Writing for an Audience or Something Like That

Writing gives you the illusion of control, and then you realize it's just an illusion, that people are going to bring their own stuff into it. -- David Sedarus

This has been an interesting week for communication and failure to communicate. I have shared my writing with several individuals and found that where I was going with a piece or a scene was not necessarily where my reader found themselves.

One wonders, I wonder, how much of my stories are going to be transmitted as they are in my brain and how much will just be fodder for the fantasies and mindscape of a reader. For instance, I told three people the same story with four parts. I was clear that the writing was true but not accurate. This literary genre being variously called: non-fiction fiction, nearly fiction, or the old artistic license. As Mark Twain is said to have said:

The difference between fiction and non-fiction is that fiction must be absolutely believable.

So I told the four part story to the three people and each found some part believable as fact or at least non-fiction. However, each listener found different combinations of fiction versus non-fiction in the elements of my tale. Apparently we decide which is right and which is an illusion.

Which leads me to another strange discovery on the subject of the written word. Being back in a stable environment, meaning I am going to be here for a time measured in months not days, perhaps even years not months. Being in such a place, I have launched myself onto an internet dating site or two. On one of these I use "Poker Shrink" as my screen name. One member of the female variety actually found a way to make Poker Shrink obscene. Yes, there actually is an X-rated interpretation of that moniker. A large dill pickle if you get it; don't try too hard she was a really inventive ....... character.

So the moral of this pondering -- Don't be careful what you write, it's all going to be interpreted completely differently by whomever reads it anyway. Speaking of which, you know a good plastic surgeon could fix that.

ScreenWritin'

There is a huge difference between writing a book and writing a screenplay. I am not sure if the difficulties are decreased or increased if one is attempting to create the script from a book they have already written. What I can say for sure is that the "play" in screenplay is a lot more fun than the book was at any point.

Spending a week plus here in Austin with Amy and Eric has meant that Aimlessly and I have had a lot of time to think through and talk through the status of our joint effort to turn Check Raising the Devil into a movie. I am strongly of the opinion that we have a solid 120 page draft. Amy firmly believes the first 40 pages she was edited are indeed worthy and the rest is "shrink drafty." She may have a point.

As to the process, if you have read the book, you know it is completely in the first person of Mike "The Mouth". That format was both defining and limiting. I admit to being opposed to it but every other person involved in the decision making process was for it, soest. In the screenplay, on the other hand, being able to add a character/observer/commentator at any juncture is remarkably freeing. I particularly enjoyed adding "The Shady Character" as our meth dealer on the rail at Binion's. Plus we have the freedom of having any random player at any poker table say what you and I and every 2+2 forum weenie wants to say to Mike. Very freeing.

In the end, this may or may not make it to the big silver screen. All I can promise is that if we get this film made, poker players will walk out of the theatre saying: "Finally a poker movie that got the game right!"

Oh and about that academy award. We have exactly a 0.003% better chance of being nominated than you do; unless you have an unfinished screenplay in bottom desk drawer, in that case it's a dead heat.

A Mix and Match Rant

Two items cross my path in the last forty-eight. Hmm, perhaps it was their paths that crossed. Whatever, I have been putting in a clump of hours on the Matusow screenplay and in that light I was interested in an article link sent to me by three separate friends. The title is: No I Will Not Read Your Fucking Script. If you are considering a screenplay, novel, short story or even a blog; I cordially invite you to read it. To my friends, buddies, pals and family members who will be getting our screenplay in a few weeks, thanks in advance and if you read this psot, maybe please thank-you also read the article.

Item two is a quotation from Zen and the Art of Motorcycle Maintenance by Robert Pirsig:

There is an evil tendency underlying all our technology - the tendency to do what is reasonable even when it isn't any good.

Now I'm no Luddite, my life has been dramatically changed by the personal computer and the internet. But all great advances have a dark underbelly. OK, most of them do; I haven't done an exhaustive list. And it is not just reasonable outcomes that can fail to be accretive to the good of humanity. There are simply less than satisfactory non-accomplishments that abound because of our really big technocracy. The primary culprit in today's rant is writing. Sure start a blog, write every day or twice a year; good for you, get it out, say it, write. But that does not make you a writer.

As the article says: "It rarely takes more than a page to recognize that you're in the presence of someone who can write, but it only takes a sentence to know you're dealing with someone who can't. By the way, here's a simple way to find out if you're a writer. If you disagree with that statement, you're not a writer. Because, you see, writers are also readers."

Mind you I say this as an apprentice writer. No not a writer yet, despite having a book and a couple of hundred articles on poker out there plus several fiction pieces floating about the interwebs. But I am an aspiring, apprentice writer. Nasty (unpublished) comments I get on this blog regularly remind me of my shortcomings, real or imagined by my faithful if cranky readers.

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photo credit: FlickrPhotos