studying: john gardner's on becoming a novelist

i read this a while ago. and this post has been a draft for who knows how long. but i'm ready to reread my notes on this wonderful book. 

source

in a recent post, i wrote about the idea that you might not be able to just write. you might have another job...and if you didn't read to the bottom. THAT. IS. OK.  even john gardner thinks so:

"it is far more satisfying to write well than simply to write well enough to be get published."                           -john gardner

john gardner is a big advocate of authenticity, discipline, and dedication to fine workmanship, which he describes as "art that avoids cheap and easy effects, takes no shortcuts, struggles never to lie even about the most trifling matters (such as which object, precisely, an angry man might pick up to throw at his kitchen wall, or whether a given character would say 'you aren't' or the faintly more assertive 'you're not')."

wow. right? the poetry in that alone makes me want to get every little detail right, to impress mr. gardner, may he rest in peace. 

something else john gardner talks about in his aptly titled book is becoming a novelist. and that's what we're doing, right? becoming a novelist. here's what he says about it... 

"the whole world seems to conspire against the young novelist." yes it does. and he goes on to say "writing teachers and books about writing, not to mention friends, relatives, and professional writers are quick to point out the terrible odds (thereby increasing them) against anyone's (ever, anywhere) becoming a successful writer."

and he said that actually, that discouragement is the least of it. that writing a novel is hardest on you, the writer, because of how much time it takes and how much it tests your  psyche beyond endurance. 

can i get an amen? 

gardner even talks about the toll it takes on the writer's spouse, who grows "sulky and embarrassed" after the amount of time that passes without any movement. 

(mase? if that's you, it's ok. thanks for supporting me all the while) :) 

another point, closely related to the fine workmanship quoted above is the language. i wrote down three long paragraphs from the book about his issue with writers and their intense need keep writing words, words without reason, words for the sole purpose of sounding smart. here's a small portion of how he feels about it:

"the writer who cares more about words than a story (characters, action, setting, atmosphere) is likely to create a vivid and continuous dream; he gets in his own way; in his poetic drunkenness, he can't tell the cart-and it's cargo-from the horse". 

he says that a writer can probably get away with it once, but that the reader won't be back anytime soon. the reader "tires" of it soon-and the author. (not what you want!)

so the point is that while words are important, it's not just about words, how many we can cram into one description. it's about words, yes. but the perfect ones. the ones carefully chosen, no more, no less. 

this goes right alongside what he said about that precise object an angry dude picked up. or the exact dialect. "details are the lifeblood of fiction," he writes. see? it's all about which details, not how many you can add. that way, you can put the reader right in the heart of the scene, capture his/her attention and keep it until that last page.  

i don't know about your early eduction (or late even), but i remember countless english lessons on theme and symbols and stuff like that. here's what mr. g has to say about theme:

"theme is like the floors and structural supports in an old fine mansion, indispensable but not, as a general rule, what takes the reader's breath away. more often than not, theme, or meaning, is the statement the architecture and decor make about the inhabitants."

that description really helped me. i won't go further into it (shocking, i know) because it might not work for you. :) but it did for me!

and the last (but not least) little nugget of amazingness i'll give is about the checks and balances while writing. john gardner writes about a few items that will impair the fiction you're writing, the world you're attempting to create:

1. unfairly manipulating the characters

2. laying on too much symbolism

3. breaking in on the action to preach

4. pumping up the style even more visible than the characters

*he also says that "to notice such faults is to begin to correct them".  thank goodness. i'm correcting a lot then. 

there is so much more in the book...i highly recommend it. on becoming a novelist is a timeless book, and it is a must for a new novelist, if nothing else but to show you that you are not alone in your fears and doubts. those feelings are not new. not in the slightest.