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LOU READS
This week, Lou Reed visited my local independent bookstore to publicize his new book, The Raven. Or that was why I assumed he was coming; after having seen him I'm not sure why he was there.
I was admittedly not the target audience for this reading. There was a period in my youth when I thought he was a genius, and I still find much to admire in his songs and his stance. And I'm grateful to him for serving as a gateway to the Beat poets, Rimbaud and WS Borroughs, all of whom provided me with entertainment, inspiration and courage at difficult times in my life. But I'm older and more tired now, and the only reasons I attended the reading were that my friends wanted to go and the bookstore is a quick walk from home. So I was in a good position to observe the audience-author interactions from an outsider perspective.
I have attended many readings in which authors have presented as anxious to please their audiences, going out of their way to respond politely and in detail to such questions as, "What is your favorite color?" and "Why didn't you write about [fill in pet topic]?" I have even attended a reading at which the author was actively hostile to the audience, ridiculing their questions and accusing members of not knowing how to read. But this was my first encounter with a writer who seemed completely indifferent to the other people in the room.
He read in a monotone that was at times difficult to understand, and instructed the employee in charge of the accompanying slideshow to linger on or return to his favorite illustrations so that he could meditate silently on them. He dismissed questions, not with anger or contempt, but simply, apparently, because they did not appeal to him. And although I could not wait to leave, the rest of the audience seemed entranced. (And no, very few people appeared stoned. That was my first thought too.)
I was especially attuned to this because I am scheduled to give two performances this week, neither of which is high-stakes, but about both of which I am extremely nervous. Both my musical theater teacher and a friend who is a professional musician, to whom I have been neurosing ("I know there is nothing to be afraid of--the same way a child knows there aren't monsters under the bed, but doesn't want to turn out the light") insist that nerves are a good thing--that a lack of complacency makes us work harder, and provides that all-important charge between performer and audience.
I'm thinking, too, though, about a wonderful acting teacher who used to tell us, "Don't cater to the audience. When you cater to anyone--a lover, a child, an audience--you lose them. Do what you do based on who you are, and the audience will find you there."
I think there is wisdom in both stances. But I have to admit, I would have appreciated a little nervous energy the other night.
Susan O'Doherty, Ph.D., is a clinical psychologist with a New York City-based practice. A fiction writer herself, she specializes in issues affecting writers and other creative artists. She is the author of Getting Unstuck without Coming Unglued: A Woman's Guide to Unblocking Creativity (Seal, 2007). Her Career Coach column appears every Monday on Inside Higher Ed's Mama, Ph.D. blog, and she is a regular guest panelist on Litopia After Dark. She can be reached at Dr.Sue at mindspring dot com.
Dear Dr. O'Doherty,
With the most recent extreme example of plagiarism all the publishing buzz at the moment (Q.R. Markham's Assassin of Secrets, published by Mulholland, turns out to be entirely composed of text taken from well-known published books), would you please tell us something about the impulse to plagiarize? These cases arise every so often, most recently, for example, the case of Kaavya Viswanathan's debut novel, published in 2006 and withdrawn when her plagIarisms from Megan McCafferty, Salman Rushdie, and a few other published authors came to light.
With Assasssin of Secrets, it isn't just a few cut-and-pasted sentences, but an extraordinary crazy quilt of appropriated text on, possibly, every page. (It is a remarkable feat, in its way, crafting a Frankenstein's monster of a novel apparently coherent enough to garner starred reviews in PW and Kirkus.) Even his answers in an online Q&A about the book turn out to be words stolen from other writers.
How could someone capable of composing a readable manuscript, getting an agent, signing with a publisher, and going through all the stepsone goes through over many months or even years when one publishes a novel never have second thoughts about this sufficient to withdraw the manuscript? (And the author is part-owner of a Brooklyn bookstore, so he might even have awareness of the impact on booksellers when something like this happens.) How could someone's (apparent) ambition to be a published writer lead to the delusion, especially in this internet age, that "writing" such a book could succeed undetected?
Obviously, the publishers need to do some soul-searching on their side. I am asking you to explain something about the author's behavior and thinking in a situation like this. While of course you cannot know what was going on for this individual in this case, can you shed light on what may be going on when someone does something like this? What happened here?
-- Curious and Disturbed
Dear C & D,
As you may know, since you wrote, Quentin Rowan ("Markham") himself has published an account of his process. You will need to decide for yourself how truthful and self-aware this is.
Regarding the more general issue you present, it is fascinating and complex and deserves a fuller response than I can give here, but I will try to hit the main points.
There are many possible motivations for covert antisocial behavior. Some individuals have an inflated, possibly delusional, sense of their own cleverness; they may believe they will never get caught and even enjoy the sense of hiding in plain sight.
Others are thrill-seeking; the excitement of doing something risky (such as speeding, sneaking drugs and alcohol into the school dance, or, yes, plagiarizing, particularly in an obvious way) is enhanced by the knowledge that the consequences of being caught may be dire. This seems to be, at least in part, the process that Rowan describes: substituting the addictive thrill of alcoholism with that of plagiarism.
Still others may struggle with deep-seated feelings of guilt over unrelated acts and actually wish to be caught and punished.
And our culture tends to value form over substance; the state of being famous rather than doing something worthwhile that may also make you famous. Some writers struggle with a perceived need to be published, or famous, and this need can become so intense that it overshadows morality and realistic thinking.
But keep in mind that, although plagiarism is illegal and arguably deeply immoral, it is not unnatural. The idea of intellectual property is a relatively recent one; for earlier generations, stories were passed down and refi
Writing on the Air
My regular improv class is on hiatus, so to keep from getting rusty I recently took a trial class at another school. It was fun, and fascinating to experience a very different approach to the same material. One exchange between John, the teacher, and another student stayed with me, because it highlighted something I think all improvisers feel but that I have never heard articulated before.
In a scene involving food preparation, the student had been holding an imaginary pot when he got into an argument with another character and started waving his arms around. Afterward, John asked, "So what happened to the pot?"
The student acknowledged that he had forgotten all about it. "I was worried about where the scene was going," he said, "and I lost track of where I was."
"That's what's so hard about this business," John commented. "You have to wear all the hats, at the same time. You're the writer, the director, and the prop manager, in addition to being the actor. You have to be completely authentic in the moment, and at the same time you have to be aware of the narrative arc and where you're pushing it. There are no rehearsals, no do-overs. It's just you and your co-creators, up there, naked."
He made it sound difficult and scary, and it is. It is also incredibly freeing.
When I write, I am a compulsive reviser. I have to force myself to send stories out, because I never believe they are really done. I rip them apart and put the scenes together in different order; I rewrite them from the point of view of a minor character; I change the setting, the time of year, and the characters' names and vocations. I have been fiddling with some stories for more than 15 years now.
This is fun, but it can be hard to know when to stop--when there really is more to be gotten out of a story, vs nit picking that keeps me from moving on.
Improv is really helping with this. I can't look on anything I do as a draft. I can't revise. I am constantly learning from my mistakes, but I can't go back and fix the mistakes; I can only try to do better next time. And sometimes what I think is a mistake--a spontaneous expression that I would, if I were writing, go back and delete--turns out to be exactly what the scene needs.
It is an exciting, humbling, and confidence building art, and it is changing everything.
Susan O'Doherty, Ph.D., is a clinical psychologist with a New York City-based practice. A fiction writer herself, she specializes in issues affecting writers and other creative artists. She is the author of Getting Unstuck without Coming Unglued: A Woman's Guide to Unblocking Creativity (Seal, 2007). Her Career Coach column appears every Monday on Inside Higher Ed's Mama, Ph.D. blog, and she is a regular guest panelist on Litopia After Dark. She can be reached at Dr.Sue at mindspring dot com.
Thoughts on Entitlement
I have had a difficult few weeks. Some clients at an agency where I volunteer are facing life-threatening problems that are not, technically, mental health issues, but because of budget cuts and layoffs there is no one else to address them, so we have stepped in--and been stymied at every turn by bureaucratic snafus. A dear friend who has been plagued by a series of scary health problems over the past few years is preparing for yet another serious operation later this month. And I have been preoccupied and disheartened by both the responses to the Penn State scandal and the military-style crackdown on the OWS protesters.
And so this week, I screwed up in my musical theater class. It wasn't one of the insane, dramatic failures that come from overreaching, which happen to me periodically and which I don't mind, because I always learn from them. This time, I simply called it in, something I don't think I have ever done before, and that I didn't think I was capable of doing.
At our regular post-class coffee-shop postmortem, my friends agreed that my performance had been subpar. "You usually have this spark, and it just wasn't there," was how one of them put it. My friend Florrie, who knows pretty much everything about me, said, "It's not surprising that you were a bit distracted given everything that's been on your mind."
It wasn't just distraction, though, I realized later. It is more that, given all of the distressing events going on right now, it is hard to feel entitled to spend time and energy on such frivolous pursuits.
Don't get me wrong: I believe firmly in the value of art to any civilized society. Just not necessarily my art. I don't write searing social or political critiques, and I am not performing protest songs or guerrilla theater. I write stories about the inner workings of ordinary people, and I perform songs about unrequited love and social awkwardness.
I went to bed after class thinking that perhaps I should just give up this nonsense and focus on things that matter. When I woke up, though, I remembered two things people had said about my work the day before, which hadn't really registered at the time. My class friends agreed that even when I do mess up, I always make them laugh. And my teacher, after rightly blasting me for a half-assed performance, said, "One thing about you, though--I always care about you. Whatever you're singing, I'm always engaged and rooting for your character. Some people perform flawlessly, but they don't make us care. I'd rather watch you."
And laughter and caring are also important to a civilized society. So I'm still in. Though not giving up the day job.
Susan O'Doherty, Ph.D., is a clinical psychologist with a New York City-based practice. A fiction writer herself, she specializes in issues affecting writers and other creative artists. She is the author of Getting Unstuck without Coming Unglued: A Woman's Guide to Unblocking Creativity (Seal, 2007). Her Career Coach column appears every Monday on Inside Higher Ed's Mama, Ph.D. blog, and she is a regular guest panelist on Litopia After Dark. She can be reached at Dr.Sue at mindspring dot com.
Advice from a Pro
On Sunday, I had the privilege of seeing my musical theater teacher, Lorraine Serabian, perform in "Broadway Originals" at Town Hall. This annual program features actor/singers performing the now-classic songs they originated on Broadway.
I have had wonderful teachers whose performances disappointed me. Some teachers, like some editors, are more skilled at helping others achieve their potential than at shining themselves.
Lorraine isn't like that. She stole the show, even among such luminaries as Tammy Grimes and Marilyn Michaels. She lit up the stage with her passion and her beautiful voice.
We talked about the performance in class on Monday. How, We wondered, does a person achieve the confidence that allows her to throw herself that completely into a role? Is it something you're born with?
Not at all, she assured us. She was "nervous as hell" before the performance, as usual. But, she said, if you keep performing, eventually you get sick of watching less talented but more aggressive performers tear up the stage, and you decide to plunge in. Sometimes this happens all at once; more often in stages, but we will get there.
I have decided to believe her.
Susan O'Doherty, Ph.D., is a clinical psychologist with a New York City-based practice. A fiction writer herself, she specializes in issues affecting writers and other creative artists. She is the author of Getting Unstuck without Coming Unglued: A Woman's Guide to Unblocking Creativity (Seal, 2007). Her Career Coach column appears every Monday on Inside Higher Ed's Mama, Ph.D. blog, and she is a regular guest panelist on Litopia After Dark. She can be reached at Dr.Sue at mindspring dot com.
BEGINNINGS PART THREE: A BRIEF INTERVIEW WITH CAROLINE LEAVITT
For many of us, the hardest part of writing is facing the initial blank screen. I asked novelist Caroline Leavitt to discuss her emotional and psychological process in beginning a novel.
Starting a new work for me is always a combination of a great leap of faith, terrible fear and stubborness. I always start with something that obsesses me--usually a what if around a character. The novel coming from Algonquin next year (no title yet!) started with my wondering about a crime in a 1950s suburban neighborhood, at a time when everyone is paranoid about the Cold War and women had little rights and everyone imagines they are living the American Dream. And that led to one of my main characters, Ava, a woman ahead of her time, who somehow, in the suburban paranoia, is targeted for the crime. I clung to that kernel the whole time I was writing the novel, but what I cling to even more is my first chapter. I've always felt that the first chapter holds all the seeds for everything that germinates in the novel. Every clue, right down to the last--and hopefully surprising, but in an inevitable way--page, should be there. So I work for months on my first chapter, and then I have to show it to a few other writers. When that chapter is right, it becomes my lifeline. When I'm in chapter 8 and convinced I should chuck it all and go to dental school instead, I look at that first chapter. It's as if that chapter says, "See? You can do this. You can't give up. This is what haunted you. Keep going."
I'm always intimidated. I'm always sure that what I am writing is dull, stupid, boring, melodramatic or all of those adjectives. I have to keep myself from going on Amazon to compare myself to other writers (always dangerous.) I have to stop the fear in its tracks. I do this by hunkering down in my seat and putting blinders on, by writing the book that I need to write for myself (I'm not thinking of readers at this stage.). I outline and map what I imagine should happen and then I change it as I write. I'm waiting for edits on the 1950s novel, and I've started another new novel, and once again, I've got that first chapter-lifeboat. I'm trying to map out the story (though I know the map will change). I suffer writer's amnesia. I don't remember the process once it's over, but I'm trying to recall more and more because I think it's important to remember that yes, it's hard. And yes, it is so, so worth it.
How do you get yourself from the intimidation phase to the hunkering-down phase? That is, do you simply remind yourself that you’ve been there before, and this is the antidote, or is there a more complex process?
That's a really great question. I'm never intimidated at first--I almost always love the opening stages, which to me are like falling love. It's after the first hundred pages that I start to fall apart and panic. I have writers' amnesia. I forget that this happens every time so I have writer friends that I ask repeatedly, Was I like this last time? And then they email and they tell me that yes, I thought I didn't have a plot and never would. That yes, I thought my characters were wooden and stupid. And yes, I was crying then, too. This reminder helps me to realize that this is a process, that this is the really tough time and all there is to it is to sit there every day and work through it. I have to stop myself from dramatizing how difficult it is, and I have to stop myself from thinking that every other writer is having it easy and merrily writing along!
Caroline Leavitt is the author of nine published novels, most recently the New York Times bestseller Pictures of You. She is the recipient of a New York Foundation for the Arts Award in Fiction, and a Goldenberg Fiction Prize. She was also a National Magazine Award Nominee in Personal Essay, a finalist in the Nickelodeon Sc
MORE ON BEGINNINGS: A BRIEF INTERVIEW WITH MASHA HAMILTON
This is the second in a series of short interviews with writers about the emotional and psychological processes involved in creative writing. I asked Masha to describe the process of beginning a new novel:
I don't plot a new piece. It is a lot scarier than that for me; questions start to bubble to the surface, and I begin to feel a character, as unformed as that sounds. Then I look for the "inciting incident," the moment that is going to challenge the character in difficult and unexpected ways and start off some action that will change lives. Usually that inciting incident stays roughly the same as I work on the novel, but really, everything else is open to change. I try to remind myself if I don't have something on the page, I have nothing to revise, because I know the beginning is simply creating something to revise!
So, by the time you actually get to the point of writing, are the character and incident so clear in your mind that you feel ready to set it all down in draft, almost as if you were recording something that was actually happening, rather than creating from scratch? Or are there steps between conceptualizing and writing?
The character and the inciting incident are clear enough to get me excited. I know what I want to explore, and how, in essence, to trigger that exploration. And that trigger occurs in scene, so yes, I can kind of see the scene by the time I actually start writing it. I'm writing it as though it will be the first chapter. It always ends up near the start, but it doesn't always end up as Chapter One.
It sounds comforting, to remind ourselves that what we write at the beginning will almost certainly be changed, so there’s no point in stressing over it. Does it work that way for you? Are you able to just start writing, knowing that you’ll probably come back and revise?
Yes, it is really comforting to me. In fact, it surprises me how much can change months and even years into the project--although "change" isn't exactly the right word. Clarify is more what I mean.
Masha Hamilton is the author of four novels, most recently 31 Hours, and the founder of two world literacy projects, the Afghan Women's Writing Workshop and the Camel Book Drive.
Susan O'Doherty, Ph.D., is a clinical psychologist with a New York City-based practice. A fiction writer herself, she specializes in issues affecting writers and other creative artists. She is the author of Getting Unstuck without Coming Unglued: A Woman's Guide to Unblocking Creativity (Seal, 2007). Her Career Coach column appears every Monday on Inside Higher Ed's Mama, Ph.D. blog, and she is a regular guest panelist on Litopia After Dark. She can be reached at Dr.Sue at mindspring dot com.
Beginnings: A Brief Interview with David Abrams
This is the first in a series of short interviews with writers about the emotional and psychological processes involved in creative writing. I asked David to talk about what comes up for him when he is starting new work:
If I stare at them long enough, blank screens (formerly known as "blank pages") terrify the shit out of me. There is so much empty space waiting to be filled, all that acreage primed for words--words which are still trapped in my head, words which are hiding around the corner, cowering under bedsheets, refusing to come out into the light. Blank screens fill me with self-doubt and second-guessing. Blank screens are the arch-enemy of productive writing and should be avoided at all costs. Therefore, it's best to populate them as quickly as possible, even if it means typing the word "The" and letting it sit there all alone in that white space while you summon what follows. That "The" buys you some time while you wrestle the anxiety and try to tamp down the fear of beginning a new story, novel, poem or essay.
David, this is brilliant. I love the idea of just writing "the," of filling up a page with nonsense. I’m going to try it myself the next time I have trouble getting started.
The image made me think of going to a party filled with people one doesn’t necessarily like, just to not be alone. I once met a woman who had been widowed for about a year and still was unused to the isolation, both in her home and in her social life, since she and her husband had entertained mostly as a couple with other couples. She told me that when things got really bad she would go to the emergency room of her local hospital and sit there among the people waiting to be seen; it brought her back to humanity just to be around others.
This made me wonder how much of a role loneliness or perceived isolation plays in reluctance to begin a new work. Writing is such a solitary activity; the decision to plunge in entails accepting long stretches of complete aloneness, especially before we have our fully formed characters to interact with. Do you think filling up the page with nonsense might be in part a hedge against this aloneness?
That's a very sad image of the widow going to an emergency room just to connect with people--especially when you stop to think that ERs are packed with people at their worst moments--in pain and feeling very vunerable. I can think of safer, quieter places to mingle with humanity. But, on the other hand, if she sat in a coffee shop, nervously sipping her brew and moving muffin crumbs into shapes of continents with her fingertips, she probably wouldn't connect with anyone else. They'd all be too busy chatting with others at their own table.
But I stray from your question (avoidance technique!).
In truth, I'm never alone when I write. This will sound a little Jekyll-and-Hyde-ish, but I'm always at war with myself when I sit down at the desk. One half of my Self--the louder, bullying half--is always trying to convince the meek, compliant (and lazy!) Self to do anything but the task at hand. I sit there for long stretches doing a lot of Not Writing. Until finally, through guilt or reason, Mr. Meek rises up and gives Mr. Bully a swift kick in the teeth. So, I don't really surround myself with my characters as entities; I don't really converse with them or wait for them to "arrive." I'm enough company for myself. As they say, I'm my own worst enemy.
I should also note that physically, I can only write when I'm alone. I set the alarm for 3:30 am every day and, half-asleep, go down the stairs to my basement office where I spend the next two to three hours in solitude. The silence is only broken by the hiss of the furnace, my hungry cats' plaintive mews, and the classical mu
We had our final improv class of the semester this week, and our teacher, Rob, asked us to comment on our experience of the class. Most of the other students are professional actors, and they talked about how the work had helped them deal with curve balls at auditions and performances.
As documented here, my singing and acting have also benefited from this class. What I emphasized, though, was its transformative effect on the rest of my life.
I don't think of myself as particularly rigid or negativistic, and I know my teacher and classmates don't experience me that way, so it was, and is, difficult to articulate how differently I'm responding to everyday events; how I feel so much more flexible and positive thanks to this training in being present in the moment and accepting even seemingly unpromising situations as gifts.
I think part of the difference is that I am now blurring the distinction between "work" and "play" in some useful ways. In the past, "work" meant a task, an agenda, and single-minded focus. "Play" was what I did with my friends, letting my hair down, getting silly, meandering where our thoughts and feelings led us. I find that now, I'm looking on nearly every encounter as a potential adventure, co-created with other participants, which combines my agenda and theirs in often surprising and rewarding ways.
Of course, acting and singing--and writing--have always mixed "work" and "play." But I find that my serious work is becoming more playful, while even in my "pure play"--singing with friends, writing in my journal--I'm on the alert for gifts; for that moment when a spark ignites and, if I am sufficiently aware and grateful, something unexpected and beautiful may emerge.
Susan O'Doherty, Ph.D., is a clinical psychologist with a New York City-based practice. A fiction writer herself, she specializes in issues affecting writers and other creative artists. She is the author of Getting Unstuck without Coming Unglued: A Woman's Guide to Unblocking Creativity (Seal, 2007). Her Career Coach column appears every Monday on Inside Higher Ed's Mama, Ph.D. blog, and she is a regular guest panelist on Litopia After Dark. She can be reached at Dr.Sue at mindspring dot com.
The Full Catastrophe
My musical theater class had our cabaret night Sunday evening. I had been nervous all month about messing up and ruining the show, and my anxiety peaked on Sunday morning. I had two songs in the show, "Summertime" and "All of Me." I was fairly confident about "Summertime," but we'd had a disastrous dress rehearsal of "All of Me," and I was convinced that something was going to go very wrong.
As it turned out, pretty much everything did, starting with my air-headed decision to do something about the ridiculous color in my hair. I bought a highly recommended (and expensive) "color extraction system" at a professional hairstylist supply store that was supposed to take out artificial color and leave your hair the way it was originally. I used it as instructed, and it did exactly nothing, until I went swimming and emerged once again with green streaks. I pulled it back and hoped nobody would notice.
"Summertime" was fine, and well received. "All of Me," though, was prop-dependent, and when I get nervous, props tend to take on a wild life of their own. I pulled my slinky shawl from around my shoulders, intending to drape it sensuously around my partner's neck, and instead hit him in the face with it. Our (fortunately plastic) champagne glasses leapt off the table and crashed to the floor, where I tripped on one. A lace handkerchief that I was supposed to pull out of my bra to emphasize "Your good-bye left me with eyes that cry" got lost around my navel and I had to dig for it.
And it was okay. I recalled my improv teacher's mantra, "Mistakes are gifts." We tried to use each mishap to deepen the scene and move it forward. I kept singing, we kept dancing, and the audience kept laughing and clapping. For the finale, my partner, whose day job is as a firefighter, spontaneously lifted me up and swung me around, neatly demolishing what was left of the set, and the audience went wild. Afterward, my teacher said, "They loved you--even more because of all the mishaps. They were with you 100%." and I felt that.
What I brought away from the experience was not the idea that anything goes, but that if I take risks I am going to make mistakes, and that that is part of the fun and excitement of live performance. What happened wasn't the result of carelessness or poor planning, but of hard work, dedication, and nerve-induced klutziness, which I hope one day to control. But it is comforting to know that an audience is willing to engage with me on this journey, and to cheer me on.
I will be away next week. I hope you all have a good summer's end.
Susan O'Doherty, Ph.D., is a clinical psychologist with a New York City-based practice. A fiction writer herself, she specializes in issues affecting writers and other creative artists. She is the author of Getting Unstuck without Coming Unglued: A Woman's Guide to Unblocking Creativity (Seal, 2007). Her Career Coach column appears every Monday on Inside Higher Ed's Mama, Ph.D. blog, and she is a regular guest panelist on Litopia After Dark. She can be reached at Dr.Sue at mindspring dot com.
I have been struggling with a dental situation which, over the past few weeks, became a crisis and then an emergency, necessitating quantities of antibiotics before a root canal was possible.
I mention this not because it is that unusual or of intrinsic interest, but because I've noted an effect on my creative output (besides just making me stupid and slowing me down, I mean).
On Monday, we had a dress rehearsal for our cabaret performance, which will take place this Sunday evening. As noted here, I have been nervous about my part, but also excited. This week, though, when our teacher gave me some fairly normal direction, I became despondent, apologizing to her for doing such a bad job. She was dumbfounded. She had just been giving me a suggestion.
Then, on Tuesday night, I had my improv class. I didn't even notice, until a classmate pointed out out, that I had created a completely negativistic scene, in which my partner couldn't do anything that pleased my character, and in fact could hardly make contact with me.
I came home and tried to work on a story. The plot seemed too Pollyanna-ish. People wouldn't be that sympathetic in real life. I tried to revise, decided it was garbage and I was untalented and should just give up, and went to sleep.
Today, post-root canal, the world looks different. I'm nervous about my performance, but not pessimistic. I can't believe the drunken, accusatory, isolative spouse I created for my partner to deal with on Tuesday night, and I'm so grateful I didn't do permanent damage to my sweet little story.
It has started me thinking about the impact of transient (or more enduring) mood states on writing. I wonder whether others have had these experiences, and how you have coped with them?
I will be talking more about this, and other topics, on today's Litopia After Dark. Please tune in if you can. And while you're there, check out MJ's recent guest panelist gig, if you haven't already. She's brilliant, as always.
Susan O'Doherty, Ph.D., is a clinical psychologist with a New York City-based practice. A fiction writer herself, she specializes in issues affecting writers and other creative artists. She is the author of Getting Unstuck without Coming Unglued: A Woman's Guide to Unblocking Creativity (Seal, 2007). Her Career Coach column appears every Monday on Inside Higher Ed's Mama, Ph.D. blog, and she is a regular guest panelist on Litopia After Dark. She can be reached at Dr.Sue at mindspring dot com.
A Formula for Those of Us Who Dislike Formulas*
In my improv class, we are currently studying narrative structure. Last week, our teacher, Rob, handed each of us a piece of paper with the beginning of a sentence written on it. Our task was to go around the circle in order, each of us reading our opening aloud and completing it in a way that moved the story forward. The openings were as follows:
- Once upon a time there was a world where...
- And every day...
- And every day...
- Then one day...
- And because of that...
- And because of THAT
- But then...
- And because of that...
- And so...
- And finally...
After a couple of false starts, we managed to create some credible, if abbreviated, stories. It was fun and interesting to participate in the building of these bare-bones narratives. "You'd be surprised," Rob told us, "how many great stories fit into this template."
You bet I’d be surprised, I thought. This formula was useful for creating the simplified story lines needed for improv; but great, original narratives can’t be squeezed into a 10-point outline, right?
For homework that week, we each had to watch a movie and describe it using this template. My assigned movie was “The Shawshank Redemption.” Here’s what I came up with (spoiler alert, obviously):
Once upon a time there was a world where brutality and corruption ruled. And every day, the more powerful brutalized the helpless. And every day, Red tried to get by without hoping for anything better. Then one day, Andy, who was innocent, intelligent, and the vice president of a bank, was incarcerated. And because of that he helped the guards and the warden with their finances, including corrupt schemes. And because of THAT he was able to use his influence to improve life for all of the prisoners, including Red. But then, evidence of Andy’s innocence surfaced. And because of that, the warden, frightened that he would expose the corruption if he was released, turned against him. And so, Andy escaped, used the embezzled money to flee to Mexico, and did expose the corruption, leading Red to realize that hope can be a positive thing. And finally, Red was released and joined him in Mexico.
Okay, but come on, this was a simplified movie version of a Stephen King novel. It couldn’t possibly apply to actual literature.
To prove how impossible it was, I tried it on a few favorites. And look:
Once upon a time there was a world where orphans were considered less than human. And every day, Mrs. Reed spoiled her own children while treating Jane with contempt. And every day, John Reed played horrendous “tricks” on Jane. Then one day, Jane couldn’t take it anymore, and fought back. And because of that, she was sent to Lowood School, which wasn’t much more brutal than the Reeds’ home. And because of THAT she went to work for Edward, who fell in love with her. But then the brother of Edward’s insane wife exposed him as an attempted bigamist. And because of that, Jane ran away and tried to start a new life, but she realized they were destined for each other. And so the first wife perished in a fire she had started herself, freeing Jane and Edward to marry. And finally they had a baby and lived happily ever after.
Or what about this:
Once upon a time there was a world where respectable couples didn’t have sex until they were married, and couldn’t marry without money to live on. And every day, Kate and Merton longed for each other. And every day Kate tried to come up with a scheme that would earn them enough money to marry. Then one day Milly, a rich girl with a serious illness and a crush on Merton, came into their circle. And because of that, Kate figured that Milly was their ticket to marriage. And because of THAT, she convinced Merton to court Milly in the hope that Milly would marry him and then die. But then, Milly found out about
Confidence Confidential
My musical theater class, like my original singing class, has an end-of-term cabaret night, but the bar is considerably higher in this class. Martha, my previous teacher, took care to make the occasion as low-key and stress-free as possible. She referred to the evening as the “final class,” and insisted that it really was just a class; the difference was that we invited our friends and family and brought food.
This is different. It’s held on a different night from our regular class, in one of the school’s theaters, and wine and hors d’oeuvres are served. The entire school community is invited. I’m terrified.
This week was our last chance to bring in new songs; for the next two weeks we will each work to perfect 2 songs that we’ve sung in class before and that Lorraine, our teacher, feels are performance-ready. I had already gotten the nod for “All of Me,” but both she and I were a little uneasy about Jimmy Roberts and June Siegel’s “What Did I Do Right?” because I have a hard time getting through it without tearing up. I decided to work on “Summertime,” because I love the song, and also because it’s emotionally challenging—the melancholy melody runs counter to the optimistic lyrics, and it’s necessary to weave hope and despair together without going over the top in either direction.
I worked on it using Uta Hagen’s six questions, talking it through like a monologue, and then singing it, to a baby doll. I sang it (sans baby doll) at a party last week, and it was well received. So I brought it in this week.
When I was done, Lorraine said, “That’s fine. It will work. I have only one note—you move your head sometimes for emphasis, and it distracts from the emotion of the song.”
I sat down, crushed. She had been spending a great deal of time with other singers, blocking their every step, having them repeat a line over and over until she was satisfied. I felt I must have screwed up in a way I didn’t understand, to be passed over like that.
Afterward, I went out with Florrie and Beth, two close friends from Martha’s class who moved up with me. “So,” I demanded, “what isn’t she saying?”
They had no idea what I meant. “How bad was it,” I said, “that she couldn’t think of anything to say? Really, I can take it.”
“What the hell are you talking about?” Beth responded. “You sounded good. The song was terrific. She liked it; you’re in the lineup. What more do you want?”
It hadn’t occurred to me that Lorraine had said it was fine because it was, well, fine. Not even for a second.
This led to a long discussion about how the default assumption, for all three of us, is that our work is inadequate. I can see how talented Beth and Florrie are, and their hesitations surprise me—as does the fact that they feel the same way about me. We talked about childhood experiences that sapped our early confidence; about punitive parents and teachers; about our own inner judges. We were all in tears at certain points.
We agreed to remind each other regularly of our gifts, our promise, and our courage. I feel blessed to have such friends. I know their support has already made a great difference in the way I view my work, and I plan to make sure they know how great I think they are, on a daily basis.
Susan O'Doherty, Ph.D., is a clinical psychologist with a New York City-based practice. A fiction writer herself, she specializes in issues affecting writers and other creative artists. She is the author of Getting Unstuck without Coming Unglued: A Woman's Guide to Unblocking Creativity (
All of Me
Last week my musical theater teacher directed me to create the role of "Susan the temptress, Susan the seductress" as I worked on my torch song. As noted, I have pledged to do everything she says, no matter how anxious or ridiculous it makes me feel. So, in addition to compulsively rehearsing the song, writing out the answers to the six questions, etc., I looked at obstacles to feeling like a temptress, and tried to find ways to address them.
Basically, I am a skinny, gray-haired 59-year-old klutz who tends to dress like a fifties-era kindergarten teacher.
I asked myself, WWRHD?
Rita Hayworth, I decided, would tackle one issue at a time. So: Skinny we could reframe as "stylishly slender," right? My age we could do nothing about, but look at how sexy Elizabeth Taylor, Simone Signoret, Barbara Cook, and so on, were well into their sixties, often beyond. Okay. And by some alchemical miracle I don't begin to understand, "klutzy" tends to translate into "hilarious" onstage.
So we were left with the hair and the clothes, and the attitude.
Rita guided me toward a tag sale in my neighborhood, where a much younger woman was unloading a black dress that, as my mother would say, left nothing to the imagination. For $5.00, it was mine.
Now the hair. I decided, partly as a tribute to Rita, partly to help me get into character, and, okay, partly as a joke, because if people were laughing with me, they wouldn't be laughing at me so much, to temporarily color my hair red.
This is where Rita deserted me. In the drugstore, I found a "glaze" that promised to wash out in a single shampoo. On Sunday afternoon, I did a trial glaze, in preparation for the real thing on Monday.
It turned my hair bright pink, the color of cotton candy. And it wouldn't wash out.
I started frantically IMing friends, most of whom were, unfortunately, too busy having hysterics over my predicament to be of much help. One of them did suggest a henna rinse. "It will cover the pink, and they fade quickly," she said. So I ran out with my troll hair to the health food store.
It did cover the pink--with bright orange. Another friend suggested a "corrective" rinse that then turned it a luscious shade of swamp green.
My son was posting instant updates on Facebook: "My mom's hair is green now! How badass is that?" I drank a lot of wine with dinner and went to bed early.
I awoke hoping it had all been a nightmare, or at least that I had overreacted, but when I looked in the mirror, it was definitely still green. I washed it about six times, then applied a hot oil treatment, recommended by another friend, that was "guaranteed" to remove the color. After that it was both green and greasy.
I had to decide whether to keep washing and miss class, or to just go green. I thought about what Lorraine, my teacher, had said the previous week: "You need to come up here convinced of your character, your situation, and your objective--and fuck everything else." I had committed to listen to her. I got on the train, green hair, skimpy dress, and all.
Onstage, I reminded myself of Lorraine's instructions. I reviewed my character's history: the hot, steamy affair with my classmate Peter's character; the burning need to get him back. "Just take your time," Lorraine coached me. John, the accompanist, would vamp until I was ready. "Get in touch with the emotion, and sing from that place." I embraced, him, caressed him, and teased him--and when I opened my mouth, a big, sexy voice came out.
At the end, the class cheered and hooted. Lorraine rushed up, grabbed my
hands, and cried, "You did it!"
Later, I played the Billie Holiday version for my son. "You know," he said, "you actually sound better than her."
I stared at him.
"No, really. You have a better voice, and you're always on pitch. She went off. But she
Doing the Thing I Think I Cannot Do
I am more than a little intimidated by my new musical theater class. The teacher is brilliant, witty, and a highly accomplished performer herself; and most of the other students seem Broadway-ready to me. After the first few classes, in which I performed well enough, but far below the level of the class, I thought seriously about transferring back to my old class, where I was comfortable.
But the teacher is warm and encouraging, and the other students are friendly and supportive—and I remembered how frightened I was in my first class, and how I thought about dropping out, and how glad I am that I didn’t. It’s because of that class that I was able to even walk into this one, and actually get up and sing on request in front of a new teacher and a bunch of accomplished strangers, even though my voice and my knees shook a bit.
Besides, as Lorraine, my new teacher, said to me, what I’m seeing in these students is a finished, polished product. They didn’t come to her like this; they came, like me, with vocal training, good potential, and hope. She sees that I have the first two, and assured me that if I keep up the third, we will do wonderful, exciting work together.
So I committed to do everything she tells me to do. Which is turning out to be harder than I thought.
Last week, she told me I was done with the song I’d been working on. She said, “Next week, I want you to bring in a song you really love, that you can engage with on a deep emotional level.”
At home, I went through all of my music. I talked to friends. I couldn’t identify a song in my range that I feel that way about. I like all of the songs I sang in my previous class, but for the most part, I chose them for technical reasons—to stretch my range, to learn to belt, to conquer my fear of Sondheim, etc.
So I emailed Lorraine, outlining what I saw as the problem: the music I really love is totally inappropriate for me: Billie Holiday, Sarah Vaughn, etc. The songs for someone like me leave me lukewarm. Did she have any suggestions?
She wrote back immediately: Why not Billie Holiday? Why not Sarah Vaughn? If you truly love a song, it is the right song for you.
Okay. That is a challenge, but that’s what I enrolled for. I emailed back that I would bring in “All of Me” this Monday.
She wrote back that she wants me to prepare it as a mini-scene, to dress in costume and set the stage, and cast myself as “Susan the temptress, Susan the seductress.”
My first reaction was, I couldn’t possibly. But I made the commitment, and I will. I’ve already written a short scene to play out with a fellow student, in which he, a married man, has returned to his wife, and I’ve asked him to meet me to “talk things over,” but really to get him back. I’m practicing what I would do to make that happen.
And I’ve decided not to feel ridiculous, a scrawny 59-year-old gray-haired woman staging a seduction scene and singing a torch song. This is theater, where anything can happen. And it will do me good as both a singer and a writer to stretch myself this way; to get into the head of such a different character. Besides, I promised.
I’ll let you know how it turns out.
Susan O'Doherty, Ph.D., is a clinical psychologist with a New York City-based practice. A fiction writer herself, she specializes in issues affecting writers and other creative artists. She is the author of Getting Unstuck without Coming Unglued: A Woman's Guide to Unblocking Creativity (Seal, 2007). Her Career Coach column appears every Monda
Uta Hagen’s Six Steps
In A Challenge for the Actor , Hagen asks actors to answer six basic questions for themselves, in relation to each new part or scene. In my Musical Theater class we are learning to adapt them for each song/routine. Recently, I have started looking at the characters in my stories with these questions in mind. It has been illuminating in a few instances—highlighting areas of fuzzy thinking or unconscious “cheating” to make a point. I thought you might find them helpful as well:
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1. WHO AM I?
What is my present state of being? How do I perceive myself? What am I wearing?
2. WHAT ARE THE CIRCUMSTANCES?
What time is it? (The year, the season, the day? At what time does my selected life begin?) Where am I? (In what city, neighborhood, building, and room do I find myself? Or in what landscape?) What surrounds me? (The immediate landscape? The weather? The condition of the place and the nature of the objects in it?) What are the immediate circumstances? (What has just happened, is happening? What do I expect or plan to happen next and later on?)
3. WHAT ARE MY RELATIONSHIPS?
How do I stand in relationship to the circumstances, the place, the objects, and the other people related to my circumstances?
4. WHAT DO I WANT?
What is my main objective? My immediate need or objective?
5. WHAT IS MY OBSTACLE?
What is in the way of what I want? How do I overcome it?
6. WHAT DO I DO TO GET WHAT I WANT?
How can I achieve my objective? What's my behavior? What are my actions?
(P. 134.)
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