Strategies/Techniques
• the voice was an echo from
another life, where he was my father giving me his usual measured, modest
advice. To describe the way someone used
to be, start from something specific and physical, like their voice, before
working your way to more general personality descriptions
• the naked face and apologetic,
presumptuous familiarity, in her smile, of people who come to help. Describe character’s smile (or eyes, frown,
gesture, anything really) as characteristic of a certain group or type of
people.
• I woke up in the dark. It’s hard
for an adolescent boy to allow himself to weep; the sound is horrible, I
suppose because it’s his voice that’s breaking. Instead of saying “I wept,” imply the action of a singular character by
speaking about the action in the general sense, with a universalizing
commentary.
• For what she wanted was, in
essence, always what he wanted; and that is not as simple or purely submissive
as it sounds. I didn’t — don’t — pretend to understand how. It was between
them, and will not be available to any child of theirs, ever. Expresses the awareness of something
ineffable, will admitting that it cannot be approached from the narrative
voice. Good way to address something significant that your narrator can’t have
total access to. Also, sets up an expectation (she’s submissive) and then
rejects it explicitly; this creates complexity in the characterization of the
relationship.
• I spoke to him for the first
time. —Biology. On Tuesday. — And so there was complicity between us, he drew
me into it, as if he were not my father (a father would never do such a thing).
The contrast between the banality of the
dialogue, and the emotional intensity revealed underneath. Perhaps it would be
better in subtext than in text?
• The teacher smiled as one does at
something expected, feared, and already dealt with at four in the mornings,
lying quite still so as not to disturb the sleeper sharing the bed. Keep pushing the comparison further, adding
clauses to create a more detailed image.
• I don’t think my father knows any
of these things about himself. Good to
have one character question another character’s self-awareness, because it
casts doubt on both of their perceptions.
• She said, and how much of your
life have you spent doing that — so next day we went to the hairdresser and I
had it off. When someone accuses us of
wasting time (or wasting life) and we take it to heart, we move quickly and
drastically to change something superficial about the situation, without addressing
the deeper accusation. Also, the reaction of cutting the hair creates an
opportunity to demonstrate Will’s feelings of betrayal.
Loved Phrases and Ideas
• The pride the old people took in
him was not just the snobbery of the poor and uneducated, that rejoices in
claiming one who has moved up out of their class, and which, although their
hubris hides this aspect from them, contains also, always, the inevitability of
sorrow: his desertion. Always come back
to this idea that every impulse or desire contains its opposite. When you
describe how a character or a people want one thing, think about how he/they
must always want the opposite on some level.
• Of course she is blond. The wet
dreams I have are blonde.
• Sonny did not go so far as to
believe, with Kafka, that the power in which people are held powerless exists
only in their own submission.
• There came a point, not possible
to determine exactly when, at which equality became a cry that couldn’t be made
out, had been misheard or misinterpreted, turned out to be something else —
finer. Freedom. That was it. Equality was not freedom, it had been only the
mistaken yearning to become like the people of the town. And who wanted to
become like the very ones feared and hated. Envy was not freedom. The way in which jealousy for the
privileges of the rich/elite/powerful (while it can galvanize protest and
activism) can undermine freedom or revolutionary efforts. The desire of the
proletariat to become bourgeois, instead of striving to eradicate the class-based
society.
• it has made him someone elect,
not to be followed in his private thoughts by ordinary people. The intimidating presence of some people.
You don’t want to approach them physically or even mentally, their thoughts
seem too imposing to speculate about.
• The whole world is lying,
fornicating and lying. The propensity we
have to impose our own internal experiences and mental states on the entire
world.
New Words and Words To Use
• rictus – fixed grimace or grin. A
rictus of dire fear.
• harangue
• kohl
• pediment
• sidle – walk in a timid manner
Ideas for my story
• for the roused state of an
ecstatic love affair in men and women mutually dedicated to a political ideal
and battle, heightens their concentration and application in relation to these.
Arturo and Custis’s romantic attraction
is heightened by their mutual political involvement. Custis respects Arturo’s
dedication to the cause. I think I’m moving ultimately toward a betrayal of
Arturo’s love, and allegiance to David’s love and worldview. But David can’t
respect Custis the same way after he betrays Arturo, and Custis can’t respect
himself.
• Yet you cannot be called poor if
you are poor by choice — if she
had wanted to, she could have been set up in a boutique or public relations
career. The inescapable difference
between being born into poverty and making the conscious decision to pursue a
lifestyle that thrusts you into poverty. Arturo and Custis both choose poverty,
although Arturo for religious reasons and Cutis for artistic ones.
• Guilt is self-indulgent and
unproductive. So many different ways for
a character who believes this to react to this conviction. Refuse to
acknowledge feelings of guilt about anything (more David). Feel guilty about
feeling guilty, and lose himself in self-indulgent infinite loop (more Custis.)
Dedicate himself entirely to aiding other people (Arturo).
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