Re: [SciFiNoir Lit] Re: Octavia E. Butler: 1947-2006
Hello, I'm a novice to the game. I haven't even sold my first piece of short fiction yet, but my fingers are crossed that that might happen soon. Just wanted to say that I'm fascinated by this discussion. I've often wondered myself how people can churn out novel after novel, in such a relatively short period of time. This whole discussion is very enlightening. Chris Hayden [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote: I wrote the 80,000 words of my first published novel--A Vampyre Blues--in three months. And I went through three drafts in that time. It was an ordeal--all I did was eat, sleep, go to work and write that novel for three months--nothing compared to Walter Gibson- -if that was his name--guy who wrote all those Shadow novels. He wrote a 60,000 word novel every two weeks for fourteen years. Of course it was the same novel over and over--he said he used to type until blood came out of the ends of his fingers. I forgot also the volcanic rage one can feel when one gets a rejection or an article does not appear in print when the editor publisher said-- I remember being consumed with hate when a review did not appear--it did two weeks later. Also there is the moping around the mailbox waiting for promised payment. I never tell anybody that something is coming out--I tell them when it is out. Publication may be delayed for many reasons. If money has been promised I just wait until I get it--don't count on it coming within a certain time. Also the best cure for worries about whether something will be accepted or not is to start working on something else immediately. I also forgot about downing pots of strong coffee, getting wired and being exhausted at the same time. It is just like being an athlete. There will come a time when we have to hang 'em up-- --- In SciFiNoir_Lit@yahoogroups.com, Nora [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote: I think it's different for everyone. Some people find writing difficult. Some people are charged by it. Some authors find success and then crash and burn. Some find success and turn into Energizer bunnies, just going and going and going... I also think it's a matter of what you bring into it. Discipline is discipline; you need it to function as a writer whether you're getting paid/pressured/rewarded for that discipline or not. Last year when I finally landed an agent, I made a goal for myself to finish my current novel within a year just to prove to myself and to her that I could do it. I've got three months to go and I'm on 68K words; I think I'm going to make it. This is why I'm so grateful for my writer's group. Working with them has done wonders for my self-discipline, because every month I have a deadline and if I miss it, I have people to answer to. The same goes for any workshop a la Clarion. I feel no great need to go to Clarion because I already know I can write a story in a week (and sell it, no less). When I finish with my current project, I won't be afraid of getting a book deal because I'll already know I can write a novel in a year. Once you find out you have the discipline to work at a professional pace -- and you can figure this out even before you become a professional - - then success really shouldn't do you that much damage. Of course, my tune may change if I ever get a book deal. =) Nora -Original Message- From: SciFiNoir_Lit@yahoogroups.com [mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED] On Behalf Of [EMAIL PROTECTED] Sent: Wednesday, March 01, 2006 2:39 PM To: SciFiNoir_Lit@yahoogroups.com Subject: Re: [SciFiNoir Lit] Re: Octavia E. Butler: 1947-2006 What happens to our drive anyway when we get older and more comfortable? Writing, especially a long piece can be a mental, physical and spiritual ordeal. You stink like you'be been running a country mile after a good session, your brain is like mush. You can hardly think, can't read nothing. Have to be careful about drinking because you can down drink after drink and it is like water. I used to wonder why coleagues, who had been at it longer, drifted away and quit and got haunted looks on their faces when I asked them why they weren't writing. Then I got seriously involved in it and saw--sitting up talking to yourself until you start doing it out in public, jumping up in the middle of the night scribbling stuff down, the stories invading your dreams, characters taking over and talking to you, getting so crazy and uptight you are yelling at people, doing draft after draft after draft and finding still one or two typoes after you are finished and getting a deep pessimism Little voices telling you this ain't shit and they'll just take this out and they won't like it and they won't see it. Letting out shrill squeals when you see other writers' mediocre books shipping millions of copies. Being unable to read for pleasure again, always,
[SciFiNoir Lit] Re: Octavia E. Butler: 1947-2006
Some people can churn out novel after novel because they want the bucks--Walter Gibson (who wrote all those novels about The Shadow under the name Maxwell Grant) was getting $750.00 a pop for each one. This was at a time when a working man was making a dollar an hour and thus $40.00 a week. Robert E. Howard same thing. And most of your commercial writers, Spillane, Steele, etc. It is a job. With some people it is a matter of compulsion as Nora says, so they develop a discipline. Stephen King shoots for 1,000 words a day. Thats about 4 typewritten pages. Doesn't sound like much--but at the end of the year, even if you took off for weekends, you got 265,000 words. 3 or 4 good size novels or one monster. I do it because I am compelled. If I do not write something every day after a few days I get physically ill. Somethings are a joy--but most serious writing--a long poem, a novel, a short story that I am having trouble with--is an ordeal. A good, satisfying ordeal. Much like walking a long distance in a good time or doing some good, back breaking labor-- No pain. No gain. --- In SciFiNoir_Lit@yahoogroups.com, Chad Sharpe [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote: Hello, I'm a novice to the game. I haven't even sold my first piece of short fiction yet, but my fingers are crossed that that might happen soon. Just wanted to say that I'm fascinated by this discussion. I've often wondered myself how people can churn out novel after novel, in such a relatively short period of time. This whole discussion is very enlightening. Chris Hayden [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote: I wrote the 80,000 words of my first published novel--A Vampyre Blues--in three months. And I went through three drafts in that time. It was an ordeal--all I did was eat, sleep, go to work and write that novel for three months--nothing compared to Walter Gibson- -if that was his name--guy who wrote all those Shadow novels. He wrote a 60,000 word novel every two weeks for fourteen years. Of course it was the same novel over and over--he said he used to type until blood came out of the ends of his fingers. I forgot also the volcanic rage one can feel when one gets a rejection or an article does not appear in print when the editor publisher said-- I remember being consumed with hate when a review did not appear-- it did two weeks later. Also there is the moping around the mailbox waiting for promised payment. I never tell anybody that something is coming out--I tell them when it is out. Publication may be delayed for many reasons. If money has been promised I just wait until I get it--don't count on it coming within a certain time. Also the best cure for worries about whether something will be accepted or not is to start working on something else immediately. I also forgot about downing pots of strong coffee, getting wired and being exhausted at the same time. It is just like being an athlete. There will come a time when we have to hang 'em up-- --- In SciFiNoir_Lit@yahoogroups.com, Nora njem@ wrote: I think it's different for everyone. Some people find writing difficult. Some people are charged by it. Some authors find success and then crash and burn. Some find success and turn into Energizer bunnies, just going and going and going... I also think it's a matter of what you bring into it. Discipline is discipline; you need it to function as a writer whether you're getting paid/pressured/rewarded for that discipline or not. Last year when I finally landed an agent, I made a goal for myself to finish my current novel within a year just to prove to myself and to her that I could do it. I've got three months to go and I'm on 68K words; I think I'm going to make it. This is why I'm so grateful for my writer's group. Working with them has done wonders for my self-discipline, because every month I have a deadline and if I miss it, I have people to answer to. The same goes for any workshop a la Clarion. I feel no great need to go to Clarion because I already know I can write a story in a week (and sell it, no less). When I finish with my current project, I won't be afraid of getting a book deal because I'll already know I can write a novel in a year. Once you find out you have the discipline to work at a professional pace -- and you can figure this out even before you become a professional - - then success really shouldn't do you that much damage. Of course, my tune may change if I ever get a book deal. =) Nora -Original Message- From: SciFiNoir_Lit@yahoogroups.com [mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED] On Behalf Of Frofidemus@ Sent: Wednesday, March 01, 2006 2:39 PM To: SciFiNoir_Lit@yahoogroups.com Subject: Re: [SciFiNoir Lit] Re: Octavia E. Butler: 1947-2006 What happens to our drive anyway when we get older and
[SciFiNoir Lit] Re: Octavia E. Butler: 1947-2006
--- In SciFiNoir_Lit@yahoogroups.com, Carole McDonnell [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote: Rejections can be stressing, especially when one's purpose in life depends on one's writing. Some people have too much riding on their novel -- it'll prove their intelligence, their wisdom, their sensitivity, etc. Even when it doesn't. It is only natural. I look on rejection like pro wrestlers look at falling. The first thing they have to learn is how to fall. A writer has to learn how to take rejection because he is going to face a lot of it. It still hurts, though if you think anything about yourself and your writing. It's just that when you get into it and concentrate on working on something else, it doesn't hurt very long But, aside from rejections, the point about Octavia Butler being unable to write is really not something we can really understand. Since I am only about two years younger than her I can. I can understand that one day I am going to look over at that manuscript, typewriter, computer, whatever, and say, What the hell. See at my age I know that it is only a matter of time before they are throwing the clay over my head--when you are young you can bs yourself about it but when you get past 50 you know the jig could be up any day now. Some days I feel as good as I ever did. Some days I get up and I can feel something heavy and leaden in my limbs and on my head and I know it is death and soon it shall come creepin' round my door, as the old song says. One day that is going to be looming large and I won't care about writing or eating or much else. She had been ill. She'd had a lot of success. She knew sooner or later the jig was up and didn't have nothing much more to say--which now that I think about her last book Fledgling and the last couple of short stories she wrote, I can feel some of this After all, which of us has gotten a multi-thousand dollar genius grant! So we really don't know what such a burden could do to a person, especially to a person who may be morbidly introspective or incredibly shy. This was no other blessing, for instance. Of course there were health issues too and that also gets into the way. So how do we know how a shy person with a bad heart and high blood pressure will deal with something like that? We can muse about how we would react, but in the long run.. I can't but I saw how it affected a woman who got a half million dollars book advance. Screwed her right up. Think about it. After you are a genius, what else is there to do? Be a super genius? Especially since you got no children, no family and you are living as a virtual recluse anyway. There was a lot haunting this woman, and you can really see it in those Parables books --- In SciFiNoir_Lit@yahoogroups.com, Nora njem@ wrote: Community email addresses: Post message: SciFiNoir_Lit@yahoogroups.com Subscribe:[EMAIL PROTECTED] Subscribe Digest Mode: [EMAIL PROTECTED] Unsubscribe: [EMAIL PROTECTED]: http://groups.yahoo.com/group/SciFiNoir_Lit/ Yahoo! Groups Links * To visit your group on the web, go to: http://groups.yahoo.com/group/SciFiNoir_Lit/ * To unsubscribe from this group, send an email to: [EMAIL PROTECTED] * Your use of Yahoo! Groups is subject to: http://docs.yahoo.com/info/terms/
[SciFiNoir Lit] Re: Octavia E. Butler: 1947-2006
I used to save my rejections but I read about another writer who did that for a while and then he threw them away because they depressed him. Let me ask you--if you could get all of your stories accepted, or get all of them rejected which would you choose? --- In SciFiNoir_Lit@yahoogroups.com, Nora [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote: See, I've never felt most of that, Chris. When I get a rejection I usually feel a moment's disappointment, and then shrug and send the story/novel/agent packet/whatever out again. To be honest I find rejections encouraging, in a weird sort of way. When I don't get rejections for awhile I feel like I'm stagnating, not doing my job. When I'm getting regular rejections I feel like a real writer. =) The people in my writer's group have a tradition of celebrating rejection milestones, and I should be coming up on my 100th sometime soon. Since I don't like beer much, that means a chocolate party. =P The only exception to this has been lately, with the novel rejections. I guess I thought when I got a big-name agent that I had made it; that it would only be a matter of time until my novel sold. But as each of the major publishers sends encouraging rejections but still *rejections,* it hurts. A lot. I still have some hope, but now that my favorite three publishers have said no, I suspect it's not going to happen. But then the hurt fades and I realize just how close I've gotten. I have an agent. That means that *anytime I want*, anytime I finish a novel, I can skip the slushpile and get it on a major publisher's desk. So even though this novel might not sell, the next one might. Or the one after that. And if that first sale does well and they offer me a multi-book deal, I'll have a nice backlog of novels ready to put out one after the other, at Stephen-King speed. =P So I haven't resorted to coffee or alcohol yet. (Though I do tend to go out dancing, go for a really hard bike ride or workout, or play violent video games as catharsis when I get an especially rough rejection =P) Nora Community email addresses: Post message: SciFiNoir_Lit@yahoogroups.com Subscribe:[EMAIL PROTECTED] Subscribe Digest Mode: [EMAIL PROTECTED] Unsubscribe: [EMAIL PROTECTED]: http://groups.yahoo.com/group/SciFiNoir_Lit/ Yahoo! Groups Links * To visit your group on the web, go to: http://groups.yahoo.com/group/SciFiNoir_Lit/ * To unsubscribe from this group, send an email to: [EMAIL PROTECTED] * Your use of Yahoo! Groups is subject to: http://docs.yahoo.com/info/terms/
[SciFiNoir Lit] Re: Octavia E. Butler: 1947-2006
--- In SciFiNoir_Lit@yahoogroups.com, Dr. Lester K Spence [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote: On Mar 2, 2006, at 10:10 AM, ravenadal wrote: Interesting thing about the McArthur Genius awards...it does seem to stifle writers. Colson Whitehead won one and hasn't published a novel since. Part of this is understandable. I have been writing my entire adult life and someone once asked me if I would self-publish my novel if I won the lottery. I would not. If I won the lottery, I would travel the world and LIVE. I would hope I would continue writing but I have to admit that winning the lottery might just put it on ice. After all you have to worry about keeping it, sheltering it, managing it--the money-- Whitehead has a book coming out in March. And I think he published a work on NYC after he'd gotten the MacArthur. I go back to someone like Jordan. Who wins every award there is to win and still comes back the next year wanting to do it again with the exact same level of determination, discipline, and focus. Till his legs gave out and there was no way to do it. I bet if you would open up a guy like that and find out what made him do it, you might not like what you found I know that I'd continue writing if I made it. But would I still try to publish in the same spaces? Probably not. The energy and discipline required to carve an article suitable for publishing would be more than I'd want to expend. We all want to make it--see our names in bright lights, or at the very least, make an impact on the discipline. But in my case at least, I've got to work hard at creating systems of work that would keep me doing it even after I finally have arrived. Whatever the hell that means in my case. peace lks If I make it, I would like to spend my last years teaching others how to. I think that would give me reason to press on Community email addresses: Post message: SciFiNoir_Lit@yahoogroups.com Subscribe:[EMAIL PROTECTED] Subscribe Digest Mode: [EMAIL PROTECTED] Unsubscribe: [EMAIL PROTECTED]: http://groups.yahoo.com/group/SciFiNoir_Lit/ Yahoo! Groups Links * To visit your group on the web, go to: http://groups.yahoo.com/group/SciFiNoir_Lit/ * To unsubscribe from this group, send an email to: [EMAIL PROTECTED] * Your use of Yahoo! Groups is subject to: http://docs.yahoo.com/info/terms/
