Wow, I didn't realize it had been this long since I've blogged. My absence has nothing to do with a dearth of things to write about. The opposite in fact.
My first excuse is that since the beginning of October I've been teaching College essay writing for the first time. Thirty-three students. Ninety-nine essays to mark. Secondly, I blame Facebook--I release so much of my creative energy in 20 word bursts in my daily status updates.
But teaching and Facebook-ing don't explain everything; I've been doing both for years. The main reason is a felt need for privacy. I've experienced so many emotions, changes, and stresses that would have made for intriguing blog posts--may even have encouraged someone--but I don't feel ready to share with the world.
Saturday I went to a discussion on the definition of Mennolit featuring local authors Armin Wiebe and David Elias. Afterward David Elias told me that writing fiction is more truthful than writing fact. A few weeks ago novelist Sandra Birdsell told me the same thing. She said it was like putting a puppet on your hand: a character to hide behind while you uncover yourself in complete honesty.
I know what they mean. I want so badly to show you what's inside, but I'm tired of being vulnerable, of opening myself and my family up to criticism, advice, and gossip. I want to hide behind a character who embodies everything inside me: the fear, the humour, the sexuality, the insecurities, and the dreams...how it feels to be in my skin, and somehow, through my fictional character, to have it all make sense, or at least: something beautiful.
3 comments:
So does this mean you'll venture into fiction soon, Angeline? -- I've been mulling over what both David Elias and Sandra Birdsell told you. I agree with them, but I think it's a true hiding, and really quite indirect, maybe much more hidden than even the writer knows. I find myself resisting when people make assumptions that my fiction is somehow about "me." Well, this could be a long discussion! Good post. doradueck.wordpress.com
I want to write fiction but I'm struggling. I started a story three summers ago and I'm only up to 10 pages! I read it my sister-in-law, who's taking her PhD in English Lit. and she loved it. (Naturally, her love for me means she's not an objective critic, but she is a genuine one, and those were real tears in her eyes when I read the sad bit.) I just can't get the creativity to flow.
I didn't realize you were a novelist until I saw your book list on your blog. I'm curious now and anxious to read your original and upcoming books! How does the creative process work for you?
It doesn't work as well for me as it probably should, obviously, with two decades falling between my first and second novel. But, like you, I've had children to raise and other kinds of work to do as well.-- I think the process begins with desire, which you already have, and if something simply won't let me alone, I make a commitment to it and try to do at least as much as I feel I can manage on a regular basis. I'm working on short stories these days, and it's another learning curve. Reading pushes my creativity, but can also keep me away from writing! And, we have to give ourselves permission to let the first draft be as bad as it may be.
-- Kindred may still have a copy or two of UtSSS, but if not, I have a few copies left, same price. (Bargain basement, by now!) I'd be delighted to have you read it.
-- All the best, and do keep at it. (But maybe the three-summers-old story no longer compels you enough. Maybe what you've already written could be worked into a short story that's complete on its own? That would clear your mind to allow a new/different story to enter.)
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