John Wray in The Creative Independent, and Shakespeare in the Park
Family scenes that sparked stories
For those of you keeping score at home, I’m in a good place with the novel I’ve written. (Yay!) I’ve gotten feedback from beta readers that is a combination of constructive criticism and enthused positivity. Furthermore, I’ve made most of the story revisions to address the shortcomings pointed out by the beta readers.
There is the matter of making the ending better, and adding some stronger emotions, which I’ll tackle this weekend. Or maybe next week.
The biggest reason it’s in a good place is because I’m in the twilight zone between a good reaction from beta readers and it not yet having been rejected by agents or publishers. This story has a huge potential right now because it’s untested in the marketplace.
Soon, I’ll send it out into the world and will learn the reality of its potential. Most likely, it isn’t huge. Very few books go huge.
Maybe this story hits a nerve in the Zeitgeist, but probably not.
Shakespeare in the Park
Two weeks ago, my wife and I watched a production of Shakespeare’s Much Ado About Nothing. It was a delightful evening and the play was entertaining, the actors brilliant.
Four hundred years ago, as Bill wrote the play, there had to be moments that he doubted its potential. Was he confident he’d catch the mood of the English theatre-going crowd, and have something of a hit on his hands, or did he worry it was all a bunch of drivel?
Or maybe he delivered the script in a half-baked fashion, hoping they could workshop the scenes in rehearsal and get to the story at the heart of it.
We can’t ever know for sure, but we know Bill was human, and humans deal with doubt. They were also dealing with the Black Plague, and religious persecution, and all kinds of stuff back then. Like, 400 years ago was probably a fine time to be alive if you were landed gentry or royalty (and you were on the winning side of the various conflicts) but otherwise life was probably difficult and messy.
But here is that thing Bill Shakespeare created 400 years later, still entertaining crowds.
Did he write to be immortal, or did he write for the money?
Why Do We Write
This newsletter is about how the spark of an idea becomes a longform story. But I’m going to digress for a moment about why we write longform stories at all.
If you read Sapiens, you may be convinced that storytelling is fundamental to our species. Stories teach, motivate and organize.
Stories can teach, motivate and organize for good, or for bad. Examples of stories “for good” are This American Life, The Moth, and Fresh Air. And lots and lots of novels and TV shows and movies.
Stories “for bad” are Fox News and anything Trump and his ilk say.
But why do we write longform stories?
Longer stories reflect the complexity of human nature and society. Life is messy, and we all have good impulses and bad impulses. We struggle with that; we often make poor choices, and then have to deal with it.
The world in which we live—the human world in which we live—is really messy. Aspects of it are straight-up evil.
Novels and screenplays walk us through the mess and, hopefully, bring us to a place where we can deal with the chaos and possibly have our spirits uplifted by the end.
What Do We Write About
The sparks for stories come from almost anywhere. Some are colossal moments, but anecdotes work just as well. But the story has to be about something.
Ideally, the story is about something that matters to the author, and their passion for that “something” captures readers’ interest.
Any idiot can write a longform story, but the best stories entertain, compel, and satisfy us. (I think I’ve said that before, but it bears repeating.)
The Story Story
The story-story comes from The Creative Independenta pretty cool website I wish I’d stumbled on years ago. J Bennett interviews author John Wray and the entire article is worth the read.
After abandoning a first novel, and taking some time away from writing, he went on a hike with his parents.
They were arguing or something, so I kind of lagged behind. As the hike progressed, a situation sort of presented itself to my mind, I guess, is the only way I can really put it. I began to think of three characters, and I began to think about writing a book that was set in a little town in the Austrian Alps, where my mother had been born and grown up, which had been a place that I always loved spending time in as a child.
This is the spark that led to the novel, which took him four more years to write, but that was alright. It got him going on the path he needed to follow.
You can read the entire article here.
Our Stories and Our Lives
Our story ideas are filtered through the lives we have led up until that moment when we sit down to write. Each storyteller puts their own spin on the characters and events, sorts through the issues the characters will face, and concocts a plot to drive the story forward.
If all that goes well, the readers will stay along for the ride to see how it ends.
If it resonates, maybe in a hundred years that story will still be read. Maybe even four hundred years later.
Either way, you won’t be here to know about it. You can only know the story you tell. Everything after is a mystery.