Wrong Notes

Writing is hard. In the intervening years between when I first started and when I returned, i.e., when I wasn’t writing, I read a lot of books on writing. I guess I was looking for some sort of secret, or at least, a sort of framework that would make it all click into place for me, make it seem more manageable. Of course, this never came. The secret to writing turns out to be simply that it’s hard; you only improve by doing it. While I’ve only worked on the one manuscript, I’ve written a number of stories, and my experience with that matches what I’ve heard from more seasoned writers: you’re always starting from scratch.

Still, I kept looking for something, and in the meanwhile, I might’ve learned a good bit about how to write. The best sorts of “craft” books cover not some perfect method, but tips that may or may not work. I’ve taken a class or two from Garth Greenwell, and once he said, “I don’t believe in craft; I believe in craftiness,” which feels fair to me. I’ve squirreled away the bits I’ve found useful, and continue to revise and refine my process just as I continue to do the same with my works.

One of the books that’s stuck with me is George Saunders' A Swim in a Pond in the Rain, which he describes as sort of one of his Syracuse classes in book format. The book offers textual close readings of several notable Russian short stories, interspersed with notes from George on both how they work, and how he works. It was a small miracle to find this given my minimal formal writing education; it does feel like the sort of thing I could’ve hoped to have found at university. In it, Saunders describes a key part of his writing process, which is that a story emerges alongside a writer’s own tendencies and sense of style through revision; the ability to read and assess your own works through the same eyes you turn towards others. He advocates often for a sort of simple read of your work: is it enjoyable enough to continue on? This, and the way he talks about writing as entertainment first and foremost has always seemed a bit reductive to me—reading is a lot of fun, as I’ve rediscovered over the past two months—but it can be so much more, and indeed some of the best reading experiences I’ve had I wouldn’t classify as enjoyable or entertaining, per-say. But he’s George Saunders, so I tend to think he has a point.

If you show people a series of unrelated shots in sequence, we’ll start to form a narrative even when none inherently exists.

One of his tips on writing that has stuck with me is about how a story builds. He talks about drafting stories where he simply writes out a sentence for his own enjoyment: perhaps he thought a line was interesting, or funny. Well, from that sentence, you can draw a line to another sentence. If I write, “Mary could hear the pot boiling over in the kitchen,” (a sentence I just made up) you’ve already got some scaffolding to work with. You have a character, Mary; what sort of person is she? If there’s a kitchen and a pot, this suggests something domestic to me, though there are other places with kitchens; maybe a hotel, or a navy boat. And while there’s no conflict or even tension here, the image of a “pot boiling over” suggests some unease. Of course, there are an infinite number of sentences that could follow this one. Yet if I write, “She could already hear mother going to turn it down,” that feels a lot more congruent with the image of the narrative than if I write “The coin fell from Robert’s fingers and rolled into the drain,” next. We feel a bit more disoriented by the second option; who is this Robert, anyways?

When I think about it, I imagine a sort of funnel on its side: the options get narrower and narrower as you progress in the story, or as you simply add sentences to one another. But while the connection is more tenuous with the second option, that’s not to say it’s nonexistent. I think of the studies done in film; if you show people a series of unrelated shots in sequence, we’ll start to form a narrative even when none inherently exists.

I was listening to a podcast with the writer Blake Butler lately, and he seemed to circle back to this idea. He referenced an interview with Miles Davis, who said that in jazz you can’t play a “wrong note,” because every note is in context to one another. My funnel was shattered.

I’ve long thought about reading as a two way street. There are things that a reader (same as a listener of music, or audience member for a film, or someone looking at a painting, etc.) will bring to a work that no artist can account for, which enriches the experience rather than diminishing it. I think that oftentimes writers are unable to see important themes or connective tissue in their own work, ground laid by their subconscious, or things only put into context once a conversation starts around a work. But in the same way, a reader will draw narrative lines where perhaps none were intended. We as people aim to make sense of the world around us, and the things we encounter in life and in art, by pattern recognition. That’s not to say I’m running off to make the most incongruent art I can. But it’s all about context.