Writer’s block
I’m struggling to write.
Now this is a common problem experienced by most writers. Over the last three months I have had many distractions which have kept me from the key board.
- Things like going away for several short holidays with family.
- Things like spending wonderful time with my grandson – and his parents.
- Things like catching up with family over Christmas.
- Things like celebrating my wife’s birthday with friends – it was one of the big one! (Ssssh – I won’t mention her age)
- Things like getting jobs done around the house that had been studiously ignored during the year.
Probably the most concerning, however, has been a deterioration of my health. Several things have made concentrating on my writing very difficult. This is where persistence comes into play. Over the last few days I’ve gradually pushed through the disappointments and difficulties and persisted with my writing. Sometimes it has been easy, sometimes very challenging.
As I see it now, my priority over the coming months will be to keep on steadily writing while being careful to pace myself and care for my health.
Good writing.
My latest publishing venture
Now for something a little different.
I’ve had another poem published, this time in a small collection of poems called a chap book. There’s quite a story to this poem being published.
Every month I attend a poetry writers’ group at the university where I have almost completed my Master of Arts in Creative Writing. Poetry writing has been a love of mine for decades, but it is only now that I’m having some small publication successes. Poetry was a big part of the course and my skills have definitely improved in the last 2 years.
Every month we set a poetry writing challenge for the next meeting. One of the challenges last year was to write a poem on the theme of poverty (the Global Financial Crisis even crept into our little group). Some of the poems were brilliant and deserved a much wider audience than the group. We decided that this was to be the the first compilation published by the group.
I was nominated to be one of the three editors and I also set up the design of the booklet. We called it Shifting Sands. We had a very successful launch at our monthly meeting last Thursday. Normally we might only have about 5-7 members attend. This time we had 14 people present (including 3 new members) despite at least 3 or our regular attendees being away.
This month our theme was New Year’s Resolutions and the standard was extremely high. As a result we are now planning our next publication.
Good writing.
Review “The Slap” by Christos Tsiolkas
The slap
I bought this novel The Slap by acclaimed Australian author Christos Tsiolkas late last year as a birthday present to myself. I had heard so much comment about the novel that I wanted to read it. It was also short listed for the 2009 Miles Franklin Literary Award and was winner of the 2009 Commonwealth Writers’ Prize, two more reasons for wanting to read it. There had been considerable media hype since its publication.
I resisted reading it for some weeks, keeping it on hold until our beach holiday just before Christmas. In the few days before starting to read it, I read Tim Winton’s The Turning. I reviewed that book yesterday. I thoroughly enjoyed Winton’s collection of stories set in Western Australia and picked up The Slap with enthusiasm. I was enjoying a prolonged holiday of reading, and, at almost 500 pages, this was a work I could really lose myself in over the holiday break.
Wrong.
From the first page I was not only disappointed, I was furious, revolted, disgusted and appalled – sometimes all at the same time.
Strengths
The premise is brilliant: a group of people living in Melbourne gather for a backyard barbecue. All is going well until one of the younger children behaves abominably and one of the adults slaps him. Trouble is – the adult is not his father. The novel is in eight parts, each told from a different person’s point of view of the same incident. Each section covers the life of the person relating the incident, the events before and after “the slap” and their reactions to the event. It affects each in various ways, and for many different reasons.
In my opinion, the only other strength of this book is the characterisation. Tsiolkas has drawn eight major characters (as well as a few minor characters) brilliantly. By the end of each section you feel that you really know the person thoroughly. In fact, you could meet any one of them at a barbecue or at the pub this weekend.
Weaknesses
From the very first page Tsiolkas sets out to shock the reader. There is frequent very coarse language, something I find very objectionable. It is also unnecessary. If it is in character, and used for the purpose of shocking the reader, then it may have a place, used occasionally. After the first two or three pages of this novel, it no longer shocks; IT IS VERY IRRITATING. And very poor writing. Couldn’t the writer think of another word?
I find the same thing in many movies and television shows these days. Otherwise brilliant films like Four Weddings and a Funeral are very much the poorer for all the coarse language. Writers: if you want to shock the viewer do it very sparingly, otherwise it no longer shocks. It is just lazy writing!
Two major themes of the novel relate to drugs and sex. It would seem to anyone from another city or country, on reading this novel, would conclude that everyone living in Melbourne is either regularly out of their brains on drugs, or out of their pants in yet another bizarre sexual activity – or both! Sure, this probably reflects the lifestyle of about 0.1% of Melbourne’s population, most of them crammed into the characters in this novel. It occurred to me that whenever the plot was wandering, or getting weak, Tsiolkas would decide to throw in more about drugs or sex. In sections it borders on the pornographic. Again, lazy writing in my opinion. This book reads like a set of interesting, well written characters in search of a good plot!
Conclusions
This novel has been praised for the quality of the writing. It has won awards and prizes. It has sold many copies and done very well for the author.
I have read many reviews of this novel, many of them praising the book and placing it on a very high pedestal indeed, saying, in effect, there should be more high quality writing like this in Australian literature.
What rubbish!
Such reviewers wouldn’t know good literature if it bit them on the nose. If this is indicative of the fine level of Australian literature, it is a major concern. Thank goodness we have the likes of Tim Winton who writes brilliantly. I look forward to reading more of his works. I’m sure I’ll never read anything else by Tsiolkas.
Offer: Anyone want to buy a ‘read-only-once-and-never-again’ book?
Going cheap.
Review “The Turning” by Tim Winton
The Turning - Tim Winton
Tim Winton is arguably Australia’s leading writer at the moment. Four times winner of our most prestigious Miles Franklin Award, Winton stands alone at the top of Australian literature. His most recent award was for his highly acclaimed novel Breath. I read this last year and made comments on my blog here.
It was with great anticipation then that I took his collection of short stories The Turning away with me on a beach holiday just before Christmas last year. This book is a collection of twenty short stories set largely in rural Western Australia. The rural settings evoked by these stories spoke strongly to me as I grew up in a similar setting here in South Australia. Much of what he wrote about was familiar and comfortable territory.
What makes this an interesting book is the interconnectedness between many of the stories. While each story stands alone, each also has connections with other stories. Sometimes the setting is the same. The same characters keep appearing in different stories. Different characters relate the same incidents from their perspective. It is clever and intriguing writing.
While the settings are most definitely a strong point of the collection, the characters are also strongly drawn. You could walk into any country pub anywhere in Australia and find one or two people just like Winton’s characters. He certainly has a strong grasp of the Australian character.
Very enjoyable reading.
Highly recommended.
Further reading:
Reference:
- Winton, T 2006 The Turning. Pan Macmillan Australia, Sydney
Some thoughts about weeds and words
I needed to do some weeding in the garden recently. Our rose bed was in danger of disappearing into a jungle of tangled weeds.
Weeding in the garden is so satisfying; in a very short space of time you can see the results of your labours. The garden bed looks much better very quickly. The plants you leave behind – presumably those you want to keep – give a huge sigh of relief. ‘There is a sun after all,’ they say. Weeding improves the garden.
Too often we allow words to grow like weeds in our writing. Many words creep in unannounced and unwanted. There is the danger that they can choke out the good words. At their worst they can rob the desirable words of all the necessary moisture and nutrients for growth. Your story can wilt and die.
Be ruthless. Pull out all unnecessary words. Edit relentlessly.
And your writing will be allowed to bloom into its full potential.
Good weeding – and good writing.