essay on the beauty of writing

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Revelations of Language: On Prose Poetry and the Beauty of a Single Sentence

Nick ripatrazone looks at journals dedicated to the prose poem.

I spend an inordinate amount of time thinking about sentences. I have been sentenced to this fate, you might say, which is both a bad pun and also the truth; between writing, teaching, and reading, I can’t escape sentences.

The sentence contains the entirety of literature in miniature. Individual words hold their power through context and placement; phrases carry their meaning through juxtaposition. Paragraphs are often too thick to memorize: a mindful, more than the mouth can manage. Sentences linger on the tongue and echo in the room. You can still hear, years and yearnings later, the sharpest sentences of our life.

Sentences are glorious. The titular essay in Brian Dillon’s Suppose a Sentence considers the words of Gertrude Stein. He concludes that one of her sentences “is exactly what I want”; a “combination of oblique self-involvement and utter commitment to the things themselves. For words are also things and things are apt to burst with force and loud report.” I like how Dillon’s sentences emulate the cadence and counters of the writers whose work he features. There is something wonderfully freeing about literary inhabitation.

Sentences in essays can range from the informational to the parenthetical to the lyric. We feel the latter: when the essayist takes a deep breath and unfurls emotion and description in layered clauses, each comma a pivot or step. Novelists can stretch sentences for pages, eschewing paragraph breaks for the intensity of the moment. Poets, too, write in sentences; often the power endemic to that form is the poet’s awareness of the tension between syntax and lineation. Each line break a doorway; each stanza a field.

First drawn to fiction, and then pulled by poetry, I wrangled with the sentence. I read Stein, and William H. Gass, and Jayne Anne Phillips ( Black Tickets is a marvel of sentences). I sought to define the sentence, for I believed that structure was the revelation of language. I believed that a sentence must begin and end, and because we also begin and end, there must be some mystical value therein.

The prose poem, as a mode and structure, caught my attention. Purists often use the apparent distances between the writing modes for the sake of criticism; there is no sharper rebuke of a poem than to say it is merely prose with line breaks.

Yet I’ve learned that the borders between modes and genres of writing are often the richest for experimentation and growth. I started writing prose poems to understand both prose and poetry, and yes, to acknowledge their shared dependence upon the sentence. Like so much of my reading and writing life, I found what I sought in literary magazines.

The first issue of The Prose Poem: An International Journal , published in 1992, begins with a “Warning to the Reader” by Robert Bly. “Sometimes farm granaries become especially beautiful when all the oats or wheat are gone, and wind has swept the rough floor clean.” Sunlight seeps “through the cracks between shrunken wall boards.” We are drawn to that light, and so are birds, who, “seeing freedom in the light,” flutter up and fall, again and again. Those birds often die, trapped in the granaries, for they are unaware of the best way to leave: through a rat’s hole, “low to the floor.”

Bly ends the poem with two warnings. The first is for writers: “be careful then by showing the sunlight on the walls not to promise the anxious and panicky blackbirds a way out!”

Readers must also be careful, for those “who love poems of light may sit hunched in the corner with nothing in their gizzards for four days, light failing, the eyes glazed.” Soon, they “may end as a mound of feathers and a skull on the open boardwood floor.”

Bly’s prose poem employs the same enticing images that he later critiques. Yet the critique can only succeed if the images were arresting in the first place. The poem works so well, but is an ostentatious opening for a literary magazine. It appears before founding editor Peter Johnson’s introduction to the issue, as if to affirm the importance of prose poetry rather than its definition.

Johnson appreciates Michael Benedikt’s description of the prose poem, which includes an “attention to the unconscious, and to its particular logic,” an almost acute usage of “colloquial and other everyday speech patterns,” as well as a “special reliance on humor and wit.” Johnson agrees. He thinks prose poetry “has affinities with black humor,” since that mode of writing “straddles the fine line between comedy and tragedy,” and prose poetry stretches across modes. “Prose poets,” he writes, “no matter how different in sensibilities, wander on this uncertain terrain. It’s a land of paradoxes and oxymorons, welcoming the sleight of word artist.”

Although Benedikt and Johnson focus more on content and tone, I’m interested in how prose poets imagine the sentence. Without the corners of line breaks, prose poets are at the mercy of margins—so some internal energy or tension anchors their syntax.

In one poem from the issue, “At the Grave,” Nina Nyhart writes of a widow who takes flowers to her husband’s grave. One year, “the flowers in her yard, his favorites, aren’t in bloom.” She has to wait to visit him, and misses their anniversary. Once the flowers bloom, she cuts and collects them, and heads toward his grave, but a voice admonishes her for being late—and for bringing geraniums. She corrects him: “See here these aren’t geraniums, they’re lilies, you never could tell one flower from another.”

The banter and prodding, between widow and ghost, unfold like a domestic conversation—so much that the reader becomes complacent. Yet the conversation ends abruptly. The widow pleads to her husband: “Don’t go away,” but “silence surrounds her as completely as the voice had before.” I could feel the heaviness of that final sentence, perhaps, because I could not trace it through a line. The sentence, which looked like any old sentence, unfurled the meaning, and then it ended, and the page became white.

For the May 19, 1917 issue of The New Statesman , T.S. Eliot wrote a short essay “The Borderline of Prose.” He observes “a recrudescence of the poem in prose” across the world. He wonders if “poetry and prose form a medium of infinite gradations,” or if “we are searching for new ways of expression.” Eliot admits some mystery in both the form, and his perception of it, and concludes “the only absolute distinction to be drawn” is that “there is prose rhythm and verse rhythm.”

Considering the prose poems of Richard Aldington, Eliot worries that a reader is “constantly trying to read the prose poem as prose or as verse—and failing in both attempts.” Unfortunately, that means a reader “goes on to imagine how it would have been done in verse or in prose—which is what a writer ought never to allow us to do. He should never let us question for a moment that his form is the inevitable form for his content.” Eliot’s final judgment: “Both verse and prose still conceal unexplored possibilities, but whatever one writes must be definitely and by inner necessity either one or the other.”

Sentence: a Journal of Prose Poetics opened three years after The Prose Poem stopped publishing. Founding editor Brian Clements saw the magazine as a continuation of Johnson’s work—both the publishing of prose poems, as well as a discussion of the form in contrast to “poetic prose.”

Issue 8, Clements’s final issue as editor, features prose poems by Oliver de la Paz, Simeon Berry, Nin Andrews, Michael Bassett, and Sarah Blake, as well as a forum on the prose poem. There, Peter Johnson returns to his beloved form, and isn’t satisfied. “I miss the short, pithy traditional prose poem, with its penchant for satire and surprising internal leaps.” He voices a larger concern: “In general, anger is absent in contemporary poetry, which is surprising because there is so much to be angry about.”

Johnson laments that “fashionable irony is safer than invective.” Instead, he writes, “I’d like the prose poem to get nasty.”

My favorite prose poem of the issue is “Fresco” by David Shumate. “I feel an affinity for those people frozen in frescos,” the narrator begins. “I too feel trapped much of the time. In the company of people I wouldn’t choose to be with on my own. But fate has other ideas.” The narrator thinks of a man depicted in a fresco, “lugging that wine vessel around,” a servant to “raucous revelers.” The servant watches “as they couple in the manner of dogs and tries not to snicker.”

The servant—the narrator imagines—is likely transporting himself through that same “ancient vehicle of the imagination.” The servant wishes to escape the tableau, for a woman is tickling his neck with a feather; inviting him to “make a lover of her.” Instead, the servant “takes comfort in the rules governing frescos. A thousand years may pass. But you can never move an inch.”

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Nick Ripatrazone

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What Makes Beautiful Writing Beautiful?

by Joe Bunting | 71 comments

Photo by Moyan Brenn

Personally, I enjoy beautiful writing. A few years ago, I was reading Faulkner on a bus. Liz read one page and said, “Yuck. So confusing. Do you even understand that?”

“Sometimes. He writes so beautifully, though,” I said.

There's something about beautiful writing that makes us want to read it. Perhaps Faulkner's not your favorite, but have you ever read something where you just said, “Wow,” and immediately knew you were reading a true master?

What is it about beautiful writing that is beautiful? Is beauty just in the eye of the beholder? In other words, are we culturally conditioned to think some writing is beautiful? Or is there something universal in beautiful writing, something that exists beyond cultural relativity and is inherent in all human perceptions?

A Darwinian Theory of Beauty

I watched a fascinating TED talk recently by Denis Dutton called A Darwinian Theory of Beauty  (you should watch it).

Denis Dutton was a philosopher of art at University of Canterbury in New Zealand, and in his talk, he reverse-engineers two main reasons why humans interpret beauty as beautiful. In this article, we're applying his theory to writing.

Why is beautiful writing beautiful? Here are two reasons:

1. Beautiful Writing Helps Us Survive

Dutton argues beauty is our instinct's way to help us survive. When surveyed, people from every culture will say the paintings they find most beautiful are landscapes, and in particular, paintings of rolling, savannah grasslands bordered by a small copse of trees, bearing signs of wildlife, and fresh water in the distance. In other words, a perfect eco-system for our hunter-gatherer ancestors to thrive in.

We are attracted to that which is good for our survival.

While reading the opening scene of Oscar Wilde's  A Picture of Dorian Gray ,  set within a fragrant, blooming, English garden in Spring, I remember thinking, “This is beautiful writing.” It wasn't just the writing that was perfectly evocative, it was the subject. The scene Wilde described so well was simply beautiful.

How do you write beautifully then? Describe beautiful subjects, especially beautiful landscapes and beautiful people.

2. Virtuoso Writing Shows Our Feathers

A peacock's tail feathers serve no survival benefit. They do not help him find food or escape predators. Instead, they serve as a fitness sign to female pea hens. Similarly, humans perceive beauty not just in that which is good for our survival but in displays of skill and strength.

When great writers write with skill, showing intelligence, surprise, and command of language, they show a kind of intellectual virility. As Dutton says, “Human beings have a permanent, innate taste for virtuoso displays in the arts. We find beauty in something done well.”

To put it bluntly, good writing is sexy. (Share that on  Twitter ?)

What do you find beautiful about great writing? 

Write beautifully. Describe a landscape or show off your virtuoso style for fifteen minutes.

When your time is up, post your practice in the comments section. And if you post, be sure to give feedback on a few practices by other writers.

Happy writing!

Joe Bunting

Joe Bunting is an author and the leader of The Write Practice community. He is also the author of the new book Crowdsourcing Paris , a real life adventure story set in France. It was a #1 New Release on Amazon. Follow him on Instagram (@jhbunting).

Want best-seller coaching? Book Joe here.

71 Comments

Dune was the first thing I read that really struck me with its beauty. The scenery and culture described are harsh and unpleasant; the story convoluted; but the writing, the building of that scenery, the telling of that story, could not be more lovely. For that reason it will always be one of my favorite books.

A more recent example is Erin Morgenstern’s Night Circus. Everything about that book is beautifully wrought and rendered; the settings, the characters, the tale itself. The writing is what makes it so magical.

Like you, I am grateful that some people picked up a pen and just let the words fly, not thinking about how it would match up with the world’s ideas or its system. Of Human Bondage by Somerset Maugham comes to mind. All the psychology students should have to read that book in order to graduate. It reveals more about human nature than the many psych classes I’ve taken. Anna Karenina… so many others. Raw humanity. Courageous writers!

To me, what makes writing so magical and beautiful is that it comes out of our minds. I’m sure if most of us are honest, becoming a writer was not high on our list of goals in life. I know for myself, my goal was to become the youngest Canadian born president of IBM. Needless to say, we all know how that goal turned out since I’m not the the youngest Canadian born president of IBM. I did not however, ever expect to become a writer. It’s a talent that I really never saw coming, but as I’m sure all of you, my fellow writers will agree, it’s a talent that we all embrace and use now that we have been gifted with it.

Writing is beautiful and magical, because once our minds get going, we churn out beautiful and magical stories that catch the attention of our readers. The greatest compliments that readers of my stories give me is when they say “I felt like I was there and was a part of what you were writing about.”

I’m suddenly feeling creative, time to do our “Practice” and write something beautiful and magical….

Edgar Allan Poe – The Raven

He does so good at painting the darkness and consequence of a depressed state of mind.

I could listen to his ramblings of scenery and history without ever needing any true plot elements.

hey James, did you ever see Corman’s `The Raven’? It’s hilarious, really funny. (well, IMHO) Also Jack Nicholson in an early role = fascinating to watch.

No, but it looks like it would be fun to watch. Vincent Price, that creepy old guy in Edward Scissorhands and Jack Nicholson. Love Jack Nicholson. I like him in Batman and As Good As It Gets, among others, of course.

Peter Lorre is in it too… (The Raven) Try watching the first 10 mins and see if you’re not utterly hooked. Seriously, it’s gold.

I hung out with Corman for a whole week once. Cool guy.

Ever notice how much harder it is to write something beautiful when beautiful is your goal? Every word is a self-conscious child playing dress-up. Case in point, check out the lofty well-to-do language in my practice. How many five dollar words can you count?

The dust settled in the meadow. The breath of a thousand wild ponies still hung in the air. Turf, torn from the ground by four thousand charging hooves, settled about like lilies on a pond. I was devastated. How could such a spectacle ever be fully felt by the heart of man? My trembling hands spoke to the fearful awe that gripped me. Sliding down from the boulder that had lifted me above the beautiful death that swept through the valley, I stumbled. Death. It had come so near and I was no closer to reclaiming what was mine. No closer to the object of my desire. Knowledge. That was my singular goal when I began this journey. To hold the knowledge of life inside my very self. I had been empty for so long, devoid of the vigour and quickness of life. Long days spent in parlors and pool halls had withered the wonder once bursting from my breast. The months spent abroad had brought colour to my cheeks to be sure. Climbing through mountain air and chuting mighty rivers had lifted my chin and returned the childish brightness to my eye, yet still I did not understand. What is this life for? For what purpose was I made so fragile and small and set loose in the wide majestic world? I believed once that I was made for her. My shoulder was shaped to be her pillow and my hands were molded to bring her comfort. She was the very summit of my worth as a man. Only my mother’s pleading eyes stopped me from following Adelaide into the warm hereafter. That I should have lost her to her own melancholy is a greater testament to my failure than the wasted wraith I had become. And here I stand alive, where death had cut a swath though idyllic fields, trembling in the grip of such expansive and endless unknowing. My smallness is growing, unfolding inside me. I have no task, save to eat what fish I can catch and to let sleep carry me into the embrace of another sunrise. Will life ever be fully felt again?

Hi Miss Sara Lee,

Thank you for posting, I really enjoyed reading your post and actually, learned a lot from it.

It’s amazing how a simple writing prompt can do so much…

(Er, wait – by that I am not meaning to in any way disparage this writing prompt, LOL… `Simple’ doesn’t mean bad… Ironically: `simplicity and elegance’ is what seems to be a common definition of beauty… especially in design… i.e of objects, whether they are artworks or functional objects, like say, a gorgeous purple iMac or something. I only mention iMacs, as, I read someplace the other day how sales of Apple Macs went through the roof when Apple stopped making boring white iMacs – and made colourful, funky, pretty ones… Which brings back the question of “What is beauty, what is beautiful writing, etc” Wow, hows all that for a self-rescue from a digression)

I think it’s high time I actually started talking about your post.

I LOVED your opening comment. I thought what you did there was amazing. ie You self-reflected.

This makes me wonder how long it was between writing your piece and then writing that opening para. (How long was it? Just curious. Eg 1 minute? Less? More?)

ie – this:

“Ever notice how much harder it is to write something beautiful when beautiful is your goal? Every word is a self-conscious child playing dress-up. Case in point, check out the lofty well-to-do language in my practice. How many five dollar words can you count?”

ie – Not only did you `step away from being subjective’ (ie from actively writing an imaginative work of fiction, ie the piece) but – you then `swapped hats’ and you objectively critiqued the heck out of yourself. Also, you even ended it with a really funny line. ie “How many five dollar words can you count?”

ie – LOL – That last line made me smile. Anyway – I won’t count the five dollar words, but I take your point.

So, my own personal opinion, for what its worth

This opening I felt was indeed beautiful:

“The dust settled in the meadow. The breath of a thousand wild ponies still hung in the air. Turf, torn from the ground by four thousand charging hooves, settled about like lilies on a pond.”

Mainly as it triggers/evokes loads of beautiful images, and a mood.

“a thousand wild ponies” is an image that’s inherently beautiful (for me)

`Ponies’ is a beautiful word… And the image of a pony is always beautiful… (Why do all little girls want a pony? Because: whats not to love about a pony. They’re like the majestic version of a puppy or a kitten. These are all just my theories. What do I know.)

Anyway from there though, the writing (well, the content, of the story) got tough. I didn’t find that beautiful, I found it bittersweet and painful. Now there is a school of thought that sadness, (and suffering and pain) is – or can be – beautiful. I’m not that guy. I HAAAAATE that stuff. But that’s just me. Rather like that great philosopher, Daffy S. (Sheldon) Duck: “I can’t stand pain – it hurts me.”

Anyway also the word `Death’ alone by itself shocked the hell of of me. I just wasn’t ready for it. You should warn peopkle when you’re going to come out and just have a sentence that is entirely devoted to Death. So, that was rouhg and it took me a few sentences to recover.

This I can say was empirically beautiful:

“so fragile and small and set loose in the wide majestic world? I believed once that I was made for her. My shoulder was shaped to be her pillow and my hands were molded to bring her comfort.”

`Majestic’ is a beautiful word, too. I think. Also these images and meanings are all beautiful.

I also have personal issues with the word `wraith’, I find it very scary.

`wasted wraith’ is poetic, (cos of the w’s there.)

Anyway it was a moving piece of writing. But some of the moving was into places I wasn’t ready to go. Death and all that stuff. Man, that was heart-wrenching.

A few of the `older’ words also bothered me, as they kinda jarred me.

like `parlors’, `Adelaide’ and’ – `hereafter’.

Anyway you’re a great writer. I learnt a lot from reading this.

Hi Joe V., thanks so much for your thorough, insightful and very funny comments. Where to start? The intro reflects what I was feeling as I was actually writing the piece. It was probably a minute later once I got everything formatted and pasted. While I was writing, right after the turf settled like lilies on a pond, I realized I was pandering, so I opened the door and let death creep in. You could say I just switched horses to start pandering to the serious, literary crowd. The old fashioned word choices were definitely a result of my bias towards classics being more “beautiful” than contemporary work, even though I really enjoy modern writers as much as I do Jane Austen, Poe and D.H. Lawrence. I think the preoccupation with death, smallness and being without purpose are an almost natural reaction to being cut off from the natural world. If I were to continue this practice, my protagonist (let’s call him Gregor) would start to worry less about understanding the world and more about simply experiencing it and being a part of it. As for the ponies, wild horses are my personal metaphor for dreams that need chasing. The fact that dear Gregor just stands there and almost gets mown down by them instead of running after them, shows how much he still has to learn about being alive. Thanks again for your comments!

OMG, Miss Sara Lee, you keep stampeding the wild ponies! So many supercool metaphors – even in your comment.

So, now, I am going to try and think like that… ie Wild horses – as a metaphor – for dreams that need chasing…!

I actually suspect that image (metaphor/analogy) is going to stick with me, until I am dead or go senile and start forgetting stuff.

ie – I just got goosebumps, from the metaphor you explained. – I am not even kidding. (Q: How do you write like that??? I still kinda don’t get it. ie How can I (me) write, so that in just a few sentences, the hair on say, the back of the neck of the reader *involuntarily* stands up on end?! …THAT is actually The Holy Grail of amazing writing, IMHO. I still am trying to figure out the mechanics of that stuff. (My buddy Shane Dix can do it too. I keep studying his stuff but I still don’t understand the mechanics of it enough to be able to pull off that `trick’ myself. Darn.)

Also, does anyone have any idea what the Darwinist explanation of that affect/effect might be? I guess it’s just some cognitive shift, that takes place in the mind (ergo, the brain – ergo the neurones) but: WHY..? And How? ie That right there, to me (ie the goosebumps thing) is the definition of truly “deep” writing. And – like effective comedy makes you laugh, and effective horror (well; lets say, Terror) genre – *when it works*… makes you genuinely scared — How does some writing, *make the hair on the back of your neck stand on end*??? Is there any `trick’ or explicit (teachable) technique to it?

ie Miss Sara Lee, I wonder, what were you intentionally thinking, when you wrote that? (Or, was it just intuitive?)

– I guess the thing is (and I honestly have no idea) it’s probably just practice, on your part, and maybe not even a conscious act (Is this right? …I puzzle deeply over this a lot – and I still got nuthin. ie Poe gives me goosebumps a lot, and, any sort of Rod Serling thing – at the end – does it, too.

In fact Sophocles also nailed it with Oedipus Rex. (When he realizes he’s nailed his mom and killed his dad…) I think possibly, it’s a Gestalt Switch. Like, say, that moment when you suddenly see those 2 faces in the “other” ie `black-image/negative-space’ part of that picture of a vase, or, whatever).

Anyway – I personally really like `Gregor’ as a name for your guy, that totally works, IMHO. – Brings that whole Russian `angst’ and yearning thing into it. (THough he seems American. Or maybe even British.) Anyone named Gregor already has buckets of sympathy from me. He’s clearly had a sad, heavy, painful heart-achey life (backstory). ie In a word – Russia. Like all those Russian classical music composers… (Man that stuff HURTS to listen to. Heartache, up the yin-yang.)

I also note that the massive cockroach-guy in Kafka was also a `Gregor’ (Samsa, what a *weird* surname, says someone surnamed Velikovsky), but that’s a whole different thing obviously (ie Kafka). But then, what do I know – maybe you’re even ahead of me there and subliminally and subtly `using’ that too, ie the alienation and horror that your guy is feeling (because she died). And the whole “learning about Life” thing you mention above

Also, FYI, I didnt mean to sound negative about the older words. (Adelaide and suchlike) – They do exactly what you said. ie `Ye Olde’ language really IS more beautiful, and one of my lecturers even said the other day that the advent of photography is to blame for how language become less descriptive over time, ie less florid, or – less `beautiful’ in short. ie In journalism, or even in a book I guess, when there is a photograph to go with the article/story, you kinda don’t need to describe it all in (descriptive, florid) words, you just can talk about `what happened’ or whatever. (Though – illustrations, could be argued, to have contributed to that as well. But the `main blame’ goes on photography. I tend to feel that’s probably true.)

Anyway, thanks for the dialog MSL! I love hearing how other writers do their thing. – Keep up the powerful writing… and, for my part, I will keep on envying your elite writing skillz… awesome stuff…

ie Now I’m slightly depressed, a little discouraged and feeling slightly inadequate. LOL. Really strong writing always makes me kinda feel like quitting… 🙂 (But dont feel bad – later, I always get over myself and come back and take another crack at it. Think there’s something wrong with me.)

All writing is just problem-solving I guess. (eg How do I make the reader feel [insert desired emotion] at reading this exact sentence? Rinse, and repeat.)

(And –> Literary – or Artistic (like Dutton) Darwinists would say: our minds are adapted for problem solving.

So (another *sigh*) I guess I’ll let my inherited predispositions take over… Gotta trust them instincts sometimes I guess. Why not put your fate in the hands of a caveman-guy hidden in your genes.)

There I go again, sounding like I’m disparaging Literary Darwinism – when in fact I really should be a poster-boy for it, if you read my thesis. – What’s up with that. It’s a great mystery of my Universe.

Think I’m like James Dean in that movie I can’t remember the name of.

Them: “What are you rebelling against?”

Me: (disaffected, randomly `angry’ youth) “Whataya got…”

Also – I used an `olde’ word in my exercise,

ie `Alas’

So – yeah – pls don’t think I’m knocking old words. Yours were cool

PS – Another good old word is “bumfuzzled” (it means: confused) I use it a lot, for obvious reasons. 🙂

Cheers MSL! JT

If you want to make the reader feel something, you first have to feel it yourself. Instead of struggling to engineer a feeling through intellect and a lexicon of feeling words, develop your empathy muscle. Feel awe, wonder, despair in your very core and then write the images or sensations that spring from that. For me it was wild ponies, for you it might be a still lake at midnight with the moon hanging low, or a child taking its mother’s hand. A moment from your past, or a daydream or nightmare you’ve had. Someone else’s vision that when you read it or watched it evoked those emotions in you. Either write to figure out what you’re feeling, such as in a free write, or don the clothing of a feeling and write what that looks, tastes or sounds like. And remember, practice, practice, practice! Observing yourself in the throes of emotion is a skill that needs building.

All great calls MSL

Especially: practice, practice, practice!

I’ve been a professional screenwriter for 20 years, but it took 10 years of practice before I sold my first script.

As – there is a rule, called `The Ten Year’ rule in Creativity…

And it is a *rule*. LOL.

ie – All the peer-reviewed academic research literature on Creativity (well, from the domain of Psychology, and Sociology) shows it’s: a rule.

Hey – It’s only an average though. It’s (on average) 10,000 hours or 10 years of (writing) practice, whichever comes first. See also Gladwell, on the whole 10,000 hour thing.

And more here: (see posts #6 to #14) http://storyality.wordpress.com/an-index-to-this-blog/

But unfortunately, (for me) I am a biopoetics scholar. ie Literary Darwinist (like Dutton with The Art Instinct)…

So – I need to investigate what it is about words on a page – that triggers images in a mind – that then creates a visceral reaction.

So, MSL, this kind of sucks (for me) but my goosebumps moments never come from:

“a still lake at midnight with the moon hanging low, or a child taking its mother’s hand.”

Man, I wish that stuff COULD trigger goosebumps in me. For real!

But (sigh) I grew up in the country (but also lived in the city) and have seen about a bajillion of both of those things — and never once got goosebumps.

(And I know they were just examples, sorry I don’t mean to be sooo literal,)

I mean, “a still lake at midnight with the moon hanging low,” could certainly inspire the reaction in me: Wow, that’s a really gorgeous view over there, or whatever, but, never, ever goosebumps. (Shame, really.) Not even one time. Ever. Views (no matter how gorgeous) do nothing for me, like that.

And – as as for: “a child taking its mother’s hand.” For me – more like: Jeez, somebody tell that little brat to shut up and stop screaming, before I strangle that little turd. Stupid annoying little brats. I hate those annoying little guys. etc

The goosebumps I mean, are more like, all this stuff:

http://www.watch-movies-tv.info/playlists/mind-bender/twitch_psychological_thrillers.html

And actually I have written movies that give ME goosebumps. (eg Rocket Man) ie the ending bit.

http://www.youtube.com/joeteevee

But i specifically meant, in prose, (eg novels etc) How to write a few sentences, and give somebody goosebumps. (Or even a whole lot of them: geesebumps)

Mine would be more like >

You come home after a long day. It’s late. You open the front door, you sigh, and hit the light switch. It stays dark…You hit the switch – click… Try again…click, Still, darkness.That damn lightbulb must be blown… again… You step inside. And now from behind the door he leaps, his face a snarl, he is screaming, he is covered with your blood, as: rapidfire – his KNIFE is plunging into you, plunging stabbing-plunging-stabbing-plunging-stabbing and then just all that tunnel of endless BLACKNESS and it has you now at last and… TIME… CANNNNN… STOP.

———-

Did you get em?

A little flock of geese?

Or, what…?

if not, then: see?

I really can’t do that shit.

Kafka was the master at it.

That one about riding the horse and the landscape becomes everything… Amazing.

It’s a specific form of art to make tragedy beautiful. You’ve done an excellent job at it here, in my opinion. In the tradition of Dostoevsky or Poe.

Snap! That’s what I wish I had said.

I LOVE `Crime & Punishment’. Karamazov Im not so hot about, have gotten halfway through and lost interest… But I will keep trying to finish it as it was both Einstein and Chomsky’s fave novel.

I bet if I ever finish reading it I will suddenly be as genius as both of them put together. Or not.

PS – Ah yeah I see the Poe thing. Especially with the one-word sentence `Death.’ (Totally traumatized me.) Also it;s like Gregor is mourning “the lost Lenore” from The Raven right? I can viscerally feel the aching in his breast (from: his tell-tale heart.)

Ow! Hey! Anyone see what I did there? I wasn’t even trying to do that. But I will take the credit. Also, actually, I really really did mean to do that. Serious.

“the aching in his breast (from: his tell-tale heart.)”

OMG – I did a… thing.

More Cheers

It stood on his hind legs, thin and muscly columns stabbing the ground and ending in thick round thorny claws. From its vertical foot sprouted a huge tensed thigh. Coarse hair jutted out in all directions. Its chest, an envy to all things robust, shifted rapidly with each pant. Bear-like arms ending in impressive claws that screamed their proficiency at tearing living beings to shreds.

Dayotan’s head rocked back as his eyes crawled up to the beast’s head. The luster of its feral eyes transformed the grey shades of the moon into blood-stains. Its ears tucked back under the its fur, nearly touching its neck. Hostility rolled down its wrinkled muzzle. Its brown nose wet and bumpy. Curled lips of black ringed the mouth and dripped with blood lust. The mouth, full of primal teeth, short and long jutting from the wet and red orifices of its gums, was ready to clamp warm flesh. Huge incisors offered a gory death.

Fear lay heavy on every hair on Dayotan’s body. Hackles raised, lips curled, claws extended, and a ferocious display of teeth, it was a familiar and aggressive pose. But, this was no wolf.

Wow, great piece James.

Nice cliffhanger too, at the end! 🙂

Really compelling.

Man – sentences like this are so cool

“The luster of its feral eyes transformed the grey shades of the moon into blood-stains.”

Yeah, but truly talented authors throw them out like a parade santa throws candy to children.

I beg to differ on that candy throwing metaphor. I suspect most talented writers sweat buckets, suffer self doubt and despair, and often take weeks months years to make it sound right. That’s the trick… make it look like it’s a throw-away line.

I’m with PJ on this one. But also with James. It depends on the specific idiosyncratic writer. But I slightly tend more towards PJ’s sentiment.

Actually apparently it’s all just about being prolific. Check any so-called `genius’ writer, they were/are all prolific. It;s in the editing the genius gets crystallized.

Also, check the research on Creativity… eg Csikszentmihalyi (1996), Simonton (anything), Boden (2004). Most geniuses at anything are super-prolific. We ignore their bad stuff and remember their masterworks.

All just as a broad sweeping outrageous generalization. (But darnitall they’re so fun to do. I just can’t help myself.)

In summary, here’s to having random opinions on things.

(me I mean, not you guys)

I think my metaphor had a little sarcasm in it and probably a self-cynical flavoring to it.

“We ignore their bad stuff and remember their masterworks.”

I tend to agree with this the most. Going back against my metaphor. If you throw out too much good stuff all at once, it gets a little boring. It all feels like throw-away lines.

Every here and there, a writer should throw in a shiny gem.

At the same time, a lot of talented writers seem to write with my gems being their throw-away lines and their gems being really, really pretty dazzling.

All good points James. (Well IMHO, what do I know? I’m not sure.)

Anyways, James, I don’t suppose you are this James Hall?

http://www.amazon.com/Hit-Lit-Cracking-Twentieth-Bestsellers/dp/0812970950

(And, sorry if this is a dumb question, I am *brilliant* at asking them)

If you drop the W Initial and replace it with an E.M. and shaved off about 20 to 30 years, you’d be pretty close.

They always told me there is no such thing as a dumb question… But I would have to disagree. Any question that you ask that you know the answer to (and isn’t a rhetorical question) is kind of dumb.

He is a published author. Is he any good?

Nice piece James, well described. I especially like “Hostility rolled down its wrinkled muzzle”.

Ok – so:

Thanks Joe – for this awesome writing prompt. I’ll explain why it’s awesome down the bottom of this comment.

First though —->

Q: What do I (i.e.: personally, i.e. me, not the next guy, but – me) find beautiful about great writing?

A: Ok so – I better preface my answer.

I love the writing in Flann O’Brien’s `The Third Policeman’. I think it is the greatest novel ever written, and I’ve read the first hundred or so pages of many of the classics, and many many other novels.

And – I also love Moby Dick (though I wouldn’t have liked the writing had I not read and loved The Third Policeman first. True story.)

Oh and I also love F Scott Fitzgerald’s “The Great Gatsby” (has any else here ever heard of this book? …That was a joke. Laugh anytime, laughter is free, and apparently also, The Best Medicine. That was an *in-joke*. Do NOT laugh, as it means: you have actually *read* Readers Digest, and – sorry but, sheesh that’s just pathetic. I mean – I guess you’re excused if you read it in the doctor’s waiting room, just that one time. But hey – you were sick that time; you weren’t feeling yourself. I get it. It’s okay, you don’t need to explain. It’s totally understandable in those circs.)

Anyway so those 3 books – I would be so bold as, to call the writing `beautiful’.

Wait, I really need to turn the question around Joe –

“What do I find *great* about beautiful writing” is a question I would prefer to try and answer.

What I find great – about, those 3 novels above (and I mean, the specific way that: one very-carefully-chosen word is put in front of another word, and yet also right behind, another equally-if-not-more carefully chosen word) is, this:

I like the way their mind works. They are all very clear thinkers. No convolution. Simple and elegant. Ergo: beautiful.

Also, the thing of it is, those 3 guys (and I HATE them for this, purely out of envy) know how to trigger emotion in me. (Which goes back to meme-gene co-evolution.)

This all gets into NLP (neuro-linguistic programming), and that sounds like a computer, so I won’t even go there. But I do note that Steven Pinker finds our brains are just `adapted neural computers’ (and he’s right, IMHO.)

And Joe, if you are reading this – I just read Dutton’s `The Art Instinct’ about a month ago. It blew my mind.

Then I immediately started devouring (not literally eating, but reading) everything in Literary Darwinism.

ie: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Darwinian_literary_studies

and http://denisdutton.com/carroll_review.htm

and http://neuronarrative.wordpress.com/2009/02/27/what-is-literary-darwinism-an-interview-with-joseph-carroll/

And then, I was so impressed, I even emailed Professor Joe Carroll, and asked him to tell me more. And – he did. (Nice guy!)

Mainly as – just in the last 2 months – I discovered that – my thesis I’m writing (on Film/Screenwriting/Transmedia) is actually: Literary Darwinism. For more detail on that, see: http://storyality.wordpress.com/ (eg Post #69, and #68) And for less detail, don’t read those posts.

Anyway, so, yeah.

Anyway so here’s my piece:

(I’m not going to describe a landscape, as I’m hopeless at it)

15 min Writing Exercise Practice:

Pleistocene, oh Pleistocene, wherefore art thou, Pleistocene? You have gone the way of the dinosaur, and the dodo. – Except, wait – that’s not right, we actually still have dinosaurs. Like: crocodiles, and alligators, and anyway birds are actually just feathery dinosaurs if you believe that movie Jurassic Park. And dodos we wiped out. So much for survival of the fittest. Well that’s what you get for being a *flightless bird*. Stoopid *flightless* birds. Make up your mind. If you’re going to be a bird, you FLY.

The rest of us all really WANT to be able to fly… You dodo-retards have *wings* and you can’t even be bothered to use them. Serves you right, you goddamn ingrates… Anyway – we could genetically-engineer some of your preserved DNA, and bring you all back if we wanted to – but guess what, WE’RE NOT GOING TO. And THAT’S what you get for choosing to being a FLIGHTLESS bird. (And don’t try explaining it away with Natural Selection, Mr Dodo Guy.)

Anyway where was I… oh yeah, dinosaurs:

And, yea verily, even trilobytes still grace our shores.

No wait, they’re all extinct-ified out of existence too. Though I’m pretty sure they just evolved into cockroaches. (Think back. When’s the last time you saw a trilobyte *and* a cockroach in the same room, huh? HUH? HAH! See?!)

Pleistocene, oh Pleistocene, how I miss your ancient pre-literate hunter-gatherer days, and ways. Alas, you are now but strawberry-cheesecake for the mind in the memory banks of racial heredity…

Yes I freely admit, I love ice-cold running water, and fresh ripe fruit, and creamy stuff reminiscent of fatty foods – that in combination may well have seen my ancestors through ancient wintry seasons on vast savannah plains. (Which explains why we all love cheesecake so damn much.)

And why we love stories (watching the boob tube) at the end of the day.

Pleistocene oh Pleistocene – you entertained us all with fireside stories, and now we still crave fireside stories yet the TV set is our fire, *and* our storytelling machine all at once. Creativity: combining 2 things into one.

But Pleistocene oh Pleistocene – tell me, why must I still feel instinctual attraction for your grassy wooded landscapes, with shallow water, and a historical figure (like George Washington), and picnicking family, and a random bellowing hippopotamus?

Why can I not find soothing beauty in the sight of a car-park, or the non-fractal un-green, depressing rectangular shapes of post-agricultural revolutionary urbanisation?

Am I merely a puppet of my survivalising, reproductifyiing, `selfish’ (though more accurately-named selfLESS) genes..? Tell me truly, oh Pleistocene.

Surely `Free Will’ has a place in this schemata – and information is not just data.

Whereforart henceforth springeth all my altruistic urges? Am I truly the artful ape? The social gorilla? Why do I like people so much? They all seem so unnecessary.

Is Brown really correct? Are there only a list of 67 human universals?

Like, say oh, I don’t know:

Age-grading, and athletic sports, bodily adornment, calendars, cleanliness training, community organization, cooking, cooperative labor, cosmology, courtship, dancing, decorative art, divination, division of labor, dream interpretation, education, eschatology, ethics, ethno-botany, etiquette, faith healing, family feasting, fire-making, folklore, food taboos, funeral rites, games, gestures, gift-giving, government, greetings, hair styles, hospitality, housing, hygiene, incest taboos, inheritance rules, joking, kin groups, kinship nomenclature, language, law, luck superstitions, magic, marriage, mealtimes, medicine, obstetrics, penal sanctions, personal names, population policy, postnatal care, pregnancy usages, property rights, propitiation of supernatural beings, puberty customs, religious ritual, residence rules, sexual restrictions, soul concepts, status differentiation, surgery, tool-making, trade, visiting, weather control, and, of all things – weaving.

Is all that crap really necessary? Can’t we just build carparks all over that lush green savannah?

Pleistocene, oh Pleistocene – Is bio-culturalism truly the explanation for everything?

Answer: Yes.

—————————–

Anyway – so that’s my random 15-minute thing.

To be critical – What doesn’t come across, at all – is that: I’m currently totally convinced by ALL this Literary Darwinism stuff.

Read `Graphing Jane Austen’ (by Carroll) for more…

Evolution, Literature, and Film: A Reader (Eds: Carroll, et al) http://www.amazon.com/Evolution-Literature-Film-A-Reader/dp/0231150199

And – watch all these lectures (all are AWESOME):

http://www.sci-hum.pwias.ubc.ca/videos.php

Anyway, thanks again Joe.

JT http://storyality.wordpress.com/

You would make a great Nonsense writer! Right up there with Samuel Beckett’s Waiting for Godot, but maybe with a little more purpose.

Thanks James. Yeah I’m a big fat fan of Nonsense Writing. Spike Mulligan, Ogden Nash and all those kinda freaks.

My satirical comic-fantasy novel is more of the same kinda garbage: http://am-so-as.webs.com/

– Funny you should mention Godot, as my novel asks: “What If God Was a Game Designer.” – We studied Godot in high school English Lit and it blew my little teenaged hormone-soaked mind.

– I’m also a massive fan of Zen Stupidity. See: `Flaming Carrot’ comics by Bob Burden, Jack Handey and Steve Martin (and Handey was also a gag writer for Martin). I think you have to be really really smart to be able to create humour that intentionally dumb. (Whoa – Did you see that?! That was some irony, it just flashed by the window!! Anyone else see that?? For rizzle.)

And yeah, I always have an insanely serious intent underneath it. ie I love Literary Darwinism (Dutton, Carroll, Pinker, Boyd and alla those guys). Like I was unsuccessfully trying to explain to Brina, you would never know it though. My novel is also a polemic. But it’s buried under the nonsense and humour, very few people glimpse it, but when they do they’re often stunned and horrified by what I’m actually really saying. I try and bury my subtext like 7 foot under. One foot under the corpse of whatever sacred cow I’m burning at the stake. Mmm, you smell that? Burnt cow. Yummm… Look out. There’s them Pleistocene instincts kickin in again. Slaves to the rhythm, that’s all we aren’t. (See: `Consilience’ by EO Wilson for more.)

That would make a great spoken word piece. In fact, I enjoyed hearing it modulate between the theatrical tone and the dry, sarcastical tone in my minds ear.

Thanks Brina 🙂 You remind me of Angelina Jolie in that photo with your cute kid. I guess you would get told that a lot.

The thing is, I didn’t want it to be sarcastic or satirical in my piece at all. But on reading it back, it most very clearly undoubtedly is. Darn it all to heck and back.

Also while I was writing it, I totally felt like was in a slow-motion bus crash (I was actually in 3 of those in high school, our bus driver totally sucked).

What I mean is, sometimes I totally have no control over my own writing. And that’s not a good thing.

– You know how, you might want to express a thought, theme or emotion, (sheesh, maybe all 3 at once; knock yourself out) and so you try desperately to keep that `guiding principle’ in mind as you let the words fly out onto the (web)page?

Well, this was all, nothing like that.

This was like a stagecoach driver who, the horses got spooked by a gunshot nearby and the reins got yanked out of my hands and we all went careening outta control around a terrifyingly steep mountainside precipice. And, the whole time I could hear the womenfolks screaming from inside the carriage. Oh The Humanity.

And we didn’t exactly crash at the end of 15 mins but I sure as hell didn’t end up near Kansas City, more like somewhere out by Dry Gulch.

What I mean is, anyone reading this would think I don’t got no respect for Literary Darwinism. So, now I feel totally misunderstood and even mis-underestimated (mainly by myself).

This writing itself was like: Blind Variation and Random Selection. So, in conclusion: not all evolutionary adaptations are advantageous to the species, ya ask me.

Anyway thanks for reading

I have heard that before.

I would have to say that it does have a out-of-control stagecoach feel to it. I kind of like it when I’m writing and the words have their own gravity. Maybe that’s why I enjoyed reading your piece.

Hey, Joe. V…. are you any relation to Immanuel Velikovsky, author of “Worlds in Collision” etc.? A real hero.

Thanks for asking, but no, I’m not related (genetically) to Prof Immanuel. Culturally, though – yes, I consider him my spiritual great-grandfather twice-removed and slightly-tilted to the left.

I am certainly all about Catastrophe Theory. (Fairly obvious,if you’ve seen my writing). I think `Ages In Chaos’ and `Worlds In Collision’ are spectacular.

Then again in some respect I am related genetically to Immanuel The Great as apparently all our DNA can be traced back to 17 cavepersons in the early Pleistocene. Man that was some drunken party in the cave that night I’m betting.

http://storyality.wordpress.com/

The beauty of a smile.

There are different kinds of smiles, and all of them are beautiful. One is the smile of knowing; as when someone talks about a restaurant you’ve been to, which you absolutely loved, and you silently remember how juicy or spicy or piquant that sauce or meat or pasta dish was. The smile reminisces and even mimics the workings of your lips around that good food. Then there’s the smile of delight, usually accentuated by a bit of prior anticipation.Many things could inspire this kind, but the newly birthed baby, a scale that reflects a change in the negative, or the dawning of the notion that you’ve finally arrived, wherever “there” may be may provide the inspiration for such a one. The wry smile betrays a suppressed laugh when there’s a question of whether we should find a particular thing acceptable, much less funny. Then there’s the smile that reaches all the way to the heart: when a tender moment removes us from the realm of time or when it’s the only way to express the joy without breaking into tears. Lesser smiles break through, but just barely, when we’ve convinced ourselves there’s too much suffering or solemnity in our midst to recklessly indulge an expression of happiness; in a hospital, church, a courtroom. Of course, I’d never be a member of a church like that. The ultimate smile is God’s own, reflected in the world by vibrant burgundy and gold sunsets, in the utterance of deliberate and courageous words of truth, the triumphant and tentative steps of a one-year-old. Our smiles, then, are ethereal elements of a world we can’t quite grasp completely, like the dark of the womb, or the dance of the butterfly. Meant to be shared, inspired and enjoyed.

I connected with a lot of the examples you gave and thought back to moments in my own life when they were true. Even though I might not have entered your world, I felt as though you were giving me a tour of mine.

I agree with Brina. ie Ditto and more ditto,

Also, your piece was just really sweet, Jasmine. it reminded me why I like (ok love, there I said it) Life.

Steven Pinker (an intellectual buddy of Dutton’s) would say we like stories (eg novels, films etc) because they remind us why we love life.

And why do we love life? Partly, at least, because our Pleistocene ancestors all loved it so much (why do we love: smiles, babies, flowers, great food, all the stuff you so eloquently mention above, Jasmine) – because they make for successful survival and reproduction.

ie Why do we get a little burst of oxytocin or whaytever when we hug someone, or when we learn a new piece of knowledge? Why does `learning stuff’ make us feel so damn GOOD? (etc)

So anyway – thanks for cheering me up, with your piece. I was feeling slightly depressed about how good Miss Sara Lee’s piece was. 🙂

Thanks for your message, Joe. Your insights are right on, and I also enjoyed that quote from Steven Pinker. And, yes, I guess we’re biologically set up for happiness. Good thing!

How cool the way you put that. Thanks for your message, Brina. There have been some very profound moments of my life accentuated by the brightest smiles. And hey, wasn’t it the first emoticon?

Great phrases here, “the expression of the freest of beings” “etheral elements” “dance of the butterfly” “meant to be shared,inspired and enjoyed”. Wonderful. What is more beautiful than a genuine smile! Thanks.

She sat, eyes wide, unsure of what was happening above her. This room, this theatre, was so surreal. In front of her silent images danced on a looming screen as they watched from a balcony.

Next to her sat her 8 year old son; his brown hair skimming the tops of his bronzed shoulders. He was still in his blue and white swim trunks; his flip-flops lost to the chaos. She pulled his face close to hers and then inspected him carefully. He looked untouched. Expecting the warm, sticky blood she had read described in so many novels, she was pleased when she felt her head and recovered nothing but sand. Once convinced neither suffered life threatening injuries, she sat with her arm around her son. She could see the curly hair on her other boys sitting a few seats away. They were watching the movie and though a bit smudged with dirt and sweat, they looked ok too.

How long were they supposed to sit down here? Would he come get them?

Thinking of her husband, she wondered if he was safe. In all honesty, she was surprised that hundreds of people weren’t packed into the theater with them. If they weren’t here, she hoped they were able to leave safely; the alternative was unthinkable. She shook her head, forcing loose those horrifying thoughts. At that moment, she realized she had never been to this theatre before. In fact, she didn’t even know they made multi story movie theaters underground. Where the hell was she? Her vision began to get a bit fuzzy and her skin started to feel prickly.

Something was wrong. Something was very wrong.

It was supposed to be a beautiful day at the beach. The boys were splashing in the surf under the clear California blue skies. Families as far as the eye could see dotted the coast line, escaping the heat of summer. Shortly after finishing their picnic lunch, the screaming and running and trampling began. She wasn’t even sure what it was, but her husband had given her specific instructions, “take the boys into that building!”

As she was thinking back over every moment which had propelled her to this, her eyes focused on the empty chairs where her boys once sat. Where had they gone? Panic replaced the confusion that pulsed through her veins.

Then she heard it; screaming and the hollow pounding of feet racing down a stair case. She ran to the door nearest her, surprised to find crowds of people. She caught sight of her husband and other boys a few feet away and tried to reach for them. Could they not hear her? Could they not see her? The boys had red streaks of muddied tears across their cheeks and she could clearly hear her youngest crying out for her. Her body began to shake and a primal cry escaped her.

Her eyes opened to a void of black. She could see nothing, but all of the fear and pain and horror remained. She blinked away the tears as she sobbed and rolled over on to her side. She had no idea where she was. Was she… dead? Was she dreaming? As she collected her thoughts like cards scattered across the floor, her hand instinctively reached out to where she thought there might be a remote control for a light.

The room flooded with disorienting light as her husband groaned and rolled over, pulling the covers off of her. Her confusion only grew. As she scanned the room, it seemed as though it was full of hard unfamiliar edges. Still crying, she climbed out of bed and tip-toed down the dark hallway. With growing confidence in her surroundings, she found her sleeping trio of boys, tan and clean and soft.

As she lay back down, fear covered her like a second skin. Fear that the peace of this sleepy, warm summer night was, in fact, the dream.

There’s some good stuff in here. There’s a dark thread. I read it several times though and I can’t make sense of it. Maybe that’s the idea, but I can’t understand the flow. Is it a nightmare? Anyway, I liked it. I just think maybe the reader needs some more pointers to help them orientate themselves. Not to ruin the dreamscape, but to aid in the readability.

Yeah, I know. I almost didn’t post it at all. I find beauty in writing when I feel what the character is feeling regardless if I find the world they are in beautiful. In this case, I thought I woul try to write about an experience I had with a dream that was so deep I didn’t know what was real when I woke up. I had to take a few moments to remember my real life. I hoped that I might draw people in with the emotion, but realize that ultimately it was too confusing to be effective. Maybe next time I’ll get it. I guess I just need to visit more often! Thanks for the comment!!

Brina, OMG you did it TOOOO

I got goosebumps at the moment “Something was wrong”

THIS IS THE EXACT THING I WAS TALKING ABOUT!!!

How do you give someone goosebumps like that.

ie The Rod Serling thing.

I felt like *I too* was dead (the HORROR… seriously, that `sinking-heart’ feeling) and – maybe in Hell (watching the movie) ie disoriented, and then: omg the RELIEF when you realize it was just a dream (ok horrid horrid nightmare), and – how much she loves her kids and husband and life, etc

Hmm – Which again – is probably the Literary Darwinist thing – maybe our Pleistocene-hangover minds are preprogrammed to avoid: death and danger and suchlike. (eg say – getting stampeded at the beach, etc)

This was a freaky good piece. Thanks for posting!!!!

I’m ver familiar with this scenario. It’s so like the nightmares I experience regularly. Something terrible happens, all my dark secrets are exposed, or something I hold dear is snatched away. It’s my dark night of the soul. That last sentence says it all.

Where am I?

I’m sitting in a courtyard and the air is warm. There are birds. Around me is the soft chatter of people sitting on wire chairs around circular wire tables. There’s background noise – its constant – a low humming, then hammering. A construction site. And traffic, of course. But here, in the courtyard, the birds are having a conversation, sparring with each other like bored siblings. I feel like I’m in a secret garden – which is ridiculous of course – I’m sharing this space with maybe twenty, thirty other people. All like me, taking a break from their day -chatting, reading or eating out of tupperware containers with plastic forks. We’re mostly in shade because of the high walls (on one side the office tower rises up 36 floors) but over there by the fountain the sunlight falls down through the branches of a paperbarked tree. It may reach me yet. There are mass plantings: cotoneaster, daylilies. Hostas in bloom. Flat clean flagstones. I can breathe. When winter comes, we’ll all retreat to the cafeteria whose wide windows look out on the place I sit now. I’ll be on the other side, huddled in a booth, watching the snowflakes fall into my garden, covering it carefully and keeping it for when I can return, with the others.

A siren squeals by. But it’s outside my world, and then it stops. I feel I could fall asleep.

Joe… thanks for posting another extra-ordinary piece. These are worthwhile ponderables.

I’ve been reading a lot of Lovecraft recently and the language is simply wonderful, theres also a beauty to the horror living in his words.

And heres my practice:

In the land of Eogain, eternal snow lies as far as the eye can see, covering the illusive valleys and the proud mountains with an ancient mantle.

I know this to be true for long ago, when the Sidhe still ruled over the green hills of Ériu, I sailed west, across the whispering mists and into the rolling islands of Ios Inn. From this land where the hills flow like the great waves of the sea, I first heard of Eogain, were snow rules immortal and men serve from ice castles while the true masters of the land, great white monsters of fur and teeth prowl about on unforgiving plains and icy shores.

I cannot fully describe the strange feeling that settled upon me when I first laid eyes on the white shores, but what I will say is that a sense of freedom overtook my mind while my very body laid paralysed at the sight of the deadly purity in the horizon.

How good this article is! I like it. I will share with my friends. I hope that many people also have hobby the same as me.

What I find beautiful about great writing is when I feel like the writer has read my mind. Connectivity is the reason why we share our writing and the moment we understand each other, we seem less alone. So much of our lives I think we silently think to ourselves: “It can’t be like that… I must be crazy…” but in actuality, I’m betting at least a dozen people have thought the same thoughts but have not voiced them. Beautiful writing is jarring, and yet, fitting.

Inside a lovely restaurant called Seasons, I note the passing yachts on the waterway. Soft music drifts from the piano bar and the enticing scent of garlic is tossed through the ceiling fans as it drifts from the kitchen. Yet what captures my eye is the woman at the next table. I admire the soft ruffle at the neckline of her white blouse, the cotton puffs of white hair surrounding a rosy face. She is intent on conversation with her partner, an elderly gentleman. Her gnarled hand is interlaced with his like a teenager. Her musical peals of laughter respond to their conversation. She stands briefly to visit with guests at the next table, her long skirt in tones of pink and mauve swirling around her ankles, then returns to her table. Soon she rises, unfolds the portable walker for her companion and slowly nods and smiles her way to the exit and a scarlet sunset. Surely this season of life deserves an ovation.

Eva, I enjoyed reading this a great deal. What a poignant and vivid celebration of a graceful woman of timeless beauty! I love that you created such an airy, even scented ambiance with expressive imagery – the waterway complete with passing yachts, the promise of dinner on the way in whiff of garlic, cotton puffs and even a scarlet sunset!

Thank you for your sensitive comments!

Dad drove my old sister, Jane and I to a Chinese New Year parade five towns away. My stomach curled the whole trip from inhaling the intense metal stench combined with Dad’s man odour. I always wondered how Jane could sit there in her own little world, earphones dangling down her shirt as she gazed at the signs that passed by.

‘Girls, we’re here, make sure we stay together’ dad said, helping unbuckle my seatbelt. ’and you cheeky one, hold on’ i clutched tightly to his large, ruddy palm and held out my other hand and called out, ‘Jane, daddy said we should stay together.

She cocked her left eyebrow.‘that is so childish’ walking ahead with her dark ponytail bouncing on her neck. There were these gold, crimson lanterns hanging on the side of the buildings and stuck on walls. Just as the colours were all so striking, sounds of foreign music and celebration were just as loud as we trailed through the dark haired, pale, foreigners, enthusiastically chanting ‘xing ye quai lao’.

‘xing ye quai lao’ called out dad, shaking his fist in the air. He shook his other hand so I was shaking with him.

He yelled out again ‘Come on Jane, xing ye quai lao!’ After turning her head, she wrinkled her nose and put her earphones back in her ears. Again, she was in her own little world. Sliding her hands in her pocket, she strolled coolly with the crowd and halted when she reached a jeweller, experimentally flicking through the gold jewels. ‘Dad, can I get this.’ Unhanging a pair of earrings from the hook, beaming her best smile. I let go of dad’s hand and ran to Jane and picked up a similar pair from the hook, calling out, ‘Me too’

Dad smiled , hanging the ring back up before nodding to the frail, woman sitting on the stool. ‘ We will have so much fun celebrating, we won’t need those earrings okay?’ patting my hair.

‘come on jane, quickly we are going to miss the dragon show,’ he called in a thick voice.

Unable to tear her eyes from the earrings, she cussed. ‘I want them’.

I tugged dad’s linen sleeve ‘ I want them too daddy’.

‘Come on, I have something special for you two today, ‘ Dad said with a grin before following the path of sizzling beef and chicken. The drums and tambourines played even louder than before. A woman dressed in a red gown tapped my dad’s shoulder and

sorry this is really bad :s this story is meant to be about ‘belonging’ but i really am stuck. any ideas?

i need more descriptive language to describe the narrator’s thoughts but i am very poor at writing descriptions and also any ideas how i should end it?

They drove up the highway about 2 miles and turned on to a gravel road that wound through golden grass. The sun was edging toward the horizon turning the clouds pink. The lake was a couple of rattling miles up the gravel road. By the time they arrived, it was pink in the glow of sun and more like a big pond than a real lake. There were dragonflies and mosquitoes and swallows skimmed across the water for bugs.

They found a spot under large oak where the grass was shorter and the roots of the tree were like chairs. The hum and buzz of the bugs, flutter and splash of birds and whispery hiss of grass and reeds played for them a song. They sat and ate in silence listening as the sun fell into the clouds and set them on fire.

“Thees ees perfect, like magic.” Essie whispered awestruck.

“Sure is. Its like a dream and we can fly.” Maddie leapt up and ran flapping her arms, making long graceful leaps through the field toward the lake. Essie’s laugh choked off in a gasp as Maddie disappeared like she had fallen into a hole. Essie got up and ran her heart thumping. Maddie stood up beside her. “Gotcha!” she yelled, and ran wildly away.

That was a great piece on beautiful writing, Joe. I like your answer to Liz’s question if you understood Faulkner. I’m like you. The story, even if I can’t follow it, is a structure to hang masterly writing on. (Or does the beauty of the writing overshadow the story arc?) I’m an admirer of John Updike, and other word magicians who captivate and inspire.

thank, i understand more from this articles. what makes beautiful writing beautiful!

There was nothing inside but long swathes of shot silk dyed in the most beautiful colours Calliope had ever seen: pistachio, eggshell, bistre, vermilion, tangelo, smoke. They moved lazily in the afternoon breeze, tall columns of sunset colours dancing and weaving, and Calliope was mesmerised. Slowly she walked across the room, running her hand through the weightless fabric, feeling it slide through her fingers like petals. She pulled the many-coloured silks against her burning cheeks and wound them around the tips of her fingers. They slid around her like water, cooling her perspiring body. The rainforest sighed through the open walls, and the silks swirled sensuously against her skin.

Thanks for this practice and lesson, Joe. Although I love a well written scene that involves a beautiful sunset or an angelic face, I’m with Dutton that “We find beauty in something done well.” Beauty in writing for me is a sentence that is so well written, I have to read it a few times. Usually it’s something jarringly simple that touches my heart or a metaphor so brilliant, I am wowed by the author’s skill in word choice. My favorite novels are marked with highlights or pens scratches or dog eared. I don’t mind marking up my books to remember what I found beautiful…here’s an example:

“We did our best to rub two sticks of life together to make a small fire to live by…”

“The Bible is like a particular music, you cannot always catch the tune of it.”

“He felt he was more silence than boy.”

“When it’s over, I want to say: all my life I was a bride married to amazement.”

Yikes! How can I consider posting a practice after saying this?

I really like this article!

Daybreak is my favorite time to escape into the train-abandoned railway trails, the “tracks” as we locals call them. The western end of the Island boasts the most unbroken routes. Lush vegetation grows with enviable freedom, and the seasons spoil walkers and joggers with variety of beauty. During cherry season, the unbeaten fruit drops to the ground. The bright, red beads squash underfoot and permeate the air with a cherry-wine fermentation.

Inhale deeply in the spring and summer and fill your nostrils with fragrant lilac. The scent will capture your attention before you notice the trees hovering overhead. The most spectacular are the flaming poinciana trees that stretch their branches across the paths below. Their flowers of bright red (my favorite) and orange accurately imitate the fiery drama of flames. The branches eventually shed the blossoms in a continuous cascade, covering the paths in a soft blanket of flowers, until only a layer of finger like green leaves remain.

A golden glow dances over my face as the last rays of sunlight filter through the leaves of the oak tree And finally the best part of my day begins as the sun takes his fiery leave. Soon the moon takes his rightful place as peaceful ruler of the sky, and shines gratefully on the oak tree who, being such a loyal subject, reaches out to the moon with long, graceful arms. And as it miraculously happens every night, yin and yang take their place, as must happen. Beauty.

Pink light rippled, mused, and mingle fused with violet and plum. Across the water, vibrating fiddles danced. Saga walked along the edge, digging her nose in tuffs of grass. The sun peeked from behind the hills, casting it’s midnight rays into the clouds–wisps and bellows lingering, listening to Nordic fiddles play. Upon the water the sky reflected a mixture of purple, pink, gold, and midsummer gray. Saga wagged her tail. I lit a cigarette and walked, wondering from where the music played.

I don’t know another would describe this as beautiful, but for me it’s a moment I personally cherish and think is beautiful.

It was early one blissful Saturday, when I saw him standing over the crib with a baby happily sleeping in his arms. My eyes were irregularly light, unlike the previous mornings when they were hooded with fatigue. He was singing, something Evie particularly enjoyed as well as myself. I pulled the sheets closer to my chin and savored the calm singing of the birds and Jared. After Evie was thoroughly put out and the sun began to awake, he turned and met my eyes. Sharing a smile, he came to me and placed his full lips on mine. As quietly as we could, Jared scooted in snugly next to me and wrapped his arms, the ones that had just held our beautiful daughter, around me. I don’t know if it was the extra sleep I’d gotten, the hormones, or the familiar, cozy smell and hug of Jared, but I couldn’t be more elated than in that moment. I didn’t feel like talking, afraid I might disturb the quiet bliss of the moment. My Jared, my baby Evie, this Saturday morning in the silky sheets of our queen size bed I wouldn’t forget.

My smile is knowing that over the last two months I’ve made almost forty dollars writing. What’s even more important? I have touched lives.

I am sat astride a silver cow my chest bedecked with beads, my hair a mess of roses, the dervishes and belly dancers whirl eurythmic to the fair and harmonious drone of middle eastern strings. In this tent, in this palace the fresh spring water arrives in silver goblets on silver platters. Trays of fruit arrive, cut in tender slices. Lengths of white silk are wound round and round, guests and dancers, columns and a thrones. All of sudden there is total silence, the astrologogue gives her fatiloquent pronouncement and the canvas ceiling is ripped from the tent to reveal the astriferous nightsky. Gasps and applause. Still in the distance the alpenglow lies red upon the mountains, the night will be long and full of wonders.

A soft blue dawn graces the smoother side of the rougher crag. It began some minutes ago, sending out slow creeping shoots of bluish light, cresting the side of the impassable horizon. Now it reaches farther, illuminating the snow covered tops of shaggy pines, awakening the little flighty red robins and the serene nobility of the heron. The undisturbed cool pool of water stretching itself lazily along the open grass land, cushioning itself against a bank of young firs, reflected and refracted those muted yet vibrant beams of light. Hush, now a soft quick hare rushes across the plain, snow flying. No matter, soon he is gone and the landscape settles back to its magnificent indifference, waiting to welcome another powerful lighted day. The rough clad mountain deepens its sheer face’s shade as its pinnacle begins to glow with the dawn. A young owl, back late from a long tireless night of hunting, wings its way back to its clutch, hooting softly. And now: the sun breaks out from its prison of a horizon at all once, filling the sky with a newborn majesty, casting out the dim darkness, and adding a layer of black pitch to those uncouth remaining shadows. The crisp cold air seems to almost crackle like the lake ice, as it too is filled with light. It is the dawn and it is the sun.

When I was found.

Running free, sprinting across plains dried out by the glowing globe above. New smells, new everything, how did I get here? Why am I running? I don’t know who is running alongside me, but they have been here for as long as I can remember. From pretty swaying objects both towering and minute that seem to be lacking colour, but that doesn’t seem to be bothering me.

We run, underfoot the ground abruptly changes from soft, humid and cool to hard, rugged and hot. Thirst, my tongue is hanging, dry like the solid black ground beneath us. Little do we know that we are being talked of.

Something approaches, a hum turns to roar, a screech, and the noise is gone. Nevertheless, the object still remains, close and intimidating. A being clambers out, slow and lethargic, it has purpose but seems on edge, unsure of itself.

My comrades scarper, they leave me behind with nothing but thorny shrub beside me to hide my presence. I jump in, oblivious to the burrs that would take a fair while to extract. It knows I’m here. Thirst. Terror. What fate awaits? Alone I feel the drops hit my nose and ears, I look up to see, among the thicket, more drops, my tongue laps what it can, thirst takes control and I surrender myself to temptation and head out.

Grasped, lifted and trapped. Placed into the object that roared before. imprisoned. Alone. The being enters and places a bowl before me. I drink. Thirst disappearing. Thought returns. Who is this? I don’t know, but he seems friendly…

A grain of sand

Hello? Hello! Can you hear me? I am down here, yes over here. I want to tell you a story, the story how a majestic mountain became a little grain of sand. Once upon a time, my summit reached into the sky, I was a gargantuan mountain and everyone knew me. I had been created in the thunderstorms and eruptions billions of years ago. Hardly had I ever thought that I would lie once at a beach. I was caught up in a whirlwind of time. Time is the force which destroys anything without using force. Even the biggest mountain chain, the strongest beast, everything. First, the rain washed down my hat of snow, rivers slowly eroded the granite from my feet. And I? I just had to wait, looking what time can do. In no way had I thought a mountain like me could fade away. Rain after rain, storm after storm, wind after wind. All these things lethargicly transformed me in what I am now. Once, a meteorite hit my side, that night I lost my most beautiful escarpment. My friend once told me that we will see us again. At a beach, with millions of others who faced the same fate.

Years after years, I had become a rock. A rock laying on the side of the street in front of a castle. Everyone stepped on me. A little boy threw me into the dirty water, me the little leftover of one of the biggest mountains ever existed. I laid there for over a century. Travelling with the current, no possibility to grab the wheel and steer for my own destiny. I ended up at a beach, millions of little grains of sand there, some were quiet, others had to tell a lot. And now you are here, and I told you my story, and fade away with the next wave.

Pink and white petals were drifting off the great cherry tree and gnarled old Bosch Pear swirling down on on a wet Spring breeze, they clung to my bare skin. I was a little girl dancing with delight in my rumba pants, and nothing else except rain and sticky petals. Dancing in the sunshine and drizzle on an Oregon day where it can rain while the sun shines at the same moments creating rainbows you can catch if you are young and fast enough and filled with joy. And what caught my little eye? But a huge, bursting, blooming purple magnolia bud. Just ready to unfold into a blossom. The first on my grandmothers prize magnolia tree. She had been waiting for this flower for a very long time. She would be just thrilled to see this flower! This is what I thought as I plucked it and held it in my hand. Bigger than my hands I held it cupped there and gazed at it. It was marvelous. I ran inside, slamming the back door behind me. Look! I’m sure I shouted. Instantly my young dark haired mother and my grandma saw me with my prize. Grandma was peeling carrots in the sink. “Look what I found for you”. But I had made a grave mistake. I had picked the flower too soon. They had been watching it for days, waiting for nature to have her moment and unfold the bud. And I had broken it off the tree. They spanked me right on my frilly rumba pants. I was very sorry. The magic of the morning was gone. I have been more cautious ever since in grabbing beauty to be mine.

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