Hey! Sorry, this topic is late this month - time keeps running away from me. Speaking of which, don't forget the F.Scott Fitzgerald Short Story Contest. Entries must be postmarked by July 18th!

Epiphanies - Those moments we wait for when everything falls into place, NOT to be confused with that religious thing about the manifestation of the divine nature of Christ to the Gentiles as represented by the Magi - you know, the three wise men.

I do wonder if I have been incredibly dense sometimes. Do you ever have those moments when a way to improve your writing becomes suddenly apparent? Not too long ago, I believe I talked about making my writing simpler and more complex at the same time. The simpler part involved using obvious literary techniques (the emphasis on obvious) less - and in response to someone else's comments - I believe that was Jerri talking about red hair - the hair also needed to serve double duty. In the not so distant past, I might have given a character red hair merely to distinguish her from another character. Now, I would want the red tint to also signify something in her character such as her persistance or stubborn nature.

7/17 - Reading this over today, I realized that as usual, I'd talked about the upside instead of the downside. That's not always such a good thing. For the first time in my short writing career, I've been asked to do a reading based on something published and asked how many friends I plan to take to a launch party for the anthology. Gee, I almost deleted that email because I didn't recognize the sender! You would think that I'd be up, up, up. But in reality, I've been down.

I don't worry about the down days anymore. After being through it so many times, I understand that it's part of my process. I can't move on to the next level until I SEE what I've been doing wrong. Why did I think that sentence was clever? What happened to my plot? These are the days that come before my "aha" moments. When I was in school I don't think I ever talked about the bad days. That's just not my way. But I have them too.

Do you have epiphanies? What's your process like?

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marystojak

Edited: 07/17/2008 at 01:34 PM by Mary Stojak

Here's the website for the contest: http://www.montgomerycollege.e...20call%20for%20ent.pdf Someone I was in a JHU workshop with, did win this before.

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marystojak

Edited: 07/17/2008 at 01:20 PM by Mary Stojak

One moonlit night I was wheeling my garbage can up my driveway to place it near the curb for the morning pickup, an empty-minded ritual I had done for a dozen years. But on that particular night the moon shone bright and the driveway was lit up in a way that set it apart from the bordering trees and grass. It was then that I first noticed it: my driveway had the same length, downward slope, and curvature to the left as the street in front of my childhood home many years ago and miles away. I wondered why I hadn't noticed it before. My Epiphany Number One: I wondered, how much the layout of my driveway, with its similarity to my childhood street, subconsciously added to my decision to buy my house a dozen year's earlier?

My Epiphany Number Two: I looked back over all of my stories that had a street or road in them. Sure enough, the streets sloped downward and curved to the left.

My General Epiphany: There is a reason for anything you write. If you say a character has red hair, there is a reason for it. For some, maybe it's the long forgotten imprint caused by a crush on a red-hair girl long ago in the fifth grade. So I say go easy on yourself. If your descriptive choices don't seem to do much other than be descriptive, go ahead and make them work harder. But ask yourself, why did I make that choice in the first place? The answer might be deeper than you think.

Mary says "those moments we wait for" -- but does anyone out there DO anything in an attempt to GET to a moment of epiphany? Can it be an active process, or do we have to wait for the Muse to strike?

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Jerri Bell
Moderator

I can connect with your driveway. You provided a good picture of it too! I do have this ritual that I used to do every day to get a spark. Don't do it that often nowadays but still works for me. I started doing collecting all these literary criticism books and "how to's" a long time ago and the earlier books are mainly by authors that no one recognizes. Now, I like to read the writing non-fiction books by authors I know. If I read for about half an hour, something will click and get me started if I've hit a dry spell. That's also frequently when I get "aha" moments. So, yeah, I still collect those books and will probably read them many times before they get moved to the "yes, I'm finally finished with them," bookcase. Weird, I know. But works for me. Hope people keep writing about "writing." M

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marystojak