I’ve played the organ for quite a few church services this year. I can’t say that I’ve enjoyed it. I’m still finding my way around the keyboards and pedals, I’m still working out the best stops to use. I don’t like the fact that the organ appears to be a purely technical instrument: it doesn’t allow expression in the way a piano does.
Worst of all, I don’t like the context in which I’m playing. I find playing for a congregation very difficult, and consequently I get nervous in the time running up to the service. I feel very exposed, there on my own with nowhere to hide. I’m not playing for myself, I’m there to cue in the congregation and to keep them on track as they’re singing. I’ve got to follow the service carefully and immediately play the appropriate piece at the appropriate time. Even keeping track of the number of verses in a song can be tricky. (Someone suggested that I say the number of the verse out loud as I begin playing it. That works)
My wife asks why do it if I don’t enjoy it. The answer is that I hope to enjoy it someday. I was nervous the first time I stood up to perform, the first time I sent a story off to a publisher, the first time I spoke to girl I liked (and pretty much all the subsequent times). As has become a theme in this series of posts, the things that give me the most pleasure tend to be the things I’ve invested in. There’s not much fun in things that come too easy.
Apart from going for a walk of course. Everyone should walk more.
I got a Christmas card from a friend this morning with a picture of a steam train on the front.
No surprises there, my friend loves steam trains. Since retirement he’s worked as a volunteer on a heritage railway line, mainly restoring old carriages. It keeps him happy, but face it. It’s not the sort of thing most people would choose to do with their spare time. It’s not a cool thing to do.
It occurs to me that few, if any, of my friends are cool. So far this week I’ve had cards from brass band players, Sunday School teachers, a cub scout leader and possibly the uncoolest of the uncool: a Science Fiction writer. I’ve had cards from the sort of people who are generally figures of fun, an easy laugh in a standup routine.
There’s a name for the hobbies and pastimes described above: guilty pleasures. According to Wikipedia "a guilty pleasure is something, such as a film, a television program or a piece of music, that one enjoys despite feeling that it is not generally held in high regard, or is seen as unusual or weird."
The term is a recent one. The concept, however, has been around for a long time.
In The Screwtape Letters by C.S. Lewis, Screwtape the devil says "you should always try to make the patient abandon the people or food or books he really likes in favour of the best people, the right food, and important books. I have known a human defended from strong temptations to social ambition by a still stronger taste for tripe and onions."
I don’t believe in devils. People are perfectly capable of acting against their own interests without the intervention of supernatural entities. Why else would anybody feel guilty about listening to a piece of music they enjoy? Or indeed working with steam trains.
If you think about it, it takes a certain strength of character to not care about doing things that most people think are ridiculous.
It’s worth it. In my experience, these sort of people tend to be a lot happier.
Here’s one of my favourite lyrics, one that you’ll hear at this time of year
"There’s a happy feeling nothing in the world can buy,
When they pass around the coffee and the pumpkin pie"
Bonus points for naming that tune before reading on.
I like these lines for two reasons.
Firstly, I admire the economy of the writing. It only takes one line for the imagination to conjure up a room full of people. Taken in context with the rest of the lyrics, ("Sleigh Ride" if you didn’t name that tune) I have an image of people in colourful jumpers, their faces filled with excitement and happiness having come in from the cold. They’re chatting brightly, delighted to be amongst friends. All that from one line. That’s good writing.
Secondly, and more to the point of this blog entry, (and following on from yesterday’s entry), the lyrics illustrate that happiness is increased when you’ve invested in it.
Like most people who grew up in England, I have no experience of eating pumpkin pie at Christmas. I do, however, appreciate how much better a cup of coffee tastes after you’ve been out in the cold. I imagine that coffee tastes even better after an exhilarating sleigh ride. (Not that I’ve never taken a sleigh ride, but I know coffee tastes better when drunk after building a snowman with my kids.)
Advertisers know this. That’s why they like to show their clothes, perfumes, food and drinks being worn, eaten and drunk in parties or at family dinner tables. They’re not selling whisky or watches, they’re selling the promise of friendship. It’s all a lie, of course.
You can’t buy friendship with gifts at Christmas or any time. You want friendship, you have to invest in the people you know.
This is so obvious it hardly seems worth writing down.
Tonight I played as part of a nine piece band at an event in a Methodist Church. I’m not sure what to call the evening, it wasn’t exactly a service, it wasn’t exactly a singalong, but that was part of its charm.
It followed the format of a typical Carol Service – a song and then a reading, but very few of the readings came from the bible. Nearly all were light hearted poems or excerpts from books or little passages written by the congregation themselves.
This was my favourite gig this Christmas. It was about half way through the evening before I figured out why. Quite simply, every one there was enjoying themselves. The performers, the audience, everyone had just come along to enjoy the evening.
I don’t know how many little churches and social clubs I’ve played at over the years. The tea and mince pies, the practically undrinkable Fair Trade Coffee, the homemade watercolours that hang on the walls, the fact that everyone keeps their coat on until it warms up, the two or three people who keep everything running… These are what the venues have in common. What distinguishes them is how seriously the patrons take them. You want to have a good night out, you have to invest in it. Some people think that means buying a ticket or a new outfit. Those people are wrong. Investing in an evening means participating. Singing along, making the tea, getting up on stage to read out a poem you’ve found on the internet or just standing at the door and collecting tickets. People always seem to have a better time at little venues.
At the end of the evening the organiser happened to mention how the same readings came up again and again at these services. Okay, I thought, there are nine days to Christmas. I’ll accept the challenge. I’ll see if I can write something each night for the next nine nights.
In case you’re wondering, an ek is an eyeball kick:
Vivid, telling details that create a kaleidoscopic effect of swarming visual imagery against a baroquely elaborate SF background. One ideal of cyberpunk SF was to create a “crammed prose” full of “eyeball kicks.” (Attr. Rudy Rucker)
I write SF so the alien tag should be no surprise. As my story worlds are all tagged, I can easily search for 5aliens in the 3recursion universe.
Possibly of more interest are my workflow tags.
I started out following GTD, labelling all my notes TODO NEXT or DONE. That worked out pretty well in my daily life, but not in my writing life. Over the years I’ve settled on the following
conceit -> idea -> story -> developing -> next/working -> staged -> published/used -> archived
What’s the difference between a conceit, an idea and a story?
The first two are explained in the Turkey City Lexicon. Here’s my thinking on the process by which a conceit becomes a story.
I get lots of ideas – I think most writers would say the same – however most of them are never used. Looking back through my notes I can see ideas that I’ve not had time to use, ideas that don’t go anywhere, ideas that just don’t seem that interesting now. Some ideas I don’t even remember what I was thinking when I wrote them down. But occasionally I will see an idea that joins with another idea and sparks something. When enough ideas join themselves together they become a story.
What’s the difference between next and working?
This is something I think many writers will experience. A story marked next is something that has to be done to a deadline, that’s why I’ve applied GTD to it. Something tagged as working is something that I’m ermmm… working on. I tend to work on stories over periods of months or even years so this tag indicates something I will keep coming back to. When inspiration fails, or when I’m looking for a next project, or simply because I want to move on, I bring up all the things I’m working on and decide what to concentrate on next.
When a story is completed it will be staged, ready to be submitted. Hopefully I will someday be able to tag it as published.
My friend, Chris Beckett, suggested writing down what I thought about whilst listening to a piece of music…
I’m writing this listening to Schubert’s String Quartet No. 14 in Dm, "Death and The Maiden"
The violence of the opening chords, the sense of impending doom that fills the first movement seems obvious to me, and a quick search on the internet suggests that others feel the same.
I often wonder where those emotions come from. Are they innate, part of the music itself, or are they associations gained through years of listening to music?
I believe the feelings generated by music are programmed into us at some basic level. It seems likely to me that we have a common operating system written into us by Western culture and conditioning and through this we interpret the music in the same way.
Extending the idea, if we were to play the music to someone from a different culture and then see that they feel the same emotions, could we deduce that the music is tapping into an operating system at a lower level?
Does it go even wider than that? I don’t think so. No one expects a dog to understand music. Like a book needs a reader, music needs a listener. I think that music and literature are both little parts of our intelligence that are extracted and replayed. Both need our intelligence to make them live.
But what if I’m wrong, that both are filled with some spirit that stands apart from us?
The second movement is playing now. I first heard this piece in my twenties, I think, and it didn’t move me then anywhere near as much as it does now. Has my ability to appreciate the music increased, does my life experience speak more to me, or is it a mixture of both?
It wouldn’t be true to say there was more sadness in my life at the moment, in fact I’d say I’m more content than I’ve ever been. I can, however, see the beginning of my decline in the distance. I’ve achieved nearly everything I set out to achieve in my life, and this too is an ending of sorts. Schubert died aged 31. Perhaps he saw more sadness than I did, or perhaps he crammed more emotion into that early part of his life. Or perhaps he was overly emotional, and I can tap into that better now I’m older.
I think Schubert was a genius, but I tend to think that an artistic genius is someone who was popular in a certain way at a certain time (perhaps that time was after their death, as is true for Schubert.) His music is very clever: the chromatic adeptness; the innovative use of the flattened submediant; the sudden modulations. I know all that intellectually, but that’s not why I’m listening. I’m sure the music wouldn’t have have been remembered if it didn’t have those melodies, that ability to touch emotions across 200 years.
Yesterday morning I walked to work listening to choral music. It made me think of autumn / winter; bare trees; cold stone buildings. Those feelings were not innate to the music. I know that the reverb sounds like empty churches, the voices remind me of carols sung by choirs when I was a child, they stir memories of Christmas, snow and frosty breath. Associations. A lot of music is like this: drums that beat military tattoos and trumpets that sound the charge.
I’m more interested in the emotions intrinsic to the music. I heard the seas rolling in the final movement of Rimsky-Korsakov’s Scheherazade before I knew the story behind the music, but this too is an association of sorts: the rise and fall of the strings imitate the waves.
I’m listening to final movement of Death and the Maiden now and as an experiment I’ve tried imagining disparate pictures against the music – bees in a hive, people arguing, two lovers having a picnic, an icy pond, a fairy in a bottle, the US flag on the moon. Some of the pictures fit, some of them clearly don’t.
I think that much of music is association, but these associations are built on something intrinsic. I’ve read that children aren’t frightened of spiders, they have the capacity to be frightened by them, they learn this fear from those around them. This doesn’t work for everything: children don’t have this innate capacity to be frightened by bottles, for example.
The music has finished, and I’m left wondering where the intrinsic part of the music lies. In it, or in me?
How Writers Write is a monthly series of guest posts where established writers invite you into their workspaces, reveal their work habits and share their experience.
I met Anne in a bar in Helsinki at Worldcon 75. We got chatting right away…
What do you use to write?
I handwrite only when I’m limbering up. As a first stab at a new writing project, I take a sheet of A2 paper and draw bubbles of characters/themes/plot. Next, I open a new hardback notebook and jot down my initial ideas, pose questions to myself so that I hone the central premise and my overall aims. At this early stage, I consider the connections between characters, draw approximate timelines and so on. None of this preliminary work is detailed. My outlines are minimal.
Before I draft a chapter, I dash off a few handwritten notes to set the scene. But I’m as likely to ignore these notes as I am to adhere to them.
As for hardware, I work with a MacBook Air linked to a widescreen monitor and a full-size keyboard. I’ve used Macs since they were first launched and I’m not going to switch now!
I draft my novels in Scrivener, which is especially helpful for a story based on masses of research. Scrivener allows me to assemble my research into a set of folders. While I’m drafting my story, I can dip into the research material without opening other applications. Scrivener is also ideal for novels with a complex structure. I can re-order the chapters by click and drag, or temporarily reorder the chapters to check the flow of a particular storyline or character arc.
Once I begin the first draft, I create two Excel spreadsheets. (I love a good spreadsheet, with lots of colour coding). One is a simple log: dates in the left column and chapter titles in the top row. This allows me to record whether each working day is a drafting or editing day and which chapter I’m working on. If it’s a drafting day, I record my daily word count.
The second spreadsheet is more complex and this is the reason I have a widescreen monitor. It’s an on-the-go summary of the developing novel. I set up columns from left to right: chapter number/title, character list, point-of-view character, tense, settings, main plot points in that chapter, and a column in which I note how the chapter connects with the story’s overall themes, and finally a column for the chapter’s word count. In the midst of writing, if I suddenly realise that an edit or addition is needed in an earlier chapter, I’ll add a note in green type to the spreadsheet. It’s always open on my computer desktop.
For my second novel, Sleeping Embers of an Ordinary Mind, I needed an additional monster spreadsheet to record, chapter-by-chapter, the occurrence of repeating motifs and themes. The printout stretched the length of my kitchen.
When I’m ready to send a manuscript to beta-readers, I ‘compile’ my Scrivener chapters as a Word document. From that point on, through to final draft, development edit and copy edit, I work in Word.
When do you write?
With my first novel, A Calculated Life, I wrote whenever I had time — over a period of several years. It was frustrating; I had to set aside the manuscript for as long as six months at a time. You know how it is, life intervenes. So I had no idea how long that novel took to write in terms of days/weeks/months. That’s why I now keep a daily log.
I’m fortunate that I’m writing full time and when I’m in a writing phase it’s pretty full on, especially if there’s a deadline. I’m definitely not an early morning person. I’m content to start about 9.30 or 10 am and work through until 6-ish with breaks for tea/coffee/lunch/tea and cake. Sometimes I’ll set a stopwatch and do a writing sprint for twenty five minutes, for variety! However, I do find that when I write quickly, I spend more time re-writing and editing. So I don’t beat myself up if my word count looks meagre.
Where do you write?
I kinda work in a white cube. White walls, white semi-transparent blinds (invariably closed) and a desk with a near-white formica top. The desk is a lovely 1950s Hans Gugelot desk, my pride and joy. This small room is built onto the end of our garage. It’s brilliant to have this space separate from the house. I’m not disturbed by anyone knocking on the door, or by unsolicited phone calls.
Where do you go for inspiration?
I look beyond literature. I go to exhibitions, take a cycle ride, travel to new places. Or I walk around the local playing field to catch the sunset. I’m not sure I’m ‘looking’ for inspiration. Basically, I’m switching off my writer’s brain and opening up to new experiences or living in the moment, as with travel and cycle rides. I try to get away with my husband in our campervan for a change of scene. Sometimes I write while we’re away — I sit under the van’s awning, write in the shade.
How do you write?
No music. I don’t understand how anyone can write with music in the background. Each to their own! I live in a rural area but that doesn’t mean it’s peaceful — raucous birdsong (magpies are the worst), hedge cutters, chainsaws. I keep noise-cancelling headphones on my desk, and I wear them by default.
First Person, Third person, present tense, past?
For my first novel, I wrote in third person limited (free indirect style) and past tense except for two epilogues, which I wrote in present tense. I’m not sure how many readers noticed the change in tense, but I believe it shifted the tone, the atmosphere. Third person limited was essential for this novel because I wanted the reader to see the world through only the main character’s eyes — to witness the world from her limited, almost innocent, perspective.
I now prefer present tense and I think this preference reflects the fact that I don’t outline my chapters in any detail. Therefore I’m discovering the story alongside my characters. It feels more natural. I dislike the contrivance of an omniscient narrator. I don’t think I could attempt that.
My latest novel, Dreams Before the Start of Time, comprises 19 chapters and each has a single POV character: 19 chapters, 16 points of view in total, 16 chapters in third person, 3 in first person. A series of linked vignettes, if you like.
I’ve developed a real liking for first person. But the story always determines my choice. So, for my novella The Enclave I felt two different points of view would be perfect, each written in first person, giving room for the reader to make inferences concerning the gaps between the two characters’ stories.
Follow the plot or the character or just go with it?
Characters come first for me. I often discover their personalities in the process of writing their dialogue.
When the first draft is done…
After working for many years in journalism, I can’t bring myself to blast through a first draft. I edit as I go along — editing as I draft a paragraph, editing the previous day’s work, editing at the end of a chapter, re-editing several chapters at the end of a section, and so on. As a result, the first draft represents an almost-complete novel. I feel I’m almost there. Of course, I may well decide to add a chapter, move a scene, refine a character’s voice, etc. I address all the notes/reminders I’ve made in green text on my summary spreadsheet. Then I embark on the line-edits, fact checking and proofing.
For my latest novel I corralled five beta-readers: three family members and two writers. I’m fortunate that my family readers are pretty damn good, each in his own way (Yes, my family readers are all men!)
For me, it’s hard to let go of a manuscript. I like to be involved up until to the last moment, until the pages are printed.
Lastly, self promotion:
I describe myself as a writer of near-future science fiction or speculative fiction. To be honest that doesn’t feel complete because I’ve also incorporated historical and contemporary fiction in my work. I haven’t totally abandoned my fine art practice — I’m exhibiting a piece of text-art this autumn in a public installation curated by Andrew Bracey. I still gravitate towards journalistic and non-fiction opportunities. For example, I’ve had a feature published this summer on the UK feminist website, The F-Word — Time to Cut the Cord with The Stone Age? — and I’ve been given the somewhat splendid title of ‘interviewer in residence’ for a collaboration between The Arthur C Clarke Award and Ada Lovelace Day. To date the main result of this collaboration is the “Ada Lovelace Conversations” with women science fiction writers. Quick links on my bio page on my website. More conversations are in the pipeline. These have been immense fun and a great learning experience in terms of discovering other writers’ approach to their craft.
I’m currently developing two writing projects, one is underway, the other is still in outline. I can’t talk about either; it’s simply too early.
GCSE results are out today in England and Wales, they include the new tougher examinations in English and Maths. There is a new 9 to 1 grading system for these exams, chosen so that more detail can be given about the highest achieving candidates.
A similar discussion was played out last week when the A level results were announced. That’s because politicians love to talk about identifying the "very best" students.
Don’t be taken in, it’s a misdirection. Here’s why.
The driving test is a good example of a criterion referenced examination. To pass the driving test you have to show you can do certain things: reverse into a parking space, drive through traffic lights and so on. If you can satisfy all the criteria, you pass. No one complains that too many people are passing the driving test. If you’re good enough, you get your driving licence.
Many professional examinations are criterion referenced. Gas Safe registration is a good example. If an engineer has shown they have the necessary skill, they’re registered.
In norm referenced examinations, all the exams are marked and then put into order. The top 10% say are given the highest grade, the next 10% the next highest grade and so on. This way, so the argument goes, you can find the best students. This is deemed appropriate when there are limited resources. If there are only 10 places available for a university course, they should go to the 10 best students.
That seems fair.
Or is it?
Why not say "this number of students have the necessary skills, let’s make extra university places available for them"? That’s not as unreasonable as it sounds. Most British universities are opening up centres around the world.
One of my jobs is helping potential Oxbridge students apply to Oxford and Cambridge. I’m regularly told by the colleges they have five times the number of capable applicants as they have places, and I believe them. So why not make the universities bigger? The population is increasing, so why not build new colleges at the same rate to accommodate the increasing number of the most able?
Talking about identifying the very best through examinations is a distraction. It allows politicians to ignore the students who would have been able to secure a place at a top college or university 20 years ago but can’t today because the supply of places isn’t keeping up with demand.
It’s in the nature of elites to restrict the number of people who can enter their ranks. Educational elites are no different. Keeping the discussion focused on the very best is a distraction from the fact that there are proportionally less places available today.
Tagging is straightforward on Simplenote. Add your tags on the tag bar, keep track of them using the tag dropdown. You can edit and delete tags using the phone or desktop app.
Click on a tag to search for it, or use the following syntax in the search bar to find all notes tagged with knife
tag:knife
Find notes tagged spoon and/or knife as follows
tag:spoon tag:knife
You can use the following trick on the webapp to find all the notes which haven’t been tagged.
tag:untagged
Evernote
Evernote has a very flexible tagging system with an excellent search facility. Searching for a single tag is a matter of simply clicking on the tag.
You can do more complex tag searches by using the following syntax:
Search for headings tagged spoon and knife
tag:spoon tag:knife
Search for headings tagged spoon but not knife
tag:spoon -tag:knife
Find all untagged notes
-tag:*
Evernote also allows you to save frequently used searches.
Tony Ballantyne 