The remnants of this year's SXSW festival still linger here in Austin. The chain-linked enclosures to various outdoor venues appear battered and, in many places, defeated, as if in a final gesture of obnoxious enthusiasm, fans had stormed the shows either en masse, or in Land Rovers. The skeletal remains of stages await transport, standing half-collapsed and bare, and the trash that homeless people were originally paid to pick up, has once again descended in the form of broken beer bottles, abandoned T-shirts, and plentious flyers advertising shows, just in case atendees didn't have every moment of every day planned out already.
Personally, I am relieved. For one thing, I can step out of doors at any given moment without witnessing 6-10 traffic violations. I can drive home from work without having to flip anybody off, and I can sleep at night without the steady pulse of bass drums taking over my dreams, or having to worry about vomit appearing mysteriously on my door step in the morning. Needless to say, the, uh, enthusiasm of this year's event has given me ample cause and opportunity to consider my own lack thereof.
When people asked me this past week whether or not I had any "crazy plans for south-by", I generally would respond that I'm not all that in to music festivals. This statement was as much a surprise to me as to those I was speaking to, because after all, I really do enjoy music. For whatever reason, the fact of its being "live" doesn't really add much to what I already appreciate about the music. The allure of live music, as I see it, is not the music itself, but the excuse it gives us to party. The emphasis is not on the "art", but on our collective, communal appreciation of it. And I think that is a distinguishing characteristic of rock music from other art forms; the fact that it often develops as live performance, or anticipation of it. A rock song is a cultural object throughout nearly every stage of its development, and to me, that fact compromises its status as Art, in the upper-cased sense of the word.
My own understanding of what Art is, is constantly developing and redefining itself, although I would say that one critical aspect of artistic experience is recognition. That is, rather than engaging an audience directly, as in rock performances, the artist first delves into his/her Self, past easy emotions and modes of analysis, and attempts to represent what is there by way of visual, textual, and/or musical media. See the difference? The one involves a multi-step process in the way Artist approaches Public:
Step 1: Artist participates in Introspection
Step 2: Artist engages in Creation
Step 3: Artist makes work accessible to Public
Step 4: Public/Viewer-Listener-Reader either does or does not experience Recognition
The process in rock music, I believe, is much more slurred and, as a result, reaches people on a more topical, general level. Thus, we arrive at the distinction between pop art and what I would term, "serious" Art: The one touches many, lightly, while the other touches few, deeply.
I'm aware of how seriously lame I must sound right now. Just to clarify, I enjoy lots of rock music, and live music also. Art doesn't always have to be "serious" in order to be enjoyable, and even then, there are plenty of kinds of music and musical performances that, even by my standards, qualify as "serious" Art. As an example, I'll describe the one show I went to this past week: It was a "secret show" put on by the folks at the Annie Street Arts Collective (the members of which comprise a number of local bands I enjoy seeing here in Austin), and was held in an abandoned building that used to be the Austin State School. There was no electricity, so the room we were in was lit mostly by candles, and the performance had to take place with little amplification. It took about ten minutes hiking across a wet field to get there, and the bands that played were Sunday Parish, Some Say Leland, and this girl from SC named Alexa Woodward (who, by the way, was awesome). As I said, there was little amplification, so the mood was fairly quiet, with everyone's attention directed solely on the music. Yes, there was beer, which we brought ourselves, and plenty of other substances drifting around, but the experience still seemed fundamentally different than that which I described earlier. The principal adjective I would use to describe it is not "fun", or "awesome", but "inspiring". And that is not even to mention the music itself, which was soulful and poetic and in many cases, did seem to spark in me instances of recognition such as I mentioned before.
So, to sum it all up: See? I'm not that lame...
Monday, March 22, 2010
Saturday, March 13, 2010
I've got a fever...
and the prescription is... more writing?
It may not be obvious, but what I am trying to introduce with that oblique SNL reference is the sensation of writing. Many writers, as you may or may not know, describe the state they are in when they write as a sort of fever; inspiration as this delerium that sweeps over them, obscuring circumstances, surroundings, and pretty much everything but the work itself. My professor in college said that you know you're writing well when you are afraid of what's coming out. Another friend of mine says that he drools. And all of this sounds really good and inspiring and all, though as for myself, I just don't feel it.
I want to. It sounds perfectly ecstatic, what they describe. For as long as I can remember, writing for me has been a mode of understanding. In high school teachers could ask me questions about literature or philosophy until they were blue in the face, and illicit only a dumb stare until I craftily managed to work my way out of the spotlight. But when they assigned 'reader response' activites I could write for hours, lost in my own musings, fascinated by how much deeper my thoughts ran when filtered through a pen. It makes sense that if you turn that process inward, cease with reader response and begin to examine your own self, that the uncertainty you feel may well seem like fear. Picasso argued that it is not the artist's task to find an answer to life's difficulties, but to articulate its problems correctly (at least I think it was Picasso who said that), and problems are scary. The trance state people refer to, I imagine, is the state one encounters when s/he turns off the logic function in the brain, the part that is always trying to put things together, reconcile opposites, and allows life's contradictions simply to be, in all their incongruity. It is not logic or sense (strictly speaking) which imbues a work of art with harmony, but the yearning that exists beneath its contradictions, and which shines through them.
So where am I going wrong? I have tried to write my way into a fever before. I've done a lot of free association journaling in the hope that if I just keep my hand moving, and try not to think about it, something magical and real will eventually come out. What ends up happening though, is that I immediately, and intentionally, go to the darkest part of myself that I know of, and write from my obsessions. It's really not difficult for me to pen my own darkness, in private at least. Rather than a fever though, the sensation feels more like wallowing; the artistic equivalent of building a house with a wrecking ball.
I often find that, looking back, my richest writing occurs when I am most annoyed with a project. When I am agonizing my way through passages and writing about one sentence every five minutes. When I feel uninspired and pretty sure that what I'm writing is complete dreck, that's when the little moments of magic actually happen. There is plenty of magic to be had in both states, I imagine, although I truly would prefer a trance!
What I would like to do--and I've been saying this for a while--is to put off creative projects altogether, and for a few months just emphasize journaling. The journaling can be anything it wants--reflections, stories, descriptions, dreams, etc--but none of it can be planed. I would like to take a good while and focus on narrowing the gap between my hand and my brain, so that maybe, eventually, I'll know what that whole fever thing is about. Right now though, I simply haven't the time.
It may not be obvious, but what I am trying to introduce with that oblique SNL reference is the sensation of writing. Many writers, as you may or may not know, describe the state they are in when they write as a sort of fever; inspiration as this delerium that sweeps over them, obscuring circumstances, surroundings, and pretty much everything but the work itself. My professor in college said that you know you're writing well when you are afraid of what's coming out. Another friend of mine says that he drools. And all of this sounds really good and inspiring and all, though as for myself, I just don't feel it.
I want to. It sounds perfectly ecstatic, what they describe. For as long as I can remember, writing for me has been a mode of understanding. In high school teachers could ask me questions about literature or philosophy until they were blue in the face, and illicit only a dumb stare until I craftily managed to work my way out of the spotlight. But when they assigned 'reader response' activites I could write for hours, lost in my own musings, fascinated by how much deeper my thoughts ran when filtered through a pen. It makes sense that if you turn that process inward, cease with reader response and begin to examine your own self, that the uncertainty you feel may well seem like fear. Picasso argued that it is not the artist's task to find an answer to life's difficulties, but to articulate its problems correctly (at least I think it was Picasso who said that), and problems are scary. The trance state people refer to, I imagine, is the state one encounters when s/he turns off the logic function in the brain, the part that is always trying to put things together, reconcile opposites, and allows life's contradictions simply to be, in all their incongruity. It is not logic or sense (strictly speaking) which imbues a work of art with harmony, but the yearning that exists beneath its contradictions, and which shines through them.
So where am I going wrong? I have tried to write my way into a fever before. I've done a lot of free association journaling in the hope that if I just keep my hand moving, and try not to think about it, something magical and real will eventually come out. What ends up happening though, is that I immediately, and intentionally, go to the darkest part of myself that I know of, and write from my obsessions. It's really not difficult for me to pen my own darkness, in private at least. Rather than a fever though, the sensation feels more like wallowing; the artistic equivalent of building a house with a wrecking ball.
I often find that, looking back, my richest writing occurs when I am most annoyed with a project. When I am agonizing my way through passages and writing about one sentence every five minutes. When I feel uninspired and pretty sure that what I'm writing is complete dreck, that's when the little moments of magic actually happen. There is plenty of magic to be had in both states, I imagine, although I truly would prefer a trance!
What I would like to do--and I've been saying this for a while--is to put off creative projects altogether, and for a few months just emphasize journaling. The journaling can be anything it wants--reflections, stories, descriptions, dreams, etc--but none of it can be planed. I would like to take a good while and focus on narrowing the gap between my hand and my brain, so that maybe, eventually, I'll know what that whole fever thing is about. Right now though, I simply haven't the time.
Wednesday, March 10, 2010
10 Rules for Writing
The Guardian BookBlog recently had a number of authors submit their top ten rules for writing and posted them all online. The results range from the practical to the profound, and though I do recommend reading them all, here is a "super-list" that I have compiled showcasing my ten favorites. (Narrowing them down was no easy task, considering the ones I culled for my own files added up to a document three pages long! Many though were re-phrasings of similar rules, so the ones here I think represent the best cross-section.) Enjoy:
The "Super-List"
10. Do not place a photograph of your favourite author on your desk, especially if the author is one of the famous ones who committed suicide
-Roddy Doyle
9. Read. As much as you can. As deeply and widely and nourishingly and irritatingly as you can. And the good things will make you remember them, so you won't need to take notes.
-Al Kennedy
8. Don't try to anticipate an "ideal reader" – there may be one, but he/she is reading someone else.
-Joyce Carol Oates
7. It's doubtful that anyone with an internet connection at his workplace is writing good fiction.
-Jonathan Franzen
6. Remember: when people tell you something's wrong or doesn't work for them, they are almost always right. When they tell you exactly what they think is wrong and how to fix it, they are almost always wrong.
-Neil Gaimen
5. Jokes are like hands and feet for a painter. They may not be what you want to end up doing but you have to master them in the meanwhile.
-David Hare
4. Interesting verbs are seldom very interesting.
-Jonathan Franzen
3. In the planning stage of a book, don't plan the ending. It has to be earned by all that will go before it.
-Rose Tremain
2. Treat writing as a job. Be disciplined. Lots of writers get a bit OCD-ish about this. Graham Greene famously wrote 500 words a day. Jean Plaidy managed 5,000 before lunch, then spent the afternoon answering fan mail. My minimum is 1,000 words a day – which is sometimes easy to achieve, and is sometimes, frankly, like shitting a brick, but I will make myself stay at my desk until I've got there, because I know that by doing that I am inching the book forward. Those 1,000 words might well be rubbish – they often are. But then, it is always easier to return to rubbish words at a later date and make them better.
-Sarah Waters
1. If it sounds like writing, I rewrite it.
-Elmore Leonard
The "Super-List"
10. Do not place a photograph of your favourite author on your desk, especially if the author is one of the famous ones who committed suicide
-Roddy Doyle
9. Read. As much as you can. As deeply and widely and nourishingly and irritatingly as you can. And the good things will make you remember them, so you won't need to take notes.
-Al Kennedy
8. Don't try to anticipate an "ideal reader" – there may be one, but he/she is reading someone else.
-Joyce Carol Oates
7. It's doubtful that anyone with an internet connection at his workplace is writing good fiction.
-Jonathan Franzen
6. Remember: when people tell you something's wrong or doesn't work for them, they are almost always right. When they tell you exactly what they think is wrong and how to fix it, they are almost always wrong.
-Neil Gaimen
5. Jokes are like hands and feet for a painter. They may not be what you want to end up doing but you have to master them in the meanwhile.
-David Hare
4. Interesting verbs are seldom very interesting.
-Jonathan Franzen
3. In the planning stage of a book, don't plan the ending. It has to be earned by all that will go before it.
-Rose Tremain
2. Treat writing as a job. Be disciplined. Lots of writers get a bit OCD-ish about this. Graham Greene famously wrote 500 words a day. Jean Plaidy managed 5,000 before lunch, then spent the afternoon answering fan mail. My minimum is 1,000 words a day – which is sometimes easy to achieve, and is sometimes, frankly, like shitting a brick, but I will make myself stay at my desk until I've got there, because I know that by doing that I am inching the book forward. Those 1,000 words might well be rubbish – they often are. But then, it is always easier to return to rubbish words at a later date and make them better.
-Sarah Waters
1. If it sounds like writing, I rewrite it.
-Elmore Leonard
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)