This is the question I grapple with more than any other. I feel like, if I am asking myself this question so frequently, maybe I shouldn't be writing this story. Maybe I should spend my time on something I feel is more meaningful, since I seem to be having issues with the book. I frequently second-guess both my motivation for writing it and the quality of the book. (Who cares about this story? is the question I hear most in my head.) I don't generally have confidence issues so the fact that I'm having so much trouble with this book should tell me something? Or should it? Maybe every writer goes through this.
Usually, when I'm done pissing away a bunch of time worrying about this, I come to the conclusion that I'm writing this story because it's fun. I enjoy the world I created, the characters, and the complete absurdity of the situations they find themselves in. I can't constantly ask myself if this is cliche or if it isn't; I can't be always bothering about whether this is fresh, innovative, or interesting. I just need to write the story, and write it to please myself.
It's ironic to me to discover that my biggest issue is worrying about what other people think of my book. I'm supposed to be the kind of person who doesn't care about that. And if not the kind of person I am, at the very least writers can't concern themselves with those thoughts. I have to just go for it here, and not worry about what's going to happen with it. I have to allow myself to suck if that's what's going to happen. I have to remind myself that everything I write isn't going to be of the utmost important. Some of it will have to be tossed away. I just have to write, write, and keep writing until one or both of my hands fall off. It's the only way I'm going to get anything good.
Friday, November 28, 2008
Wednesday, November 26, 2008
The Inexorable Pull of Romance
Now don't get me wrong here. I'm not trying to criticize, though I can't say I haven't criticized it, openly, vocally, and energetically in the past week. But I just don't understand the obsession with Twilight. I logged on to facebook this morning to the astonishing news that one of my friends had become a fan of Edward Cullen. If you don't know (and I don't know how you can't) that is the male romantic lead from Stephanie Meyer's ridiculously popular novel. He's attractive, charming, chivalrous, and drinks blood. Yes, he's a vampire folks. Enter drama, and most of all, angst angst angst.
Wasn't it Poe who said that adding a little tragedy made something even more beautiful? I'm paraphrasing, but it seems to hold true, at least in this case. You can look at any of the timeless classics and see that star-crossed lovers is a story that sells. Better yet, make it teenagers, and we have the added bonus of the novelty of discovering these things anew. High school romance is a pretty shallow pool to play in, but add a little eternal damnation to the mix and you have yourself a story, and a strangely compelling one, at that.
But what is it exactly that makes it so every woman between 13-30 is attracted to this character of Edward Cullen? As I scrolled through the pictures (241 of them posted at the time of this writing) I noticed a certain theme. Many people had superimposed themselves into the picture with him. One person had been so bold as to admit, in textual format, that she was in love with a fictional character. How is such a thing even possible? Can you really love someone you've never interacted with; find kinship with someone who has never (and will never) exist? What is it that these people are looking for?
And then I saw it: eternity.
Eternity is a fucking long span of time. And when you really think about it, it's frightening. They say that no matter who is with you, you come into this world and you leave it alone. If you think too long or too hard about starting on either one of those journeys, it can be terrifying. And we've been trying, for as long as we've existed, to alleviate that fear. There is an obsession on the part of humanity to find permanance in a world that is anything but.
It's difficult to find love, and even more difficult to find love that lasts. The concept of a vampire, an immortal being, in love with you is intoxicating. Think about it: a person who has existed for hundreds of years, met thousands of people, and never fallen in love. And then he meets one person, one clumsy, imperfect, everywoman (and here's where we all can relate) and he's in love. And not just any kind of love, but the kind we know will last. He knows all about eternity; he's had that long and longer to think about it. And he loves me--I mean her-- how amazing is that?
It's incredibly amazing. Especially now, in a time where cheating is expected if not condoned by much of society. I'm not religious by any definition of the term but I do find the degredation of the sanctity of relationships extremely disturbing. It's as if the entire human race is afraid to believe in permanance anymore. The closer we get to answers about the universe, the farther we get from believing we are an important part of it. We are tiny, we are inconsequential, and our actions don't matter. But this is where we're wrong.
This is why people (and women in particular) reach out to these characters and fantasies that they find in books and movies. They crave this kind of love, need it as badly as breathing or eating. They are waiting for the great sweeping romance that will change their lives and make everything different. They want permanance, even if it's not for the world. Permanance for them is good enough.
Women want an Edward Cullen to make them believe that love can last for eternity. They want to be the most important part of someone else's world. The problem with though is when they finally do encounter someone who possesses the ability to love like that, they run away from it. Society programs you to think that these kinds of feelings are silly and inspid. Obsessiveness is frightening. So herein lies the problem: the very thing they desire is the thing they are made to find fearful.
It's interesting to me that we live in a society full of such contradiction that someone could "love" a character in a fantasy novel but look down on a man who loves someone with the same kind of ardor as "suffocating" or "boring."
We love you Edward Cullen. As long you remain a fantasy.
Wasn't it Poe who said that adding a little tragedy made something even more beautiful? I'm paraphrasing, but it seems to hold true, at least in this case. You can look at any of the timeless classics and see that star-crossed lovers is a story that sells. Better yet, make it teenagers, and we have the added bonus of the novelty of discovering these things anew. High school romance is a pretty shallow pool to play in, but add a little eternal damnation to the mix and you have yourself a story, and a strangely compelling one, at that.
But what is it exactly that makes it so every woman between 13-30 is attracted to this character of Edward Cullen? As I scrolled through the pictures (241 of them posted at the time of this writing) I noticed a certain theme. Many people had superimposed themselves into the picture with him. One person had been so bold as to admit, in textual format, that she was in love with a fictional character. How is such a thing even possible? Can you really love someone you've never interacted with; find kinship with someone who has never (and will never) exist? What is it that these people are looking for?
And then I saw it: eternity.
Eternity is a fucking long span of time. And when you really think about it, it's frightening. They say that no matter who is with you, you come into this world and you leave it alone. If you think too long or too hard about starting on either one of those journeys, it can be terrifying. And we've been trying, for as long as we've existed, to alleviate that fear. There is an obsession on the part of humanity to find permanance in a world that is anything but.
It's difficult to find love, and even more difficult to find love that lasts. The concept of a vampire, an immortal being, in love with you is intoxicating. Think about it: a person who has existed for hundreds of years, met thousands of people, and never fallen in love. And then he meets one person, one clumsy, imperfect, everywoman (and here's where we all can relate) and he's in love. And not just any kind of love, but the kind we know will last. He knows all about eternity; he's had that long and longer to think about it. And he loves me--I mean her-- how amazing is that?
It's incredibly amazing. Especially now, in a time where cheating is expected if not condoned by much of society. I'm not religious by any definition of the term but I do find the degredation of the sanctity of relationships extremely disturbing. It's as if the entire human race is afraid to believe in permanance anymore. The closer we get to answers about the universe, the farther we get from believing we are an important part of it. We are tiny, we are inconsequential, and our actions don't matter. But this is where we're wrong.
This is why people (and women in particular) reach out to these characters and fantasies that they find in books and movies. They crave this kind of love, need it as badly as breathing or eating. They are waiting for the great sweeping romance that will change their lives and make everything different. They want permanance, even if it's not for the world. Permanance for them is good enough.
Women want an Edward Cullen to make them believe that love can last for eternity. They want to be the most important part of someone else's world. The problem with though is when they finally do encounter someone who possesses the ability to love like that, they run away from it. Society programs you to think that these kinds of feelings are silly and inspid. Obsessiveness is frightening. So herein lies the problem: the very thing they desire is the thing they are made to find fearful.
It's interesting to me that we live in a society full of such contradiction that someone could "love" a character in a fantasy novel but look down on a man who loves someone with the same kind of ardor as "suffocating" or "boring."
We love you Edward Cullen. As long you remain a fantasy.
Tuesday, November 25, 2008
Breaking Through
This is blog one. I am hoping there will be blogs 2, 3, 4, and 1005 someday, so it's a good place to start. This is a place for me to try to sort out the ideas that come around in my head; for me to get the insignifica out of my way and concentrate on what matters. And that's writing.
It's funny to me to think of writers who didn't intend to start out that way. Writers who had an idea and just lived with it; thought about it and cared for it like it was a child. And then to have it actually work out in the end. To have someone look at that carefully tended thing that wasn't meant for outside eyes, and to say, "That's something to share."
I want to make something to share.
Do I need to think of it more like it was something personal of mine? Some part of me that can live without ever seeing the light of day and that would all right? Because I don't see that way. My writing has never been any more mine than the ideas that came to me. I don't make up things. Whenever I do, they seem small and ugly in comparison to the things I uncover. I see stories like they are truths, previously unexamined and unexplored areas that come to light with the assistance of a knowing guide. I don't write these things. I discover them, and then I show them to everyone. They're not mine to keep, and so it becomes a responsibilty to share them. And that's where the burden comes. They live! They live without me, they existed before me, they'll exist when I'm gone. They want me to tell their story, if I can. But I don't have control over them. I'm just the spectator who stumbled across them one day when I wasn't paying attention. I see them, I write about what I see.
But what happens when I don't see? When the difficulties and stress of the life I only grudgingly live (the monotonous and unforgiving office job, the bills I pay without understanding why) are too much to slough off in pursuit of my escapist land where my characters live? What happens when a wall starts to get built there, and brick by brick, it's more difficult for me to see into their lives and their hearts? What happens when I forget them for awhile? Do they forget me too?
I have a strange land inside my head. That's nothing new. Tolkien did too; a great sweeping middle earth, filled with language and culture and stories, so many of them that you couldn't see every layer if you tried. CS Lewis created a world too. Madeline L'Engle. Piers Anthony. It's their place, it's where they live when they're happy. I have that place too. But what if I can't always get in? What if the wardrobe doesn't always open for me? What then?
What then for me?
It's funny to me to think of writers who didn't intend to start out that way. Writers who had an idea and just lived with it; thought about it and cared for it like it was a child. And then to have it actually work out in the end. To have someone look at that carefully tended thing that wasn't meant for outside eyes, and to say, "That's something to share."
I want to make something to share.
Do I need to think of it more like it was something personal of mine? Some part of me that can live without ever seeing the light of day and that would all right? Because I don't see that way. My writing has never been any more mine than the ideas that came to me. I don't make up things. Whenever I do, they seem small and ugly in comparison to the things I uncover. I see stories like they are truths, previously unexamined and unexplored areas that come to light with the assistance of a knowing guide. I don't write these things. I discover them, and then I show them to everyone. They're not mine to keep, and so it becomes a responsibilty to share them. And that's where the burden comes. They live! They live without me, they existed before me, they'll exist when I'm gone. They want me to tell their story, if I can. But I don't have control over them. I'm just the spectator who stumbled across them one day when I wasn't paying attention. I see them, I write about what I see.
But what happens when I don't see? When the difficulties and stress of the life I only grudgingly live (the monotonous and unforgiving office job, the bills I pay without understanding why) are too much to slough off in pursuit of my escapist land where my characters live? What happens when a wall starts to get built there, and brick by brick, it's more difficult for me to see into their lives and their hearts? What happens when I forget them for awhile? Do they forget me too?
I have a strange land inside my head. That's nothing new. Tolkien did too; a great sweeping middle earth, filled with language and culture and stories, so many of them that you couldn't see every layer if you tried. CS Lewis created a world too. Madeline L'Engle. Piers Anthony. It's their place, it's where they live when they're happy. I have that place too. But what if I can't always get in? What if the wardrobe doesn't always open for me? What then?
What then for me?
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