A Question of Genre ( #IWSG )

       My tendency is to write what I like reading, otherwise self-editing becomes a bit of a chore for me.  But pay me enough and I'll write anything....



The Insecure Writer's Support Group

Join us on the first Wednesday of each month in Alex J. Cavanaugh's Insecure Writer's Support Group--a forum of writers who gather to talk about writing and the writer's life. For a complete list of participants visit Alex's Blog. 


The co-hosts for the June 5th posting of the IWSG are Diane Burton, Kim Lajevardi, Sylvia Ney, Sarah Foster, Jennifer Hawes, and Madeline Mora-Summonte.

June 5 question: Of all the genres you read and write, which is your favorite to write in and why?

         If blogging were considered a genre then I'd say blogging is my favorite, however blogging can consist of writing in various genres.  Over the years I've blogged in multiple writing genres, mostly non-fiction narratives related to memoir or opinions.  What I like most about writing blog posts is keeping what I have to say to a minimum.  I guess I'm the typical lazy writer.

        Before blogging though, a frequent genre that I liked to write in is what I guess would be called surrealism.  This partly stems from years of writing detailed accounts of my dreams.  I would write stories in my creative writing classes that would come back from the professors with comments like:  What does this mean?

         They had a point I guess.  Most of my submissions to publications back in the seventies was in the surrealistic mode and all of them came back to me rejected.  Reading some of these now I can see why the stories weren't published.  Not that they were poorly written, but what they had to say was so ambiguous and weird that most people would probably not appreciate them.

         If I were to start writing fiction again I might have an inclination toward a certain amount of surrealism, but I would also try to give more coherence to whatever I was writing.  That is, if I were to start writing more fiction, which I might some day or I might not.  For now my writing will be short blog posts and songwriting.   

         I don't want to put off or lose readers with bizarro writing that doesn't connect with them.  I will say though that I do like writing that way because it can stretch my creative flow.  Usually when writing in this style I will go with a stream of consciousness approach.  I will twist and turn words and phrases, come up with outlandish metaphors, or interject asides that amuse me.

          There's the problem--what I find fun to write is probably highly unreadable to most readers.  Like my professors they are likely left scratching their heads and leaving my story behind.  It was fun for me.  Kind of like some of the nutty films made back in the seventies.  I used to think certain films were so cool.  But now I watch some of them shrugging my shoulders wondering why I thought they were so great.  

           Maybe it's a matter of times and tastes.  Maybe now if I started writing in some mind chattery free-form style about peculiar topics I'd still have a grand time doing it.  I just don't think most people would want to read it.

           Guess I'll just write a blog post.  At least it will probably be short.

            Have you ever dabbled in writing experimental or non-traditional forms of writing?  Do you enjoy genre mashing and crossing?   If you're getting paid to do it, do you enjoy writing about things in which you have no interest?  

If you haven't done so yet, please stop by to vote on my current Battle of the Bands.  

Which Is the Most Important Knowledge to Have?

Which is the most important knowledge to have:  Who you are?  Where you are?  or Why do you exist?

           This was a random question from my previous post and thank you to those of you who gave your answers.  I had mentioned in that post that I often tend to think in terms of geography--the "Where am I" kind of knowledge.  Ironically I just now watched a film that ponders these same sorts of questions with the overall conclusion that knowing where you are matters most.

           The 1962 Japanese film Woman in the Dunes is surrealistic existentialism quite similar to the films of Ingmar Bergman or Federico Fellini.  My guess is that David Lynch probably was influenced by this film.  The film is primarily a drama a la the works of Samuel Beckett.  Most of the film focuses on two characters in a confined bleak setting.  The run time is nearly 2 1/2 hours though the slow pacing makes it seem longer.  Before going into the film I decided to give it 30 minutes or so before giving it up.  The film was so riveting and thought-provoking that I stayed with it until the end and now here I am writing this review or whatever this is I'm writing.

          The story begins with a school teacher from Tokyo who goes to a seaside area of vast sand dunes in order to study insects.   After he overstays and misses his bus back to the city, the villagers from the strange little town nearby invite him to spend the night with one of them.  They take him to a vast sand pit where there is a house accessible by rope ladder.  Taking on the adventure, the teacher finds that the house where he will be staying is occupied by a homely widow who treats the man kindly and lavishes him with attention.  The following morning the teacher finds that the rope ladder is gone and he is now trapped with the widow.

         There is a strange eroticism to the story though it also presents a metaphor for the alienation of the human condition while clinging to an interdependence on others.  An eerie pall is cast over this story as we see these humans struggling against the eternally flowing sands that permeate everything in their lives.  The imagery of the drifting shifting sands depict emotion as well as the obvious comparison to the sands of an hourglass.  

          When the teacher falls into the pit he already knows who he is but this identity no longer seems to matter the longer he is in the pit.   The woman explains what their purpose is to be in this pit, but it makes no sense.  Ultimately, when he attempts an escape, he realizes that his failure to get away was because he did not know where he was.

               It's not too often that a movie grabs me to the extent that I'll write about it.  Maybe I should do it more often.   But then I'm not totally sure anymore why I am here.  On this blog I mean.  I didn't intend to write this post because I had another in mind.  But that's okay.   Sometimes I feel like I've fallen into a sandpit where no matter how much I try to claw my way out, more sand keeps on pouring down and I can never quite get a handhold that will give me a grip to pull myself upward just a bit more.  The sand keeps coming and there's not much we can do about it.

              Do you tend to just accept things without complaint?   Are you good at making a bad situation into something better?   Have you seen Woman in the Dunes?

The Creature in the Recycling Bin

Contest announcement on Monday 10/3!
   Check it out!


Is anyone planning to go to the BlogWorld Expo in Los Angeles on November 3-5?

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The Creature in the Recycling Bin

          I threw some aluminum cans into an empty black plastic recycling bin in my back yard.  Before I dropped the bag of cans into the bin I noticed that the bottom of the can was filled with a few inches of water.  After dropping the bag into the bin, I turned away to walk a few feet when I heard what sounded like a muffled explosion and a whoosh.   I turned and saw that the recycle bin was gone.

           I knew immediately what had happened since this had happened on a few previous occasions.  I went into the house to the upstairs master bedroom to look out upon the front yard.  I saw the recycle can lid among the shrubs and knew that the can was somewhere in the yard.   I went downstairs to look for the can.

          As I walked about the yard I wondered what it was that had been causing this to happen.  With a shudder I concluded that the most logical explanation was that there was some sort of creature in the bin, that angered or startled by my actions of discarding the refuse, reacted in such a way as to cause the can to fly over the house and into the front yard.  I briefly thought about how someone could have been seriously injured if they had been hit by the bin.

         I reflected upon all of the previous times that this had happened.   I noticed that my mother's 1992 Lincoln Town Car was parked at an angle near where the trashcans are normally placed on trash pick up day.  I knew that the car had died in that spot and apparently George had not yet been able to move it or get it running.  I then realized that I was in the front yard of my mother's house in Tennessee, whereas I had previously been inside the house where I live and in the back yard of my house in California.  It all seemed perfectly normal to me.

        It was all a dream--part of a few seconds or milliseconds of sleep in the moments before waking.  And yet I had a memory of a complete history of previous events as though I had actually lived through them all.   Had these memories come from a protracted dream that had been occurring all through the night?   Were they layers of dream memories from dreams that were occurring in rapid succession and perhaps even simultaneously?  Was the dream experience related to what we call deja vu?

        Do you ever have dreams that include dream memory and an awareness of a complex history?--  Things that you instinctively know to be fact and true within the context of the dream but are illogical and even nonsensical in real life?   Where do you think dream memory comes from?


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