The Red Brick Store

I presented the following at the Association for Mormon Letters Annual Conference February 27, 2010.

When it comes to writing, I am an Oliver Cowdery. I’ve got a few smarts and an education. I can write my way out of a paper bag. But when compared with Joseph Smith, I’m nothing special. You remember that after acting as Joseph’s scribe for a while, Oliver wanted his own chance at translating the Book of Mormon. If he was at all like me, he likely envied Joseph’s ability to enter into the ecstatic muse of translation, and wanted his own taste. So he managed to get permission from the Lord to do some translation, but when he tried his hand at it, he failed. Why? According to Doctrine and Covenants 9, Oliver hadn’t prepared well enough. “You have supposed that I would give it unto you, when you took no thought save it was to ask me,” reads the revelation.

This verse encapsulates my many early years of attempted writing. I would get an idea that I thought had some potential and sit down to write. I had great faith that the muse would descend upon me and push words out of my fingertips. But it never worked. Never. I would frequently find my idea dried up and dead by the end of a single page. A narrative brick wall blocking my way.

It soon became painfully clear that I was in no way a natural born storyteller. But I’m a persistent little cuss, and I decided to learn how stories work the same way a mechanic learns how an engine works, or a doctor the human body. So what follows are the observations of one who had to learn story structure from the ground up. I’m like an autistic person who learns to read the emotions of others only through mapping the human face. I find the wheels and gears, the organs and veins of stories and watch them work. More »

February 28th, 2010 | Tags: antagonist, Avatar, dramatic need, fiction, goal, protagonist, Sopranos, structure | Category: Sunstone | Comments (4)

How might the history of childcare have been different had the cell phone been invented earlier?

It’s a question I’ve asked myself many times in the last two months. I’ve had a lot of time to ask myself questions because I am the primary caretaker of the world’s most beautiful baby girl. How does the person inside the Bear in the Big Blue House costume see? Is it time for mom to come home, yet? Have I really needed to pee for four hours now? When was my last shower?

Taking care of my baby has been the most rewarding thing I’ve ever done, but there is no doubt that my work has suffered. I used to sit down at my desk at 8 a.m. when my family went out the door and work straight until they returned at 4. It was a lovely, meditative life. I had time to do extra projects on the side. I was PRODUCTIVE.

Then came the world’s most beautiful baby. Now I spend my waking hours building block towers for smashing, watching puppets sing about oral hygiene, picking raisins and cheerios off the floor, and playing with my baby. Now I start work at about 6:30 p.m. And go till 2 a.m. My brain doesn’t function as well then, and I can’t crank up my tunes. I have zero time for side projects.

At first I tried to work while baby was around, but the laptop buttons are an irresistible siren to her. It was too much of an effort to get the laptop open and start something that needs as much focused attention as editing knowing that I would be interupted. I found myself getting irritable, being caught between baby and work.

I’m the oldest of nine children: I know that babies grow up fast. So I decided to dump work and just play with baby. It was a good idea. I’ve been able to savor her babyhood, which I will never get another chance to do.

But I had no time for doing my own writing and it really started wearing on me. Would I not have a creative outlet for another four years when baby went off to school? Would I still be sane by then?

I hear generations of women heaving an exasperated sigh :women who spent 30 years in my same position without any respite on the horizon. What would they do to me if they found out that my life has been given back to me through the miracle of a cell phone?

I was going to get the free cell phone because I pride myself in staying aloof from our consumerist, toy-obsessed culture. But then I saw that some phones come with a qwerty keyboard, and the gears started to turn. I got the tough phone, the phone with a keyboard my fat thumbs could navigate, the one with the GPS I still haven’t learned how to use.

I have since become an avid Facebook user, a dedicated New York Times reader, and — yes indeed — a writer of short stories.

At first, I thought the cell phone would only be good for outlining and planning, and it worked very well in that capacity. But the boredom of watching that Bear in the Big Blue House episode one more time drove me to try my thumb at composing. And by gum, it works!

I’ve started to realize that the thumb board, which allows me to type at about a tenth of the speed I can type on a full-size keyboard, is actually well suited to my composing speed. When it comes to fiction, words don’t surface very for me quickly, and I hate it when my inner editor makes me focus more on what I should have written rather than what I am actually writing. The thumb board seems to give me permission to just keep plodding along. And the words scroll up out of the screen quickly. Out of sight, out of mind.

A week or so ago, I finished my first cell phone tome. I figure I wrote about 500 words a day, which is 500 more words a day than I used to write.  Admittedly, I still have to revise on my computer, but I’m not complaining. I’ve got my writing life back.

This post brought to you by my Nokia E71.

February 23rd, 2010 | Tags: cell phone, children, fiction | Category: Sunstone | Comments (5)

Sunday evening I attended a screening of the first part of Helen Whitney’s new documentary, Forgiveness: A Time to Love and a Time to Hate.

I admit that it took a bit of time for me to get into it. The first segment was a telling of the oft-repeated story of the shootings in an Amish school and the community’s seemingly instantaneous forgiveness of the perpetrator. Then the movie headed into the story of a woman who managed to live a happy life despite an abusive childhood and being infected with HIV. I can’t remember much about that segment.

But the next two segments really intrigued me. The first dealt with Terri Jentz, the author of Strange Piece of Paradise, who survived a brutal, anonymous attack. After the attack, she lived through 15 years of torpor and depression. During that time, when someone would ask her about her feelings about her attacker, she would say, “Oh, I’m above that. I’ve forgiven him.” It wasn’t until she started to dig into her case, trying to track her attacker down, that she came alive again. She says near the end of the segment that her 15 years of “forgiveness” were unhealthy for her.

The last segment was about Katherine Ann Power who, during an armed bank robbery to get money to support her Vietnam War protest, was complicit in the killing of a police officer. She managed to evade the law for 23 years, and probably would have done so indefinitely, except that, being overwhelmed by her conscience, she finally turned herself in.

As Whitney told us before the screening, the meaning of forgiveness is under intense debate right now. But I saw an interesting definition arising from these stories. More »

February 1st, 2010 | Tags: Ferrell, forgiveness, Jentz, Power, protagonist, Whitney | Category: Sunstone | Comments (9)

Sunstone invites writers to enter the 2010 Eugene England Memorial Personal Essay Contest. In the spirit of Gene’s writings, entries should relate to Latter-day Saint experience, theology, or worldview. Essays, without author identification, will be judged by noted Mormon authors and professors of writing. The winner(s) will be announced in Sunstone. Only the winners will be notified of the results. After the judging is complete, all non-winning entrants will be free to submit their essays elsewhere.

Prizes: A total of $450 will be shared among the winning entries.

Rules:

1. Up to three entries may be submitted by a single author. Five copies of each entry must be delivered (or postmarked) to Sunstone by 15 February 2010. Entries will not be returned. A $5 fee must accompany each entry.

2. Each essay must be typed, double-spaced, on one side of white paper and be stapled in the upper left corner. All essays must be 3500 words or fewer. The author’s name should not appear on any page of the essay.

3. Each entry must be accompanied by a cover letter that states the essay’s title and the author’s name, mailing address, email address, and telephone number. Each cover letter must be signed and attest that the entry is the author’s work, that it has not been previously published, that it is not currently being considered for publication elsewhere, will not be submitted to other forums until after the contest, and that, if the entry wins, Sunstone magazine has one-time, first-publication rights.

Sunstone

England Essay Contest

343 North Third West

Salt Lake City, Utah 84103–1215

January 25th, 2010 | Category: Sunstone | Comments (2)

Or, what are genres good for?

For a long time now, Dialogue has subdivided the prose in each issue into  Articles and Essays, Personal Voices,  and Fiction.  These divisions are  strained by current submissions. More »

January 21st, 2010 | Category: Uncategorized | Comments (18)

The Association for Mormon Letters has two big announcements: a call for papers for next year’s Annual Meeting, and the birth of a new AML blog.

Call For Papers
The Association for Mormon Letters announces that our Annual Meeting will be held on Saturday, February 27th on the campus of Utah Valley University. The theme of the Meeting is “One Eternal Round: Mormon Literature Past, Present, and Future.” We welcome submissions on any topic relating to Mormon literature, film, or drama. Please submit a short (2 to 3 paragraph) abstract of your paper proposal to Boyd Petersen, boyd.petersen@uvu.edu or to Eric Samuelsen, eric_samuelsen@byu.edu, on or before February 1, 2010.

AML Blog
The AML’s new blog, Dawning of a Brighter Day, has just launched. Permabloggers include Gideon Burton, Margaret Blair Young, Rachel Nunes, Chris Bigelow and more. It should be a great new place for conversations about Mormon literature.

December 9th, 2009 | Tags: AML, call for papers, new blog | Category: Uncategorized | Leave a comment

For the first time in its ten-year history, Irreantum magazine has nominated work to be considered for a Pushcart Prize. This year’s nominees are:

Fiction:
Cara Diaconoff, “I’ll Be a Stranger to You,” Vol. 10 No. 2
Orson Scott Card, “The Elephants of Poznan,” Vol. 11 Nos. 1 & 2
Darin Cozzens, “The Treading of Lesser Cattle,” Vol. 11 Nos. 1 & 2

Creative Nonfiction:
Jaren Watson, “Of the Drowned,” Vol. 11 Nos. 1 & 2

Poetry:
Donnell Hunter, “Children of Owl,” Vol. 10 No. 2
Doug Talley, “Finding Place,” Vol. 11 Nos. 1 & 2

Congratulations to the nominees!

Also, our Spring/ Fall double issue (Vol. 11 Nos. 1 & 2) is still at the printer but will be mailed out within the next week or two. If you haven’t subscribed yet, remember that if you subscribe or renew your subscription during the month of November, you will also receive a complimentary copy of the excellent anthology The Best of Mormonism. You still have a few more days, so don’t miss this opportunity.

Thanks, and Happy Holidays!

Angela Hallstrom
editor, Irreantum

November 28th, 2009 | Category: Irreantum | Comments (1)

I thought I’d pop over here and include a link to my most recent Segullah post–a list of new titles to give as Christmas gifts as compiled by the Segullah staff. Lots of great ideas. Head over and check it out!

November 19th, 2009 | Tags: book recommendations, Christmas gifts, literature, Segullah | Category: Segullah | Comments (1)

Early in my MFA, a teacher warned us, “Dreams are exposition in a ball gown.” And if you think about it, it’s pretty true most of the time. How often have we watched a character wake screaming from a nightmare that had revealed bits of his backstory? How many musical dreams have we suffered through in order to understand the roots of a farm animal’s anxieties?

I must admit that expository dreams are a step up from listening to a character talk about her backstory. At least we get to watch chase scenes and flying elephants instead of listening to a voiceover while the main character drifts glumly along barren streets.

But still, it seems like dreams have more dramatic potential than that. The first thing that comes to mind when I try to think of a dream with actual dramatic weight is The Wizard of Oz where almost the entire story takes place in a dream. Or Alice in Wonderland where the heroine creeps into a dream world through a rabbit hole. But in both these cases, the dream world functions as the real world, while the “real” world acts like an expository dream. In it, we meet characters that will show up later in altered form, or we learn of problems that the protagonist will find the fortitude to overcome while in the fantasy world.

So again, the dream–the reality alternate to the main reality of the story–functions as exposition.

As I consider what I’ve written, I suddenly realize that I’m defining dreams as alternate, ephemeral realities that have no impact on the “real” world. I also realize that this definition of a dream is historically pretty recent. Looking back on older literature, such as the Bible, I remember that people considered dreams as valid playesr in the real world. Pharoah took them seriously enough to hire dream interpreters. Joseph followed a dream and whisked his young family to Egypt. The premise of Revelation is that a dream can show a hidden reality that affects seen reality.

So there seem to be two basic approaches to dreams. The first treats them as valid realities. The second considers them mental phenomena that have only symbolic meaning. It seems to me that the second approach is considered the more realistic one these days. Thus, when a story treats a dream as a reality equal in validity to the “real” world, we call it fantasy or magical realism, while a story that treats a dream as unequal to the “real” world is called realism.

When a dream is a valid reality in a story, it obviously has all sorts of dramatic potential. We have thousands of years of literature to prove that. But the current conception of a dream, and the demands of realist literature, seems to strip a lot of that potential away, leaving us with the imaginative but dramatically limp dream scenes we read and see today. I even admit, with great sadness, that one of my favorite movie scenes–the dream sequence from Ingmar Bergman’s Wild Strawberries–though a masterpiece, is exposition.

In order to regain their fertility in realist writing, I think dreams need to become more like characters than settings. They need to be an antagonist or ally to the protagonist, working for or against the character’s goals and dramatic needs.

One metaphor for what I’m getting at is the movie Stranger than Fiction where a man discovers that he is a character in a novel-in-progress and tries to derail the plot. At one point, he decides that his best course of action is inaction and he holes himself up in his apartment, watching television, refusing to move even to change the channel. But suddenly a crane tears down the outside wall of his apartment and it becomes apparent that the plot, refusing to be stopped, has come to get him.

Judith Guest’s novel, Ordinary People, has a good example of a dramatically weighty dream. Conrad, a teen who survived a boating accident his brother didn’t, is the victim of nightmares that push him toward suicide. He spends the book wrestling with these dreams with the help of a psychiatrist, trying to beat them before they beat him.

I’m on the lookout for dramatically weighty dreams in realist  literature or film. Any suggestions?

November 17th, 2009 | Category: Sunstone | Comments (8)