The Slaughtered Lamb

Who remembers 'An American Werewolf in London'?

The book I’m reading at the moment is The English German Girl by Jake Wallis Simons. It’s an interesting story and Simons makes it rattle along while employing some interesting point-of-view trickery to give it a literary quality. But, occasionally, I find my reading pace checked when I come across something which, I believe, should have been smoothed out by a diligent editor.

 

There are times I read a piece of writing that is so simpatico, my internal editor switches off and a preternatural connection transmits the meaning from the writer’s pen straight into my brain.  Our member Linda produced prose of this order in the latest extract from her novel-in-progress, A Head Full of Budgerigars.  This was from a chapter headed Magnetic Socks in which Linda’s protagonist Lily spends a day in her Shrubshire home but contrasts the current idyll with a remembered life on a French farm where:
 

Trevor dragged the frightened lamb on its back across the unkempt farmyard in Sainte Béatrice, to a piece of rough ground in front of the kitchen window. … He slit the lamb’s throat and the blood dripped into the bucket below. Lily had expected it to gush out in a hideous torrent. He cut open the stomach and removed the liver with a knife that flashed in the sunlight. The liver flopped into a chipped enamel bowl. ‘Do you want to fry this up? It’s beautiful when it’s fresh, not like that crap in the supermarket.’  … She [Lily] grimaced, ‘I’d rather not.’

The humour in the pay-off line is typical of Linda’s novel which is also characterized by a wistful, elegiac tone for the pieces about the English countryside. We all hope that when Lily finishes the book she can find an agent or publisher who loves it as much as we do.

In other news, we discussed the current round of competitions and it looks as if at least three of us will attempt to have a story in the Summer Guardian Weekend Short Story special. We also floated the idea that if we can’t afford to go to writing retreats organized by other people why can’t we do-it-ourselves? Five Go (Writing) Mad in Dorset beckons.  

Our last meeting was at Rob's house where we listened to Chris read an extract from Karl Marx and Careful Driving. It was generally felt by the group that Chris had got it just right this time, ie more about the journey and less philosophy. Marx (as the title implies) is central to the theme of the book and Plato is becoming equally significant, so Chris didn't quite agree.

I felt that this was an exciting extract from the book - real swashbuckling, romantic stuff. The loneliness and isolation of the long distance truck driver really came through. Tony appreciated the 'dark' humour and Annie enjoyed getting a bit closer to life on the road. Rob was a little disconcerted about Chris's thoughts on speeding: 'The Inquisition is wielding radar guns on the Minsk bypass'. Hopefully this contentious subject will attract interest and discussion and we will soon be listening to Chris being interviewed on Radio 4, while we eat our cornflakes. Doesn't he bare a striking resemblance to Errol Flynn?

Apologies to Annie for missing my turn to blog on her latest short story Aspirations and Ambitions. We all agreed that this was a well constructed story with an excellent twist and the requisite happy ending. This is the sort of story that women's magazines love and hopefully she should do very well with it. Several of us felt that the title should be changed. I suggested Keeping up with Monica.

Fine upstanding writers

It had been a while since we'd met at Chris and Linda’s and the mood was light-hearted. Thanks to Linda's hospitality and baking skills I enjoyed my second accidental cake of the day. Annie and I shared a pew while Rob -- suffering with a back problem -- was obliged to spend the meeting either towering over us like an intimidating lecturer who had lost his lectern or else kneeling beside this. Poor Rob. But the supplicant was rewarded for his humble genuflection with lots of thoughtful and constructive feedback on his submission to this week’s meeting -- an opening chapter for a ghost-written memoir. This is a fascinating project and generated much discussion about the particular challenges of writing memoir and the extent to which a ghost-writer must remain faithful to the recollections of the ‘ghost-writee’. All memory is imperfect. How much poetic licence can the writer of memoir-at-one-remove be allowed?

Meanwhile, Chris has been busy touring his ' one-man show ' based on his book Why don't you fly? With the logistical backup of Linda, Chris is as busy doing talks these days as he is writing. He played us a recording of a recent interview on BBC Radio Shropshire. Notwithstanding the chummy facetiousness of the radio presenter, BBC local radio remains one of the few forums for emerging writers to publicise their work. The BBC is a public service and, like all public services these days, is facing cutbacks. BBC local radio is a precious platform for writers just as BBC Radio 4 is one of very few outlets for short literary fiction for UK-based writers. Let us hope, as the BBC's output is scrutinised, opportunities for new writing are developed rather than cut back. Perhaps we should follow Rob's example and ask for as much on bended knee.

Certainly Not a Soft Head

The Severn Valley Authors met to review the third and final part of Tony's long short story - 'The Softeness of Heads'. Everyone agreed that it was a strong piece that would also happily stand alone without the first two parts. Rob was thrilled by the indifference shown by Tony's protagonist when it came to remembering the name of a cousin. So much so that Rob was inspired to muse on this point on his own website! There was much discussion about the use of a very large jump in the narrative. Linda and myself thought it too big a jump but Rob on the other hand did not mind. Many other facets of the writing did not divide opinion. For instance we all loved the reference to bald rather than bold knights. The story had a period feel, which Tony drip-feeds in, creating a 'roomy' read. We also agreed that this was a multi-layered story that each reader had interpreted in very different way. But we also agreed that it was about being different. It was insightful and depicted childhood well. This story was strongly autobiographical. Tony revealed that some of the events that we questioned the likelihood of, had actually happened. So he did fall down the coal hole! This story was skilfully created with Tony taking us inside the head of a child very convincingly. It reminded me of many situations from childhood and feelings of being out of step. Does anybody ever truly feel in step though? Rob was bold (or bald) enough to suggest a tiny modification to the ending where the protagonist had learnt from his experiences and had toughened up. As change should be at the heart of any short story this did sound like a good suggestion but the decision lies entirely with Tony. A gentle but captivating read!

Flying gerunds

A captive gerund - Gerald Scarfe

We welcomed a potential new member, Holly, who came to view us to see whether being part of our group would help her with the fantasy trilogy she is working on.

It has been part of the SVA ethos from its beginning to take the workshopping element of our meetings seriously and it may seem a bit scarey for somebody new to watch as we analyse our compatriot’s writing. I think we are good at emphasising the good parts and describing our suggestions for improvements as techniques of writing rather than finding fault in the writer.

Linda read an extract from her novel about the peregrinations of Lily – this chapter being titled Homeward Bound. There was much for us to admire in the way Linda evokes mood with her smooth-as-Guinness prose. She imparts a poetic rhythm with repetition, adverbs and adjectives shaping and counting the beats and this gives her work a lyrical, almost Celtic personality. It may sound as if this means the work is ‘away with the fairies’ but nothing could be further from the ‘life as Lily lived it’ story that Linda is unfolding.

In the discussions that followed, we examined the practicalities of obtaining permission to quote lyrics – in this case from the eponymous Simon and Garfunkel song  – and the use of apostrophes indicating possession when the ‘thing’ possessed is a gerund. Eg: the boys’ misbehaving was driving her wild. We failed to resolve this and decided in favour of changing the sentence to eliminate the dilemma.

So, Lily is now homeward bound to Shrubshire (or wherever) and at the end of the meeting the SVA members returned to their homes to dream of possessed gerunds trussed into strait jackets and flying away on the wings of giant apostrophes.

Thanks for the Petticoat Tails, Tony.

One-sentence paragraphs, metacognition ... and the quietest places under the sun

IT WAS the best of times, it was the worst of times, it was the age of wisdom, it was the age of foolishness, it was the epoch of belief, it was the epoch of incredulity, it was the season of Light, it was the season of Darkness, it was the spring of hope, it was the winter of despair, we had everything before us, we had nothing before us, we were all going direct to Heaven, we were all going direct the other way- in short, the period was so far like the present period, that some of its noisiest authorities insisted on its being received, for good or for evil, in the superlative degree of comparison only.

(From A Tale of Two Cities by Charles Dickens)

Thus Dickens begins Tale of Two Cities with one of the most famous one-sentence paragraphs in literature. If Dickens could use one-sentence paragraphs why shouldn't less celebrated authors? Yet I'm surely not alone in having been told in school that a paragraph must have more than one sentence. A quick internet search provides supporters and detractors for the practice in equal numbers. The consensus seems to be that one-sentence paragraphs are not strictly forbidden these days - and can indeed have great impact (hence their widespread use in print journalism) - but that they should be used sparingly. With this in mind, and bowing to Dickens’ genius, I'm prepared to forgive Chris’s one-sentence paragraph habit which became a talking-point at this week's meeting of the Severn Valley Authors.

We were discussing an extract from Chris’s work in progress: Karl Marx and Careful Driving. With flashes of brilliantly fine writing, Chris’s project is becoming ever more complex and multi-layered. Chris acknowledged that it is highly experimental but I'm not sure what he made of my suggestion that, at times, it is now closer to an epic prose poem than a narrative.

Rob noted Chris's tendency to sometimes “go off on one”, by which he meant those times where Chris quotes philosophy without linking it to his highly original truck-driving theme. The great difficulty is getting the balance right and the group agreed that it sometimes reads too much like a textbook. Annie wanted “nuggets of Marxism and chunks of real life” rather than the other way round and Chris defended himself by pointing out that the lengthy Marx quotes have only been ‘dropped’ into the text provisionally and will be edited and paraphrased in time.

Annie dazzled us with her introduction of the concept of ‘metacognition’ with reference to the following (two-sentence) paragraph of Chris’s:

Individual fulfilment is achieved by closing the gap that exists between our unique personal essence - the perfect imaginary world that figures only in our dreams - and our existence (the world transmitted by our senses). The gap between essence and existence, theory and practice, the World of Ideas and the World of the Senses, had narrowed.

Annie had always thought this thought, apparently, but hadn’t known she had thought it until now – metacognition, indeed!

After the above, one-sentence paragraph the only question that remains is: Do decades have capitals? That is to say, should it be “the eighties and the nineties” or the “Eighties and the Nineties”? Perhaps Linda will discover the answer to this and other questions when she attends the Arvon Foundation course at Clunton in June.

“Where’s Clunton?” asked Rob.

I don't want to give away the exact location for obvious reasons for, being an inveterate 'Shropshire Lad' of course I know that, in the words of A E Houseman:

Clunton and Clunbury,

Clungunford and Clun,

Are the quietest places

Under the sun.

(from Clunton and Clunbury by A E Housman)

The Sting Inside

I have been sitting here in front of my computer screen for some time struggling to find the right words for this blog. I wonder if I will ever finish my book - if I will ever find the right words - if I will ever add to my own blog, last written in September 2010. I have been attacked by self-doubt, but then I am kicked in the behind when I think of all my fellow writers at SVA. They soldier on, continuing to search for the right words in the face of the minutest odds that their hard work will be recognised. Tony and Annie manage to produce fabulous work in what little spare time they have. Working full-time, making time for family and relationships and finding time to write is a skilfull juggling act.

Chris gets up at 4 a.m. every morning so that he can get a couple of hours of writing in before cycling off to work. He allows himself a lie-in on those days when he doesn't have to work: he gets up at 5 a.m. instead.

Rob also juggles several jobs and commitments beyond writing, but never ceases to come up with the goods. We all know - it isn't easy.

After the dramatic first chapter of The Sting Inside, Rob sets the scene for his characters and their new life in America. He beautifully crafts a sense of authenticity with references to screen doors that slammed shut if you didn't wedge yourself in them and yellow school buses with folding doors that shushed open and the flag that swings out to stop the traffic. He also hints at the difficulties the family face in a new land: Ben starting a new school and the importance of having friends, and Rachel facing long days in an empty house. Annie and I immediately felt sympathy for Rachel and felt that her story should be developed but Rob showed that she was no pushover when it came to standing up for her son and her firmness with the school. I wasn't going to have them mess it up, she says to Jon. Jon comes across as a loving family man and there are nice little touches like Jon embarrassing his son by singing and clicking his fingers 'old-fogey' style, but we do get a sense of his smugness; that this life in America is about his career and the riches success can bring.

Underpinning this depiction of family life, guilt, in the guise of a malignant worm burrowing inside Jon, adds a sinister backdrop. On this occasion 'guilt' speaks, in fact it tells the story. Annie felt that the worm needs to have a persona, indeed a more malevolent one. I liked her question, Is it an English or an American worm? I also have to agree with her point that it seems hard to believe that anyone could forget that their story is going in to print that day.

Tony enjoyed the sinsiter undertones that the worm gave to the story of the (hitherto) good life in America and felt that the epigram by Primo Levi was helpful.

Phrases praised by all of us were: her cereal-commercial brightness and Ben's gangling limbs galumphing about.

We already have strong hints of the conflict to come: the musical Cabaret with its Nazi/Jewish theme, the gay lovers and of course the aftermath of 9/11 and survivor guilt. We all look forward to reading more and to discovering exactly why, as Rob says, Every good thing has a sting inside.