Karen Wiesner, Bring Your Text to Life

Over the course of the last few days, I have had the opportunity to dedicate a considerable amount of time to reading the books that I have had on my reading list for a while. Before sharing my opinion on them, I would like to point out the following.

(1) Clearly, as we all know too well, it is much easier to criticize someone—or something—than to do something worth mentioning ourselves. (2) I am not trying to suggest that the view on the books that I am reading is either objective or expert. (3) I do realize how much effort and time it takes to create anything—so I do respect the very notion of someone having created something. However, all this does not contradict the possibility itself to criticize something or someone.

While reading Bring Your Text to Life, a certain quote by Stephen King, from his On Writing, crossed my mind several times. I would like to repeat it here. 

‘This is a short book because most books about writing are filled with bullshit. Fiction writers, present company included, don’t understand very much about what they do—not why it works when it’s good, not why it doesn’t when it’s bad. I figured the shorter the book, the less the bullshit.’

Stephen King’s On Writing, by and large, is not a book on writing—but a book on how Stephen King writes. I believe this holds the very answer: a person can’t be taught to write. Can a person be taught to play the piano or the bassoon? Naturally. At some—fairly basic—level. But a person can’t be taught to play like Van Cliburn did. Instead, what is to be done, is that we should train ourselves to play, find our unique style, master it year after year, make whichever effort necessary, and learn from the best masters of the craft… But for all that to be possible a person needs to have some preliminary prerequisites. If we have a book that pretends to teach us how to master a craft, it has to be one of the two cases: 1) either the author is just pursuing some commercial interests—by offering recommendations to those who believe to need them desperately—or 2) the author genuinely believes that there exists an algorithm to make dreams come true. Well, after all it is better to have people write, play the bassoon, draw, and sing, than to have them lost in the backstreets with whichever backstreet activity. 

Bookseller: Buy my book on selling. It will help you meet your sales plan.
Selling specialist: Your book on selling will help you meet your sales plan—not mine.

There is one more aspect that I would like to point out after reading Wiesner’s Bring Your Text to Life. The reader could get an understanding that writing is akin to chopping firewood: if you do things right, you are guaranteed to succeed. I have never chopped firewood myself, but I am pretty sure it works like that—once you are shown how to do that, you start and do it. Creative work at a high enough level, however, can’t be done like that. Though I do have to say that these comments too have the same idea as what I said earlier: a person can’t be taught to write. A person can have the head fooled with certain techniques or something, but those won’t quite make the secret, the final key to actually writing something worthy, something good—something worth reading. 

So to sum up, I have to say the following: there are three levels of writing: (1) bad writing, (2) specialist writing, and (3) master writing. One can cross from (1) to (2) through a lot of dedicated hard work. One could probably cross from (2) to (3) too. But there appears to be another level, let’s call it (4) unique writing: and this one can’t be reached by just anyone. Either you are there, or not. Simply put, everything is difficult. I would say that Bring Your Text to Life definitely can be read—but it requires a clear understanding of your own work and potential in the first place.

As always, I would like to provide some quotes and to offer some comments on them. I am providing them back-translated from the Russian-language version of the book, since it was the one that made me wirte all that I’ve written here.

‘As we already mentioned, the writer must have a clear understanding of the characters and of the plot even before starting the work. The same applies to the place of action.’

IP: And if the story unfolds only gradually for the writer…

‘The surroundings are the basis of the literary palette: they give colours to the characters, to the conflict, and to the intricacies of the plot. It is as difficult to construct a story without them as to play a theatre piece without decorations.’

IP: Yet theater pieces can be played—and are played sometimes—without decorations. And sometimes better than with them.

‘The surroundings create a world for the work, unfold the characters’ personalities, clarify the conflict, slow down or speed up the story-telling, build the tension up or down, show the backstories, and create an emotional background. Well-done surroundings infinitely enrich the work. Those which are not done well don’t add anything.’ Mary Beckham, literary critic.

‘The reader needs an opportunity to breathe out. If you want an example, try reading Dan Brown’s novels about Robert Langdon. The story tempo there is absolutely merciless. About the half I usually get so tired that I can’t bring myself to finish reading. By the way, the characters need to breathe out no less than the readers—else the plot gets hopelessly convoluted.’

IP: I guess, all that stems from jealousy…

‘… that comes to my mind is Herbert Wells’ War of the Worlds. The novel was first published in 1890. One might have it hard to think of a more sensational, more explosive topic than the conquest of the Earth by hostile aliens. However, the book starts with a lengthy and fairly boring instroduction (as well as many writers of that time, Wells was fond of deep philosophical ponderings and did not haste to switch to the active part of the plot): …’

‘Were this novel to be written today, we would have got a cool thriller with action elements: with crumblilng mountains, destroyed scyscrapers…’

IP: No comments. Such a nonsense.

‘We have to remember that the first page of the book—and in particular, the first 250 words—are crucial. After those the reader either gets into reading or does not. Let me illustrate it: in the extract from Wells’ novel given here we have about 200 words. See how little moving space? Skimming through 250 words any reader (be it a literary agent, an editor in a publishing house, a library director, a bookshop-goer, or any casual buyer who wants to spend time in an intersting and useful way) makes a decision to either flip the page or to close the book forever. The wisest piece of advice I have ever got about a striking start was as follows: imagine the reader taking up the book in a horrible mood. You will never be given a second chance. You have to catch him there. All lengthy rhetorical discussions are at your own risk.’

IP: And the writer?.. One would have thought we are talking about a lingerie shop. I surely am but an apprentice wizard, but… 

‘If the author does not answer the most important questions, why lose time and effort on reading? Nothing angers the reader more than a broken plotline. They will feel deceived and could even boycott the next books by this author. One cannot underestimate the wrongs that can be caused to one’s career by an unhappy reader.’

IP: And I would have thought that it was one of the key tasks for a writer to make a reader think…

‘Not once have I said—and I won’t be over with repeating it—I always figure out the plot completely before writing a single word. This is my method, and it has not failed me once. Only this way can I be sure that my idea is complete and that the work is worth undertaking. I don’t see any reason in writing (and re-writing countless times) a book that will fail to interest both the readers and the publishers. Why devote oneself to a lost cause? My main job always is to make sure that I have come up with a fairly good plot that is worth getting through.’

IP: I believe the author has to write books for himself, rather than for the publisher…

‘Professional artists work layer by layer: first they get the canvas ready, then they apply the strokes, getting a uniform texture in which every hue and tone would strengthen the others and make them prominent. Just the same way a literary story needs layers: and even if one of them lacks, the picture won’t appear.’

IP: And here I agree completely.

‘Without working out the key elements the story will be unconvincing, schematic, and plain. But when they are all there, the images get so vivid and believable that it would seem the characters are about to come off the pages and start talking with the reader.’

‘A multi-layered structure gives special depth to the text: the characters receive emotional power and persuasiveness, the plotlines become full of intrigue, and the surroundings bloom in colours.’

IP: The book repeats the same idea a thousand times—I wonder why. 

Karen Wiesner repeatedly notes that it is crucial for a professional writer to arrange work properly—to distribute efforts, to understand well the speed of working, to check the result many times. This can’t be disagreed with. 

‘If you want your text to be alive—learn from the artists. Work in layers. Only then will you text shine with bright colours, and only then will the reader want to enter the world you painted and to go through it together with your characters.’

I can’t disagree, sure enough, that it is absolutely crucial to systemize one’s work, especially when dealing with a big project. It is impossible to do without—otherwise we would be just getting lost in our own thoughts. But this is an obvious conclusion that can be reached through any kind of activity, and—I will repeat my understanding here once again—it will never substitute the crucial, the spark, base, and foundation for all the technique and work ethic of a writer. 

As a final remark I would like to point out the following: I believe that we need to take as much as we can from those who have excelled in a craft—in writing, for instance—in order to get our understanding to a higher level. In case of literary work, it will mean reading as many widely-acclaimed books as possible: books written by masters. I am getting to the conclusion that it is much more useful to read good books than any kind of guide in order to become a good writer.

I wish everyone good and interesting reading and less (professional) ‘bullshit’!

PS. Oh, one more thing. During all of my reading time there was this déjà-vu feeling that wouldn’t leave me. Apparently, for a reason. K.M. Weiland Creating Character Arcs and Jurgen Wolff’s Your Creative Writing Masterclass, as well as the book we are talking about in this post—all three books I read recently—have the same examples analysed. For instance, Charles Dickens’ A Christmas Carol  appears many times to bring the reader’s attention to different aspects. Sure indeed, the copyright reasons are clear, but the example structure and their analysis also happen to be similar in the three books—almost looks like I have read the same book three times. I wonder why it would be…