Writing fiction is writing life. Except characters don’t go to the bathroom as often.
– Peter Bognanni
Month: June 2010
haiku 119
rainstorm leaks inside —
stairwell becomes
waterfall
Pen to Paper: Freedom of Speech
The U.S. Supreme Court handed down an extremely important ruling this past Thursday. In an 8-1 vote, the court ruled that public disclosure of the names and addresses of persons signing petitions is not a violation of the First Amendment.
The case, Doe v. Reed, comes from Washington State. The legislature had granted same-sex couples all the benefits of marriage except the word itself. People who do not believe same-sex couples should have those benefits organized. They got like-minded people to sign a petition to force a referendum on the new law. As required, the petition signers wrote their names and addresses on the petition. The petition drive got the required number of names and a referendum was placed on the ballot.
Some people who supported the law on same-sex benefits planned to publish on the Internet the names on the petition. At least some of the signers of the petition felt that would not be in their best interest and asked a court to forbid it. Their bizarre argument was that having their names made public would hinder their First Amendment right to free speech.
OT: Adopt-a-Cat Month 2010
Reverting briefly to Catsignal’s original province, June is American Humane’s Adopt-A-Cat Month. Yes, this almost couldn’t be posted any later, but any time is a good time to adopt a cat.
The best writers have loved cats. Monica Wood in The Pocket Muse: Ideas and Inspirations for Writing gives us this list of literary cat lovers: T.S. Eliot, William Butler Yeats, Christina Rossetti, John Keats, J.R.R. Tolkien, Mark Twain, Christopher Smart, Marianne Moore, Ernest Hemingway, Oscar Wilde, Doris Lessing, Rita Mae Brown, Carolyn Chute, and Nuala O’Faolain. So if you want to write seriously you should consider adopting a cat.
Wanting to be a good writer isn’t enough, of course. You must determine if a cat is right for you. Go through the checklist and make sure you’re on board.
Bringing a pet into your home must not be a frivolous matter; this is a life you would be trifling with. You must adopt a pet with the firm conviction that it is a lifetime commitment. Determine you will be the best pet lover ever for the whole length of the pet’s life, or don’t do it.
“How we behave toward cats here below determines our status in heaven.”
— Robert A. Heinlein
Pen to Paper: Stories on Napkins
So, once you’ve read your way through Catsignal — all the fiction, all the haiku, all the odds and ends that have crept into this site — you could click over to this page at Esquire’s website and read stories that were written on napkins.
It’s an intriguing idea. I haven’t tried it yet, but it’s a reminder for me that web fiction is by both necessity and definition short. Attention spans are measured in pixels and picoseconds, not pages and “perhaps just one more chapter.” I’ve been writing longer stories lately, which I have actually felt just the tiniest bit guilty about, feeling as though I don’t at present possess the discipline required to write something of 500 words or less. (And what would Freud make of writers trying to write shorter and narrower stories rather than longer and broader ones?)
There’s something charming about the idea of writing a whole, entire story on a napkin. It has a reductionist appeal, declaring that something worthwhile and beautiful can be done so simply and with such humble materials. And it forces one to write tightly, unless the last words one comes to are: “Continued on next napkin.”
PROGRAMMING NOTE: Speaking of reductionism, this is the last Friday Pen to Paper. Catsignal will be a Monday through Thursday blog, starting with Pen to Paper, then a haiku, a quote, and finishing up on Thursdays with some fiction. Sorry, but I need that time back for other projects.
Fiction: The Weapon
“Your mother’s funeral,” Aunt Margaret repeated as they sat down. She spoke, as she always did, so Eric and everyone else at the table could hear her.
It was a gorgeous late spring day and the women of the First Baptist Church had set up the funeral dinner outside rather than in the church basement. Only the mildest of breezes blew and it was scented with lilac.
Eric said nothing. He had learned long ago to keep his responses to Aunt Margaret short and polite, whatever else he might want to say.
“Where on earth were you, Eric?” Aunt Margaret demanded from across the table. “What did you think could possibly be more important than being on time to your dear mother’s funeral?”
Quotable 7
Intellectuals work with words. Questioning the value of basic grammar is like asking whether farmers should know the names of their crops and animals.
– David Mulroy
haiku 118
spring evening —
bunnies probe
driveway for food
Pen to Paper: Vocabulary Words
On the one hand, a broad vocabulary is a delight in that you can get nearer the shade of meaning you want. On the other hand, too many people with a broad vocabulary use it to obfuscate their meaning from their interlocutors (Q.E.D.).
My master’s work in communication taught me about the varying levels of communication and the dangers of getting stuck at one. Fifteen years in journalism taught me that the point of mass communication is to communicate to the masses, and that means using common words in common ways. I still have quite a good vocabulary, but I’ve learned not to use it in most settings. I don’t feel in the least that I’ve dumbed down my conversation or my writing; rather, I’ve improved my clarity of reception.
Some folks at The New York Times put together a (PDF) list of the top 50 words their readers don’t seem to have a solid grasp of. The methodology is well explained in the article. Some I actually could define; others … not so much but I’d be likely to read over most of those words without going to a dictionary and let the context enlighten me. See how you fare.
A note to those who teach: pay particular attention to word number 13. That this is unknown by a large segment of some of the nation’s better-educated newspaper readers is a grave problem. Do your part with your students to fix it.
Pen to Paper: Novels are Educational
Good fiction can do a lot of things: it can entertain, horrify, instruct, illuminate, and bring forth empathy in the reader. Really good fiction can do some or all of this simultaneously.
In November 2008, The University of Manchester issued a news report about how novels are useful in helping us to understand aspects of poverty and international development. The novel’s ability to delve deeply into both the basic facts of an issue and also show us how that affects people makes it as valuable (and often far more readable) than academic or government studies.
This is additional confirmation of what we have known for years. Think of novels that have changed policies and history: Two Years Before the Mast, The Jungle, Uncle Tom’s Cabin, The Grapes of Wrath … add to this brief list in the comments.
Fiction can explain to people what they did not understand before and move them to act to change the status quo. Someday the plutocrats and oligarchs will figure this out, and then it’ll be not Orwell’s 1984 but Bradbury’s Fahrenheit 451.