Out of the Tunnel

I haven’t blogged for a long while. I was ill for six weeks before Christmas but forced myself to study; scared that I would get behind. In some ways it was therapeutic as it took my mind off things. Christmas came and went and now I’m in the last year (hopefully) of the PhD.

It’s difficult to find anything worth sharing at the moment. If there was a webcam feed from my study it would make for rather dull watching. It’s all about editing, editing and editing. This is the hard slog part of the process. I’ve written here before about self motivation and it continues to apply. It takes effort to get up every morning sit at the laptop and concentrate for hours on end.

I have got stuck into the thesis. I have narrowed it down from what I originally proposed and have a framework in place. More research to be done but I now know what to focus on. I’m planning to submit a poster in March and this is proving a helpful milestone.

Imagine - Ian Rankin

I’m still here and in the middle of editing. I haven’t blogged about it because it’s hard slog and I’m not sure there’s anything about it worth posting. I took great comfort, therefore, from a recent BBC documentary on Ian Rankin (for those in the UK it will be on I Player for a few more days). I don’t pretend to compare myself to him but it was good to know that successful writers also have ups and downs during the writing process.

The documentary included interviews, as well as recordings made by the author using a hand held camera. He was very honest and showed that it’s not as simple as sitting in a lovely study and drafting a polished novel in six months. I wanted to share a couple of quotes which held some resonance with me but please take a look at the programme if you can.

On the writing process, “It’s still a weird rollercoaster. One day I’m enjoying it, the next day I’m not. One day I think it’s ok, the next day I think it’s dreadful and it isn’t working.”

On the novel, “The real world is very messy and incomplete and often our questions aren’t answered and we can’t always make sense of things. What the novel does for me is that kind of therapeutic thing of giving a shape. Suddenly I can take all that mess, all these notes and clippings and give them a shape...an arc, make it into a story and that is very satisfying.”

Encouragement

I had a positive tutorial earlier this week. I submitted the first draft of chapters nineteen to thirty but also the first proper edit of chapters two and three. Good news re the latter – there were less comments in the margins and more ticks. The only issue is that in making my protagonist's desire clearer, she now comes across as rather selfish. Although we see her change dramatically by the end of the novel, few readers are going to find that out if they decide by chapter two that they don’t like her and put the book down. Fortunately, it’s a problem that can be easily fixed.

I started editing chapter six today. After the first read through I was appalled at how bad it is but thankfully I know why and what I need to do to fix it.

I hope to have a decent second draft of the novel by Christmas. After that, I’ll submit it to my tutor and prepare for the inevitable draft three. Yes, I know there will be a draft four, five, six... Writing a novel is not a quick, easy process. It is hard work, challenging and lonely but rewarding when those ticks appear in the margin.

Editing

I didn’t realise how long it’s been since I last posted; I’ve been lost in the world of editing. It’s a fascinating process and I’m learning a great deal. I’m taking a chapter at a time and reviewing structure, setting, character and style. It’s difficult not to address all these elements at once so I’m very strict with myself and take each in turn. Setting is turning out to be interesting – I did include it in the first draft but am now looking at it much more closely from my protagonists’ point of view. My favourite stage is the review of style. Knowing that I’m content (at the moment) with all the other elements I can focus on the sentence structure, vocabulary etc. It’s as if I am seeing the manuscript through a magnifying glass and all manner of mistakes appear. Editing is a very time consuming process and requires a structured approach, as well as patience. It’s worth it. Only twenty eight chapters to go.

The Last Chapter

Exciting news – I have finished the first draft of the novel. I am actually more emotional than I expected. It is a milestone that I have been doggedly working towards for eighteen months and I feel a certain amount of relief that I have finally got there.

That is the good news. However, there are still many, many hours of work. What I have produced (I think) is a strong outline. I now have to go back, take a chapter at a time and build on the character and description elements. This should hopefully be more freeing than the process so far which has been slowed by the significant amount of historical research that I’ve needed to do. A key element will be to feed the creative side of my brain and, as I have written here before, just have fun with it.

Oh yes, I also have to keep reading and researching for my thesis. I aim to take some time off at Christmas but until then it is heads down…

Other Voices, Other Times

I recently attended a one day symposium titled Other Voices, Other Times; the aim of which was to explore representation in historical and fantasy writing. It was a wonderful, if rather busy day at one of Bath Spa University’s beautiful campuses in Wiltshire. It began with the keynote speakers Ashley Pharoah (Life on Mars, Ashes to Ashes) and Professor Gerard Woodward on writing the seventies. It’s interesting that even when writing about a decade that many in the audience could remember, there are still debates to be had about what actually happened and what people remembered happening.
I then attended the ethical perspectives workshop which covered: the relationship between writing history and historical fiction (this was covered in depth at last years’ Institute of Historical Research conference); voices of the forgotten; and the question of authenticity (this kept cropping up during the day). A fascinating aspect was the role that creative writing is now taking in museums. Indeed, one of my favourite notes that I took of the day was ‘writer as curator.’
The second keynote speakers were Celia Brayfield (reading Fay Weldon’s paper as she was unable to attend) and Dr Ian Mortimer. The former suggesting that historical research need only be basic and the latter that there will always be a gap between the writing of history and historical fiction.
Finally, I went to a workshop that included a paper on one novelists’ experience of researching and writing a novel on the 1857 Indian Uprising. Although my novel is set in a different period, I could relate to the various issues and felt less alone. I came away from the day inspired and very enthusiastic about getting on with my novel (four chapters to go...).

Researching the Arts

This week I was allowed out from behind my desk to go to a Researching the Arts conference – research students from the School of Arts presenting papers and performing/reading. The creative part of the brain needs to be fed; this can mean pinning up inspiring pictures on the walls around your desk to visiting a museum. The conference was an excellent way of stimulating this creative side. The performances, whether they were readings from novels in progress or music composed on a laptop, were inspiring on their own. However, the accompanying papers made my brain work harder to find connections between the art forms. Two of the papers focussed on the relationship between music and visual arts. Again, I found myself wondering at just how different mediums allow us to express ideas so very differently. What would chapter six of my novel look like as a painting or a film? What would the accompanying musical score sound like? I hope to present at next year’s conference and am very much looking forward to it.