Category Archives: Philosophy

The Heart of Lightness

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(dedicated to the Music Room Poets and all my other creative friends)

Image courtesy of Futurity.com

In the last week I’ve been think about the core of things a great deal.

My friend Kathryn Evans.

I thoroughly enjoy my belly-dancing classes and here we work on our cores so that we can do two contrasting things at once. It’s a little like patting your head and rubbing your belly at the same time. We might do snake arms as a slow and sinuous pace whilst shimmying our hips fast enough to make the coins on our hip-scarves jingle. Lots of concentration involved for me.

I also go to yoga – and core strength is central here too (pun intended).  By engaging the core, you can develop flexibility, say, in bridge pose to loosen the spine safely – but you can also use it to increase your focus in a balance like tree pose. The key is not to force but to allow a posture to come.

This last weekend I was at West Dean for a magical poetry workshop led by Philip Wells. One of the themes I picked up on was the core of engagement with each other and our creativity. On one hand, I need to open up, allow myself to be vulnerable – but on the other hand, I have to respect my own truth as I do that of others. Somehow I want to show sensitivity to others without that horrible inhibiting self-censorship: that’s me back to doing two opposing things at once.

In my understanding , the physical core and the creative are intimately connected. It doesn’t matter if it’s dance, painting or writing novels. By sloughing off my outward shy and sometimes cynical outer shell, I can let something new, trembling but truthful emerge. It takes courage – ‘coreness’ – to do that ( I think of Chaucer and hir corages ).

How do you centre yourself?

Dragonfly image by Eduardo Terrazas

Dragonfly

I crack my sternum:

The imago pulses,

A skin sinks in the pond.

                                       K. M. Lockwood September 2012

 

 

Of Muppets and Men

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I tweet a little ( @lockwoodwriter) and read a lot on Twitter. Recently I followed  with horrified interest Jeremy Duns‘ continuing expose of Stephen Leather’s tactics. I knew more than I wanted about the man’s political views and obnoxious ways of self-promotion. Other than tainting the whole concept of writer, I didn’t see how it could affect me.

That was until I read about R. J. Ellory. I was so disappointed that I cried.

I had read Roger’s work as part of my MA and met him in that context as well. I liked him – and truth told, I still do. He was unstinting of his time & encouragement- and we’ve had a few laughs and discussions on Facebook too. I find it so hard to put him in the subset of ‘sock-puppeteer’ and make that intersect with the bloke I know. You can probably imagine my relief when he apologised – and this was accepted by Mark Billingham, one of the writers whose work he had trashed.

It was perhaps naive of me not to realise that this stuff goes on in the Wild, Wild West which is modern publishing. And it would be foolish to assert that it certainly doesn’t go on in the pure innocent realms of writing for children. I honestly just don’t know.

‘It’s not easy being green…’

All I can be sure of is what I do. All my reviews are written as myself. I welcome feedback and debate.

I read books for Serendipity Reviews. I have had my moments of anxiety with this. I’ve had friends’ books to review that didn’t quite do it for me, and genres which are definitely not my thing. I try to take a compassionate and professional standpoint by asking myself the following:

  1. How would I feel to receive a review like this?
  2. What were their intentions – does it suit the readership it’s meant for?

On the whole, I err on the side of kindness. There are times I wish I had the all-guns-blazing self-assurance and spleen of an Anthony McGowan – and I do wonder if I have elected for cowardice. Perhaps my judgement is weak. But my motto in this context is ‘first do no harm’.

Likewise in my role as Graduate Editorial Assistant at West Dean, my primary goal is to develop what the MA students are trying to do. Doing them down to make me look or feel superior won’t achieve much. I need to suggest more they could do, not shut down their options.

The green-ey’d monster which doth mock…

Now before I sound far too goody-goody, I had better point out this took a while to learn. And I should also make it clear I acknowledge several motives for sockpuppetry in myself:

  • envy of sales – 50 Shades of **** for example
  • jealousy of talent – Patrick Ness, Philip Pullman, Kath Langrish, Sally Prue et alia
  • sheer desperation

That last is a killer.

Oh to be superstar like Miss Piggy

Let the one without sin cast the first stone…

Travelling hopefully

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I had been considering writing a post about holidays, partly inspired by the thread started by Paul Morton of Hot Frog Graphics on the SCBWI-BI email group. He told us what things he thinks about taking on holiday – and what he actually takes, then asked what everyone else does. Interesting stuff.

I was also prompted by Nick Cross’s  post here. Deep joy.

Then my Wonderful Other Half or Him-at-the-Back-of-the-Garage-Who-can’t-Resist-a-Bargain asked would I like to go diving in Egypt for a week?  On Saturday? Would I !

Now there isn’t a lot to say about packing for a live-aboard. Once you’ve got the necessities:

  • mask
  • snorkel
  • regulators
  • BCD
  • weight-belt
  • wetsuit
  • wetsuit boots
  • fins
  • dive computer
  • swimming costume
  • beer money
…there’s only room for a couple of sarongs and T-shirts left in your dive bag. OK I shall have a notebook & pen, and my Kindle in my backpack, but that’s it.
So it was rather serendipitous to read the results of a survey in the Sept 2012 Diver magazine that asked ‘What’s the best thing about diving?’  Here’s my summary of the results:
  1. Entering another world
  2. Being with your own thoughts
  3. Escaping from the mundane
  4. Freedom
  5. Adventure
  6. The fellowship of others

Any of this sound familiar to my creative friends? Add in the fact that the vast majority of divers I’ve met over almost a decade are rather individual people, and there will be wrecks and maybe sharks, then you can see why I’ve jumped at the chance.

Image by Alfonzo Gonzalez

What sort of travel refreshes your creativity?

The Skull beneath the Skin

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When I go out on a jolly, I usually end up with a theme. Today’s theme was skulls.

Memento Mori – remember you will die

I went to Portsmouth to visit the Cathedral. I love a good Cathedral, and one features in my work-in-progress (currently titled Georgiana and the Municipal Moon). I was on a gargoyle and grotesque hunt, so I walked round the outside first. I came across that wonderful 17th century doorway (detail shown above) – and a tranquil Garden of Remembrance.

I wanted to take pictures of the gravestones but a sign exhorting me to treat it with respect made me hesitate. Was it disrespectful? Grief is grief – two months or two centuries ago, surely? I reflected on this as I walked on the crazy paving made of bomb-damaged tombstones. I recalled the Ancient Egyptian maxim: to speak the name of the dead is to make them live again. I believe telling stories through words or other forms of art does exactly that.

Once inside I found more skulls. I overheard the lovely ladies in the coffee shop remarking on my photography later. It made me pause a little. Am I morbid, overdoing the Goth thing, death obsessed – in this and my writing?

I would argue that children and young people love a bit of gruesome. The bowels of Buckingham ( and his sister) interred there would fascinate most, I think. I recall very clearly finding an ossuary in Ireland by the Kenmare river and being both fascinated and  horrified by the skulls at one and the same time.

This skull sits beneath the urn containing the viscera of the Duke of Buckingham – and that of his sister.

But I think there is more than just pleasurable terror involved in a fascination with bones and the like. There are deeper issues of mortality. These can and should be dealt with in books for younger readers. The bracing comedy of ‘Henry Tumour’, and the powerful honesty of ‘A Monster Calls’ bring hope and strength  to the world, not despair.

I have recently read ‘Constable & Toop’, which also deals with death. There is humour and quiet dignity, and ghosts. (They will be a subject for another post or two). But my point is that children will come across death at some point. Their pets will die, or their grandparents. Perhaps they will see an accident and ask questions. People are fascinated by death – and touching on it with honesty brings depth to a writer’s work.

In the midst of life we are in death.
Book of Common Prayer, Burial Service

Whatever your beliefs, it is inescapable. But in the same way as shadows are the darkest when the sun shines brightest, the thought of Death should bring intensity to Life – in this world and any fictional one.

The child who survived

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Photo by Savannah Roberts

My dear,

The creative adult is the child who survived.
The creative adult is the child who survived after the world tried killing them, making them “grown up”. The creative adult is the child who survived the blandness of schooling, the unhelpful words of bad teachers, and the nay-saying ways of the world.
The creative adult is in essence simply that, a child.
Falsely yours,
Ursula LeGuin

My experience doesn’t quite agree with Ursula LeGuin: my schooling was not bland. In my various Primary Schools, there was a good deal of violence: of playground bullying and the sneering rejection of the newcomer with the odd accent and ‘posh’ vocabulary. The continuous mockery of anyone who showed talent (other than on the sports field) by my peers didn’t exactly encourage the bright children to offer answers or stick up for each other.

Secondary School brought fewer bruises but more harm to my self-confidence. There was isolation, exclusion and worst of all false friendship. More than once I was stupid enough to believe in my apparent acceptance into a popular group. I would relax, be myself, be the star turn – only to have the set-up gleefully explained to me.

‘We just wind you up and off you go.’

Then came the loneliness again.

Trapped by Timo Waltari

And what of the nay-saying ways of the world? In my case, never mind the world, what about some parts of my family? Water on stone: a steady erosion of my self-belief.

Dolly Daydream.

Lizzy Dripping.

What do you want that for?

Why can’t you do it properly?

That’s not for girls.

Why can’t you be like Mrs Perfect’s daughter?

You’ve spelled that wrong.

Silly waste of time.

That’s not how it’s done.

Join e to d like this.

What’s that supposed to be?

I’m too busy.

Photograph by Kalev Kevad

This piece isn’t intended as a plea for sympathy (though I do appreciate a little support at times, if I’m honest). My point is that many creative writers and other artists I have met have been thorough the mill like me. One way or another they have survived.

As a survivor though, I have scars and flashbacks. There are damaged, healed-over places which are painful to probe. There are memories I don’t want replayed.

But that’s where the best raw material lies.

‘Rapunsell’ by Duygu

Do you know ways to deal with this? To let the child survivor out to play safely?

 

 

 

Confused of Sussex

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I cannot define ‘literary fiction’ but I know it when I read it.

I love ghost stories ( as anyone who reads my Wedding Ghost blog will attest) . I read a lot of them and at the moment I am enjoying the Virago Book of Ghost Stories. It’s fascinating to read women writers that I might not have expected having a go at the genre: how about Stella Gibbons with a strange Cornish story ‘The Roaring Tower’ and Mrs Gaskell’s first person ‘The Old Nurse’s Tale’ ? Both disturbing and memorable in their own way, they have a strong forward momentum that draws the reader on.

A different sort is Edith Wharton’s ‘The Eyes’ . This story only makes sense at the end, and demonstrates a more subtle psychological approach than many others. Yet still there is an inherent drive for the reader to know more. There is a plot.

‘The Happy Autumn Fields’ by Elizabeth Bowen is another story in the collection. She is a much admired writer and this piece was full of beautiful language. It suggested this and implied  that and hinted at another thing. The point of view shifted between heaven knows how many people. It was all awfully clever, terribly literary – and it annoyed me no end. It annoyed me almost as much as Henry James’ ‘What Maisie Knew’ ( one of the very few books I have actually flung across the room).

For me this sort of writing has a shifting sense of implication – and if you don’t get it, if you don’t appreciate the the oh-so-subtle references and sub-texts; well, you’re ignorant. I will cheerfully admit that sort of tone has a similar effect on me as The Oxford Voice on D. H. Lawrence.

Yet part of me, the part that went to Wakefield Endowed High School for Girls and took ‘S’ Level English Literature and actually read ‘To The Lighthouse’, feels I ought to value it. I ought to find ‘literary fiction’ somehow better and I ought to aspire to writing such quality work.

Why?

That’s where I am truly puzzled. But my one consolation is that there is a far bigger audience for more populist fiction ( which one is encouraged to sneer at)  than there is for the clever stuff.

Spectrum by Chronon6.97 on Flickr

Where do you stand on this continuum? 

Acts and ideas

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‘It is by acts, and not by ideas, that people live.’Anatole France

I asked my youngest son what I should write on my blog today; he said ‘character research – where do they come from, how do you make them seem  real?’

This surprised me – but led to an interesting train of thought.

It has to be said he has always had high E.Q. and was an excellent actor at school, so I should not have been startled at his focus in writing. He made me think about the various ways I could approach creating my characters, and the implications of these.

Observation

– the obvious source of behaviour. but it comes with several reservations.

 

Spy video camera by Emilian Robert Vicol

 

There is the morality of my ‘using’  family and friends for a start: I could hurt people’s feelings; inadvertently divulge secrets or embarrass them. As for strangers and acquaintances, well, it’s not good to stare and note-making is a bit obvious ( my memory isn’t that good).

Syncretion

I could blend people together; a kind of character pic ‘n’ mix. There are gestures, tics and idioms of different people I could combine. If I make them diverse enough, I might avoid offending any one person.

 

Gaudi’s trencardis lizard at Parc Guell – by Richard Uzermans

 

That seems cowardly as a motivation, and the result likely to seem artificial without a great deal of care. Actual behaviour – now that’s another thing. Translating action I have seen from one person to illuminate a single aspect of my character – that appears more honest.

Invention

‘Just make it up’ – that feels like a valid way to get on with it and avoid procrastination too. Let the back of my mind do the work; watch what my characters do and say in my imagination and write it down.

 

Cartoon writer created by Joan M.Mas

 

I have to acknowledge the inevitable influence of what I’ve read ( not to mention seen in films and heard on the radio). I recognise there’s a danger of resorting to cliché and stereotype too. But it is all the more reason to read widely – and I find non-fiction and biographies have much for me to absorb.

Creation

I need to acknowledge that whatever approach I take, it is filtered through my perceptions.No matter how hard I might try to be a disinterested observer, it’s still me on the page in one way or another. This is where multiple personality is not a disorder.

I get to try out different selves, live more lives than one and let rip with my inner actress. The characters that live are those with most authenticity: they are a part of me. So I have to be honest and accept that the bitter, vengeful Celia in The Wedding Ghost is as much ‘me’ as the courageous Lorna in The Seal People of Scoresby Nab.

That’s quite a thought.

Mirror in New Orleans by Scott E.

I’ll finish with a quotation from Beryl Bainbridge:

‘When I write a novel I’m writing about my own life; I’m writing a biography almost always. ‘

Excuses, excuses…

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This week I have been mostly playing.

View from our bedroom window

On Wednesday TWH ( The Wonderful Husband) suggested a break away beginning on Saturday. It would have been rude to refuse, wouldn’t it?

Shadow of a palm tree - see, there's sunshine.

I have managed a book review and a short story for a competition on the literary front. I’ve done surprising amounts of exercise, eaten really quite healthily and actually experienced sunshine – in Corsica. There’s been aerobics in the sea, a ride on a catamaran and best of all (so far) a walk to a waterfall and a swim in its plunge pool. It was bliss.

Cool and lovely after a walk.

So I’m sorry there are no writing revelations this week to share with my faithful readers…

A little past Pimms' o'clock...

…unless you can think of something yourselves?

 

Get over yourself

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Yesterday I made a complete fool of myself. In public. In front of people whose good opinion I deeply desire and those I am supposed to be helping.#epicfail

I had to take part in a mock interview with a much-respected colleague as a demo for newer MA students. I was simply supposed to speak about my work-in-progress.

I really struggle to tell a story in mid-field, as it were. I can give you the grand sweeping overview – girl with magical powers has to choose between saving her mother or saving her city – or the close-up detail – Georgiana plays knucklebones with her friends the Blewcoat Boys. Anything inbetween I still find appallingly difficult. Before I’ve even opened my lips, what I have to say sounds so lame, I just dry up. And when I do venture something, it’s just plain wrong: not what I was asked to do.

So humiliating.

Those around me could not have been more supportive. No-one tried to make me feel pathetic – I was surrounded by encouragement.

But I still couldn’t do it.

Having been told it was both easy and an essential skill didn’t really help. Nor having it demonstrated with admirable skill by others. Currently, I feel an utter failure with no future in writing.

I know. Ridiculous. But it is how I feel amongst the tears.

But I’m still carrying on. I watch my friends stream ahead of me with book deals and agents and distinctions and just plain skill. I just crawl a bit further.

Give me a wave when you pass.

 

Tell it true

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David Almond’s handshake was warm and strong. He was welcoming and unpretentious though the delegates were quiet and perhaps, like me, thought – that’s David Almond, that is – and I’m here in the same room. Me.

Despite all that hero-worship, he encouraged us to offer own work written oh-so-quickly there and then. He gave off appreciation and candour – even to Mrs Gobby here.  In the spirit of that openness, this post will be about those elements of the master-class that really touched me. They are interspersed with  some of my images of Newcastle to give you pondering time.  The quotations are David’s, the rest is my understanding of what he said.

Protect yourself as a writer.

Wherever you are along the writer’s way, you need things to sustain you. You will feel ‘stupid and insignificant and rejected’. There will be moments of bitterness and frustration. David said ‘create your own mythology’ of how you came to be a writer as something to draw on.

Honour your own work.

Every day find that piece which is you – identify what’s authentic. Where have you connected with the story and transcended the obvious ? What resonates? Get that stuff out and value it – it might be scary but it is truly yours.

Indulge in the process.

Being playful allows you to be all sorts of writers. You never know what sort of writer you are until you become that kind – it’s a sort of acting. When you think about it , as he said, ‘My Name is Mina‘ by David Almond is such a pretence. Playing lets you be ‘alert and relaxed’ without the brain too engaged – the ideal state for writing. He likes to scribble, to jot, to rough things out by hand – it leads to messy notebooks and a sense of freedom. Speed can help too.

Find unexpected opportunities in yourself.

‘Stop fighting yourself – let who you are out’. Such an inspiring thought – that it’s our imperfection that generates creativity. ‘Sometimes the things you draw on you might not want to’ he acknowledged – but he rejected the concept of challenging difficult emotions and experiences.

Writing well comes from every art of you.

It’s not about confronting –

it’s about allowing.

There was more about about turning ‘the mess in your head into straight lines on the paper’ but I want to finish with what seems to me the fundamental notion of writers I admire:

To write a book is an act of great hope.

My hope is that one day a book will come to me as Skellig did – ‘full of energy and grace’. Meanwhile, I will take advice that I have had from many different sources ( David Almond, Greg Mosse, Celia Rees, Linda Newbery…) – write some more.