{"id":6830,"date":"2015-02-15T18:44:21","date_gmt":"2015-02-15T18:44:21","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/orcutt.net\/weblog\/?p=6830"},"modified":"2015-02-15T18:44:21","modified_gmt":"2015-02-15T18:44:21","slug":"paying-attention-as-a-fiction-writer","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/orcutt.net\/weblog\/paying-attention-as-a-fiction-writer\/","title":{"rendered":"Paying Attention as a Fiction Writer"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"Goldfinger<\/a>I have been writ\u00ading fic\u00adtion since I was 13 years old, when I first read Ian Fleming\u2019s Goldfin\u00adger <\/i>and was swept away not only by the sto\u00adry, but also by Fleming\u2019s elo\u00adquence.<\/span><\/p>\n

This marks the thir\u00adty-sec\u00adond year that I\u2019ve been writ\u00ading (not nec\u00ades\u00adsar\u00adi\u00adly pub\u00adlish\u00ading) fic\u00adtion, and one of the things about writ\u00ading that has nev\u00ader ceased to sur\u00adprise me is this: No mat\u00adter how good a writer you become, no mat\u00adter how much you learn about the craft, you can always learn more and write bet\u00adter. Indeed, as Ernest Hem\u00ading\u00adway once remarked, \u201cWe are all appren\u00adtices in a craft where no one ever becomes a mas\u00adter.\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n

It was less than a decade ago that I became aware of an aspect of fic\u00adtion writ\u00ading that I had always known instinc\u00adtive\u00adly, but that, if approached with aware\u00adness, had the poten\u00adtial to make work on new fic\u00adtion projects if not eas\u00adi\u00ader then at least smoother<\/i>. In a famous inter\u00adview, one of my lit\u00ader\u00adary idols, Vladimir Nabokov, likened the writ\u00ading of a nov\u00adel to a bird build\u00ading a nest: \u201cAll I know is that at a very ear\u00adly stage of the novel\u2019s devel\u00adop\u00adment I get this urge to gar\u00adner bits of straw and fluff\u2026. Nobody will ever dis\u00adcov\u00ader how clear\u00adly a bird visu\u00adal\u00adizes, or if it visu\u00adal\u00adizes at all, the future nest and the eggs in it.\u201d<\/i><\/span><\/p>\n

For years, many times when I wrote I felt as though I was grop\u00ading in the dark, feel\u00ading around for what I should be writ\u00ading. I adhered to Hemingway\u2019s max\u00adim of, \u201cWrite what you know.\u201d Since then, how\u00adev\u00ader, I\u2019ve learned that Hemingway\u2019s max\u00adim is incom\u00adplete.<\/span><\/p>\n

\"birds_nest\"<\/a>Nabokov\u2019s idea taught me that writ\u00aders need to pay atten\u00adtion to the things that are attract\u00ading and keep\u00ading their atten\u00adtion. The books they inex\u00adplic\u00ada\u00adbly grav\u00adi\u00adtate to online or at the library. The movies and doc\u00adu\u00admen\u00adtaries that inter\u00adest them on Net\u00adflix. The intrigu\u00ading snatch\u00ades of con\u00adver\u00adsa\u00adtion over\u00adheard on the street, in a restau\u00adrant, at the the\u00adater. The sur\u00adpris\u00ading fac\u00adtoids they pick up while web surf\u00ading that cause them to gasp or pon\u00adder.<\/span><\/p>\n

Now that I\u2019m aware of this, I can point to the things I was pay\u00ading atten\u00adtion to just pri\u00ador to start\u00ading, and while writ\u00ading, each of my books.<\/span><\/p>\n

\"Coyotes_040-Pack_of_three-Moving\"Lead\u00ading up to the writ\u00ading of my first PI mys\u00adtery nov\u00adel, A Real Piece of Work<\/i>, I was obsessed with an inter\u00adna\u00adtion\u00adal art forgery case involv\u00ading a New York City gallery own\u00ader, and with the fact that, as late as 2003, tens of thou\u00adsands of pieces of art loot\u00aded dur\u00ading WWII were still miss\u00ading. While writ\u00ading my mod\u00adern pas\u00adtoral nov\u00adel, One Hun\u00addred Miles from Man\u00adhat\u00adtan<\/i>, a slew of dis\u00adparate ideas, events and inter\u00adests caught my atten\u00adtion: the yip\u00adping of coy\u00adotes on my neighbor\u2019s estate dur\u00ading sum\u00admer nights; Tolstoy\u2019s Anna Karen\u00adi\u00adna<\/i>, Cheever\u2019s \u201cThe Swim\u00admer,\u201d and Chekhov\u2019s short sto\u00adries; watch\u00ading eques\u00adtri\u00adan cross-coun\u00adtry com\u00adpe\u00adti\u00adtions; and a stone house in the iso\u00adlat\u00aded coun\u00adtry\u00adside, and won\u00adder\u00ading what some\u00adone alone in the house would do if she ate some\u00adthing and began chok\u00ading.<\/span><\/p>\n

The key is to pay atten\u00adtion to these things that get and keep your atten\u00adtion, and then to indulge them, play with them, let your imag\u00adi\u00adna\u00adtion roam. Here\u2019s the thing: Before you write word one of a sto\u00adry, a play, a nov\u00adel, your sub\u00adcon\u00adscious already knows what it wants to write. This is why it\u2019s so impor\u00adtant to notice what you\u2019re pay\u00ading atten\u00adtion to, and to not try to define too ear\u00adly what it is you\u2019re writ\u00ading.<\/span><\/p>\n

\"fracking-infographic\"<\/a>Sev\u00aden years before I began writ\u00ading my newest PI mys\u00adtery nov\u00adel, A Truth Stranger Than Fic\u00adtion<\/i>, I saw a doc\u00adu\u00admen\u00adtary on lunar min\u00ading and helium\u20113. I became curi\u00adous about the con\u00adtro\u00adver\u00adsial process of hydraulic frac\u00adtur\u00ading (frack\u00ading) used in the fos\u00adsil fuels indus\u00adtry, most notably in the recent\u00adly dis\u00adcov\u00adered Bakken For\u00adma\u00adtion in North Dako\u00adta. I also became inter\u00adest\u00aded in U.S.\u2013China espi\u00adonage, the phe\u00adnom\u00ade\u00adnon of fan\u00adgirls of fic\u00adtion writ\u00aders, and the secret lives that many peo\u00adple lead.<\/span><\/p>\n

When I began to write the nov\u00adel, I had no idea how, or if, these seem\u00ading\u00adly unre\u00adlat\u00aded things could coa\u00adlesce into a nov\u00adel. But I trust\u00aded my incli\u00adna\u00adtions, what I was pay\u00ading atten\u00adtion to, and let them lead me where they want\u00aded to go.<\/span><\/p>\n

I\u2019m con\u00advinced that one of the main ways in which we fic\u00adtion writ\u00aders sab\u00ado\u00adtage our\u00adselves is by stub\u00adborn\u00adly stick\u00ading to our orig\u00adi\u00adnal vision for a sto\u00adry and ignor\u00ading where our sub\u00adcon\u00adscious wants to lead us. Don\u2019t do this to your\u00adself and your writ\u00ading. Start pay\u00ading atten\u00adtion to the bits of straw and fluff you\u2019re gath\u00ader\u00ading, and trust in your sub\u00adcon\u00adscious to weave them into a beau\u00adti\u00adful nest.<\/span><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

I have been writ\u00ading fic\u00adtion since I was 13 years old, when I first read Ian Fleming\u2019s Goldfin\u00adger and was swept away not only by the\u2026<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":6833,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"wp_typography_post_enhancements_disabled":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[16,30,3,18,19,36,77,78,76,11,12,14],"tags":[97,131,122,154,155,156],"class_list":["post-6830","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-a-real-piece-of-work","category-chris-orcutt-books","category-craft","category-dramaticwriting","category-fiction","category-mystery-writing","category-novels","category-one-hundred-miles-from-manhattan","category-process","category-dakota-stevens-mysteries-series","category-the-rich-are-different","category-writingexperiences","tag-craft-2","tag-fiction-2","tag-hemingway","tag-nabokov","tag-orcutt","tag-process"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/orcutt.net\/weblog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/6830","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/orcutt.net\/weblog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/orcutt.net\/weblog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/orcutt.net\/weblog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/3"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/orcutt.net\/weblog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=6830"}],"version-history":[{"count":3,"href":"https:\/\/orcutt.net\/weblog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/6830\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":6837,"href":"https:\/\/orcutt.net\/weblog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/6830\/revisions\/6837"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/orcutt.net\/weblog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/6833"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/orcutt.net\/weblog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=6830"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/orcutt.net\/weblog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=6830"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/orcutt.net\/weblog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=6830"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}