Lost
I need to write the last pages of the book -- actually I've written the very last 3 pages, it's the pages that come right before I need to do. But I'm very resistant -- I wrote them once already and they've been lost. I am mad as hell because I wrote them well and I can't get it right and where on earth did they go and how could I lose my writing???? I THOUGHT I always saved the different versions of the book but I can't find the section where I sit in the American consulate in Guangzhou and look at the photos of the newly elected George Bush and Dick Cheney. I wrote it well a while ago. Could it be a year ago? Maybe longer. but it is gone now. I went through the hard copy I had in notebooks and the e-copy on my computer, then the copies on CD, then the copies on my work computer, then the file drawer, even the trash and gone, gone, gone. How could I have done this?
But it is gone, so now I have to write it again and the energy just isn't there in my writing. I must get it done anyway, just do it, like a task, a tedious task. Maybe I can liven it up later.
It is very difficult to write this last section and I'm not sure why. I wonder if I'm afraid to end this book? Somehow, the story feels more complicated here. but the story has been complicated in other sections and I've resolved it. Writing a story based on fact has its own problems. It gets sticky -- how much to tell when I am eager to be done with the telling, when I am sick to death of this story, when I want to get it right and somehow it is like walking through a bog.
One step at a time throught that bog. And if it is slimy, bring it to the writing group to have it cleaned up.
Reva
But it is gone, so now I have to write it again and the energy just isn't there in my writing. I must get it done anyway, just do it, like a task, a tedious task. Maybe I can liven it up later.
It is very difficult to write this last section and I'm not sure why. I wonder if I'm afraid to end this book? Somehow, the story feels more complicated here. but the story has been complicated in other sections and I've resolved it. Writing a story based on fact has its own problems. It gets sticky -- how much to tell when I am eager to be done with the telling, when I am sick to death of this story, when I want to get it right and somehow it is like walking through a bog.
One step at a time throught that bog. And if it is slimy, bring it to the writing group to have it cleaned up.
Reva
posted by Seven Authors in A Private Conversation at 1:16 AM
2 Comments:
Reva-
My first novel is one that I have been too close to for so long that I can no longer go near it with an objective mind. I, too, have trouble ending my story because it has no end and I have no compelling reason to write the final line. I took the writing class with the intention of finishing my book once and for all, but what the class did more than anything was show me that I lost the "story" long ago. My characters had taken over the writing entirely and I allowed them too much freedom. To end the story would be death to them and why would they collude in their own demise? Once I realized my unwillingness to confront my characters, I was able to set the novel aside and move on to a new novel. I will have to harden my heart with this new set of characters and perhaps one day I will be strong enough to tackle novel number one as a stern commander instead of being the meek lieutenant of a mutinous crew.
Amy
Oh my, Amy, what a wonderful image: you at your computer and a host of angry characters standing behind you shouting while you ignore them and write a new novel! R
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