It's been a month since my last post--but that's not because I've stopped writing. It's just that there's been nothing good enough to post, or anything I would consider progress. More words, more sources, more obsession? Yes, yes, and yes--but still not enough.
Currently, I'm very excited about securing digital copies (suck on that NYPL!) of two potentially enlightening sources, one primary and one secondary. Published in 1872, James McCabe's Lights and shadows of New York life; or, The sights and sensations of the great city. A work descriptive of the City of New York in all its various phases will serve as my cultural guide to postwar New York--just as it did for McCabe's audience. Although it will hardly be an objective account, it seems awfully comprehensive and detailed in areas of particular interest--especially those necessary for creating an accurate sense of daily life in the city at the time.
And I realized a few weeks ago, that while I attempt to decipher and depict the emotions and psychology of a young prostitute, I ought to have a better sense of what her life and experience would be like. So I found Their Sisters' Keepers: Prostitution in New York City, 1830-1870 by Marylinn Wood Hill, and discovered both that I knew little about prostitution in this city and that I would need to know a good deal to give Charlotte both depth and a realistic context. But just beginning the Introduction has confirmed that I'm on the right track with all the complexities and, especially, contradictions that would have been present in her life. And I'm always on the look out for more authentic details. Answers to a big question about a little thing came from The Humble Little Condom: A History by Aine Collier. Anecdotal, yet detailed, her history gave me a sense of the common usage, materials, and popular opinion of prophylactic birth control in mid-19th century America. Fascinating stuff, and more ancient than I thought.
And in other research news, I finally finished a classic source on life in the New York City tenements: How the Other Half Lives by Jacob Riis. Yes, he does rely on some pretty glaring ethic stereotypes that almost undermine the work. But in the context of his time (1890) these would have seemed apt characterizations. And there's no denying the influence of this work toward improving the conditions of the poor in New York by popularly depicting their plight in a pioneering work of photojournalism. Although he writes about conditions 15-20 years later than my period of interest, his anecdotes and photographs from visits to the tenements are invaluable records of street life and the hidden lives of the indigent. While the conditions are specific to this city and this time, Riis is able to show something universal, sadly enough, that's recognizable among impoverished people of all places and ages.
Now, for some thoughts on writing.
First, on writing--literally: http://lifehacker.com/5738093/why-you-learn-more-effectively-by-writing-than-typing Here we have the results of studies on the psychological affect of handwriting versus typing. Needless to say, despite your penmanship (or lack thereof), writing something by hand gives you a stronger connection to the words, thus better retention (in the case of note-taking), accountability & drive (in the case of goal/task statements), and fluidity of thought (in the case of creative writing). I have been writing by hand for about the last month, and while the flow of the pen is nice, beholding an actual page--and filling it with ink scribbles--is the more satisfying part of the process.
Then I found two interviews in Guernica Magazine that spoke to me, the first with noted writer Lore Segal. Although she's had a long and illustrious career, I've not read any of her works. Nonetheless, one of her answers struck me as particularly relevant to my attempt to write:
I’m always amused by the way questions are asked. “What did you intend?” That’s not even a recognizable verb. You don’t intend when you write. You sit down and you’re thinking things and dreaming things and someone says something and you think “Ah!” That’s how it happens. Intention is not part of the game.I too often make intention part of the game, when it clearly doesn't belong. It just happens. Sure, thinking about the reader is one thing, but doing a critical analysis of your own novel before it's even finished? That could very well lead to a book that a) doesn't get finished, and b) isn't worth reading. Something to ponder ... but not too much.
This interview led me to one with my favorite fiction writer, Aleksander Hemon. Now, I've actually read and re-read several of his books, articles, and short stories--and even gone to a book signing. So I was surprised I hadn't come across this interview earlier. I suggest you read the entire thing. By the end you might be fed up with his personal opinions or his cynicism, but he's prone to some profound reflections on story-telling.
Exhibit A:
You devise ways to tell a story that complies with your sensibility. Style and method are really extensions of your present sensibility. The beauty of literature—also its limit—is that it is inescapably personal, even if you’re writing science fiction. Even if your story takes place on a different planet, it comes out of your personality, your personal experience, your sensibilities, your interests, your passions, the whole of you. Even if you tried to extinguish your personality, what is left in the story will reflect it, perhaps by its negation. Our lives provide the bricks from which we build these cathedrals.Exhibit B:
I like to blow up this notion that all we have to do as writers and artists is represent reality, which is presumably solid and self-evident, with no negotiation of the gap between myself and the world, between this body and this space, which needs narration to close it. You have to figure out a way to cover that gap. It seems self-evident because we do it routinely. It’s a condition of being conscious. But what fiction and art can do, particularly narrative art, is construct consciousness—in a sense, we have to do it for the first time, every time. We, as writers, have to figure out a way to create a consciousness in language. It’s crazy even to attempt to do that.
Exhibit C:
Guernica: What has been the most surprising thing about living as a writer?
Aleksandar Hemon: I don’t know if surprising is the word, but I learned a hard lesson in Bosnia about art and its ennobling aspect, or the absence thereof. But despite all that I know rationally, and everything that I can put into words, I can say that I have difficulty giving up the notion of the nobility of art. I make money doing this, and I want to make money, and I would like to have a lot of money, but I still believe that the only reason to write is that somehow it will make something or somebody better. I do believe—and I know I shouldn’t—that art transcends money and success and any of that. You can still do it if you’re not clinging to the notion of nobility. But I am, I’m clinging to it by my nails. I really can’t justify it intellectually. I’d argue against it rationally. Yet, if it wasn’t for that—what would this life be? What would this world be? What the fuck would we do? I’m fully aware that it’s something that cannot be accomplished by me or anyone, but it’s something to strive for, and fail at, daily.
And finally, to add to the discussion of the role of the artist, I'll leave you with an excerpt from a speech by James Baldwin. Take it as you will, but to me it is both daunting and inspiring to really consider the exclusive duty and unique ability of the artist.
