Lies Writers Tell... To Other Writers (Part Five -- It Shouldn't Be Work (Or "Waiting for Your Muse"))

Those of you who have been following my own blog (StrangePegs) for any length of time will know that my daughter plays the accordion.

In many ways, she has a love/hate relationship with it. She loves playing. She loves performing even though she doesn't like to admit that. She doesn't want to give it up. However, she hates practicing. She hates getting new, more difficult songs. She hates the work of it.

Now, let's go back to the beginning:
Learning to play the accordion was her idea. It would never have occurred to us to suggest to any of our kids that they ought to learn to play the accordion. I mean, who does that, right? But my daughter decided that she wanted to learn to play it. Of course, that meant that she had to learn to play it and that's work. Playing the accordion is not just picking one up and jamming it in and out.

At first, for the first year or so, she hated going to lessons. She also hated practicing, but the real issue was that she hated going to lessons. She wanted to play the accordion, but she wanted to be able to do it without putting any work into it. [How many of you know that feel?] Eventually, she got over hating her lessons and dislikes when she has to miss them. She still hates practicing. Well, not always, I suppose, but there are days when it's a huge ordeal to get her to sit down and put in the half hour. It's work.

But she wants to be able to play the accordion, and that means doing the work.
And let me just throw in here that her teacher (who has been teaching the accordion for decades) says she's one of the best students she's ever had. She has a lot of natural talent and great expression (let me put that another way, in a way that may make more sense to you writers (and readers) out there: Her playing has great voice). Talent isn't enough, though, especially with music. It takes work.

Writing takes work, too, although I think a lot of people that want to be writers want to deny that part of it. They believe they can get by with picking up their pens and paper and just jamming them in and out.

Some of you are probably offended right about now, but I see it all the time on blogs of people that talk about how they want to be a writer. They say things like
1. I only write when I feel inspired.
2. I have such writer's block and haven't felt like writing, lately.
3. Writing should be your passion. If it feels like work, you shouldn't be doing it. Only write from passion.

There's this sort pervasive idealization about writing that it comes from the universe and just flows through human conduits and it should just pour out of you and be, well, easy. I think this idea is a stumbling block for a lot of "young" writers because, when they start to struggle (and everyone will struggle), they start to feel like maybe they just weren't "called" to be a writer. Because, according to the prevailing wisdom, it shouldn't be a struggle, right?

Look, there will be times when you're inspired and words pour out of your fingertips and those times are GREAT. AWESOME, even. But that's not the norm. Mostly, writing is work. At least it is if you want to be any good at it. Which is not to say that you can't become a popular writer while not being any good at it, because there are plenty of poor writers out there that, for whatever reason, became popular. However, if you want to be good, it takes work.

So, see, I'm not dissing inspiration and I'm not saying that it shouldn't be fun. I am saying that if you sit around waiting for inspiration and quit doing it when it's not fun, it's very unlikely that you will ever finish anything. The first step to being... I don't even know what to call it, so I'll just say "published author" because that's what most people mean, I think, when they say they have aspirations of being "a writer." So the first step to being a published author is finishing what you start writing, and that will, at some point, mean work. It will mean sitting down to your manuscript when you "don't feel like it" or when you'd rather be out "doing something fun." See, just by using that qualification (and I see people say that on their blogs a lot), you're implying that writing is not fun and, usually, what people mean by that is that it's, well, feeling like work. Which it is.

Being someone that has a few things published, I get asked a lot of questions about writing and what it's like, and I always start with "It's a lot of work" and "It's both harder and easier than you would think." So...
I'm not saying that you need to "take lessons," although you might, and I'm not saying that you need to practice half an hour a day, although you might; I am saying that, if you want to be "a writer" expect it to be a lot of work and persistence and perseverance (and, yeah, those are kind of synonyms, but I mean them in contextually different ways). What I'm saying is that if you're out there roaming blogs (or whatever) and seeing a bunch of stuff about how glorious writing is and how people feel like the universe is speaking through them and how writing is so easy and never a struggle, you can just be about 95% sure that those people are lying (Just 95% because, heck, maybe there are some people who never struggle to put words down because the universe really is speaking to them). Writing is work, so be prepared.

[Having said all of that, none of this applies to Briane Pagel for whom writing is always fun and who would never do it if it all resembled "work."]

Anticipating the "Why?"

"Why?"

It's one of the most dreaded questions in the world. Well, at least if you're a parent, at any rate. I mean, what business is it of your kid's to know "why?" she needs to do something, right? Or "why?" she needs to do it the way you're telling her to. Or "why?" she needs to go to bed RIGHT NOW! And, sometimes, all you're left with is "because I said so!"

Of course, teachers have the same problem. And it can be worse for them, because, often, they don't actually know the answer to "why?" All they know is that the book says so or the school board says so or whatever, but those amount to the same "I said so" to a kid, and, for a kid asking "why?", "I said so" is rarely enough.

I learned at a fairly young age to not ask "why?" No one ever had answers for me, so I learned to figure them out on my own. I didn't stop asking the question, though, which is what I think a lot of people do. When faced with inadequate answers, they just don't question, which is how I think most people like it.

And, actually, probably how most authors like it.

As an author, "why?" is the worst question ever!
"Why didn't the they just tell them what was going on?"
"Why is there only one city on the whole planet?" (Come on, Star Trek, really?)
"Why didn't he just kill him when he had the chance?" (Because he was killing everyone else, right?)

The problem with the answer is that it's usually an "out of story" answer. Like, "he didn't just kill him because, then, the story would have been over." Or "there was only one city on the whole planet because it would have been too complicated if there had been a whole planet of people to deal with." But out-of-story answers don't work for those questions within the story, which is why it's the author's job to anticipate the "why?"s and provide answers for them within the story. It's why you have so many super heroes with personal codes against killing. That provides the answer to that particular "why?"

The problem is that the "why?"s frequently have to do with a character's (or characters') motivation(s), and that, when dealing with science fiction, can often be at odds with the IDEA. So let's take Looper (you can read my review of it here) as an example:
In Looper, the premise is that the mob of the future has a time machine and they use it to dispose of pre-dead bodies.
Really? That's it. That's the best use they could come up with for a time machine? Which is the problem, because the IDEA is that a guy in the "present" is sent his future self to kill. Wouldn't that make a great story? And, as long as you don't ask "why?", it does make a great story. However, as soon as you say, "Why doesn't the mob in the future just use the time machine to take over the world?" or "Why doesn't the mob of the future use the time machine to invest in all of the right companies?" or "Why doesn't the mob of the future use the time machine to win every lottery ever?" As soon as you ask one of those questions, the story falls apart. And, sorry, the answer "they didn't think of it" just doesn't cut it.

And I'm not even going to start on the scene where the future guy loses his body parts in the present as his present self is tortured and then killed, because there's no way you can answer the "why was that guy there to begin with if he was already dead?" question. Sure, it's cool and freaky to watch as he loses his fingers and stuff, but "cool and freaky" doesn't answer "why?"

Then there's the great "why?" of the Star Trek reboot: "Why did Nero just hang around in space for a quarter of a century doing nothing?" And the obvious answer is that Abrams wanted Nero to kill Kirk's dad but had nothing else for him to do until Spock showed up, so he just had him sit and brood with his thumb up his ass for 25 or so years.

And I could go on but, really, why?

As authors, it's our job to anticipate the places where our readers (or viewers) will say "why?" and weave those answers into the story. Sure, a lot of people, maybe even most people, are not going to ever say "why?", but that "why?" will kill a good or fun idea for those of us that do ask. And, no, telling us not to ask or to "just go with it" doesn't work either. That's a cop out. And irresponsible. And, well, sloppy story telling. Be asking yourself that "why?" question all the way through while you're writing and, anytime you don't have an answer to the question, figure it out. Or take that part out. Something.

And just by the way, long ago I did tell my kids that they could always ask me "why?" I'm telling them something. Man, that's a hard thing to live up to. My daughter, most of all, really holds me to it and, when I try to wiggle out of it, she will say to me, "You said I could always ask you why." The best I can do is delay, too, by saying something like, "Right now, you just need to do what I'm telling you to do. Later, ask me again, and I'll explain it to you." And she does, too.