Working at Shenandoah

For my last blog I thought I’d talk a little about some of the things we interns have been working on for the past twelve weeks – mainly reading manuscripts sent in for the magazine. Each one of us has had our own roles to play, but everyone has spent at least some time reading over some hopeful stories. At first it was very hard to be critical (with of course some exceptions), for how could I criticize another person’s work when I myself have never been published? Professor Smith helped us out with that brain buster by asking us two simple questions. First: Are you ever critical of professional sports teams? And then, after everyone nodded their heads: Have you ever played on a professional sports team? Finally it became apparent to us that what we really needed was to take ourselves out of the game (hah). We could not just say we didn’t like the piece and then offer no explanation. We had to justify both our likes and dislikes. To make it easier to vocalize these justifications we came up with a list of criteria that each piece accepted into Shenandoah should contain. The list included things such as inventive style, unique (but familiar) characters, wit, ingenuity, character development and many others. This type of list was extremely useful when trying to pin down the thing that made the story feel just slightly off to you or, better yet, made it unbelievably successful.

The more manuscripts we’ve read the easier it has gotten to categorize them, but it is interesting to see how the interns disagree from time to time. When we comment on manuscripts we leave a few detailed lines on a sticky note for Professor Smith to look over. Most of the time those post-its read pretty much the same, but there have been several occasions when that was not the case. I suppose that’s to be expected though because tastes in writing do differ and we are bound to disagree every once in a while. I am just glad that ultimately, here at Shenandoah, we are not a democracy or else we’d be here all summer long.


Movies and Literature

We have recently been talking quite a bit about Young Adult Fiction, both in our blogs and in class. In her earlier blog “When Young Adult is too Adult” Lauren Starnes questioned whether the Hunger Games was an appropriate book for the age group which it targets. I have both read the Hunger Games and seen the movie. The movie appears to be geared towards a similar age group, with a rating of PG13 and yet all ages have been clamoring to see it. It was interesting to see how the film makers managed to make the movie both appropriate for the younger ages and appealing to the older ones. The violence was definitely more subdued on screen than it was on the page. Peeta’s leg that has to be amputated in the book is miraculously healed. The muscular Katniss does not look at all to be on the brink of starvation when Peeta throws her the burned bread. We do not hear the agonized screams of Cato as he is being savagely ripped apart for a seemingly never ending amount of time. The children watching the movie are somewhat protected from all of the unpleasantness that the Games suggest.

Usually, these omissions would make an older audience shy away. They want the gritty stuff. But in this case it doesn’t. Critics adore the movie; people are raving about it. One of the main things the movie had made is to make the characters more mature. Katniss Everdeen is no longer the young stripling she is in the book. In the movie she is played by Jennifer Lawrence, whose 22 years makes her much more of an adult that 16 year old Katniss. All of the actors are older than their counterparts in the novels. This makes their emotions and their actions suddenly more believable (especially Katniss’s). In trying to make the movie more attractive to all ages, the film company has actually done the books a favor. They have brought the series and entirely different audience who will now want to read the rest of the series, for with an established cast of mature characters in mind, adults will not think of it as reading a children’s book- the Hunger Games becomes more appropriate for their age group as well.

What other movies have you seen that you thought made the book better?


Social Media as a Language

Social media has the world in its grasp. Facebook, Twitter and even Google’s new Google+ have all stamped their names upon the word’s computer screens, smart phones, ipads, and tablets. For the majority of the population these websites provide an easy way to reach out and keep in touch with their friends and family. Because we allocate so much time to these websites, we have begun casually implementing the abridged lingo in general conversation. It all began with texting- abbreviations such as lol (laugh out loud) or brb (be right back) began infiltrating everyday conversation.  Facebook seems to be reinforcing these abbreviations and grammatical errors.

Everyday use has made use of this slang appropriate in casual conversation, but I still do not feel they are appropriate in more formal situations. For example, I cannot think of any student who would think it was appropriate to write 2night or btw (by the way) in a formal paper or even in a classroom. So what makes it appropriate for social media? It would make sense if texting was still a bit of a process like it was ten years ago, but today it is simple. It would not even take me an extra second to write got to go instead of gtg. Neither is it because Facebook is a time to relax with friends; Facebook is littered with businesses – bosses are friends. People we would never address in slang terms suddenly fall to the level of buddies. So why do we let our language devolve the second we see that iconic blue and white logo? Personally I hope that particular vernacular remains inappropriate for formal and scholarly settings. I have no desire to even look at a book that reads like a list of status updates.


Pride and Pigs

When I was in high school, my junior English teacher assigned us a project: to write the story of the three little pigs in the style of our favorite author. We were not allowed to write the author’s name anywhere on the page and we were graded by the ease with which he guessed that author. A couple of my favorites flitted through my mind- Daphne Du Maurier, Dornford Yates, Martin Cruz-Smith– all with their own entirely different writing styles. I could just imagine all the various sorts of transformations the little pigs would go through in the eyes of these distinctive writers. But I wasn’t going to risk my teaching not having read one of these author’s of mine, so I settled on one that I figured any high school English teacher had to recognize: Jane Austen. I had a great time writing it. It was so easy letting yourself slip into the mind of an author so stylistically well known and use her voice to speak through. There was no need for me to be original, no need for me to be afraid of overstepping my boundaries. The story wasn’t mine and that made it easy.

When I write my own stories it can be agonizing. I never know how much influence I should allow other writers to have over me. I want to be the one to tell my own story, no exceptions. But sometimes, when I read over a piece I wrote a while ago, I could tell you exactly which author I was reading around that time. Usually, when I ask my friends to see if they can tell they can’t see what I’m talking about, but it bothers me. I know its natural for other writers’ influences to creep into your work, but how much is too much? When does the work become more theirs than yours? Sometimes I struggle with this more than others, but I am beginning to believe that everyone’s particular voice is made original by the authors they have read. Influences are allowed as long as they are slightly outweighed by your own inventiveness. They should be the assistants, not the craftsmen.

What do you think? How much influence should you allow into your work?


The Gloaming

I was recently reading Nightwoods by Charles Frazier when I stumbled upon a word that really stuck in my mind: gloaming. Frasier uses it as a possible option for a description of the state of nightfall, which the antagonist, Bud, is experiencing. Frazier writes, “It gets to a point of darkness where you don’t know what to call it. Dusk or Night…People used to have a word, gloaming, but that’s only a snatch of memory from a song.” I do not think I had ever heard the word before, at least not in a way that would have made it memorable, but this time it just resonated with me. I find myself watching for its appearance in the evenings. It seems I have a new compulsory desire to feel its manifestation.
It’s strange how that happens, when an author uses a word well and you just can’t stop thinking about it.  I later looked it up in the Oxford English Dictionary, but the somewhat stagnant definition of “Evening twilight” did not captivate me near so much as Frasier’s “snatch” of time between dusk and nightfall.  As I think it over, I probably have heard the word once or twice, but it took Frasier’s unique description to make it stick. There is something mysterious about the way he describes it. For instance his use of “people.” People is a very ambiguous term. What people? And from where? Perhaps it was the combination of the strange new word and the ambiguous one, but my mind immediately jumped to the faery people of old. It must have been the mystifying quality of the idea of a “gloaming” that entranced me, but I would have never have noticed that quality had it not been for Frasier’s vivid description.
Have there ever been any particular words that an author has brought to life for you in the past?


To Record or Not to Record: A Question

In the past, one of the only ways you could only hear the words spilling out of your favorite author’s mouth was if you braved the masses and attended a reading. And even though you got to see said author in person, you only got the story once. No repeats. Now, because of the ever-growing world of the online literary journal, you can listen to a new or well-known author time and again, with the added bonus of being in your own home. Sure there are some earlier examples of author’s recordings such as ones of Yeats and those collected by Caedman, but none of these are so easily accessed as those on the internet.  Shenandoah is featuring a couple of them in their newest edition. Both “Love, Creusa” by Amina Gautier and “Three Scenarios in Which Hana Sasaki Grows a Tail” by Kelly Luce have audio versions of the stories.

Audio recordings and readings affect me in different ways. The author can either completely ruin the story for me or make it entirely better. Either way, it always changes the way that I will read the story in the future. Sometimes, if the author has a bad reading voice, hearing one of your favorite stories being read aloud is like seeing your favorite book being made into a movie: shocking and somewhat disappointing, nothing as you had imagined it.

I usually find I am more receptive to an author’s own telling when it is one I have never read before. That way I have had no time to imagine the voices of the characters in my own particular way. I can more easily see them as the author sees them.

Typically, once I can get past the initial shock of another person’s voice grabbing hold of what I have come to think of as my characters, I can see the benefits.  For example it is an extremely useful tool if you wish to have a greater understanding of the work as a whole. Good recordings allow you to get more of a glimpse into the author’s intentions. Hearing the story aloud, with the author’s own particular inflections and breath, adds an entirely new level of depth.

So what do you think of audio recordings of stories? Good or bad?


Food: A Vehicle for Personality

Shenandoah’s new issue is featuring a piece of flash fiction by Nicholas Roerich Prize winner, Sharon Hasimito, entitled “Vindaloo.”The piece contains cancer, a subsequent death, and food. You would think that the first two would be the more attention worthy, but surprisingly it is food that takes center stage (or in this case center of the table). Hank Teroka remembers his wife through the meals that he has experienced with her. We are given very little description about her physical appearance and specific personality traits, but the types of food that she wants to eat and wants her husband to eat tell us everything we need to know. We find out that she is adventurous, caring and vivacious. Her husband, Hank, on the other hand, is more cautious and pragmatic. The fact that he is willing to try the things that she loved reinforces both the fact that he loved her and the fact that even after death his own decisions remain subject to hers.

I particularly liked this story because I’ve always said food can tell a lot about a person. I pay particular attention whenever eating is involved in a story and perhaps it is just my obsession with all things food related, but I like to think it helps me to develop a better understanding of the character. Like “Vindaloo” it can show whether a person is willing to try new things or not, but it can also tell a lot about a person’s background. For example, if a person only likes to eat McDonald’s perhaps they grew up with blue-collar parents who worked all of the time or if their comfort food is black-eyed peas and collard greens, you can bet on some type of Southern origin. Having the character eat something unusual is another tool that helps to create a more three-dimensional character and allows the author to segue into another aspect of their character’s personality.


A Somewhat Melodious Undertaking

There have been countless studies showing that music improves intelligence. Recently, however, there has been some disagreement to as to whether or not it is beneficial to studying, especially when that studying involves memorization and numbers. Well, memorization is not my cup of tea. I got Calculus 101 out of the way my freshman year and I’m happy to say I’ll never take another math class again. Looking back, perhaps I shouldn’t have listened to the Rolling Stones so much when I was studying for exams- maybe it would have improved my performance, who knows?

Personally, I’ve always liked background noise when I’m writing. Complete silence makes me antsy. I find that it’s most helpful when I am writing because it helps me to block everything else out and let’s me focus solely on what I am doing. I have only one stipulation: there can be absolutely no lyrics. Slow tunes enable me to concentrate on my own words; if there is an alternate storyline going on in the song it invades my thoughts and permeates my work without my even realizing it. This definitely gets me into trouble when my iPod is on shuffle mode. The type of music depends on both my mood and the material that I am working on. I find that when I am working on creative writing, I tend to lean more towards jazz, mostly Chet Baker or John Coltrane. For critical essays, I stick with classical- there is something about it that just makes me feel smarter.

In my opinion, I think that music is an enormous help creatively. It can bring back specific memories you thought you had lost or help you imagine new places you never knew existed, it provides an escape that still allows you to remain grounded. What do you think, is music an aid or is it a distraction? And if you do listen to it, what do you listen to?


Bravo

Shenandoah’s very own editor, R. T. Smith, is a poet. But you probably already knew that. What you might not have heard is that his poem “Shades” is the poem of the week at reduxlitjournal.blogspot.com, and his poem “Within Shouting Distance of the Coosa” will be the poem of the day on Poetry Daily, www.poems.com, this Wednesday.  Be sure to check them out!



Holy… what?

Professor Smith wrote in an earlier blog about the utilization of “I swan” in order to avoid using a stronger oath. His blog left me thinking what phrases I use in order to avoid committing a social error. The only thing that I could come up with is the somewhat trite “holy cow!” Perhaps it is redeemed by the fact that it possibly stems from Hinduism, but it still produces snickers from my peers when I inadvertently say it in a moment of surprise. I am again surprised by their laughter. I always thought of it as a common expression. But it seems that as we grow older the swear words become more common and the polite cover-ups less so. Curse words don’t seem to be nearly as shocking as a simple “holy cow” or “oh my gosh!” in everyday language.

And yet, when we see the curse word written on a page, we are shocked by it. Why? Why is the transformation from spoken word to written such a jump? I admit that I’m guilty of it. I’m offended by it in a way that I would never be if someone said it in casual conversation. Perhaps it is because the spoken swear word is fleeting and transient and the written word is permanent, there for the entire world to see.

So what are your thoughts? Are you like me and feel that there is a difference between  written swear words and spoken ones? Or do you think that there’s no difference at all?