A New Beginning
19/03/09 04:41 Filed in: Writing
This is a new beginning. My web-design program,
RapidWeaver, for some reason converted the original
files of this blog into "php" files, rather than
"html" files, rendering them unreadable for many (if
not all) people. Worse still, all my efforts to
correct the problem have failed completely. It's one
of the things I hate about computers (yes, I am
that old): things can go wrong in some quiet
little corner of program code and you have no chance
of figuring out what or why or of correcting the
problem.
So, I start a new page for the blog. This one seems to be working. Of course, if I want to have the 70 plus earlier posts available from this new page, I'll have to block and copy the text for each one into the new page. Right now, I'm not seeing that as being worth doing. Sorry. The text is still saved on my computer but, for now at least, won't be available on-line. No great loss, perhaps, but frustrating for me nonetheless.
Now, on to the last post.
I have some rewriting to do on the last section of Phillip Gold, more because I hammered out a difficult scene than because the writing is particularly bad. Sometimes I do that: I plow through a scene that I know is going to be complex and challenging, with several layers of meaning, numerous characters and a great deal of thematic and tonal importance just to get the basic elements and structure down. Then, I let it sit for a couple of days to get some distance from it. Finally, I go back to it fresh and start an intense rewrite, highlighting stuff I wanted to highlight, adding in elements I might have left out, etc.
It's a variation on the way Stephen King apparently writes. From what he says in On Writing, he hammers out the entire novel in rapid fashion, then goes back and expands on stuff he's given short shrift, identifies and heightens themes and images that have emerged in the writing and fine-tunes the writing itself.
I do that more on a scene-by-scene basis, especially with complex scenes. So I'll try to do some revising this evening.
On a public announcement note, my friend Ross Pennie has informed me that his new novel, Tainted, is now available in stores and through on-line book sellers (like Amazon). It's published by ECW Press from Toronto and it looks like they've done a great job of it. I had the honour of workshopping Tainted as Ross wrote it in and around 2007 so I know it's great. I'm interested to see the changes the professional editors asked him to do and excited to see it in its true, hard-cover form!
So, I start a new page for the blog. This one seems to be working. Of course, if I want to have the 70 plus earlier posts available from this new page, I'll have to block and copy the text for each one into the new page. Right now, I'm not seeing that as being worth doing. Sorry. The text is still saved on my computer but, for now at least, won't be available on-line. No great loss, perhaps, but frustrating for me nonetheless.
Now, on to the last post.
I have some rewriting to do on the last section of Phillip Gold, more because I hammered out a difficult scene than because the writing is particularly bad. Sometimes I do that: I plow through a scene that I know is going to be complex and challenging, with several layers of meaning, numerous characters and a great deal of thematic and tonal importance just to get the basic elements and structure down. Then, I let it sit for a couple of days to get some distance from it. Finally, I go back to it fresh and start an intense rewrite, highlighting stuff I wanted to highlight, adding in elements I might have left out, etc.
It's a variation on the way Stephen King apparently writes. From what he says in On Writing, he hammers out the entire novel in rapid fashion, then goes back and expands on stuff he's given short shrift, identifies and heightens themes and images that have emerged in the writing and fine-tunes the writing itself.
I do that more on a scene-by-scene basis, especially with complex scenes. So I'll try to do some revising this evening.
On a public announcement note, my friend Ross Pennie has informed me that his new novel, Tainted, is now available in stores and through on-line book sellers (like Amazon). It's published by ECW Press from Toronto and it looks like they've done a great job of it. I had the honour of workshopping Tainted as Ross wrote it in and around 2007 so I know it's great. I'm interested to see the changes the professional editors asked him to do and excited to see it in its true, hard-cover form!