This blog . . . builds on a book I wrote about the creative process called UNCOMMON GENIUS. Based on conversations with forty winners of the MacArthur Award, or so-called genius prize, I put together a picture of how great work happens.
Buy here.
soulofaword continues this quest to bring transparency to the creative process, especially as it relates to the written word. We use the back door here and enter through the kitchen to learn how good work really happens. Join us, every Friday, right here!
Photo credit: Patrick Hajzler.
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 Many, many decades – The esteemed Elizabeth Bishop, on one line of poetry, the comma moved back and forth.
25 years – Steven Spielberg, on his latest film “Red Tails.”
30 years – Frank McCourt on Angela’s Ashes.
2 months – Richard Paul Evans, author of eleven New York Times best-sellers, including Finding Noel and The Christmas Box. Average number of revisions once the first draft was done: 800 per book.
6 weeks, or 4 years, depending upon the source – Charles Dickens, A Christmas Carol.
10 days – George Simenon, lunch delivered on a tray to his closed office door, no interruptions tolerated. Creator of Inspector Maigret. Author of 200 novels, 210 novellas, several autobiographical works, dozens of articles, and scores of pulp fiction written under twelve pseudonyms.
5 days – Dame Barbara Cartland, resulting in some 623 best-sellers in her lifetime.
4 days – Samuel Johnson, Rasselas: Prince of Abyssinia
A single 12-hour transatlantic flight – Dr. Richard Carlson’s wildly popular Don’t Sweat the Small Stuff.
Are you glacial? Or do you like your latté hot, so make it quick!
Make peace with yourself. That’s how the best work happens.
Comments welcome and edited to include first names only, and website, if provided; never your email. Photo by K’vitsh.
 Want to improve your writing? Try these suggestions culled from my decades at the craft:
1. With few exceptions, stay in the moment. Use your chronology and don’t get ahead of it.
2. Don’t save anything for later. Bring whatever you have right here, right now.
3. Each time a character appears on-stage, some aspect must deepen. Characters develop vertically.
4. Every chapter, every paragraph must relate to the theme. The theme is what the story is about: love, war, jealousy, revenge . . .
5. Every chapter, every paragraph must move the action forward. You need a firm command of where the story is going so you can arrange the pieces in a way that allows the reader to discover things for himself. Don’t tell the reader anything. Just set him on your shoulder and off you go, the story unfolding before you.
6. All meaning must be imbedded in action. Don’t deliver any lectures or philosophy lessons telling the reader what you want him to know. He has to discover this through the action. Similarly, don’t weight the story down with description.
7. Use all your senses. Taste it. Smell it. Hear it. See it. Touch it.
8. Tell it straight, as if talking to a five-year-old.
9. Finally, if something is really not going well, walk away. And don’t come back until you’re ready to see the thing with new eyes: reset, reinvent, reappraise.
Comments welcome and edited to include first names only, and website, if provided; never your email. Photo credit: bighappyfunhouse.com.
 Almost everyone has his or her own version of what it takes to get to work.
Do you start fitfully like Michael Lewis?
Do you stay in bed for a while and have your papers brought to you on a silver tray like Lady Antonia Fraser?
Though you may not see another soul all day, do you need to wear a coat and tie to remind yourself that you are going to work as did Robert Caro?
Do you need amphetamines (W.H. Auden), prefer to write all night (Steven Naifeh and Gregory White Smith), rely on a weak whiskey and soda to get going (Churchill), or prefer to be horizontal (Truman Capote)?
No matter the quirky specifics, the common denominator is this: most serious writers need a routine to get the writing done.
And if perhaps this seems paradoxical—the idea that the most amazing, creative things can emerge from people working in accordance with predictable daily routines—just the opposite is true.
A routine should be predictable and ordinary if it’s going to work. Even better, it should be soothing. A writer surely will experience struggles, but getting to work should not be one of them.
Comments welcome and edited to include first names only, and website, if provided; never your email. Photo credits: the Sunday breakfast routine and open magazine is by joeywan; the police eating ice cream routine is by filmbuffhowsy at The Sensimovielert.com.
 We all know the feeling, and we know too that our fears can compromise if not shut down an otherwise perfectly good writing day. Fear may not just precipitate the failure; it may be the primary reason for it.
Is there an antidote to its crippling effects?
Some writers talk about the need to muster one’s courage, or dig deep for a sense of dignity, or consider your lost opportunities if you never take a risk, or buck up and write through and past the fear. These are all reasonable strategies . . .
And then there’s the artist Maurizio Cattelan, who favors a more extreme response.
The Italian-born artist has a massive piece right now, which fills the central atrium of the Guggenheim Museum, and yet we learn from the curator notes that the fear of failure is a central issue in the artist’s life. So, how can be he plagued in this way and still produce so much?
The artist made his fear work for him:
“Since his first solo show in 1989, in which he hung a sign saying ‘Be right back’ on a locked gallery door, Cattelan’s preoccupation of failure has led him to concoct a series of ingenious ways to complicate access to his creative output. Subsequent strategies of evasion have included presenting an authentic police report documenting the fictional theft of an invisible artwork; creating an exact replica of another artist’s show at a nearby gallery; and dressing his gallerists in absurd costumes that transformed them into living artworks.”
Want to manage your demon Fear?
If more typical strategies seem toothless, why not take a tip from Cattelan and use the fear, exploit it even, and make it a central element of the work.
Yo—fear! In your face!
Comments welcome and edited to include first names only, and website, if provided; never your email. The photo, by zio Paolino, is of another of Maurizio Cattelan’s works, his extended finger, positioned outside the Italian stock exchange, in Milan. Don’t neglect to click on the “central atrium” link above to see a cool video of the installation going up–an engineering marvel.
 “We are living in a storm where a hundred contradictory elements collide; debris from the past, scraps of the present, seeds of the future, swirling, combining, separating under the imperious wind of destiny.”
These words of a poet, published in a French literary journal more than a century ago, still seem exactly right,  especially tomorrow night, New Year’s Eve.
Lift a glass. Celebrate. Bathe in the air of possibilities. Where will the imperious wind take you this year?
Wishing you all good things in 2012.
Comments welcome and edited to include first names only, and website, if provided; never your email. Photo credit: vitaminsea.com. Quote by Adolphe Retté, La Plume, March 1, 1898
 What went well these past twelve months, and what could have gone better? I’m supposed to ask myself this every quarter—it’s in the plan!—but that part of the plan, two years running now, has fizzled. Still, it’s not too late:
1. TIME
On a good day, I can look up and be amazed that five hours have slipped by. But I may not have produced much, as it can take me multiple iterations to figure something out. I hate this about my writing. And yes, I do know people who get it right the very first time. (Okay, only two people. And yes, they are MacArthur prize winners.)
2. VOICE
But hey, not for nothing, all those hours this work-a-day writer has put in, for at least I have established a voice for this blog. That’s one part of the plan that went well. If you say soulofaword, you mean me.
3. THE VISUAL
Every post, including this one, comes with photographs (part of the plan). And, as was true from the very beginning, trawling the photo sites and picking the pictures continues to be a pleasure. It’s like accessorizing. The hard part—the writing—is done, and now we get to pick the shoes.
4. COMPLEXITY
My sense is that these posts are growing in complexity, both in content and in language. This was not in the plan. Is this a good thing? A bad thing? I’m not sure yet, but I will say that complexity doesn’t add to the ease or speed of the undertaking. And it takes up time that should be spent on other things, like the business of blogging.
5. THE LISTS
The stories are one thing, and people have their favorites, but many of the most popular posts here deliver information in neat, tidy lists and/or have titles that begin “How to . . . ” What to make of this? Are my readers pressed for time? Are they looking for instruction? Do they prefer to graze, not read? And from a writer’s point of view, is it easier or more difficult to use this form?
These are some of the questions I’ll be answering as I make my year-end plan. For now, though, I’m off to gather the hard data, another something I’ve left for the very last moment, but oh well, it’s not too late.
Comments welcome and edited to include first names only, and website, if provided; never your email. Photo credit – Giacomo Lorenzo.
 We who write the words can entertain, confound, confirm—anything can be concluded from what we say, intended or not. Sometimes I forget this. Recently, however, I got a reminder, courtesy of a party game devised for the amusement of our guests.
At the heart of it were ornaments labeled specifically for each person, but by description, not name. The glittering and tasseled things were scattered throughout the house, and in between eating, drinking, and talking, the idea was for each guest to find his or her own and claim it.
Future poet laureate. Fresh from the hell, and better than ever. Most gracious woman in the room.
There were 120 in all, an array of miniature pickles, handbags, shoes, polka dots, petit fours, orbs, olives . . . It was remarkable to see who took what, spirits rising, and before long baubles hung from buttonholes and strands of pearls.
“Is this mine? Is this it?” What was not said, the implied question “How is it that you think this of me?”.
Most beautiful woman in the world was coveted. So was the mock: Our boys, your girls, finished.
No one claimed Wicked gossip, reliably dispensed, but a few people wanted to meet that person.
And the competition was positively fierce for Get naked and light up a joint. (The ultimate taker proved his chops with the observation that I had the order wrong: first the joint, then the naked.)
Future mayor. The one I call when I’m in trouble. If only my hips could move like yours.
I was surprised at how much explaining I had to do. I thought people would recognize themselves. Some tags had direct quotes, no less. And though I knew there might be multiple contenders for things, to me, there was only one best answer.
Who’s a queen? Who’s a visionary? Wasn’t it obvious? And how about married to a peach? Apparently there was room enough on that one to drive a convertible straight through.
It probably shouldn’t have been a surprise that my guests wouldn’t necessarily see themselves as I saw them. But it was also a reminder to me: readers don’t always read things the way we intend them. Five words—or even fifty thousand—and a reader will conclude as he chooses.
Partial to our own point of view, is there anything we can do to secure its adoption?
A few things, maybe. We can sharpen our words, of course, and think for a minute as well about how to build confidence in the reader that we have it right. And when we think we’ve finally got it, we can step away from the page, pretend we are strangers, and consider how we might be heard.
Comments welcome and edited to include first names only, and website, if provided; never your email. Photo credit: moonstarsandpaper.
 “Everyone came to the party, even those who were not invited,” reads the line in chapter eight of my novel that introduces a pivotal scene.
It’s a line from real life. In fact, I’ve just uttered those same words, as I prepare for an upcoming gathering of friends. Of course, I used the present tense, and added in a passing moment of panic, “Where will we put them all?”
Now, lots of things can happen when people gather for pleasure, which is why I included the scene. My husband and I went, for example, from being friends to more-than-that at a Christmas party. My roommate and I had given the party in our college dorm room, a converted lounge. We hauled in a tree, strung it with lights, and hung chocolates from the branches. And there was my future husband, stretched out under it, catching the dripping chocolate in his mouth.
In the fictional party scene, I wanted all of it, the uncertainty and the possibilities, every party I’ve ever given pinned in words: the swish of taffeta, the crack of laughter, the indiscretions told in the corner. I wanted to touch it. And taste it. And smell the cologne and cigar smoke. If my characters were to confirm their love for each other, surely it would be in this scene.
Did I succeed in capturing this experience on the page?
Perfectly, or so the self-pitying me believed, for just when I’d finished, the entire file disappeared, snatched away by the computer Gods with the exception—true story—of one line, the opening line.
“Everyone came to the party . . .” The words just sat there, naked on the page.
“Don’t worry,” my husband said. “It will be better next time you write it.” 
And it was.
The lessons here multiply:
1. Everything comes from real life, even the make believe. The so-called line between fiction and nonfiction is really just a piece of scrim, and you, the writer, can always see through it.
2. If you can possibly manage it, include a cheerful scene, pivotal or not, for even in the most serious stories, your reader needs a break.
3. If you have to start over, it might go easier next time and may even turn out better, as we tend to remember only the good parts.
Chapter nine begins “For the next few days we cleaned, coming across lipsticks and stained napkins under pillows and glasses tucked in odd places—even in the hen house . . .”
That part comes from real life too, only no hen house. But the screened-in porch, the wood pile, the beach? Well, we’ll see what turns up in the morning.
Comments welcome and edited to include first names only, and website, if provided; never your email. Photo credits: ornament by Burger Baroness/Jessica Rossi; bird by Vitamin Sea.
 This blog took some months to conceptualize. These were some of the writers whose works I admired and from whom I took inspiration:
Seymour Britchky, for his tart, bright, and straight voice showcased in his restaurant reviews from the 1980s.
Richard Critchfield, for his nonfiction narratives, his roving, vagabond soul and his respect for humanity.
Dominick Dunne, for his reporter’s eye and novelist’s sensibility, and for how easily he moved between the gritty and the glitterati.
Joan Didion, for her rigor and dead-on accuracy, and for her lack of sentimentality. Her memoir on the loss of her husband, for example, was the coldest and most clinical look at grief that I’d imagine possible.
My friend S, the most beautiful woman in the world as I think of her, for her precision with language, her storytelling arts, and her grace. Hers is an elegance so profound that she has been known—true story, I swear—to turn a blind’s man head upon her entrance at a restaurant.
Zenhabits, Copyblogger, and disciples, for their highly strategic, to the bone content, and for always testing, simplifying, improving, and playing it by the metrics.
Alice Waters, MFK Fisher, and Julia Child for being at the forefront of what was possible in the food revolution they birthed, and for mixing memoir with  method in their work, a life and career available for inspection, nothing held back.
In thinking through this blog, I tried to meld what I admired from these writers into something fresh and distinctly mine. A little from this one, a little from that one, and I filled notebooks before my concept began to take shape. But it all began with a study of my betters. I could triple this list, but you get the idea.
So, who or what influences you?
Comments welcome and edited to include first names only, and website, if provided; never your email. Photo credits: reflection (left) and freedom (right) by evilkosmoz .
 I come from a long line of people who regularly consult coffee grinds and confer with the dead, so I suppose that my accumulation of talismans, through the years, was inevitable. Most I’ve collected, but some have been given to me. I could list them, even explain them, the eye of God, the yin/yang rattle, the Marino Marini coin, but they wouldn’t hold much meaning for you. You have your own to contemplate.
Some tokens might be meant to cheer, or to provide focus or encouragement. Others might serve as a physical reminder of story. Some may be part of a writing ritual. Some might even figure into the stories.
Somehow, for decades even, we keep up with these objects. For the memory maybe of the circumstances of their acquisition. For the promise they hold perhaps to ward off evil or bring good fortune, even if we don’t quite believe in the promise, or maybe we do. There is, as well, a welcome physicality to them that we writers, so used to plucking things from midair and trying to pin them to the page, might find reassuring. Certainly, reassurance and hope are at the heart of the whole endeavor.
In some parts of the world, providing talismans, like fortunetelling or witch doctoring, is a profession. In my part of the world, each person finds his way. Me? I’ve got a dried horse chestnut in my pocket as we speak. You?
Comments welcome and edited to include first names only, and website, if provided; never your email. Photo credit: istockphoto.com
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Many, many decades – The esteemed Elizabeth Bishop, on one line of poetry, the comma moved back and forth.
