Monday 28 November 2016

More on writing


28 November


Have you ever heard of bloke named Franz Kafka? No, nor me, until yesterday when I came across a quote from him which I liked. He said, ‘Books are a narcotic.’ I liked that one so I made a note of it from the list of them on the published by ForReadingAddicts. We writers are told to, ‘Edit, edit, edit and edit again,’ which I find hard to do at the best of times, not because I consider my work doesn’t need it, it does, but because most times I miss something as I go through it. Then I found another Kafka quote that I liked; ‘Don’t bend; don’t water it down; don’t try to make it local; don’t edit your own soul according to the fashion. Rather, follow your most intense obsessions mercilessly.’ So much for ‘kill your darlings' then!


As I’ve said above, my work does need editing at some point, mainly for the typos that I regularly make. You may have come across more than a few when you’ve read this blog at all often. Yes, I do read through each one and correct most of them, but as I said, I always manage to miss a few. To have my work professionally edited would cost a fortune, which I don’t have, so I do have to make with just mesen doing it. Longer work I can print out and use a red pen for corrections. For this blog though, the cost of paper and inks would make it a costly affair to produce this on a daily basis. So I have to make do with my faulty Mk1 eyeball and brain.


And while I’m on the subject of writing … Yesterday Jan took Kile to a church in Bed’th yesterday and he seemed to like it there, so I took the chance to get some more writing done, for the first time since 6 November. I shall never get anything finished if I don’t get on with it. It’s not the old favourite of ‘writers block’, which cause some debate as to whether it’s real or not, but simply because there are far too many distractions for me sitting here in the living room. I really am missing my study area, but there’s no room to reinstate it now after a move round. So later today I will be getting on with it again today. …Bristol Fashion is not far off finished in its draft form. Once it is, I can get on with Arathusia. Then I want to get on with new Fred Cooper, a much larger job because at 30K+ words, it need a complete rewrite, something I’m not looking forward to, even if I do know it needs it.


You know what; this writing malarkey is a funny thing to engage in really. The obvious doesn’t strike writers as the best way to do something. Even big names like Stephen King falls victim at times. Yesterday on his Facebook page he mention someone who had written a children’s book which he liked and ended the piece by saying, ‘I just wish I had written it.’ Oh, right, so why not write one then. And that is exactly what I said in a reply. It would sell well anyway simple because it would have King’s name on the cover, but I have a feeling that is not so much what King was speaking of; no, I think he just liked the book as a whole. It does show us that at times even the great writers of our time don’t see the wood for the trees.


It’s something that I have come across many times, usually when I’m sat in a pub by myself, note book and pencil in hand and someone asks me what I’m doing. I explain what I’m doing and then I hear the dreaming words, ‘I wish I could write a book,’ usually with a sigh and a shake of the head. My reply is easy; ‘Get yourself an A4 pad, a few pencils, sit at table and write then, that’s how they all get done.’ ‘Oh but I have the time.’ ‘Really? How much time did you spend watching telly last night? How much time did you spend on social media last night or out on the booze?’ At the point the would-be writer retreats to where they came from.


For me the problem is lack of motivation, not too much telly or Facebook, and that is bad enough. We all have time to do what we would like to do, it’s just that we don’t make the effort, and that is the road to failure. There’s an old saying about there being a book in all of us. That may be true, but there isn’t a writer in all of us. It’s fine to have book inside you, but unless you can write it, it will remain forever unseen by the public eyes.


Today’s photo then …


One of my two book cases.


Today’s funny …


Said the FBI agent to the bank teller after the bank was robbed for the third time by the same bandit, "Did you notice anything special about the man?"
"Yes, he seemed better dressed each time."
        

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