Reflections on September

"Progress" is not a word I would apply to my ... Okay, "efforts" is not a word that should belong in the context of this project, either. But here are some of my recent thoughts, considerations, hang-ups, issues, distractions ...

1) Story. Is there a strong enough story to compel me to write this novel? Isn't that what I value in writing above all else? It's without a doubt what draws me to my other historical-based projects. I find the stories of the Warsaw Ghetto uprising, the creation of the Rite of Spring, the exploration of the Grand Canyon to be terribly fascinating. And the challenge is conveying that to a reader. But why do I want to write about the Brooklyn Bridge and 1872 and all that? Where's the story? I have just characters and context. Why do I want to write this story? I know why I want to write stories in general: to educate, to delight, to inspire. But why this story in particular? Why is it just a lingering idea, and not a burning obsession that I have to see finished? There are so many parts that I need to write still; and many parts that I have no idea I’ll eventually write. And there’s an exciting facet to each of those. The drive to flesh out what is just a vision—it’s not always easy or brilliant, there’s no other way to get it out of my head. And then in that action, I can take turns and twists I would never have planned.   

2) Writing. I thought I had a break through a few weeks ago. Or rather a new perspective. And I thought this might develop into a strategy. It hasn't. So, I don't highly prioritize the act of writing in my life. I put more effort into things like work, hobbies, sleep, relaxing, reading, listening to music, depressing thoughts, planning ahead to avoid indecision, general procrastination, "doing things" in the City, the Internet ... stuff like that. This would all be great and necessary to balance out my disciplined writing--except that doesn't exist. I would rather do what's easy and most readily gratifying. But writing is one of the few things I kind of really good at--and also like doing. You'd think that combination would be like a spark to fuel. But you and I know that oxygen is necessary--that's the life blood of a fire. And I starve my fire of oxygen. I thought I could just substitute writing for those moments when I might gravitate to another activity. Sure, the novel won't be finished today, but the little bit you do now--even if it's crap--get's you that much closer. It's entirely about considering the long-term value of what I'm doing with my time versus the short. Until now, I've only lived with a short-term mind-set. Because it's easy, and I have the luxury to do that (I also happen to have the luxury to lead a life free of war & famine & poverty & and illness ... which is nice.) Call it laziness or "following the path of least resistance" or whatever. I know it well. I even wrote a play about it, sort of. Writing this novel is not just an opportunity to tell a story, but to figure out what it is to lead a life worth living.

3) Overwhelming sources. I recently purchased a fantastic book at the Strand, something I really wanted but didn't know existed: an anthology of nineteenth-century illustrations of New York from the pages of Harper's Weekly and other newspapers. These engravings are amazing depictions of the exact period I'm trying to evoke. But suddenly I'm flooded with information about culture and daily life than I was ever aware of--and I feel that I somehow need to include it all. I need to reference such and such event, set a scene in this cool location, reference this song or activity or individual that was in vogue, or relevant, or embedded within the cultural consciousness of the time. In this book I flip a page and learn something or see an entire scene to be written--yet feel paralyzed with the thought of how to transcribe it. But as a novelist this shouldn't be my job anyways. If a reader wants a history lesson, they can find it somewhere else in another book. What should be inspiring, stymies me instead. 

I recently read a brief essay on Shakespeare by an actor who claims to have written the entire oeuvre of the Bard. Impossible, certainly (even for a hundred monkeys at a hundred typewriters). But it's actually a clever observation on Shakespeare's dramatic writing. Shakespeare not only assumed that certain stories were common knowledge, but description is sparse in the text. The audience of a play would be provided with costuming and just a semblance of setting, and of course live actors performing the characters. But a reader of Shakespeare's plays has to bring all that to the page himself. And thus, you end up being Shakespeare's writing partner. Tim used this to bring to my attention what may be my tendency to create a fully-fleshed out, three-dimensional sense of place and time and context with each page of the novel. He's read only little of what I've written, but I'm sure he's still right. Even though this is a historical time period that may be unfamiliar to a reader, I have to trust that they would be able to meet me part-way. By relying on their imagination, there would be less of a burden on the words, and the writing could have a freedom and lightness. This isn't a movie. I can't show everything. And to attempt to do so would be unproductive, and bad writing. Simply, with an engaged audience participating, less is more.

4) Make it more like a play. Although I never finished the last two three few plays I attempted to write, I still have an interest in dramatic writing. Most of my ideas (that don't necessarily entail kick-ass illustrations) are developed, at least initially, as a play. There's something about putting two people in a situation and just saying "go." They have personalities and motivations and backgrounds, but that's all revealed in dialogue and stage action, which keeps it interesting and active and succinct. Well, that's at least how good plays work.

What I'm trying to say, it that in situations when I just don't know what to write (which is pretty much every time I sit down to work on this project) I should consider a potential scene as part of a script. It can be fleshed out with details and such during editing, but to get the thing written and characters developing, this is one possible trick I could use. 

Fender-bender at the intersection of Bowery and Canal

Before he heard the screams, shattered wood, or wrenched metal, Aedan felt a sudden pulse—a shudder in the ground. When he turned, the scene was still in motion, but eerily slow, startling him almost as much as what he saw.

            Broken horses writhed on the street, tethered still to the omnibuses. Their drivers could not be seen, having been thrown from their perches during the collision. A wheel spun. Arms waved from the toppled coaches, the passengers' desperation painfully evident. Where one car ended and the other began he could hardly tell at a glance.

            Traffic halted all around, the sudden congestion nearly spawning more accidents. Solitary riders slipped past the wreckage and carried on their way unfazed.

            Monday morning and already some people would not live to the end of the day.

            The crowd was quicker to relate their account of the incident (and assign blame to both parties in equal measure) than to aide those trapped within their would-be transports.

            Aedan stood there too, sickened, and paralyzed with inaction. He knew Kyla traveled uptown on a similar omnibus at this very moment. ‘She could just as easily be the victim of such a tragedy.’ He could keep her fed and clothed and safe from their father, but against the sudden ill wind of fate he was powerless. 

Recent History

I'm sure I've mentioned this before in a post, but I'm still captivated by the density of history in New York--Manhattan especially. And even though New York has a reputation for razing the historical urban landscape in the name of Progress, that is itself a legacy of the development of this city. New Yorkers, whether they recognize it or not, encounter their history anytime they venture above 14th Street. Designed 200 years ago, the grid is still at the heart of Manhattan's structure, still defining public spaces, residences, traffic patterns, businesses, and socializing. Like any rigid format, it inspires as much as it hinders.

Sometimes, it may take a bit of deliberation--imagination, if you will--to conjure the past from the present city. Like trying to picture the peddlers and tenements of the 19th Century Lower East Side amidst the hip kids, clubs, and cafes there now.

Sometimes, the city's history surprises you with a hidden plaque. Or else, you actually walk up to a statue just to see who it really is you've been walking by this whole time. Why do they have a statue?

Sometimes an iconic bridge carries you to the era of its creation, and you sense what it meant those who built it, to their society, and why it's still there for us.

And sometimes, you exit a PATH station on a sunny September morning, and you're struck by an uncanny sensation that you can't shake. And you stop, actually stop, and think about what it was like to be in that exact spot exactly twelve years earlier. But many people you pass on the street, or share a subway car with, already know. For them it's not recent history--it's part of their life. Lives that continue despite those lost. Or rather, for those lost.   

And that's all I have to say about that. 

One person will recognize the first paragraph from their own life. The rest is my initial attempt to convey the hellish conditions of the cassion.

The sweat pooled on Aedan's hatless head. The reservoir crested his brow then, with gentle deliberation, rolled down his forehead and poured off his nose in one long, stringy drip. The perspiration seeped into the river muck between his gumboots.

He tried to summon the chill winds plunging down the river overhead. A cruel and icy whip to those working the docks, he sought its refreshing embrace. But as he returned to his own labors, the humid air clinging at his wiry frame reminded him of the city in August. A ripe peach and its sweet juices never seemed farther away as he wiped the salty residue from the corners of his mouth. There would be cool lager flowing in every beer garden along First Avenue--but none of that now for his parched throat.

Be the change ...

It's hard to believe that it's been nearly two years since I had what you might call an epiphany, or perhaps just merely a coincidental realization.

Late December 2011: I had been shopping for Christmas gifts in Dumbo that evening, and I decided to cross back to Manhattan over Brooklyn Bridge. Twas breezy as always, but not as chilly as you'd expect on the old bridge that night. Repainting and minor repairs (the bridge has never required anything more in its 130 years) were being done on the center portion of the promenade; sheets of corrugated metal wrapped the construction area, creating a cattle chute of sorts for the herds traveling on foot and wheels. Both had cause for complaint: cyclists had an even more restricted path over the bridge, while camera-toting tourists were denied a spectacular view of the city, and especially, the harbor.

The promenade was one of the original—and unique—features of Brooklyn Bridge. Engineer/designer John Roebling was particularly excited to compliment the trolley tracks and roadway with an elevated path for casual foot traffic. Pedestrians, now as much as then, could enjoy the exposure to fresh air and an unparalleled view of the natural and urban environment.

But the new limitations on enjoying the bridge have fostered a creative response: graffiti—both an art and an act of defiance. The Wall Street Journal this past spring reported on the graffiti, as well as the mixed responses it elicits. I, for one, see nothing wrong with defacing these barricades, and here's why.

Gandhi? Uh, sort of.

That night on the bridge, I noticed among the collage of colors and words, a message of action and hope, pragmatic and optimistic, simple and containing multitudes. "Be the change you wish to see in the world" was not spoken by Gandhi, but it sort of seems like it, right? But he didn't. It's probably the best known example of a false quotation attributed to the likes of Gandhi, Thoreau, and Mandela. Author Brian Norton considered this phenomena in The Times a couple years ago. His final paragraph I found particularly insightful (italics added):

But ours is an era in which it’s believed that we can reinvent ourselves whenever we choose. So we recast the wisdom of the great thinkers in the shape of our illusions. Shorn of their complexities, their politics, their grasp of the sheer arduousness of change, they stand before us now. They are shiny from their makeovers, they are fabulous and gorgeous, and they want us to know that we can have it all.     

He's certainly correct that "it’s believed that we can reinvent ourselves whenever we choose," but this has been an American notion since ... America was just a notion. It's fundamental to this country's saga--both in the recorded history and in the enduring mythology. But I will agree that simplifying the subtle or multifaceted words of inspiring figures is a modern trend, and abets the perpetuation of the belief in our abilities to transform ourselves. And some, in the vein of the "Gandhi" quotation, believe that doing so will also trigger a rippling wave of change whose effect will broaden as it grows wider. A notion paradoxically selfish and selfless? Maybe, but maybe I just haven't thought about it enough. I'm sure I'm missing something.

Back to my story. I realized upon reading this graffiti quote that I had discovered my theme. This was a message that I could both convey to a young adult audience and effectively portray with the characters and circumstances I already had in mind. Excited, I sent Tim a text before I even reached the Manhattan tower. Naturally, he replied with something like, "Yes. Good. Now go do it!" And even if this is a misquotation attributed to the enigmatic Timothy Decker, it still's pretty damn true.   

Writing about not writing

This daily writing thing has become dangerously undaily.

Book thought: what is it like to be under the East River? Something to ponder there.

Also to ponder, these Andrew Wyeth quotations:

Inspired by a candlelight dinner on my roof the other night …

During the summer of ‘63, the shantytown mirrored the night sky. Each hovel tended a fire, and in the blackness between the river and the Central Park, these points of light were a veritable galaxy. Desperation fueled the flames—hope burning bright, yielding little more than ghostly smoke. But like a star to the Sun, these feeble hearths were dim compared to the menacing glow downtown.