for that which is objectively most stylish and now? Or are they writing about what their friends are doing? Readers assume a certain amount of logrolling so don’t sweat it.

If you’re writing a critical piece; however, then your friendship might be an issue. If you’ve treated Michael Jackson and you want to write a story about how the media is overreacting to his alleged prescription drug abuse, then readers need to know you have a relationship with your source.

How this is handled is ultimately between you and your editor. You have to recuse yourself from the story. Or, a simple “full disclosure” will do.

The question of whether your friendship will survive the story is separate. Even if you’re nice your friend can take something you wrote the wrong way. Or maybe they get mad at you for not being nice enough.

I think the answer may be as simple as having a conversation with your friend about this very topic. As long as both of you understand that what happens in the public sphere is business (you’ll get some praise but you might take some knocks) and what happens in the private sphere is friendship (you are my special, special star) then if you’re both grownups then you should both be fine.

So go ahead and write that story. And when you’re done:

Wheeeeee!

Imagine William Shakespeare sitting down to an early draft of Romeo and Juliet and trying to figure out the whole Montague/Capulet thing. Quill flying, he cooks up genealogies that go back six generations, elaborate sketches of each family member, and an intimate history of every insult and betrayal. Then, after a moment’s reflection, he scratches it all out and writes:

If you’re a Montague, then Capulet = bad.
If you’re a Capulet, then Montague = bad.

That settled, he moves on to figuring out the coolest way for his tragic lovers to die.

Years ago, when I took my first writing classes, I was taught (by multiple teachers) to write detailed biographical sketches of my characters. The assumption was that if my protagonist were a poor boy from a coal mining town, then I needed to know exactly how dirty his clothes were, how young he was when he got his girlfriend pregnant, and what he called his truck.

The flaw with this exercise is that it produces a lot of detail, but not a lot of meaning. As the Shakespeare example shows, belief is more powerful than biography. A Montague believes a Capulet is evil and vice versa. ‘Nuff said. To the audience it doesn’t really matter whether that belief is rational and justified, or insane and unfounded. Audiences understand that, for the purposes of this story at least, the only thing that counts is intensity.

In fact, belief—that love transcends all, that Juliet is dead, that I can’t live without my Romeo!—drives Romeo and Juliet as much as desire does. The conventional wisdom says that a character’s actions are determined by their wants. This is true, but their wants are governed by belief. The cruel empress who wants to crush the rebellion because she believes it will make her rich will behave differently from the cruel empress who wants to crush the rebellion because she believes her minions lack the ability to govern themselves.

As a writer, you not only need to understand the beliefs of your characters and their world, but you’re also responsible for making those beliefs compelling and complicating (though not necessarily complicated).

Getting back to our poor coal miner’s son, consider the stark differences between the following characters:

The poor boy from a coal mining town who believes that his poverty is a personal character flaw that must remain hidden at all costs.

The poor boy from a coal mining town who believes that his poverty is a great injustice and that others need to be confronted with the realities of his background.

The poor boy from a coal mining town who believes that it’s his fault his father never left the mines to fulfill his dream of playing professional baseball.

In his wonderful novel Cloud Atlas, David Mitchell writes: “Belief is both prize & battlefield, within the mind & in the mind’s mirror, the world.” Remember this sentiment the next time you sit down to your manuscript and the page will come alive. (This mentality spices up query letters, too.)

Final thought:

If there’s a danger in using this technique, it’s that once you start thinking in terms of belief, you’ll start seeing it everywhere. Eventually, you’ll have to confront your own biases and shortcomings. Looking back, my coal boy is good enough to illustrate a point in a blog post, but as a character he feels thin, stereotypical and borderline offensive. (Dirty clothes, a pregnant girlfriend and a truck with a name? Is that the best you can do, Dennis?) It just goes to show that no matter where you are in your career, you must never stop developing your intelligence, your knowledge of the world, and your heart.

Good luck.

When I think of collage I think of Hannah Hoch and punk band flyers that look like ransom notes. In other words collage as reflection of a fragmented culture and society.

What I like about this Sour video is it’s collage as integration of a fragmented culture and society.

The people in the video are all fans, and each made their little piece all by their lonesome in front of their lonely webcam, and then directors Masashi Kawamura, Hal Kirkland, Magico Nakamura and Masayoshi Nakamura pulled it all together and made it beautiful.

You could totally do that if you wanted to.