Browsing All Posts filed under »Books & Writing«

Philosophy of Writing – 14.1 – A Sample

August 13, 2012 by

1

As this short story develops, I’ll post edits. I imagine this will help regular readers see how I approach editing. Drafting There ‘s was a tree, in a our woods, tht that lets that will would send you to sleep. We learnt to grow cultivate it – my mother’s family – to cor crossbreed it with oaks so the trunks grow […]

Philosophy of Writing – 13 – Waiting

August 13, 2012 by

0

Writing about waiting is writing about nothing. I can wax lyrical all I like about negative space but I can’t meaningfully describe a vacuum. The brain isn’t fond of lacks, naughts, loves or negatives. Blog posts that catch writers mid-suspension list symptoms of a human brain occupying non-coordinates: insecurity – my writing is awful egomania […]

The State of Self-Promotion

August 6, 2012 by

2

He introduces me as “a writer” to his friends. I want accuracy – I say in his native tongue, clumsily, that I earn nothing. I’d like to say that I often feel like a racehorse at the starting block: Let me show you how I can run, watching other races, pacing, for months and years, while my […]

Philosophy of Writing – 12 – Obsession

May 27, 2012 by

1

You imagine what people will say, but they always say things you never expected, because word sludge is pulled through their sillystraw brains in an entirely different set of loops than through your neural spaghetti, right? Because each person is a universe, and Cosmo can’t tell you shit about what your man thinks. I brace myself, […]

Philosophy of Writing – 11 – Concentration

April 18, 2012 by

4

I used to sneak frozen orange syrup. My mother liked her juice watered-down, so the only reason I got in trouble was because I couldn’t open those paper cans without making everything sticky; they had to be thrown away. Frozen orange concentrate tastes like stars. I can’t eat more than a spoonful. I was worried […]

Philosophy of Writing – 10 – Wordcount

April 12, 2012 by

1

Most authors should cut. They embed tiny fragments of complex, fragrant chocolate into warm bread dough so sparsely they can barely be tasted–then draw a line through the points with a butter knife to emphasise their effort. Here! Look! Here are the good bits. I meticulously fashion a mask of silver thread and beaten gold, jewels […]

Philosophy of Writing – 9 – Depression

April 10, 2012 by

2

I’m not. I can’t. Really. Thank you for the lovely words. Thank you for the things you told me. They’re not true. You told me it’s beautiful. I don’t know how that happened. I worked hard, yes, I did, but you. You said it was beautiful. I can’t have done this thing I’ve already done, because that […]

Music and Writing – Six

April 1, 2012 by

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Peaches: your characters are high on dangerous substances like sex & adrenaline. Peaches: every scene you write is angry.

Philosophy of Writing – 8 – A Case Study

March 17, 2012 by

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I’m going off-script now. I’m going to need you. Now we get up to our elbows in blood and bone, together. In a few days, I’m going to start a series of professionally relevant, deeply difficult edits. Publishing, so I gather, is a business that keeps its cards close to its chest; I don’t want […]

Philosophy of Writing – 7 – Skim Editing

March 14, 2012 by

4

This is the second and final post that will cover flavours of editing that I inflict on my own manuscripts but that I don’t see referenced anywhere else. My previous post dealt with how our perceptions of words will change dependent on what physical medium they’re presented on; in that post I suggest an editing step that […]

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