Bouncing Off It and Getting Back In, OR, It is Hopeless; You Must

May the Hello, Reader. humble scribe here.

What follows: a real-time attempt to communicate experience. It's an experience that may be relevant to some of you, if you write. Or, in fact, engage in any effort that's similarly shaped.

Let's at the outset define the term: 'write'.

The useful definition—the definition that applies to all of your humble scribe's discussion of 'writing', however glancing—is inclusive and jerky.

The inclusive part is: if you write, you write. Ha! Not helpful! Meaning: if you sit down, in the absence of external distractions except those that (inevitably) your brain smuggled in; if you try for periods of sustained diligent focus to create works that are meant to be whole and complete unto themselves; optimally if these sessions string together to create large-scale wholes that a Reader must herself attend to over many sessions of reading [this part, the large-scale part, is not required; just an accentuation of the other qualities]; if you, in these period of sustained focus, think in some kind of way (your own way, no doubt) about the form and format of the language you are using, about the vehicle of your language as a thing unto itself, not simply as an instrumental substrate for your semantic content...

then: you write.

That was a lot of words to describe what is, like pornography, an elusive but really not-that-complex thing. If you think that you do it you probably do it.

Caveat (remember: the definition is both inclusive and jerky) — you have to sit; focus; do the writing. With the words, and the scribbling/typing/erasing/writing other words/etc.

Thinking about writing and story: not writing. Even a lot of that: not writing. Daydreaming about it constantly, weaving threads in your mind: not writing. Your humble scribe does these things, of course; constantly! And most people experience it, and (he hazards to guess) every person who winds up doing actual writing does it. But just having ideas for a story, with
gosh that should happen and
yes! that is neat and
but no time at the desk, no time: words, shuttered, focus.
Not writing.
That is called being a 'Creative Producer'. Or something. And—in all seriousness—it is great. It's an important thing, for the world. If that is you—there are, I know, a few of you out there—thank you.

And obviously, many people have both things inside them. This is not about some strange top-down designation of who you 'are'; we are all many things. It's about what you are doing and do, and how praxis constitutes lived identity: moment-to-moment, day-to-day.

Alright, let's start again.

Perhaps you write; statistically speaking, based on in-person knowledge of Readers herein, there is a (exact figure) 78% chance that you do.

And if you are like me, like your humble scribe here: even though you indeed write (or perhaps: because you do), you have to do [other things]. You do these things to remain viable in this world as a functioning adult; you engage or allow yourself to be engaged in various other activities for which remuneration is reliably forthcoming.

This describes your humble scribe's position, certainly; and slimbuttons will no doubt be jabbering at you about those experiences in the coming weeks. Because the first two moons of the new year are a time when your humble scribe is particularly wrapped up in these [other things]; this 'work'. And let's be clear, here: your scribe's not a punk; he does not imagine that his situation is a novel, remarkable, or regrettable. But it is disruptive, of course, to the praxis of writing. He's using that work on purpose, here: praxis. It's a fussy word; why not just say 'practice'? Because in its difference and distinction by usage it, praxis, carries a certain set of connotations that 'practice' does not, while also being unburdened by other, less useful for right now, meanings. Praxis is what we mean, presently speaking.

What this post is about is: your humble scribe's personal praxis of writing in balance with challenges, [other things]: life.  For much of the year since the calendar turned, this is the balancing act he's been in; it's one he'll be in 'till the worst of this year's cold is over and through (in the Northern Hemisphere, at least; on this shard, at least). We're all in it, of course, constantly; but this is a period of during which—for your humble scribe—these issues are pressing.

[[Bouncing Off It and Getting Back In]]

You lose it, if too much of your day—of your time, thought, and effort—is spent outside the work. This, for your humble scribe, is just a reality; he has learned not to beat himself up about it too badly (even though it is, probably, a function of his own weakness). But it's a reality, for him; the writer's-retreat state of being deep inside the work, of having it running all times in your mind, of laying down bricks in a structure you can see—a structure you can see even where it's not yet built...you lose it, if you have to do lots of [other things]. You just do!

And part of the reality your scribe's come to recognize is the unavoidable, frustrating, but also passing bumpiness of the reëntry period. To be specific: during a recent trip, a trip that was part of these other activities, he was able to take a few hours each morning with Emmy, Rich, Stang, Erra, etc. — the crew. The limitations and importance of that, of these few snatched hours, will be discussed at the bottom of this post. What we're talking about here is now, these days when he's come back home between the various trips for these other activities that constitute so much of his year's first two months. And in this brief furlough, his time's much more his own. But it is frustrating, at least at first, because: having been 'taken out of it' by the trip he's returned from; having, despite his best efforts, lost certain threads of attention and continuity and flow; the first couple of days back are...Reader, they're not good. The header for this section is 'bouncing off it' because that is exactly what it feels like; it's not that words won't come, or even that thoughts and ideas have been lost. It's that thoughts, ideas, words, structures, everything skitters in every direction, a hard but thin stream of what is inside my head hitting some newly-constructed wall, some obstacle that has erected itself beween the inside of my head and the rest of the world, between my head and the work and its essential nature, and so all the thoughts, ideas, words, structures, everything hit that and scatter and spray and diffuse. They bounce off it, away; they attenuate, echo, and fade and then die.

This is not, in itself, a big problem per se. At the best of times, ~94% of the thoughts, ideas, words, etc. that your scribe thinks of are complete total rubbish; and these periods of returning full-time to the work are hardly the best of times, so it's possible that it is even a blessing that his efforts are, for a time, obliterated. But what is bad is that the praxis must be rebuilt; the capacity to usefully sit—with breaks, but consistently—for hours a day with the work and do work: lay track, produce outcomes, 'get things done'. That gets broken, replaced by this splashy diffuse mess. And the only solution that your humble scribe has come up with for this is...no solution. There is no thing you can do, beyond: doing the thing.

Sit.
Fail.
Trash.
Sit.
Fail.
Fail.
BOUNCE. Nothing. Splat.
Sit.
Fail.
Trash.
Bounce.
Sit.
Fail.
Fail.
Fail.

Just...until one of those 'Fails' becomes, if not not a 'Fail', at least a 'Fail' that has some tiny something inside it: some speck of something that breaks through the wall of inattention and distance that's arisen between you and the work, hooks into the gnarled mess of threads (story, character, plot, theme) all contained in the work, and begins to tug them out—or, more accurately, tug you in.

A famous scribe on your shard, whose impressions in clay are still much read and loved, even now long long after his return to dark water, expressed an excellent thought which—Reader, brace yourself—the Internet has basically mangled. In his own quest for stories about...dogs? and men in cold places? let's move on In his own quest for hist stories, Jack London found that, herewith (orange highlight is our focus):

This is by Jack London, from a magazine called The Editor. The essay is entitled "Getting Into Print", and it was published in the March, 1903 edition. Image credit is gratefully given to The Harry Ransom Center at UT Austin.

This is an obvious truth, of course; at least 'obvious' now that we've all grown up with this quote (or: an adulterated, simplified version of it) popping up popularly in various places. It feels especially true in these periods of reëntry; during these periods—and here your scribe will use London's 'club', but perhaps in a different manner than that rather sanguinary scribe had in mind—during these periods, you take your club and you smash it to smithereens over and over against the stupid dumb wall between you and the work, and eventually eventually: a hairline crack, and you slither through, and you are in.

[[It is Hopeless; You Must]]

On this recent trip, the one from which your humble scribe's just returned, the one for [other things] — as noted, your
pointless, but better than nothing things slimbuttons does; the takeaways; how you handle them;

it is hopeless, it is useful

this is about the work you were doing in Aransas Pass, but could also apply to your work while you're TAing.


The idea is: it is hopeless, because grabbing 2-4 hours a day just isn't enough to make progress. Even perfect hours, that's not enough to really drive progress. And if they're compromised hours; well -- no chance.


BUT, it's also worth noting, or has to be noted, that it is so much better than not doing that; you keep connected and so much more tapped into the work. You don't lose it, and you 'don't backslide (as much).


it is hopeless, it is useful.

May the Hello, Reader. humble scribe here.

What follows: a real-time attempt to communicate experience. It's an experience that may be relevant to some of you, if you write. Or, in fact, engage in any effort that's similarly shaped.

Let's at the outset define the term: 'write'.

The useful definition—the definition that applies to all of your humble scribe's discussion of 'writing', however glancing—is inclusive and jerky.

The inclusive part is: if you write, you write. Ha! Not helpful! Meaning: if you sit down, in the absence of external distractions except those that (inevitably) your brain smuggled in; if you try for periods of sustained diligent focus to create works that are meant to be whole and complete unto themselves; optimally if these sessions string together to create large-scale wholes that a Reader must herself attend to over many sessions of reading [this part, the large-scale part, is not required; just an accentuation of the other qualities]; if you, in these period of sustained focus, think in some kind of way (your own way, no doubt) about the form and format of the language you are using, about the vehicle of your language as a thing unto itself, not simply as an instrumental substrate for your semantic content...

then: you write.

That was a lot of words to describe what is, like pornography, an elusive but really not-that-complex thing. If you think that you do it you probably do it.

Caveat (remember: the definition is both inclusive and jerky) — you have to sit; focus; do the writing. With the words, and the scribbling/typing/erasing/writing other words/etc.

Thinking about writing and story: not writing. Even a lot of that: not writing. Daydreaming about it constantly, weaving threads in your mind: not writing. Your humble scribe does these things, of course; constantly! And most people experience it, and (he hazards to guess) every person who winds up doing actual writing does it. But just having ideas for a story, with
gosh that should happen and
yes! that is neat and
but no time at the desk, no time: words, shuttered, focus.
Not writing.
That is called being a 'Creative Producer'. Or something. And—in all seriousness—it is great. It's an important thing, for the world. If that is you—there are, I know, a few of you out there—thank you.

And obviously, many people have both things inside them. This is not about some strange top-down designation of who you 'are'; we are all many things. It's about what you are doing and do, and how praxis constitutes lived identity: moment-to-moment, day-to-day.

Alright, let's start again.

Perhaps you write; statistically speaking, based on in-person knowledge of Readers herein, there is a (exact figure) 78% chance that you do.

And if you are like me, like your humble scribe here: even though you indeed write (or perhaps: because you do), you have to do [other things]. You do these things to remain viable in this world as a functioning adult; you engage or allow yourself to be engaged in various other activities for which remuneration is reliably forthcoming.

This describes your humble scribe's position, certainly; and slimbuttons will no doubt be jabbering at you about those experiences in the coming weeks. Because the first two moons of the new year are a time when your humble scribe is particularly wrapped up in these [other things]; this 'work'. And let's be clear, here: your scribe's not a punk; he does not imagine that his situation is a novel, remarkable, or regrettable. But it is disruptive, of course, to the praxis of writing. He's using that work on purpose, here: praxis. It's a fussy word; why not just say 'practice'? Because in its difference and distinction by usage it, praxis, carries a certain set of connotations that 'practice' does not, while also being unburdened by other, less useful for right now, meanings. Praxis is what we mean, presently speaking.

What this post is about is: your humble scribe's personal praxis of writing in balance with challenges, [other things]: life.  For much of the year since the calendar turned, this is the balancing act he's been in; it's one he'll be in 'till the worst of this year's cold is over and through (in the Northern Hemisphere, at least; on this shard, at least). We're all in it, of course, constantly; but this is a period of during which—for your humble scribe—these issues are pressing.

[[Bouncing Off It and Getting Back In]]

You lose it, if too much of your day—of your time, thought, and effort—is spent outside the work. This, for your humble scribe, is just a reality; he has learned not to beat himself up about it too badly (even though it is, probably, a function of his own weakness). But it's a reality, for him; the writer's-retreat state of being deep inside the work, of having it running all times in your mind, of laying down bricks in a structure you can see—a structure you can see even where it's not yet built...you lose it, if you have to do lots of [other things]. You just do!

And part of the reality your scribe's come to recognize is the unavoidable, frustrating, but also passing bumpiness of the reëntry period. To be specific: during a recent trip, a trip that was part of these other activities, he was able to take a few hours each morning with Emmy, Rich, Stang, Erra, etc. — the crew. The limitations and importance of that, of these few snatched hours, will be discussed at the bottom of this post. What we're talking about here is now, these days when he's come back home between the various trips for these other activities that constitute so much of his year's first two months. And in this brief furlough, his time's much more his own. But it is frustrating, at least at first, because: having been 'taken out of it' by the trip he's returned from; having, despite his best efforts, lost certain threads of attention and continuity and flow; the first couple of days back are...Reader, they're not good. The header for this section is 'bouncing off it' because that is exactly what it feels like; it's not that words won't come, or even that thoughts and ideas have been lost. It's that thoughts, ideas, words, structures, everything skitters in every direction, a hard but thin stream of what is inside my head hitting some newly-constructed wall, some obstacle that has erected itself beween the inside of my head and the rest of the world, between my head and the work and its essential nature, and so all the thoughts, ideas, words, structures, everything hit that and scatter and spray and diffuse. They bounce off it, away; they attenuate, echo, and fade and then die.

This is not, in itself, a big problem per se. At the best of times, ~94% of the thoughts, ideas, words, etc. that your scribe thinks of are complete total rubbish; and these periods of returning full-time to the work are hardly the best of times, so it's possible that it is even a blessing that his efforts are, for a time, obliterated. But what is bad is that the praxis must be rebuilt; the capacity to usefully sit—with breaks, but consistently—for hours a day with the work and do work: lay track, produce outcomes, 'get things done'. That gets broken, replaced by this splashy diffuse mess. And the only solution that your humble scribe has come up with for this is...no solution. There is no thing you can do, beyond: doing the thing.

Sit.
Fail.
Trash.
Sit.
Fail.
Fail.
BOUNCE. Nothing. Splat.
Sit.
Fail.
Trash.
Bounce.
Sit.
Fail.
Fail.
Fail.

Just...until one of those 'Fails' becomes, if not not a 'Fail', at least a 'Fail' that has some tiny something inside it: some speck of something that breaks through the wall of inattention and distance that's arisen between you and the work, hooks into the gnarled mess of threads (story, character, plot, theme) all contained in the work, and begins to tug them out—or, more accurately, tug you in.

A famous scribe on your shard, whose impressions in clay are still much read and loved, even now long long after his return to dark water, expressed an excellent thought which—Reader, brace yourself—the Internet has basically mangled. In his own quest for stories about...dogs? and men in cold places? let's move on In his own quest for hist stories, Jack London found that, herewith (orange highlight is our focus):

This is by Jack London, from a magazine called The Editor. The essay is entitled "Getting Into Print", and it was published in the March, 1903 edition. Image credit is gratefully given to The Harry Ransom Center at UT Austin.

This is an obvious truth, of course; at least 'obvious' now that we've all grown up with this quote (or: an adulterated, simplified version of it) popping up popularly in various places. It feels especially true in these periods of reëntry; during these periods—and here your scribe will use London's 'club', but perhaps in a different manner than that rather sanguinary scribe had in mind—during these periods, you take your club and you smash it to smithereens over and over against the stupid dumb wall between you and the work, and eventually eventually: a hairline crack, and you slither through, and you are in.

[[It is Hopeless; You Must]]

On this recent trip, the one from which your humble scribe's just returned, the one for [other things] — as noted, your
pointless, but better than nothing things slimbuttons does; the takeaways; how you handle them;

it is hopeless, it is useful

this is about the work you were doing in Aransas Pass, but could also apply to your work while you're TAing.


The idea is: it is hopeless, because grabbing 2-4 hours a day just isn't enough to make progress. Even perfect hours, that's not enough to really drive progress. And if they're compromised hours; well -- no chance.


BUT, it's also worth noting, or has to be noted, that it is so much better than not doing that; you keep connected and so much more tapped into the work. You don't lose it, and you 'don't backslide (as much).


it is hopeless, it is useful.

I Cannot Overstate the Preposterousness of This

A theme of this series—'this' 'series' being me, humble scribe (hello. it me.) writing about the process of channeling the work that you, Reader, know as Erra's Throne—

a theme of this series is:

things that many people,
your humble scribe most absolutely included,
have had the good fortune to be taught
about writing
since they were in many cases rather young;
things like 'show, don't tell';
'don't overwrite; or, if you do, go back and edit'; or, conversely,
'your best arguments and material may be buried behind many words of much less good material; be disciplined: sit down and work your way through';
all these things that, honestly, your humble scribe
has been blessed with the extraordinary good fortune
of having been taught by teachers
and even guided on by peers
since a very young age...

a theme of this 'series', perhaps the theme of this series,
is what a hard f#*king time I still have with these things.

This is why, Reader-friend, your scribe (me) is 'humble'. I have many faults, as a writer and person, but I promise that—at least in this case—affectation's not one. The humility's true and extremely well-earned; I am a broken vessel, and the best I can hope for is to patch, somewhat, some of the cracks in my making.

Thank you for journeying with me as I do!

I'll return, further down, to one of these simple lessons and my (latest) failure to learn it. But first,

A Digression about Putting Words in the World
I've written eight (8) posts about the process of writing Erra's Throne, including one in November 2017 (fourteen months ago) in which I first articulated and embodied this persona in this space.

I have drafted 49 posts, some of them hundreds or even thousands of words long (I originally typo'ed that to "hundreds of thousands of words long" which...l0l. It's not that bad), as part of 'this' ostensible 'series' of observations about the process of &c.

And, in fact, in addition to those 49 unpublished drafts, there are...wait holdon lemme...twenty (20) drafts in a Scrivener folder dedicated to this ostensible u get it.

The backlog of posts is not quite so bad as summation implies; there is some overlap between these two collections, and therefore the total of unpublished work in this vein is not quite 49 + 20 = 69. But, it is close. Close enough that the point, as I'm making it, stands: there's a lot of writing sitting around in some digital shed gathering dust. And what is striking about this, to me, for today, is that it is this kind of writing we're talking about:

loose, experiential, first-person commentary; the kind of writing that is supposed to (and does, indeed) flow rather easily and—more to the point—not require fine-tuning, chiseling, improvement;

writing that is instrumental and communicative rather than experiential and/or immersive;

'just talking 2 u' writing, rather than the carefully wrought (for worse, and for better) prose that shows you, dear Reader, the story of Emmy, and Stang, and of Erra.

I'm not sure why this is: why even this casual side-commentary seems to be trapped in the bēt ṭuppi of rigor and effort that still houses the prose of the story itself. I'm not sure why I have held onto it in this way. It's understandable with the prose of the story; perhaps not right, even in that case—that's another topic; let's not get diverted—but absolutely understandable: I can give an account for why the text of the story (for worse, and for better) is precious and takes certain work, certain iterations (many) to be ready.

But this stuff? Right here? This is meant to be not precious; meaning, in this case, both the positive and negative senses of that word (hopefully, with respect to the prose of the story itself, the negative sense attains...minimally, if that. I'm trying. ☺). It's easy, not hard; this. And it is: easy.

Yet.

I've got dozens and dozens of these posts, unpublished. Long posts, complete thoughts. Because they...needed a little more work, or weren't formatted yet, or...whatever! wutever.

I'm not sure I can articulate—in a real, useful way—what the holdup is. With any of this; certainly, not with this part. I was and am eager to open the process, to open myself to you, Reader, in this way.

I don't have more to say on this. That's where this is. w8, no— one thing, one more thing. That's pretty important:

Amidst all the work and the months and the years, it has also...not 'always', but 'usually' felt, in such a way that yes I think the feeling-of-this is real:

It's usually felt like I am making progress at something. ('At what?' Separate question.) That I am doing something material and real and that, in fact, the day may arrive—unexpectedly, perhaps—when the dominoes all are aligned and...tip:

down they go.

Okay. Enough of that. Back to:

"What is the 'This' That's 'Preposterous', scribe?"
⇑ That is you, Reader,
asking me—scribe—a question.
Here goes:

So, yes, the title of this post could apply to the section above: to the strange mystery of these posts, themselves, still being stuck in a locker. But don't worry, it in fact has a more defined and specific contextual meaning that

oh gosh Todd Snider has a new song that's fantastic

applies to a particular 'this' that's et cetera.

Lemme just plug it out; it'll be rough but hey hey here we go at least we're 2gether.

"just get there, just do it
and then…write something else"

That's the note I wrote. What it means:

"just get there, just do it..."

This is me saying to myself "don't mess around, don't write in extra stuff or digressions along the way, just get to the main story event and tell that, quick as you can."

I have 'realized' this so many times. So, so many. Honestly, I 'realize' this with the force and weight of a great new insight...mmm, two or three times a week? Honestly. I'm not kidding. I'm emphasizing both the repetition and novelty of this because what is 'preposterous' is the force and durability of its contrary, of this other thing in me and my...creative reflexes, let's call them. What I mean by this latter, 'preposterous' thing is

"and then...write something else"
Meaning the fact that, no matter how well I know that it's a bad idea, this impulse I feel

to 'build up' the story for the reader;
thicken it with events, with world-stuff—
all of which is done in a spirit of creative reflex (ugh) and 'inspiration' (UGH)—
this impulse is powerful and often commands me.

And my point here
is that this? This impulse?
It is bad. So bad that, @ this point, let's call it 'preposterous'. 

It's 'preposterous', yes, (a) cuz I already know it. And the...fortitude of my ability to make the same mistakes over and over is shocking.

But why is it 'bad'? What's the substantive reason? I'm not just saying so, or kicking myself for no thing. It's bad because it is hard enough—more than hard enough—to just tell the absolute essential story. You may have to write a bunch to, y'know, find that story. But once you've found it, even then — it's still hard! You're not done! It is not like the hard part is like...even half done! There is still lots of challenging (for me, at least!) work to do.

(I feel I may have written this sentiment, or a very similar sentiment, before in this space. I probably will again. Which...that's the point, right? Preposterous.)

And since I know this by now
since I know that
just writing the story is hard
this impulse to stack things above and before it
becomes not just 'bad'
but 'bizarre', 'perverse',
'preposterous'
et cetera.

Putting in an extra little setup fight
before the main fight ("just so it's not y'know klunky, abrupt");

adding some detail
of lore or world-building ("just so y'know it's not just flop: 'heyhey, all dun'")'

all that,
is bad!
uses time!
lessens story!

And you have to go back, take it out — make things better.

Yet despite this awareness, I'm continually doing it.
Add a thing; throw a paragraph in that oh, okay; two paragraphs...three
because it's not as if these digressions and distractions need to be long to be damaging to the story and the flow and the reader's attention;
a switch on a train track is a tiny, small thing
when compared to the miles, miles of track all around it
but a mis-aligned switch...
well, you get it:

train. lost.

Putting things into stories or art makes them...different. It is not just additive; it never is, just. It changes and reconstitutes everything in them; things that go before, even, and absolutely things ager. You put in more stuff: the story itself changes — it becomes a new thing.

So you have to be diligent, 'bout what goes in.

Here's the specific occasion that set me off on this (this time).

We're in Column Two.

What's 'happening' is reasonably simple, or should be.

The action-y climax of this part of the story
is a long sequence in which

• Emmy seeks Rich out at school, cuz she thinks she may need him to do [important thing]
• She talks him into doing [important thing] with her 
• They succeed! They do [important thing]
• Which leads to [climactic battle]
• Which leads to [Emmy's key realization in this column],
• which leads to a [Big Choice which has Big Effects].

Now I started this riff by calling all that simple. And...it is. Those literal plot-beats above are plot beats; you could do that with lots of stories at this level of detail and you'd get this bump-bump-bump sense of this "this, then this, then this..." (It's actually worse in narratives that aren't 'plotty'; try doing a beat-by-beat breakdown of Hamlet).

But it's not that simple, either. Of course: I know that. Especially because all those [things in the brackets] are crucial story moments that really need to land with you, the Reader, for the story to land. And for that to happen, it will really help if you—the Reader—have been served by the prose thusly:

1. equipped with the knowledge (even if you don't 'know' it) required to make [thing in bracket] make sense; and hopefully more than just 'make sense', but matter;
2. guided into an affective or emotional state such that you're receptive to whatever kind of [thing in brackets] is happening (exciting! tender! et cetera); and
3. not freaking distracted by a bunch of other stuff that might clog up both your intellectual and emotional relationship to what's going on!

And now, again, we get back to 'preposterous'. Because: this is what I mean. (1), (2), and (3) are all...fundamental. Right? A good sixth-grade teacher with solid classroom resources could get his kids to come up with this list in discussion.

And yet! And yet...astonishing, frustrating, "preposterous": I add superfluous stuff to the flow! To the bulleted [things in the story], above, I add [off-track other things]! Details! Freaking...extras. In this specific case, my main (and repeated. repeated.) mistake has been to be like, "Oh okay cool good. Emmy and Rich did the [important thing]. They're heading to [climactic battle]. Good, great. Hey: I better put some [extra battle] and [stuff] in there."

????

What the...how am I like this? Reader, honestly, how? What on earth the matter with...what you write the story about is what the story is about. So, um, don't write the story about things that are not the story? Maybe? Might help? Dunno.

And look, yes I know, there are things that I'm...papering. Exploration is important; so is making mistakes. Because they're not mistakes, lots of them; they are steps in a process. But. The reliability with which I do this, is past that. I think? Or is it, a form of...

honestly. i don't know.

Let me wrap this, here. But: there you go. This is one reason why, when people gently and carefully ask if the reason that Erra is taking so long is 'writer's block' or some metaphor for lack of flow, action, volume — when people (gently! carefully! understandably!) frame this, I tend to give something along the lines of a harsher-than-intentional blast of grim laugh. It has edge in it that I never intend at the person — though I know I still shouldn't do it, and am still sorry if I've ever done it to you. But...no. No. The issue is not, not blockage in that sense; there are plenty of words and actions and events; even plenty of character moments, choices. And plenty of 'world-building'. 'World-building' is junk.

No: the issues is burning off all of that excess. Getting down to the thing of, just...story. words. Reader. So it's all strong and legible. Affecting. And clear.

Okay! That is it! 4 real now: I am done. I've done my best to make this clear; I am sure that I've failed and that it's still riddled with errors and infelicities, as well as being sprawling, strange, discursive, and odd.

And so I thank you, always, for coming along. Even if you just skipped to those big words, below. You can have them. Even if you're not reading (though: not sure how that'd work).

Thank you.

Here's to talking more in this new year.

game, game on.

Tale of Fades

This post, Reader, deals with the pressing of clay. The actual pressing; the placing of story into tablet/slate form, using the stylus you know as CSS.

Erra's Throne—as you know, Reader—is native to this format. The 'digital' format; it is designed for consumption on tablets and slates, on handheld devices of diverse form and preference.

Your humble scribe has assayed, therefore, to learn this "CSS" to the best of his (extremely limited) ability. This being essential to the practical craft of conveying the story of warrior Emmy, Richard her vanguard, and the diverse many others of whom the tale tells.

One of the first pieces of wisdom that one gleans, undertaking this, is that too much prescription from the scribe herself is bad, in this context. Meaning with respect to how the text is styled and presented to you, the Reader. Because one of the delights of our tablets, our slates, is that they allow the reading experience to be customized. The Reader can make the text bigger or smaller; a black or white background (or Sepia, or...green!); a different typeface. All of this is for the good and

in the words themselves

, as you begin to investigate how to customize and create with scribe gleaned as he assayed the task
 they caution you not to set things — font types, sizes, colors — but rather to scale relative preferences
immediately on-board for sizes and, 95% of the time, font (no prescription of regular)
but color!
so, fades
exhaustive!
tried to automate it with CSS gradient functions but they broke in various ways
so, did it that way

so…after 2.5 years
takes the Lizard to make me aware of inversion issue
i.e., that for some appreciable % of readers this way of doing fades has never worked
doesn't work in inversion; white text (what the "fade" faded to or from)…well, it shows up quite clearly on black, does it not?
so these lines do an even crazier thing, cuz they don't invert, they like bottom out and snap back, cuz as it goes to the greys it actually gets more obscure (against black bckgd, remember) THEN snaps to default.

l
o
l

so, quickly figured out a thing that worked: opacity
a manual opacity gradient worked on both Android and iOS devices, against all backgrounds (white, black, sepia, green)
but: remember above how i'd tried to automate this earlier, or at least make it cleaner and less labor-intensive in re: coding? the goal being to find something where i don't have to style code every single letter but rather can apply a gradient effect to a field
well, i have gotten a bit better at CSS
i could do it, now!

but: could use linear gradient? faster?
no, because linear gradient is for color, and that's the point — any set color distinction gets screwed up by user preference, inversion, etc.
the projectionist has final cut

BUT! tricksy way found used online in a few places (that i did not, of course, invent; magpie raven scouring the flow for gems glinting in the currents, snatching them up with gratitude)
allowed gradient for opacity (actually, 'transparency' was the operator, but…)
but…
not using it!
still not sure why but
main problem was: perhaps because cleverly applied a background block into text, it didn't break like text; it got messed up
i like messing up line breaks (white-space:nowrap!)
but only when that's the point
these were actually particularly bad lines to further obscure in this way
secondary problem, equally disqualifying: actually did the same thing in Android (not iOS); on black, full text was visible just plain, i.e. the whole phrase that was meant to be faded into or out of was just there, white-text plain and fully visible, no effect

so…opacity it is
codin' EACH LETTER.

before you ask: i realized, three years ago, that the smart way to do this (the CSS stuff) would be to be mindful of up-front time investments that felt like they were delaying writing but were in fact timesavers because they would spare me having to, for instance, style code each letter for fade sequences.
and i have found many such things!
i have even overcome my double reticence to do this, because i quite enjoy tinkering around with and learning the css style coding stuff, so it's a high risk of becoming a form of semi-justified procrastination
but i powered through all that and have put in work!

just…well i mean, look. i never said i was good @ this stuff.

Crowbar

[[May the great gods bless you always,
may the heavens & earth calm your mind.]]

Reader -- it's I, humble scribe. Your humble scribe.

Here is how this will work.

A timer is set for 71 minutes. At that timer's conclusion, these words will be posted. Etched into clay for (lol) posterity. I, their poor and inadequate author, will be permitted to add links to any words that must go out to the webs; perhaps if, in doing so, I see a literal word that is literally missing I will be allowed to supply it. I will be honest about that, and limit myself to that.

That's all.

Let's go.

Quoted immediately below is an introductory digression that was written when there was all the time to write this (and, consequently, it sat unfinished for weeks). You could skip it, perhaps should! But it will remain -- in full candor.

I had wanted to do this like, perfect. Like: "wow." Thoughts fully formed, novel & familiar, about (ahem) 'the process.' Arguments, observations, feelings, granularities of the transmission through prose of event, person, experience. I wanted this to be good because I wanted it to be useful to you; because I was and am aware of an inherent selfishness in my own motivations, a solipsistic unburdening. 

So, but, oh well. Fair warning: these thoughts aren't fully formed; they're not novel; they probably are familiar. 

Basically, what you're getting is the solipsism. In which--who knows--perhaps you will also find pieces of you. 

Here we go.

I want to write about something I've taken to calling crowbarring. Meaning, basically, 'forcing in, in an ill-advised and undesirable way.'

Here's an introduction, in the form of me losing my $h1t @ myself.

These are selected notes from various unspecified locations of a read-through I recently completed of (the latest drafts of) [[the first five columns of Erra's Throne.]]

o my G*d

you're just adding more stuff

all this is just adding more stuff

no more

write

NO it doesn't work, James. This way of doing it, sneaking it in with "good" writing because it's ostensibly an observation that builds world and character The observation rings hollow, because it's the product of ulterior, expositional motives And the exposition is not even clear it's dishonest, and the reader knows; even if she does not know, she knows

you want to put in a note re: all these efforts, each time, where you try to crowbar in information
and do something "interesting" or formally cute, as if that will make it okay
it does not
it is crowbarred in nonsense
who cares if they get the Sibitti stuff
who cares if they…anything backstory, backdrop
surely, obviously — none of that matters
all of these things are wrongheaded
and you know it!

my gosh it's so bad
it's so an agenda

[note: the following comment is about a different, apparently equally unsatisfactory, scene]

it's broken
you broke it
it was probably broken before, to be fair
but you broke it more

w/ your threads
and your seeding

only immediate story
it's not an ideology
it's a fact
only immediate story — anything else: fail

Alright, we're back from the reading notes, now. Ah who cares. Who cares? Who cares, who cares, cares? Do you care? You should not. Okay but no: keep going.

There are several things going on in the stream of notes, above. They are reactions against
(1) crowbarring itself, i.e., the forcing of elements into the story; but / and / also
(2) the cutesiness and nonsense that I--your humble scribe, that's me--am frequently guilty of throughout the first seven or eight or nine drafts of a thing (and, in some sad awful cases, in the drafts that are pressed into clay for your eyes).

The two notes that are red, by the way, are red basically because I got so mad. What happens is: I am reading the story on my Kindle; I make one, two, three four consecutive notes regarding the wrongheadedness or  selfishness or narcissism of some crowbarred in detail, scene-beat, or whole scene; and when it's that last one--when it's a whole scene--basically the contempt pops my cap and I write a big note in red.

A challenge in addressing this tic to "crowbar", to add too many things, is that it or it feels like two separate impulses, one of which is good and one of which is bad.

The bad one-- well actually, both may be addressed more in subsequent posts. But let's start with the bad one, which is the narcissist 'world-builders' impulse to 'get it all in'; this idea that the reader should know or should care about details of whatever alternate reality the work is set in that are outside the story. The idea that--because some aspect of that world was breathed into the author's mind by the gods--a reader would or should care at all about that.

That idea is upsetting (to me!).

But the good idea is: you want things to be clear. It's really that simple. You want things to be clear, and so 'well perhaps it would be good to introduce these facts here'-- or, honestly, it's not even that calculated. You'll simply be writing or revising, and in the natural flow will find a digression inserting itself, the idea being to explicate facts / events for the Reader.

you've used up 35 minutes

When you crowbar bad facts

The reader STILL will not get them

They won't fit

It's like throwing puzzle pieces that don't fit

On top of a puzzle

No one will get them

They don't go in the picture

And the picture is...if you can convey even that, then you're grand

Cutting Prince?

Reader:

Hello! Welcome into the week. May yours be productive, purposeful, and true.

Let's structure this entry the same as the last, namely

raw notes ⇒ Reader: "???" ⇒ explication by scribe

Herewith, therefore: raw notes.

humble scribe

o g*ds i cut prince i cut prince i cut prince!

following the text! like a curse! i cut prince!

am i going to cut him, completely forever?

yes.
when he appears, he appears.
like a quest.

+ also, the refrain: it's right. not just right, but right: solves problem down the line; makes things better.
if only this took less time!

cutting prince: something clicked — cutting out everything that is not A-plot; A A A 

not because there is no worth in the fullness
and the geeking out, "what about joy aristottle" holds
sort of
because TELLING THE A-STORY IS HARD ENOUGH
and if that fails then…honestly. then it's all masturbation. [the gods displeased; something]

separate
the stuff you cut — it's not all  bad
e.g. "Harder at altitude, in fact: gusty Wind."
this is useful! and it's not, like, an awful sentence.
so…why cut it?

These notes are drawn from the "workpad" I run during writing; the "humble scribe" at the top is a tag that alerts me that this is (rather: could be) an entry herein -- an entry herein, as distinct from the mess of pieces of dialogue, macro structural ideas, micro structural questions, and whatever just notes all related to Emmy and her ongoing story, which otherwise clutter that workpad up quick.

writing: good self editing tool

your instincts are good -- how you throw it all in
you're "throwing" smart stuff in

buuuut then it's overwritten, right? it's a big packed mess
but those "first thought best thought" pieces may indeed be the best pieces

say there are 4 of the in your first three sentences

her eyes flicker
she rubs the back of her hand with her wrist
she snuffles
blink, blink, focusing

they're your arrows
just you've stupidly, unrevisedly, shot them all out the gate
(we're deliberating sidestepping another ready metaphor here, because this blog is not a craven adolescent cesspool, thank u vry much)
but they're good thoughts!

don't HOLD ON to any
take 'em out, they are gone

buuuuuuuuut -- keep in workpad
work 'em in as you go

of course you'll have to change syllable count and perhaps swap synonyms for vowel sound or syllabic emphasis

but i don't need to tell you that, at this point

The First Pass is Always Heuristic B*llSh*t

Fallen,

Well we're doing it nearly first.

So--
no, wait.
You know what?
Reader (hey there!) y'know what?
Since the point of this exercise,
meaning these words printed on this strange, changeable clay,
(as opposed to the other, more rarefied space; Emmy's space, the space of the slip and of Erra)--
since the point of all this
is transparency, honesty,
sharing the process whatever it is...

I am going to start
by just sharing my notes.

Here they are, pasted below with blue header.

Unrevised notes, written g*ds know when (long time ago), for what has now become, in this spot, this here "post." And which have, of course, changed so much in that time! It took me a minute to find these notes, even; that was mostly because my scribal software rather spectacularly failed to find the word "heuristic" in a search (???).

Anyway:

Here they are. And don't worry: they make no sense -- I agree; correct! That's the point. We'll talk, after.

the first time is always heuristic bullshit
not do full texts, but Emmy here in c1
the thinking is simple: need and want; and—oh joy, emergent in the scene—to make clear to the reader and for the story
emmy's relationship to the lore
and how the game handles the mechanics of quest-giving, etc.
do "writing" with "phrases" that describes those things
reader, many of those phrases were b4ller. no, really. your scribe has a way with the words.
[for which may the gods chop his hands, cut his tongue]
because what you must then do
what takes forEVER
is tell that story
this is not a precis
it's not a 600-word piece of bullsh1t on the internet
it's a story
it gets told
through instantiated and specific realities
[don't show final
but do show some version of early]
and the peace and the calm that comes on when you do
for the gods have released you
you are unworthy, unskilled
your showing is doubtless unclear, clumsy, deranged
but you have not cheated anyone
no gods
nor—same—reader(s)
you are, as you are, in good faith with the world
good phrase: toil in cheap anonymity
[[there seem to be scribes who … and, to be fair, there seem to even be readers who, … to which your humble scribe has two equal and equally heartfelt responses: de gustibus non est ppl r krazy. unpack
- de gustibus; full phrase; just explain what umean
- ppl r krazy come ON. no, really. you'll be happier. i promise. u will.
compare to smokers
acknowledge insanity of comparison]] ]]

End crazy notes.

So, now, cool: let's unpack this. These notes, once again, are from months (years?) ago; that said, their main idea wholly remains. And, in fact, many snippets and fragments still stand.

That said: they clearly (haha!) make no sense. So:

In Column 1, we are learning about Emmy's new game. And, just as much, we are learning about Emmy. Who she is; what she's like; what she likes. We're learning how she functions as an agent and object of action; specifically, how she approaches these games.

In this context--learning about game; learning about our hero--there are several particularly crucial elements. Crucial elements that must be understood in a certain way. This is not true of all elements in the story; the gods aren't concerned very much with our "feelings", so many elements in this tale admit ranged understanding. But these "crucial elements" are not part of this freedom; they are elements that the Reader (you!) should be guided to see in a specific way, because if you don't then things built on them won't make much sense. [Even here, of course, there's subjective assumption: "it is more fun to read something that makes some sense." Some may not think so! Your humble scribe does.]

These "crucial elements", which must be specifically understood, include:

• Emmy's particular relationship to "lore"
• with some (minimal) explanation of what "lore" is and means in an MMORPG context
• How this game, Erra's Throne
• approaches "lore"
• approaches quest-discovery and quest-allocation; how these things are linked rather tightly to "lore"
• presents "lore" in its playing environment

And these two things--the two darker main bullets, above--are important because they sum into one crucial fact [no spoilers, of course :) ] :

• many important events as the story progresses are driven by the interaction between 
• Emmy's particular relationship to "lore"
• the game's particular handling of "lore"
• other players' differentiated (from Emmy's, and Stang's, and each others') relationship to "lore"

These things are important to plot ("what happened?" "why?" "why did [character] [do that]?"). Equally, they're important as, like...story elements ("what's this story about?" "why am I reading it?" "what did I learn? how'd it change me?" etc.).

Okay? Okay. So, at this point
these comments
will shift in their focus;
I'll do my best, Reader, to carry you through.

I encourage you now to abstract these specifics, to take a high-level and summary view of these "crucial elements". View them as a category. I went through the specifics because--for me as a Reader; and therefore for me as the humblest of scribes--a thing without specifics does not seem real at all. And I wanted this thing--these "crucial elements" as a category and concept--to seem real to you, because they are the driving need behind what I'm about to describe. But all the stuff about Emmy and the game, etc. -- you can now let that go. All you need to know going forward is that

I, as the scribe pressing words into clay
have some top-down conception of "crucial elements"
which we'll sometimes refer to as, say, [XYZ]
namely, plot/story/character elements of the whole
which I, as the scribe, have at some point decided
[or, perhaps, "realized" (if that's your view {it is mine})]
are "crucial" enough to be understood in a specific way:

I want you, the Reader, to know [XYZ].

And with this we slide in towards the heart of these thoughts.
(I am listening to this; it is very fantastic).
Because the moment I'm allowing for this category:
these "crucial" [XYZ] things the Reader "must" know;
the moment I'm allowing that guiding conviction:

"it's important for the Reader to know [XYZ]"

I'm revealing a state-of-mind
and state-of-writing-process
that will lead
almost inevitably to
what we'll call, hereafter,
instrumental writing.

Definitions! No, not violins; not "instrumental" like that. In fact, the word's first meaning (per whatever dictionary comes up when you use your search bar to get a word's definition) is the one we are using.

"Instrumental writing" meaning writing that was wrenched into existence in order to serve some preset goal/objective; in this case, say, "make sure that the Reader understands [XYZ]."

Reader, you'll have to allow some fluidity with this definition--this isn't Chemistry. It's not even Economics. But that word, "preset", is helpful and important. Certainly, any writing can be said to "serve" goal(s). Much writing, of course, quite explicitly does so: to educate, persuade, et cetera etc. And even the most felt and private of prose can be seen in this way: a journal entry that, written, remains ever secret -- in this case, perhaps, the "goal" was that the writer 'got it off her chest', or it 'helped her think through it', or just: expressed joy.

But all that's precisely why "preset" is helpful.

For instrumental writing, the goal's known going in. So, for a project (a whole project) to be instrumental overall, its goal or objective is known going in. For an op-ed, or similar piece of persuasive short prose: in most cases the writer embarks with a goal; it's specifically defined, s/he understands it quite well. This does not mean their thinking won't evolve as they work; it does not mean that the writing's not generative, creative. It is. But it means that the map and the reason are there.

This idea, instrumentality, applies equally to some fiction. If a project has a prescribèd goal at conception ("write a [movie] about [those characters from the popular book series] that will [appeal to young kids and a bit to their parents]")...that defines it. Literally. Both circumscribes and directs what it is and will be.

So now let's do a different thing. Non-instrumental writing: writing that, in its genesis, can be anything. Including, and in most cases: be nothing at all! There is no goal @ outset. Or, if there is, 'goal' must be defined in such broad sweeping terms as to be, like...who cares? "To write in my journal" is a pretty broad goal and, more importantly, doesn't redound onto the text itself -- it's a goal about practice and action, not deliverable. Writing in her journal may make this protagonist feel good; or clear her head; or think through things; whatever. But qua the thing that she writes -- no goal. Whatever! It can be long it can be short it can be coherent incoherent neither both fanciful sad whateverwhateverwhatever: she has no agenda.

She just sat down to write. Cuz...y'know? whatever. She may not even know.

Returning to fiction: this applies just as well.

In this view, sitting down to that blank page with a prescription even as specific as "Okay, I'll write a story" takes you welllllll into instrumentality and "instrumental" writing. That's where you are from the start: you're prescribed. Because you're not then just writing--

just writing because these ten lines of dialogue have been in your head for the last several days
and for one thing it's getting kind of hard to remember them
and for another they kind of are driving you crazy
and a third (fourth?) you're interested where they might go...
...and, turns out they go nowhere! oh well! done with that!

Because that riff in the voice of your sparky protagonist
a clear riff on a [topic] that [could be in story]
has been churning and churning and seems pretty good
and so yes: write it down! Flesh it out; a few...hours...
yeah okay that's fine but totally doesn't fit. done with that!

I deliberately slid, with that second example, into the context of non-instrumental writing on a preëxisting and larger project. Because that--and I know, it's taken some time to get here--is what this whole post is about. Rather, this post is about the eventual necessity of instrumental writing on even the most internally motivated, non-prescriptively defined project. Because: once there is a "project", prescriptions are in place. [Unless you want to be constantly tearing the whole thing down or changing fundamentally what it is, which I know it may look, in your humble scribe's case, is what's been going on for the last um...three years? But is not. Honestly. That is nuts. lol.]

The whole point of this piece 
is that on any project,
of any length whatsoever 
even one that begins in the most 
unforced, unprescribed, "found" and discovered way, 
if that project is a thing to be given to Readers
and especially if that project is more than, like, four lines long:

you're gonna be doing instrumental writing.

And that's hard. 
Because all your first passes 

will 
suck.

Your poem, your play, your seven-part serialized sci-fantasy novel, your memoir that began when words raced from your heart...all these might originate from unplanned inspired motion of the stylus -- a phrase you loved; a single scene; a first-moments-of-story that just leapt from your mind. BUT,

1. it's unlikely that this unreflective and instinctive rush will sustain for, say, 150k+++ words; it might sustain for the length of some much shorter pieces, but even that doesn't matter because
2. you're going to, at some point, present this to Readers. Right? i.e., other agentive, reactive intelligences that do not reside inside your freaking head.

You're going to wind up with stuff that is unclear. Some of your most "inspired" bits...are unclear. You're going to read these bits, realize they're too long and in fact aren't that good, but the bits that you wrote after them are maybe okay, so you cut them and see how et cetera etc.

You're going to--most of all, Reader, if "you" are me--realize that something that seemed clear to you is not even close to clear for your dear Readers. And you're going to need to figure out, in a "figuring it out", top-down kind of way:

okay. so what can i do, then, to make this thing better?

Instrumental writing.

And, to be clear, it is going to suck.

[Unless you're a Mozart: it comes out sublime. In which case that's great gud 4 u go away. (Did it even work that way for Mozart, though? Just cuz a guy wrote a play where it did? We digress.)]

Your "fixes"? To the "problems" that arose from your writing? Problems should not be in quotes: you were right. There were problems: your story was bad and unclear; the gods were enraged at your clumsy, sad efforts.

But now they're yet madder: your fixes are WORSE. In your humble scribe's limited, humble, humble humble experience: you may or may not have an inspired flash; you may or may not write a thing that...okay, might be worth working on. So you'll write it. Then, "fix" it.

Your first, second passes will be beyond hope. (The actual 'first' pass, where it first gets laid out...that's not even a thing. That's a zygote. A spud.)

Your fifth, sixth and seventh...like, very embarrassing.

Eighth ninth tenth: f*ck: junk.

Meanwhile you've at some point cut out inspiration--the inspired nuggets; that first throbbing gem that set all this in motion [you haven't. not all. but that's how it feels.]--and you're left with a thicket of...how's it feel? Like:

⤤
⤤True story. First draft? Second? ...Fifth?
⤤l 0 l.
.Moving on.

...actually: let's not.

I had intended to dive into details, with this. To explain the "heuristic B*llSh*t" in the title with examples; examples that demonstrate the how and the why of these awful first (through fifteenth) draftings. And then, from these examples, lead into a cathected, snippy, and self-important exegesis of your humble scribe's views on the whole "show, don't tell" thing.

I had not, in fact, just 'intended' to do this: I just cut 925 words that did do that.

Which I mention because I am going to end, here. And that feels like a fitting conclusion as well. Not just ending the post here (which does: feels 'bout right). Ending with that thought: about cutting and changing the scope, because...well:

This "post". These words, etched in digital clay...are these words "instrumental"?

...somewhat. ?

I'm not sure. They did not originate with any set goal; they erupted from the facts and frustrations of work. But...they're also 'making a point' (or at least: trying to). Which is a pretty good indication of...I don't know.

I don't care!

But the reason I like ending here is that this post has already gone on...well, let's be kind and let's say "long enough". And that, therefore, the ideas I not-just had 'in mind', but had in fact written out, fully detailed for you...they will wait.

Despite the fact that the prescriptive idea that emerged in my mind of what this short piece is--the idea that emerged as it moved from my mind to a lived, written-out execution in clay--encompassed a whole further set of ideas; despite the fact that, whether or not this piece originated as an eruptive expression of thought/feeling, it eventually became governed by this same top-down, instrumental thinking...or, rather, ran the risk of being thus governed. Because it's not. Governed, thus. It is ending now, where my instinct feels it should (really, honest; it's ending; gimme like...fifteen seconds).

Which is, perhaps, another good and related topic to this. Even in instrumentality-- rather, topping instrumentality, which is no use in itself, is the fact and the shape of the thing as it grows. So perhaps another topic is: finding it. Making the map, but then breaking it. Following the thing as it goes...wherever. Perhaps we'll return to that, some other day.

Right now, today, this, these words: done. Winding down. Not me! I'm bright-eyed and ready 2 go!

But the words, they are done. This is done. So

I, humble scribe, have herein written this
I set it down
with my hands; with my fingers and mind.
I told only the truth. (Might not be smart or right.)
I hope it was worth your time.
I'm sorry if it wasn't.

I thank you, as always,
dear (patient! firm!) Reader
dear dear dear Reader
who's made it this far

I thank you
as always
that yet I exist.

Unity, Discipline, Joy: here we go...

Fallen,

"Aristotelian Unity": our subject, today.

It is often in mind as I press, erase, press, and re-press in this clay. And not just in mind: it comes out of my mouth, in conversation about 'story' and 'structure', etc. And, every time—every time that your humble scribe says it, uses these words to articulate what he seeks ever day (fails, every day) to achieve—he's a little bit anxious he's making stuff up.

Brief research reveals that this is not the case. These words, "Aristotelian Unity", essentially mean what I mean by them.

Relief!

To spare those who'd rather not click links (and who would? what would that mean? to prefer to click links?), the key idea is to create

a whole, the structural union of the parts being such that, if any one of them is displaced or removed, the whole will be disjointed and disturbed. For a thing whose presence or absence makes no visible difference, is not an organic part of the whole.^Source!

Your humble scribe—Reader, hello, that is me!—spends most of his energies trying to do this. Failing, as noted above, to do this. Cutting and slivering pieces of text; realizing some recent addition does not "help"—that it, in fact, obscures things for the Reader (that's you! hello, again: thank you for reading). That in fact what he's done, and done over and over, is added where reduction was what was required; it's always well-intentioned, not some deranged narcissistic expanse (we'll discuss "world-building" some other day, friend; believe it). But my frequent discovery is that, in the efforts to make something clearer, I have instead simply added more words / phrases / ideas, in a tale that is already quite full of them, thank you. So the whole challenge, the whole challenge, becomes distilling the scope and complexity of events, of this tale that the g*ds demand be pressed into clay, with an efficiency and directness that serves story and you — Reader; since you are of course the whole point of this thing.

It is hard. I'm not good at it, yet. (Getting better?)

But what's interesting to me, here and now—

since all of the rest of my time's spent attempting this—

what's interesting here/now is:

"But sometimes it sucks."

To be clear, it does not "suck"

because it is hard. Things don't suck

cuz they're hard; they are hard

cuz they're hard, and you suck

(perhaps; in that moment; wutever)

if you let that fact beat you.

No, I'm interested in how, why, and when this "Aristotelian Unity" that I (and so many others) have praised and reified as a lodestone of narrative creation just actually is a bad idea, on the merits. The thing I'm concerned with is stifling joy.

What about joy, Aristotle? Hm? HUH?
What about "geeking out" (awful term, but you get it)?
What about undisciplined excursuses into world, character, context?

When everything, everything is tight and constrained, it seems you must run the risk of creating a story that feels, to the Reader, that way: tight, constrained. A work that is empty, that lacks the sprawling joyful wantonness of—

no. Wait.

Already, I have to double back on myself. These "feelings" I reference: they're not yours. They're mine. Confusing the two is the same awful mistake that the actor may make — thinking the performance is good if/cuz she feels it. For some actors, I'm sure we all know some examples, feeling it is indeed a magnificent tool by which they achieve what in fact is their goal: making us (the viewers) feel/see something. So this is the same thing: how "I" (humble scribe) feel truly does not matter. All that matters is how you (Reader) feel, read, receive.

BUT, infusion of joy is a real thing, as well. It seems far from far-fetched—in fact, ex ante, it seems probably true—to suggest a connection between how the writer writing the work feels about it and how that work is then received by the Reader. We've all read, seen, experienced stories that were loose, sloppy, lacking in sense or direction, deficient (in our view) in important respects...but still very enjoyable. "Good", if you will. Because they were animated and enlivened by this joy, and that sense itself was itself quite infectious, and of course therefore trumped all our small, who-cares quibbles.

And the reason this concern seems, to me, worth expressing is that it's presumably beyond my control. There are many things that your humble scribe tries to, if not 'control', at least 'manage': diction and cadence and vowel-sound, line length; character, choice, decision, action. Words. But, presumably, in each of these things there are manifestations I cannot control. Ways in which—and this is, of course, also thrilling—my mind, heart, and state are laid bare for the Reader. It is not hard to believe that my internal state—and, specifically, the extent to which I do or do not allow a sense of abandon, of "f*ck it: keep that part. it's fun"—is conveyed to you, Reader. Subliminally (or not). That it manifests itself in every aspect of words that I press, erase, press, and re-press in this clay.

Given that, might it be that

this unrelenting 'disciplined' dedication to "Unity"…

might it not be depriving you, the Reader, as well?

Or is this whole thread just weakened justification? That's a real question, because—to be totally honest—every time I review work of hours, days, weeks, reading over some section that was hard to create...

...it is good. It is better, for you. I am sure.

No matter how it felt or was, for me. Doing it. Good or bad. Sticking tight to this discipline goal, 'unity'...it has always, always meant the thing has got better.

Joy, freedom—

they're there! They are there, from the discipline;

they don't need themselves to come into being. They need work, to create an experience for you.

I'm not at all sure what solution this frames. I think that, predictably, it frames none at all.

Keep allowing flights of fancy, word plays, ideas and side-bars and scenes chapters irrelevant; or overwritten, overdetailed, whatever. Do them as necessary

then cut them away. Keep lashing the words and the work into the shape that lives somewhere inside it, obscured by excess.

And take joy, and hope that it's joy some will share, at each contour and line of that shape you reveal.

OH G*DS I'M CLOSE (MAYBE?) TO WRITING THIS, WELL.

Or, not.

Just keep trying.

It's all you can do.

Reader,

Humble scribe here and hello happy holidays. May the great gods bless you always; may the heavens & earth calm your mind.

In pressing these various thoughts into clay, your humble scribe has encountered a problem that— well, to be frank, that he might have foreseen. The problem being that, in undertaking the task of talking (writing) about writing, he has confirmed that, yes, everything connects. He has many "topics"; he's written thousands of words. But every topic is linked in a tumbling landscape of spiderwebbed mess such that any attempt to focus—even upon some quite detailed sub-topic—blunders into engagement with all of the rest. Each post he might write to share with you in this space is a marble that, upon grasping, he finds endlessly linked: to a candelabra, the moon, and the concept of love and a waterfall— oops! Also, it turns out, it is not a marble. The thing he first grasped: not a marble at all. It turns out to be (say) a tiger. The sky.

This makes much of the discussion jumbled and unclear — as if all terms must be pre-defined, understood. Which...being unclear is precisely not the point. But, equally: existing, with respect to these posts, is the point. In fact: the point.

So, Reader, sorry for tumbles of speech and of logic; effort has been made, truly, to keep both to a minimum. And with that let's begin. Let us talk about clarity. In fact, we can start with more focus than that.

Let's start with: frictions.

Definitions are hard. For our purposes here, what "frictions" means is: tiny drags on the Reader's attention; tiny demands made of the Reader's ability to intuit linkages in the text.

The "tiny" part is important. We are not talking about errors, or clear (as it were) failures of clarity — problems that conventional editing will address. We are talking about micro-problems, things an editor might not notice or might, upon noticing, consciously leave in out of deference to authorial 'style'. The trouble being that, over time and in accumulation, these 'elements' make a 'style' that is crappy.

Let's use an example.

Real talk: she truly had been equitable as possible, sharing the loot out with Bryn and with Raif.

(The sentence above used to be in the story. It no longer is, though its context may still be familiar to some. Quoting it like this—bereft of context—is deliberate, even if that seems to be counter-intuitive. Much of this discussion depends on context, yes. But: the point is to look at a unit (a sentence), stripped out on its own. To imagine the problems it might present, without the contextual clutter that is necessary to assess how bad it really is or is not.)

There are so many frictions that might screw us up here.

A huge one: the cutesy (dis)ordering of clauses. She'd been "equitable as possible," had she? About what??? Here it is useful to note context: this was the first sentence of a paragraph. So, even if the broad topic and moment in time are (hopefully) clear to the Reader, there is still—by convention—a new thought on offer. A new thought about which the heroine might be, in this case, "equitable." But what is it? 

Addressing this brings up our first key point. Because, in fact, the sentence is not unclear. The question of what "she" (we'll get to that: the "she") had been "equitable" about is not, semantically speaking, bungled. There is a comma two words after "equitable"; the four words immediately following that comma explain what it is she'd been "equitable" about. If someone read this whole sentence and were asked, 'So, what was it that 'she' had been 'equitable' about?' they would, in most cases, be able to answer.

Doesn't matter.

be able to answer. , left unanswered: literally the next four words after the comma explicate precisely what it was she'd been 'equitable' about. BUT: how many readers will have that small, tiny snag? How many will experience, however briefly, a momentary jolt of not following meaning, a bump in the road they must take through the tale? One out of a hundred? okay sorry (honestly): One-in-a-Hundred, you may be on your own. 15/100? hm. that...is not good. 32? shit. 40? more? shitting fuck -- sentence: broken.

A similar point could be made about the 'Real talk' frame that kicks off the sentence. It's a stylistic flourish, so it adds something there. But it may not be immediately clear to all readers what exactly it means: why is the talk is 'real'? is this 'real' talk the thing that was just said (above), or what's about to be said? Et cetera. Now, your humble scribe sometimes overlooks some of these questions -- sometimes you do leap, and ask readers to follow. But is precisely why not asking readers to make any unnecessary stupid tiny little jumps is important. So if you love your 'real talk', if that has to be in there: maybe change up the cutesy misordering just after it -- that moment where some readers might not know the answer to 'equitable about what?'

Again, the question here absolutely is not: 'is it clear, soon enough?' This is not non-fiction; it is not argumentative prose. That does not mean it cannot make demands of the reader -- big, surfaced ?s left explicitly unanswered. Or maybe subtle, folded-in questions left not-even-asked. But neither of those categories apply to these frictions; these frictions are drag, they are weight, they are burden. Each creates load in the reader's working brain; load that your humble scribe may want/need for elsewehere, load that you (the reader) may not even acknowledge. You may just know: nah. didn't like that so much.

A fantastic, terrifying further example: pronouns.
if you literally know from the sentence before, and are a supergood Reader (and Reader, if you can put up with my sh1t: you are) — it still 

every confusing pronoun
and define: confusing
it does not mean an editor would be — hmmm, to whom does this refer.
it means the reader's brain has to make just this tiiiiiiny leap in connection, because there's been just one or two more sentences, a few more words or one thought too many between the actual noun and the pronoun it refers to. Like how many tiny, tiny little snaggy things make up velcro — each confusing pronoun is one tiny hook.
put a few in, even, just — you really slow your sh1t down at your readers' disservice



Emmy swallowed.




...


Warrior Emmy reached up to—




hWOOP!




rising; onstage.




"nrrf. (hello). Yup." Jake gave Emmy a smile, letting go of her hand. "Yeah just the PSU, but. Zap. Ded rig."








the cuteness with the name, emmy --> warrior Emmy


changing "Jake gave her" to "Jake gave Emmy"


tiny little frictions


not clarity. a lot, a lot, about clarity -- of diction and usage, and then of course more broadly of story. but this is not. I think even a reader who's skimming--generally my enemy reader; the person I am happy not to be writing for--I think even that reader would get that "she" is Emmy, here. Grace (Emmy's big sister) is also in this scene, and she's prominent in the first half, but she's at this stage receded into background and not had her name mentioned or been giving a visual check-in for a few paragraphs.


BUT. even for me, reading -- and presumably i'm paying attention to this text -- it's a TINY bit quicker, easier, less frictious to read "Emmy" and not "her", there -- a tiiiiny bit less work to lock into identity and image of that instant. So: change it.


I think I think a lot about these tradeoffs because I'm aware that, in other ways, I ask a lot of a reader. And I want to "ask" those things that I ask; because those are the things that I value and love as a reader, too, so I want to give those to people. But I think an important/useful flip to that--to "asking a lot" of a reader--is to try to make the easy parts easy, the smooth parts smooth.


a lot of it is just the summation of moments of "ask"


there's a moment of "ask" when I go from Emmy to Warrior Emmy; why is that word in there? I sort of remember it from before, what's it mean? etc.
there's a moment of ask after, with "PSU". a lot of readers won't really know what that is; I'm hoping even those who don't know will quickly gloss it as a "tech thing fine whatever", but it's still an ask. and if don't know or do that (quickly gloss it and put it away) then it's really an ask.



so so far tiny tiny frictions is in here -- so gone when it's done
anything else?