I am not alone + Writing as pathology

[rolanni]

Orlando, Florida (CNN) -- Paramedics responded to a medical call at Tiger Woods'* home in Orange County, Florida, early Tuesday, the county fire service said.

*Emphasis mine

rest of story

And!

Ten years to write a novel

Comments

[elektra.livejournal.com]

Well, at least Despair, Inc. is on the ball. They've put out a new "Tiger" t-shirt. http://www.despair.com/lyinking.htm

[keristor.livejournal.com]

Ambulance called to Woods' home (http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/low/world/americas/8401706.stm)

For a change they are actually consistent through the article as well (the BBC news site's quality of proffreadnig is not high).

The rate at which your novels have come out, have you ever taken ten years? Not to publish it (plenty of writers have taken that long before they found a buyer) but writing something and blocked from writing anything else? I think I would indeed give up before then...

[rolanni.livejournal.com]

The rate at which your novels have come out, have you ever taken ten years?

The books that eventually became Local Custom and Scout's Progress took a couple years to write, but that was when no one was buying our stuff; the projects were hobbies, really. I put them away for months at a time, both of them, but I never thought I couldn't finish them.

I think I would indeed give up before then...

Knowing what I do about the writing life, I think the fellow who wrote that article is . . .too intense for his own good.

I mean. . .Pulitzer Prize or not, what he's done is written a book. Ten years of misery is not a reasonable trade for a book (IMHO, IMHO). There are lots of books -- many people (as he admits himself) have the talent, and the drive to write books, so there's never a lack of something to read. But ten years...you only get one life, and neither his book nor his prize will give him back that decade.

I'm inclined to think that his struggle, while epic, wasn't...necessarily noble. It isn't heroic simply to struggle (corollary to: A cause is not necessarily just because someone is willing to die for it). He seemed so wedded to the Idea of himself as a writer that he couldn't even formulate a tolerably acceptable Plan B. He accepted that he was going to be miserable, no matter what he did, because he was blocked on the book.

Now, this could well have been depression, which does terrible things to one's thought processes, and could well have been the whole reason for the block -- but the writer doesn't make that connection in the article. And, yanno? Some books Just Don't Work, no matter how cool the first 75 pages are -- and he doesn't seem to have been able to consider that possibility, either.

[growlycub.livejournal.com]

And since he got a Pulitzer for it in the end, I don't think he'll ever think that decade lost, either.

[rolanni.livejournal.com]

How much money goes with a Pulitzer? I confess to not knowing...

*Google-foo!*

Uh? Ten thousand clams? For ten years? And the honor, of course, but honor doesn't buy cat crunchies or happiness.

[growlycub.livejournal.com]

I agree, but to folks in the 'literary' scene these awards are so meaningful... literary folk are plain weird.

Give me a Theo story any day! :)

10 year novel

[(Anonymous)]

In Oprah magazine? 'Nuff said.
Sue H

Re: 10 year novel

[rolanni.livejournal.com]

In Oprah magazine? 'Nuff said.

Is it not a true story?

Re: 10 year novel

[(Anonymous)]

I am sure it is true, but is this the kind of story they print?
Oprah is the one who will not have any type of person with a belief in an alternate religion on her show. Kinda limits the worldview.
Some authors (Mercedes Lackey, Robert Heinlein) have said writers block (in a professional writer) is a myth. The job is to write, and writers block is just a convenient excuse to not 'go to work'.
I do *not* direct this comment to the Lee/Miller team, how many books do you have coming out this year? The antithesis of laziness! And all the other stuff you do, including the dayjob.
I could not be a writer, waaaaay too much work for me. I'll just keep buying the books!!
Sue H

Re: 10 year novel

[rolanni.livejournal.com]

Some authors (Mercedes Lackey, Robert Heinlein) have said writers block (in a professional writer) is a myth. The job is to write, and writers block is just a convenient excuse to not 'go to work'.

No, I believe in writer's block. I believe that writer's block is the back-brain's way of telling you that you've steered the story in the wrong direction. Once you (generic you) realize that and go back over what you've done until you identify and straighten out the problem -- hey presto! no more block. I've been through this dozens of times, most recently with Ghost Ship (where I wasn't blocked, exactly, but writing at the speed of cold molasses and Deeply Unsatisfied with the shape the story was taking).

The trouble comes when people equate writer's block with being ill, or inept. I think it would go easier on some of the nervier of my colleagues if they could realize that a block is a message, not a disaster. It would, I agree, be much easier (but creepier) if the back-brain would just pick up the phone.

I also know that illness, worry, and an overabundance of the less-joyful segments of life can slow and stop a writer's work -- just like it can have an impact on anyone's work.

[(Anonymous)]

I met Junot Diaz at a reading and really like this book. He gets the "voice" right and its funny and tragic -- recommended to all Lee/Miller fans. Don't know if writing the book is worth 10 years of his life, but he's on my "buy when it first comes out list." I normally stay away from "literary" fiction because I find some of it too self-conscious and the story comes in as a poor second to the technique. But I'm definitely in favor of his continuing to write.