Wednesday, March 29, 2017

The Everlasting Journey of the Hero

Naive and immature protagonist is thrust into strange and dangerous world. Guided by a wise mentor he suffers through innumerable misadventures to return, wiser and transformed. 

It is a plot arc that has been written a thousand times. Classic examples can be traced back to the beginning of storytelling itself, from early epics like Homer's Odyssey to the Arthurian tale of Percival to modern favorites like Star Wars, The Lord of the Rings and even Harry Potter. Scholars have even posited that the stories of Jesus Christ, Muhammad, and Siddhartha Guatama fit neatly into this common pattern. This plot, a type of bildungsroman sometimes called the Hero's Journey, forms one of the keystones of storytelling throughout the ages.

The Hero's Journey
Joseph Campbell's The Hero With a Thousand Faces
Joseph Campbell's The Hero With a Thousand Faces
was the first work that explored the "monomyth" of the Hero's 
Journey
As a definable term, the "Hero's Journey" entered in the modern lexicon with mythology scholar Joseph Campbell's 1949 book The Hero With a Thousand Faces. In this seminal work of comparative mythology, Campbell describes a recurring narrative, what he calls a "monomyth," that is present throughout the ages and across nearly every culture. What is it about this "coming of age" story that makes it so compelling it has captivated the human imagination for millennia virtually unchanged? The hero wears his thousand faces, but at his core he is the same. The details of the story, as Campbell illuminates, are recognizable to the point of predictability, yet are employed by storytellers subconsciously. It would seem that the notion of the Hero's Journey is buried inside every one of us.

The Components of the Hero's Journey
Campbell identified several stages of the Hero's Journey, split into three "acts." Here is an oversimplification of each using modern or classic examples:

Act I- Departure
  1. Call to Adventure- The call to adventure most often interrupts the hero's stasis of normalcy, pushing him (I will say "him" throughout but the Hero's Journey can and has been undertaken by many female figures as well) towards a dangerous fate at the end of a long, desperate road. Usually this call to adventure is forced on the hero. For example, when Gandalf sends Bilbo out against his will with his dwarf companions in search of the Lonely Mountain, or when Odysseus is driven into the far seas by Poseidon's angry winds. Both represent a sudden, unexpected departure and the beginning of an obstacle-laden journey.
  2. Refusal of the Call- In many examples, the Hero experiences a moment of fear, doubt, and unwillingness which often leads to them refusing the call. Such as Luke Skywalker's reluctance to abandon his aunt and uncle at the moisture farm to join Obe Wan Kenobe's journey to Alderaan.
  3. Supernatural Aid- Inevitably the Hero meets a helper, often in the form of a guide, crone or older mentor (which coincidentally often fits cleanly with Carl Jung's archetype of the wise old man, or "senex"). This guide frequently presents the hero with a token or amulet that will help keep him safe on his journey, such as Obe Wan gifting Luke with the lightsaber, or Dumbledore giving Harry the cloak of invisibility.
  4. Crossing the Threshold- The point at which the Hero departs the safety of his world and begins the epic journey. Sometimes the order of these things can vary, but think of how Bilbo runs out of Bag End, famously forgetting his hat.
  5. Belly of the Whale- A first crisis, one that often appears nearly fatal, represents the final departure from the hero's former world and his plunging headlong into the journey. With The Hobbit, this could be either the run-in with the trolls or perhaps, even better, Bilbo getting lost in the tunnels and having to face Gollum in a riddling contest.
Act II- Initiation
  1. The Road of Trials- The road of trials is a series of tests that the Hero must face in order to gain
    George Lucas used The Hero With a Thousand Faces as a template for Star Wars
    The original Star Wars trilogy fits nicely into the Hero's Journey
    framework, a move that was intentional by George Lucas
    wisdom, skill and knowledge that will help his reach his ultimate success. The hero often fails at one or more of them and is bailed out by his mentor, often covertly. Frodo has to survive being grabbed by Old Man Willow, captured by the barrow wights, and being stabbed by a morgul blade at Weathertop, among other things, before he has the strength to face his ultimate test at Mount Doom.
  2. The Temptress- Having passed, or merely survived, many of the early trials, the hero now faces temptation(s) that threaten to draw him away from his journey. This does not always have to be a woman as the term temptress implies, but it represents the seduction or lusts that could draw the hero from his quest into an apparently easy life of pleasure. A classic example is Circe in the Odyssey. Circe is a goddess who gives Odysseus and his men comfort, food and drink. At this point their quest nearly fails as they grow gluttonous (and are even turned into swine) on pleasures of the flesh.
  3. Atonement with the Father- The hero now faces the figure which holds the ultimate power over his life, often represented by a male figure or even the character's literal father. An obvious example is Luke's confrontation with Darth Vader in The Empire Strikes Back. While it is difficult to say Luke and Anakin reach "atonement" in this sequence, it is the confrontation, and the subsequent acquisition of knowledge, that is at the heart of the quest.
  4. Apotheosis- Apotheosis is the point in which Hero realizes he has reached a greater understanding. Like Luke casting aside his light saber after defeating Darth Vader in The Return of the Jedi and proclaiming himself a "jedi." The hero is now ready for the final and most dangerous part of the journey.
  5. The Ultimate Boon- The ultimate achievement of the goal or quest. Having survived the trials, reached his state of enlightenment, the Hero is now ready to complete the goal he set out to accomplish. This is when Frodo finally casts the ring into the lava at Mount Doom, or Harry defeats Lord Voldemort, or Luke (and Anakin together) overthrow the Emperor. The goal is achieved and the most dangerous part of the quest is over.
Act III- The Return
  1. Refusal of the Return/Magic Flight- Much like how the Hero needs help getting through the threshold, he may also need help starting the return. In many instances, an escape is necessary for our hero. As Campbell says: "The hero may have to be brought back from his supernatural adventure by assistance from without. That is to say, the world may have to come and get him." For example, without being rescued by the eagles in The Return of the King, Frodo (and Sam) would have laid on the rocks until the lava overtook them.
  2. Crossing the Return Threshold- A crucial part of the complete Hero's Journey is the return. The character struggles processing what he has learned and, by extension, how to share that wisdom with the rest of the world. In The Return of the King, Frodo, Sam, Merry and Pippin return to the Shire to find it overrun by crooked men and hobbits who are operating under the will of a depleted, malicious Saruman. The world they have returned to is an ugly pantomime of the one they left and they must now utilize the wisdom gained on their journey to rescue their former world.
  3. Freedom to Live- In the final stage of the journey, the Hero reaches an inner peace with the world that he has faced, how it has changed and how it changed him. The shedding of the fear of dying allows the character, at last, to live fully in peace. This can be seen in Harry's settling down to marry Ginny, have children together, and make peace with Malfoy. This moment of understanding is also apparent at the last moment of the Return of the Jedi when Luke sees the corporeal figures of Anakin, Obe Wan and Yoda apparently restored to their former selves, peaceful and unified, representing the achievement of inner peace.
The Hero's Journey in Today's World

Odysseus fits nicely into the framework of the bildungsroman or the Hero's Journey
A depiction of the Odyssey from the 2nd century
There is something innately pleasing about the Hero's Journey that strikes at the heart of what it means to be human. Literally or metaphorically we all undergo journeys. It is through these trials, quests and accomplishments that we grow most profoundly into the wise people we are bound to become. Innovation as a storyteller then comes in ways we can invent a new and more interesting Hero, or creatively tweak the setting to create something fresh.

Or perhaps there is more. Perhaps we can subvert the Hero's Journey and show how its convenient template fails our modern world, either in part or catastrophically and completely.

In Joe Abercrombie's Before They Are Hanged, we find a corrupted version of the Hero's Journey. In this novel the heroes are guided on a journey far from home that ends in a triumphant return of sorts. Outwardly it looks like that familiar form all over. But Abercrombie subverts the tale in several interesting ways. Instead of a wise old mentor, we get the wizard Bayaz, a corrupt, selfish and dangerous figure whose goal isn't to guide the hero's self discovery but to further his own wicked ends. And the ultimate boon turns out not to be some great object of power and wisdom but no more than a worthless rock. This intriguing, and perhaps quite intentional, subversion paints a non-idealized and realistic version of the journey that ultimately feels more applicable to the real world. 

It seems painfully possible that the Hero's Journey was a myth all along, something we're taught to believe in impractically, like the romantic notion of "the one" or the myth of "happily ever after." Perhaps the notion of the Hero is toxic: a projection of corrupt idealism in a realist's world whose failure is in part responsible for far-reaching cultural fatigue and disappointment. As storytellers it's our job to interpret the narratives of the world and either to forge a new and metamorphosing mythology that better fits the ever-transforming world or to reinforce the well-trodden trails until they are so deep that even those who are astray can easily return.


I am in-debted to all of my readers. Without people to endure my words on a page, I will cease to exist. If you liked this post, feel free to comment below. If you didn't like it, feel free to comment below. I'll be your friend forever if you consider signing up for my weekly newsletter. You'll get a once-a-week update on my posts and NOTHING ELSE! No spam, no selling your email to third parties. Okay, if I ever get around to publishing one of these numerous books I've been working on for years, I might send out an email letting you know about that, but that's it! In the meantime thanks for reading.

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All writing is the original work of Brian Wright and may not be copied, distributed, re-printed or used any form without express written consent of the author. Find out here how to CONTACT me with publishing and/or use questions

Sunday, March 19, 2017

Children Are Our Future...Make Them Readers

Kids are our future. It’s a terrifying notion really. The modern kid is a smelly, noisy, selfish, fit factory. And the potential for blame could lie with many of societies numerous shortcomings: flailing school systems, overuse of the internet, video games, bad food, parents who are even bigger smelly, noisy, selfish, fit factories. But if our future depends on these pint-sized monsters growing up to captain our troubled world into the coming millennia, then frankly I’m concerned. We need a champion that can save this generation so they can save ours.

Books. 

Not all kids are as bad as I made them sound. I'm not a parent (you may have guessed), but I'm an uncle. My nephew and two nieces (almost five, seven and sixteen) are all pretty inspiring. Above average, I would dare say but everyone thinks that about their own family, right? But seriously, my older niece has more wisdom as a teenager than I did at twenty-two, my younger niece has a greater knowledge of animal species than some high-school graduates, and my four-year-old nephew can drive a Tonka tractor like a construction wizard.

There are truly some kids, hopefully more than I give the world credit, who possess the skill sets and budding potential to bail us out of the muck pile we’ve buried our boots in.

We need more of them!

Congress recently added a new species to the Endangered Species List. It was a sad and terrible day when I read the news, for this species was part of what made the world the colorful, amazing, mind-mindbogglingly brilliant place it once was and still could be. That species? Critical thinkers.

The United States just suffered through its ugliest presidential election in modern history. Both sides unleashed volleys of hate-filled nastiness at an unprecedented volume. It was Total War. Nothing was safe. Rampant social media addiction has birthed an era where people rely on memes, not actual journalism, as the raw material to forge their opinion of the world. No longer can a person suffer through a two-thousand word article by someone who put in the time to research a subject thoroughly and whose writing was subjected to multiple layers of editorial oversight. Now we allow ourselves just enough time to view a picture and a sentence (usually promoting some clever-sounding but fallacy-packed pseudothesis) click “like” and move on.

It’s sad.

How do we rescue critical thought from the brink of extinction? We need to cultivate readers. Coddle them like the California Condor, scrubbing their oily wings when the pollution of the world runs too deep, and monitor the minutiae of their development to ensure they don't disappear forever. 

I don’t know about other countries, and those of you international friends could weigh in, but in the United States the problem to me is obvious: a sampling of the Facebook/Twitter rhetoric proves that a massive cross-section of our country is functionally illiterate. This huge blob of the population can't tell the difference between a valid, supportable thesis and a nonsensical, ridiculous conspiracy theory hatched straight from a backroom at the sanitarium. And if the decline in critical thought continues at its current rate, intelligence, careful analysis, good decision making and (by extension) almost everything good about the world will be gone in just a few short generations.

Children are our future. We need readers. Tyrion Lannister, an infinite source of entertaining wisdom, said, “A mind needs books as a sword needs a whetstone.” We need to encourage literacy.

How do we get kids to read in a world where it’s no longer a priority value by culture at large? There are so many distractions for children. So many things that pry them away from the pages of books. I've seen young kids holding smart phones they looked barely old enough to carry, and kids cross-eyed from endless hours of video game madness. Nowadays kids are more likely to proclaim that their heroes are the stars of reality television like Kim Kardashian or Si Robertson than a literary figure or character. Take away their smart phones. Turn off the television. Steal their video games. Not that they can't do these things some of the time, but for at least a few hours make them read a book.

Our future depends on it.

BONUS
One of my literary heroes, Dave Eggers, who is founder of the powerhouse literary journal McSweeney’s and author of the brilliant (though sometimes convoluted) memoir A Heartbreaking Work of Staggering Genius, gave TED talk a few years back on the subject of creating tutoring centers that encouraged reading and writing among children. His main philosophy? Make it fun! The video is a bit long (24 minutes) but his ideas are brilliant and if you are interested in a discussion of pedagogy and childhood learning it is well worth the time to watch. His ideas are applicable to many things beyond reading. The video is hilarious and entertaining. I’ve never shown it to anyone and had them say they were disappointed afterwards. The first time I watched it, I was inspired to go out and try to change the world one reading/writing child at a time. Enjoy!


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Thursday, March 16, 2017

Obsession, Love Letters, and Book Reviews

Everyone loves their own opinion. Recently I've become convinced that this self-obsession, this overbearing lust to bask in our own perceived magnificence, is very reason the internet exists. The virtually unlimited comment sections and forums are the ultimate medium for people to blather on unedited about any and, well, every topic. Sometimes it is just worthless word soup. Other times, hearty chicken noodle.

I'm no better. For me my opinion is probably the most important opinion in the world (shouldn't your opinion be for you?).  I'm an opinionated person, I admit it. However, I'm not rude about it, like some people, nor am I afraid to listen to what others have to say. I love a spirited debate. And one thing I definitely have an opinion about as an editor, literature major, semi-professional writer, etc, is books.

Admittedly, I'm a little disappointed in myself right now. Book reviews are a probably one of the most common and probably uninteresting topics for a blog post and now I'm guilty of it. There's two reasons for this generic and rather mundane bit of writing:

1) Love letters- Yes, that's right. Books and writing are what I love, so I tend to hammer out a great volume of letters (also words and sentences) about them.

2) Obsession- With my brand new work-in-progress that is. Having reached near crisis levels on all three of my unfinished manuscripts for various reasons, I decided the best option was to put them all aside for awhile and start something new. Against all odds, in poured a new idea that gripped me like a row of serrated teeth. Over the last few days I have been obsessed, hitting stupid daily word counts like 7,000 effortlessly (something that seemed so rare historically for me.) Yesterday I wrote 11,301 words, which I'm pretty sure is a new personal best. In fact, I'm super eager to just get through this blog post so I can start hammering away on my new story again.

So enough jabbering. I'm going to risk sharing my own opinions about a few books I have recently read. Take them for what they are...just another person's viewpoint. Maybe it helps, maybe it's just word soup.

BOOK 1

Look to Windward
by Iain M. Banks
Amazon scores: 133 total reviews (5 star: 61%; 1 star: 2%)

The Good:

Imagination- The Culture series is an impressive feat of human imagination. Look to Windward was the third book I've read in the series and in this area it did not disappoint. Banks lays out some seriously creative ideas for the future of humanoid civilization:

  1. Orbitals. Ring-shaped, planet-like artificial constructs that are mobile, controllable and form the new home to most of the trillions of inhabitants of the Culture.
  2. Futuristic extreme sports, like lava rafting. I love rafting but what would make it even more exciting? Friggin' lava!
  3. Unique alien species like the behemothaur, a continent-size flying whale-like creature circling for millennia around inhabitable gas giants. 
  4. Minds. hyper-intelligent sentient AI which run essentially everything about the Culture while the humans bask in post-scarcity bliss. 
  5. Sublimation. Once a species reaches a certain technological level they are actually able to download their minds and souls into an artificially created "heaven."
Complexity- Counter to many examples, both historical and modern, of speculative fiction, Banks's writing borders at times on literary, plumbing intriguing questions of humanity, and forging it all together in tangled webs that resolve in beautiful, but sometimes untidy denouements that feel remarkably poignant.

The Bad:

Over-complexity- Sometimes, and this seems especially true in Look to Windward, Banks gets a little too complex. In Windward, I found it challenging to keep up with the many plot lines. It seemed each time I started to really get into the action, I was whisked away to some other time and place, sometimes another world, having to start back from scratch, learn a new character, try to decipher their motivations, and succeed just in time to be transported away somewhere else. In a relatively short novel (400 pages) there just didn't seem to be enough time to develop it all.

Static characters- Perhaps due to the aforementioned over-complexity and the multiple plot lines, I just never felt like a knew a character long enough to feel the dynamics of their minds, or engage in deep empathy which for me is what makes a novel great.

The Conclusion

All-in-all I would give this novel a 3 of 5 stars. What sticks with me more than the story or the characters was the impressive world-building. This cutting-edge world (or more accurately, galaxy) building took the standard good-against-evil Star Wars-esque space opera and shoved it into a whole new plane. However, sometimes I enjoy a good character-driven story like Star Wars where the plot sinks beneath the interactions of the characters whom you have formed deep empathy for. This lack of character relation, sadly, is where this otherwise excellent book fell short.

BOOK 2

The Fifth Season
by N.K. Jemisin
Amazon scores: 416 total reviews (5 star: 71%; 1 star: 2%)

The Good

Refreshing- As fantasy writers there is something we all have to face: the old tropes, the pseudo-medieval world where a young, innocent character is thrust into a large world and becomes a powerful superstar, is tired. Exhausted really. Yes, great examples of this overused idea are still written, published and successful every year, but it is good to breathe something fresh. In some ways, The Fifth Season is not that much different, but it infuses just enough freshly squeezed lemon juice in that stale old water to give it a new flavor. The world building was intriguing and original, the setting was entirely new, the theory behind the magic was unlike anything I'd been exposed to, and the characters were refreshingly non-Eurocentric. 

Interestingly complex- There are three main plot lines in The Fifth Season. To avoid spoiling some great movements within the book all I will say is I enjoyed how they all tied together. It had hints of the literary qualities that push and challenge readers in an interesting way but didn't allow them to become heavy-handed to the point of ruining the story.

The Bad

2nd Person!- When I first saw that this book had sections written in second person, I almost threw it in the trash. I hate 2nd person and almost never see the use for it. At best it is a tolerable distraction and at worst it can completely ruin an otherwise interesting story. Luckily, the entire book is not 2nd person, only about one-third of it, and Jemisin pulls it off fairly well. Still, I would have preferred had she left it out entirely. In my humble opinion, it did nothing to make the story better and it felt like a heavy-handed and unnecessary grasp at originality.

Forced Diversity- I saw on the negative Amazon reviews several people complain about this and  I almost have to agree to some extent. Despite what I said earlier about being glad the book was not centered around a bunch of white, European males, the forced diversity in this novel almost felt like one of those contrived McDonalds commercials where a Hispanic, a white guy, a black guy and an Asian are all sitting around a table together. I have no problems with gay characters, transgender characters, black characters, or people of any other race, size or sexual orientation, but I strongly feel it has to be for the better of the book. Characters are who they are because they exist in a world that should feel real. And though writers have to be mindful of their audience, and the conscious or even sub-conscious ways we can influence the world, I felt in this case like at least some of the diversity was inserted as an afterthought is an attempt to prove she was being inclusive. As a counter example, although Game of Thrones is a strongly "white-dude" dominated book, the inclusion of a small person, a couple of gay characters, a bastard, a tomboy, etc, all felt decidedly important and these characteristics were used in a way that made the story better.  

Conclusion

I really enjoyed this book. It was a rare page-turner for me and I finished it in three days, immediately ordering the sequel when I was done. N.K. Jemisin deserved the Hugo Award for this rather brilliant piece of speculative imagination and I look forward to her future writing with great interest. The above criticism did not distract from the story in a significant way, perhaps only keeping this book at a "I really liked this book" level rather than a "this is one of my favorites." I would give it somewhere along the lines of 4.2 out of 5 stars.

BOOK 3

The Color of Magic
by Terry Pratchett
Amazon scores: 969 total reviews (5 star: 56%; 1 star: 2%)

The Good

Creativity- I'm a latecomer to the Terry Pratchett phenomena. The Color of Magic is the first in the Discworld series, which spans some 41 novels that have sold over 80 million copies. It was published the year I was born (1983). The Color of Magic is a parody of the fantasy genre, much like Douglas Adams parodied sci-fi with A Hitchhikers Guide to the Galaxy in 1979. While poking fun at fantasy classics like The Lord of the Rings it also became a classic itself. And rightfully so. It is unique, creative and funny and provides a breath of fresh air to the usually heavy, good vs. evil structure of so many fantasy epics.

Funny- I love a good comedy. Who doesn't? Life should not be taken so seriously all the time. The light-hearted desire for a bit of laughter is what prompted me into Discworld, and I'm glad I did. Images like in the prologue when a group of observers lower themselves over the edge of the rimfall at the edge of the flat disc-shaped world only to discover they whole planet was propped up by four elephants standing on the back of a meteor-pocked turtle, or the sentient, many-legged trunk (who belongs to the first ever, and lovably naive tourist, to the city of Morpork's) who is prone to biting off the hands of anyone tempted enough to reach in for the bags of gold it carries around, are what make this book the hilarious and fun read it is.

The Bad

Lack of Poignancy- Okay this may seem a bit contradictory because some of the very things I listed as "good" qualities of the book are also some of things that keep me from loving it. While I enjoy the goofy, irreverent humor, I also found its silliness a barricade to my overall enjoyment. I guess I'm a sucker for a book that hits all of my emotions: excitement, fear, sadness, love, joy. In short, I love books that can stir humor into an otherwise serious cauldron. In essence, this notion, that the very goofy nature that gives this book its unique edge also eviscerates the other emotional connections, is the heart of my criticism. While I sort of like Rincewind, the Quixotic and hapless "hero" of this tale, I don't find myself particularly empathetic with his story and I did not care enough about what happened to him in the end.

Conclusion

Take this book for what it is: a goofy break from the legions of dark, serious and mythical volumes of fantasy novels in the modern canon. I enjoyed reading this book, but it wasn't a page turner. And for me I feel I "got the gist" and don't feel particularly compelled to read on in the series.


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Friday, March 10, 2017

Brilliant Books I Couldn't Finish

Some of the most brilliant writing I have ever encountered came in books I couldn't finish.

These books had it all: stunning insight, diamond-sharp imagery, dynamic sentences that seemed to leap straight from the page. Each one of these masterpieces showcased writing of a caliber I couldn't even fathom. Writing so far above mine all I could do was bask enraptured in its enormous shadow. If only I could craft even a single sentence like these authors, then I'd feel okay naming myself a writer.

But thought these books may be master studies in the craft of writing, for one damn reason or another I just couldn't finish them.

David Foster Wallace- Infinite Jest (1996)
Infinite Jest is a brick. A beautiful, brilliant brick but a brick nonetheless. It is a daunting 1,079 huge pages of microscopic font. But immediately upon dipping my pinky toe in the first chapter, I knew I was swimming in something special. The sentences are infuriatingly brilliant and the descriptions so vivid I could have tossed my computer into nearest lake with envy. I wanted to write like that. I wanted to be David Foster Wallace. When he committed suicide in 2009, I was shocked. I'd lost a hero, and modern American literature had lost an icon.

Infinite Jest is described as "encyclopedic postmodernism" and has been compared to Thomas Pynchon's Gravity's Rainbow. During each of my attempts to read it, I had the distinct sense I was experiencing something profound, something that struck so deeply at the core of our deeply troubled society that it laid bare all of our innumerable foibles, good and bad. In the end, however, I suppose I was simply too overwhelmed by the immense gravity of what I was experiencing to understand it. My enthusiasm withered like a dying well after just 300 pages. In subsequent years I tried three more times to pick it back up but to no avail. There were simply too many characters and too much dizzying description. About a third of the book is page after tedious page of endnotes, necessitating constant flipping back and forth. For me, this literary dystopian megabook simply collapsed under its own weight. 

Dave Eggers- A Heartbreaking Work of Staggering Genius (2000)
A Heartbreaking Work of Staggering Genius is a fictionalized memoir that earned a spot on The Times top books of the decade (2000-2010). It truly is heartbreaking and there is a staggering measure of genius. It was a New York Times Bestseller and a finalist for the Pulitzer Prize.

I love Dave Eggers. His quirky antics and brilliant championing of literacy inspire me to become not just a writer but a steward of the written word. He founded McSweeney's, which quickly rose to become one of the most prominent literary journals in the world. You can watch his inspirational and hilarious TED talk about encouraging writing and literacy among children here and witness for yourself basically everything you need to know about his ebullient personality and unique brilliance. I challenge you to watch it and not be inspired to go find a random kid on the street and teach him how to read.

Eggers' parents both died within months of each other when he was in his low 20's necessitating him to raise his eight-year-old brother like a son. This tragic set of circumstances forms the subject of Genius. His story is deeply moving and his manner of telling it is something to behold. The book is also hilarious at times, and starts with a lengthy preface that provides (among other things) a list of irreverent tips to better enjoy and understand your reading of the book that follows.

Much like Infinite Jest, however, I found all of the distractions and digressions, well, distracting, and eventually it was gathering dust on my coffee table with my bookmark stuffed somewhere in the middle.

Ken Kesey- Sometimes a Great Notion (1964)
Published two years after more famous One Flew Over the Cuckoo's Nest, Sometimes a Great Notion is Ken Kesey's second novel and very different from his first. As with Jest and Genius, the writing is painfully brilliant yet unbelievably convoluted. The imagery cuts like sharp coral on virgin toes. The characters are intriguing and the plot is fascinating. However, the multiple overlapped voices (which often jump from a first person narrator to third person then on to a different first person with barely any clues to illuminate whose mind you are now in) makes the book almost unreadable. Though many consider this book one of the classic pieces of American literature in the second half of the 20th century, I found it daunting (my edition was well over 700 pages) and my motivation for it fell apart halfway.

With each of these books, I felt like a better writer after reading even just a part of it. Every word is meticulously selected. Every sentence flows like perfect music. But somewhere along the way, something broke. Perhaps they were overly self-indulgent in their explosion of artistic expression. More likely the fault lies within me: I'm not patient or clever enough to recognize that the very things that turned me off about these books is what makes them so great.


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Tuesday, March 7, 2017

Fireproof and Over a Foot Thick: Dealing With Negative Criticism

As I shake the dust of sleep from stiff limbs, I fall into my morning routine: Fire up the coffee, let the dog out to put a little yellow water on the backyard fence, flick on the computer to check my status in the world of the interweb (views on my website, Facebook likes, Twitter notifications, yadda, yadda). Alas, I find a DM in my Twitter message feed that looks like something other than the usual automated spam. Two months into my great Twitter experiment and mostly pleased thus far with the result, I am anxious to read on.

But as I start to read, my coffee mug halts forgotten a quarter inch from my lips.

Hate mail! What?
dealing with negative criticism
Don't let critics burn you like they burn me

Apparently I've offended someone. A paraphrase of their message:  This is ridiculous. This is awful. How could anyone hold this opinion? You trivialize everything we real writers do.

In short, I am dumb, a bad writer, intellectually worthless, and offensive. Worst of all, it is quite clear that the person did not even read the article in question but made the snap judgement based on the title alone. 

I feel sick. It seems like a lot of hate over a rather bland how-to article. How can so much judgement be channeled my way based on a seven-word title hardly representative of my full thesis? 

How do I react to this torrent of nastiness? I try to collect my cool and form a response coated with a thin, non-patronizing glaze of honey. 

Me: Did you read the article? I think you will see that the opinion you are criticizing is actually only one part in the puzzle. 

Response: You couldn't pay me to read your article. (verbatim)

I must admit, I am highly offended. I want to load up my biggest guns and fire back. Something terrible that will tear as big of hole in the offender as they have torn in me. 

Perhaps overly meek, I settle on: How rude! It's a mark of our shortcomings as a culture that we put so much stock in mere titles without verifying the substance of the article for ourselves. I wish you the best of luck with your writing. 

Then I do something I've never done before on Twitter, block him. I'm too much of a coward to read his response.

My mood is thoroughly soured. My pleasant morning is now stained with gloom. Plans to plow through 3,000 words on my current work-in-progress no longer sound fun. Instead, I opt for a hike in the rain.

The Thing About Redwoods

There are many lessons that can be learned from a redwood tree. They are the tallest trees on Earth. They are near the oldest as well. The stand silent, modest, un-boastful in their grandeur. They let their beautiful work, the millennia (yes, that's right) of growth stand for itself. They look down on the rest of us, unconcerned as we dither about hyper-focused on our useless problems. And their bark, which can grow more than a foot thick, is nearly fireproof.

nasty criticism is a part of our world now
The bark of a redwood is nearly fireproof
I admit that I have thin skin. Criticism eats at me like acid on a glass etching. More than once I've woken in the middle of the night, rolling and tossing as I agonized about some stupid thing somebody has said to me. As much as I work on it, as much as I try to convince myself it doesn't matter, it does.

As a writer, I'm told this could be a problem.

The social media age has ushered in a new time where anonymous "haters" have been given the ultimate platform to vomit their nastiness un-filtered for all the world to see. Even the most brilliant artists, writers, athletes, politicians, and people among us are subjected to the most hyper-critical, mean-spirited criticism in history. It's terrible. It demeans us all as a world culture. Things that would never be said to a person's face are said to their digital avatars with reckless abandon. Uncaring, un-empathetic hate. 

How do we handle this volume of criticism? Bury our heads in the sand and wait for it to pass? Respond with sugar? Saccharin? Even more vigorous hate? Writers are a group often prone to withdrawing from social confrontation. That's partly why we hide our words in paper and on the computer screen. As a result, however, we are thrust into a world where we are viewed as faceless names on a page and judged harshly for works that we poured our blood, sweat and souls into. A single missed typo, a careless bit of punctuation, a bad paragraph, can be enough for people to launch into a vicious tirade against us on social media, talking about how bad our writing is, how dumb we are, how worthless our hard work is. Imagine if you took an entire year's worth of work for a carpenter and took to social media bashing them for the one nail they didn't quite pound flat.

I suppose I have to learn from the redwood. Grow bark so thick as to render me nearly fireproof. To poke skyward until the opinions of others are so far beneath me that I no longer hear them. Why should I care anyway? Those critics will come and go in such a blink and I'll stand for centuries after they've moved on. 

Until then, I am but a tiny sapling, unable to dodge the harsh, steel-toed boots of my enemies.


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All writing is the original work of Brian Wright and may not be copied, distributed, re-printed or used any form without express written consent of the author. Find out here how to CONTACT me with publishing and/or use questions


Friday, March 3, 2017

Writers are Sexy

Mmm...writer... I love the way you hold your...pen.
And how you wear that...fragmentary sentence.
You are so smooth how you...build your imagery.
I can't quit staring at the size of your...brain.

The power of a good writer is attractiveYou get me excited when you...place that semicolon.
My eyes are fixed on your...back cover.
The way you say...The End is so breathtaking.
It makes me crazy the way move your...plot.

I start to tingle when you...title your chapter.
It's breathtaking how you tickle my...amygdala.
You have such nice curves on your...letter S.
I just can't get enough of your...complex characters....

Us writers are a nerdy bunch. I'm pretty sure I just proved that with the above...poem? We are more prone to stumbling out for our mail at four pm still pajama clad and cursing the blinding saber of light somewhere above us they call the sun than stunning a roomful of the opposite sex at the latest soiree.

But I love us. More than that, I find us sexy.

People forget the importance of the brain in arousal. Too much focus lies in the flesh. The brain with its vivid, wild imagination. Its ability to focus its vast power into something as infinitesimal as the brush of a fingertip on a single point of skin. Yes, the brain is the most important organ of intimacy.

Good writers draw their power from the ability to manipulate your brain. At the outset of a fiction story, everyone knows they are about to be lied to. An alternate definition of fiction, in fact, reads: "An allegation that a fact exists that is known not to exist." In other words, a lie.

Lie to me, baby....

You probably picked up your last book standing under a sign that said in big letters "fiction," so it's not like you expected it to be real. But somehow, that all-powerful writer tricked you into buying her the narrative. She convinced you to care more for her characters than the person you just bumped into crossing the street. Such talent takes magic.

Sleek, sexy magic...

Who isn't drawn to intelligence, wit, strength? Who ever said they disliked a sense of humor? Nothing is worse than a brainless beauty. It's like a book with a stunning cover but filled with scribbles. Or nothing at all....

Frankly, I would rather pry open a plain white hardback and find Shakespeare.

There's something intriguing about the girl in the corner of the room. You know the one. Veiled by shadow. Quietly watching. Not wearing a histrionic red dress covered in the drool stains of her latest love victims. No, she's quiet but sophisticated. She notices you long before you notice her. She understands the thrill of raw emotion. She knows how to manipulate your mind. Her eyes are brimmed with wisdom and power. Her gaze constantly rakes the room, seeking her next character.

I'm terrified it will be me.

Nevermind that damsel in distress. Meh to the helpless princess. I want a queen. No scratch that. A goddess. One who shapes worlds, molds characters, dictates universes. A goddess with the power to create, build, manipulate, seduce. Even destroy.

Sleek, sexy writer....


Yeah, that just happened. I'm not going to apologize for it. If it made you blush, well, tough it out and move on. That's kind of the way this blog has worked so far; you never really know what sort of nonsense is flying at you next. I don't either, so don't ask. If you liked it, feel free to comment below. If you didn't, feel free to comment below. I'll be your friend forever if you considered signing up for my weekly newsletter. You'll get a once-a-week update on my posts and NOTHING ELSE! No spam, no selling your your email to third parties. Okay, if I ever get around to publishing one of these numerous books I've been working on for years, I might send out an email letting you know about that, but that's it! In the meantime thanks for reading.

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All writing is the original work of Brian Wright and may not be copied, distributed, re-printed or used any form without express written consent of the author. Find out here how to CONTACT me with publishing and/or use questions