Battling the Crutchword Curse

It's one of those things we do without thinking. Awkward silences bring forth um's and ah's, followed by crutchwords that pepper everyday conversations in an effort to fill the gaps in our vocabulary. My pet crutchwords tend to revolve around connectors relating to time - 'after a moment', 'then', 'and then'...

But, yes, I'm sure my use of crutchwords spans a wider range than this in reality:)

Unfortunately, writing - like speech - is often infected by this very same malady: the curse of the crutchwords.

Hmmmm, 'curse'. Strong word, that. But they really are a bit of a curse, aren't they? I mean, though crutchwords oil the wheels (a bit like comfort food ha), they always seem to result in lazy dialogue. Especially on paper.

Crutchwords can make a passage turn boring in the blink of an eye. The same words repeated every so often is the perfect recipe for stale writing.

Stale writing... Every writer shudders at the thought.

The thing is, writing - good writing - is crafted. It's really not everyday dialogue.

Even though the first few drafts of a work might feel like an ordinary conversation, depicting plot, character and voice on paper is very much a conscious task. Whether in terms of word choice, emotive limits, or any number of a million little things that make us tweak and jab, worry and erase, write and write and write - writing is so blatantly a craft.

Crafting involves shaping, exploring - sometimes breaking boundaries - but consciously so. In this conscious effort to craft however, a scene in one's head, so beautifully created and held, can be diluted painfully in translation.

Words used to compose the picture of one's story - the 'right', most accurate, words - are often woefully absent in one's mind just when you need them the most.

The writing process can then become one of desperation (for some) in balancing perception with execution.

This is the moment when most writers find themselves relying on crutchwords. They get you through difficult passages before you forget important elements of your mental image; you get at least the basics of your imaginative vision down before it's gone forever.

So, why worry about crutchwords at all? They seem to be a pretty serviceable tool, hmmm? Why are they such a plague in writerly minds?

The problem is, many writers aren't aware they're using crutchwords. I know I'm not. I definitely can't sieve them out of my work right from the beginning, not when my piece is still being formed, still being grown and layered in my mind. Even after a first draft is written, obvious deficiencies can easily escape me.

Maybe my imagination is still brilliant at this point with the image I've tried to depict. Unlike a first time reader of the story, maybe I'm engaged too strongly in the imaginative world underlying the story to detect its obvious flaws.

I guess that's why perfecting and re-perfecting the drafts of a work is so important to writers like me. The need to redraft often, polish often, is perhaps a need that will diminish in intensity the more experienced one is at the craft of writing. But until one reaches that 'higher' level of experience, it's probably beneficial to let a piece of writing - like wine - breathe before you visit it once more.

What I know for certain is, leaving my writing untouched for a week at least almost always guarantees me seeing it with new eyes. At this point, I can easily spot crutchwords that would have been invisible to me before.

Hmmm, how shall I conclude this post? I started out by seeing crutchwords as a curse, something which makes a writer's masterpiece flawed and terrifyingly monotonous. But I think that's only half the story.

After all, crutchwords don't pretend to be anything they're not, do they? ... Just a shoulder to happily lean on until one's writing legs have worked out their kinks.

I suppose, at their most basic level, crutchwords are merely a symptom of a larger problem: unpolished writing.

But, you know, the great thing about recognising the symptoms of a problem is, it becomes so much more solve-able than when you didn't know it existed:)

Battling the Crutchword Curse

Book Review: 'Lolita' by Vladimir Nabokov

When I finally picked up Lolita by Vladimir Nabokov, it was for two reasons.

I'd been curious about the controversy surrounding the story for the longest time, one which centred on the book's plot:  a middle-aged man's attraction to a sexually precocious 12 year old girl.

My second reason was a passage from Lolita that I'd come across in a book on writing tools; a passage that was written so beautifully, so economically, so evocatively, so damn well in fact, that it piqued my interest and made me wish to discover more of the voice Nabokov had created in this infamous story.

I guess this is where I quote the passage that caught my eye in the first place. I wonder if it will grab you and never let go the way it did me.

"Lolita, light of my life, fire of my loins. My sin, my soul. Lo-lee-ta: the tip of the tongue taking a trip of three steps down the palate to tap, at three, on the teeth. Lo. Lee. Ta.

She was Lo, plain Lo, in the morning, standing four feet ten in one sock. She was Lola in slacks. She was Dolly at school. She was Dolores on the dotted line. But in my arms she was always Lolita."

These lines set the stage for protagonist Humbert Humbert's unhealthy obsession with 12 year old Dolores Haze, to whom he affectionately *shuddering with distaste here* awards the pet name 'Lolita'.

Soon, we are introduced quite intimately to the desperate, near-monochromatic world of seduction, corruption and self-indulgence that makes up Humbert Humbert's entire world view. And we are made to watch with a kind of horrified fascination as his sometimes hilarious methods to obtain the object of his infatuation come closer and closer to success.

Humbert Humbert's ruthless manouvering into Lolita's life (to the point of becoming her stepfather) and the subsequent swift unravelling of her world - and his - occurs with a deft, graceful hand.

But what surprised me most about Lolita was the sheer honesty in Nabokov's writing.

Nabokov isn't pulling any punches here. There is no pretence. This story is blatantly about the sexual attraction felt by a man for a child.

Yet, Nabokov handles his tale with the touch of a master. There is no explicit erotica, not in the modern sense of the word anyway; matters which occur under the sheets are hinted at more than painted in excruciating detail.

It's the emotional pain of the participatants in this tragic travesty of familial life that is so well drawn out. The  pain of innocence betrayed is breaking at the seams throughout the book. This, if anything, is what can make Lolita such a difficult book to read; it's impossible to remain removed from the plight of Nabokov's remarkable characters.

Young, vulnerable and precocious Lolita is gradually stripped of her freedom and innocence through choices quite beyond her control. And - in the saddest way - though it is impossible to sympathise with Humbert Humbert, there is definitely a sickening sense of fury and horror at being faced with the existence of this damned, selfish and utterly weak-minded personality who is so enslaved to his desires that he doesn't hesitate to wreck the lives of those too powerless to defend themselves from him.

Vivid and elegant prose aside, Nabokov's grasp on the dynamics of the human personality, his sensitivity to nuances of abuse, manipulation and deception that are often ignored, misunderstood or - sadly - left unvoiced by victims and onlookers alike, and his courage to tackle a subject that was taboo for reasons that are truly beyond me (shouldn't the protection of the defenseless be a priority over issues of potentially erotic subject matter?) has been eye-opening to me.

As a writer, and as an individual, I feel a renewed responsibility to speak for those who don't have a voice to fight for their freedom from abusive situations/relationships.

Lolita's storyline is one of perversity, yes, but it is a perversity which not only reveals the unreliability of the source of the story, Humbert Humbert, but also society's wilful turning of a blind eye to matters that disturb its clean and shiny persona.

Issues concerning the lack of care/protection of children is woven into the entire story in tiny, veiled glimpses, both in terms of Lolita's youthful confusion and heart-breaking need for a truly loving family, and in Humbert Humbert's clearly predatory attempts to make her his own.

At the end of the book, we are left to wonder: where was the rest of the world as this single individual systematically betrayed a child's trust in the most dissolute way under our very eyes?

Suffice to say, Lolita has surpassed both my curiosity and my expectations. Disturbing, thought-provoking, so well-written I couldn't put it down... Lolita is one of very few books that has succeeded in turning the story of a monster and victim into a subtle, personal lens on the way our world works to hide uncomfortable truths.

A subject that is so very distasteful is infused with authenticity, truth and a subtle undercurrent of blame towards those who take the innocence and care of children for granted despite the existence of predatory, diseased minds among us.

I've come to the conclusion now that Vladimir Nabokov's Lolita is one of the best books I've ever read. Chilling, and written with power and perception, this is Lolita. If the subject is within your comfort zone - or maybe even if it isn't - do give Lolita a read. I'm certain it will be a book you'll never forget.

Book Review: 'Lolita' by Vladimir Nabokov

It's NaNoWriMo time!

National Novel Writing Month 2011 has just begun!... Well, earlier this week anyway:) I'm finding the whole thing quite exciting. I've never participated in NaNoWriMo before. For one reason or another, I just never felt attracted to the concept.

Write 50,000 words of a novel in a month, and you win NaNoWriMo!

No emphasis on 'quality', genre, verification of whether you're cheating or not...

Yes, it seems quite superficial, doesn't it?... Except when you think of those two small things we call Freedom and Entertainment:)

Not to mention the impetus to utterly destroy the awful impulse to procrastinate *shudder* that so many of us writers suffer from ugh!

This year, I find myself flirting with NaNoWriMo - maybe even going on a first date with it (haven't registered on the site yet, but the wheels are definitely turnin' in that direction!)... The more I think about it, I can see why the idea is infectious to writers of all stripes. NaNoWriMo's basic philosophy is creative at the most visceral, genuine level. Namely: Get your butt in the chair and write.

Yes, it requires discipline. Yes, focus is a must. But, well, it's so damn fun, isn't it?

You're not writing with the goal of publication. You're not writing to illuminate the human condition. You're not trying to be original. You're not even trying to entertain.

You're just trying to write.

And, hey, if your book happens to create the germ of an idea for NaNoWriMo success stories - such as the novel 'Water For Elephants' by Sara Gruen - who's to complain?:)

Right now, nothing sounds more attractive to me than NaNoWriMo. It really does take all the pressure away, and channel it into a crazy race to cross the 50,000 word finish line in 30 days. No mean feat that.

And, hey, if I do cheat a bit and apply the NaNoWriMo spirit to a fun novel I've already begun but been procrastinating with for ages now... Hmmmm, it's gonna be a marriage made in heaven, don't you think?;D

Ah, November's going to be a very interesting month. I really can't wait to hit that 50,000 word mark.

Here's to everyone who's getting plugged into the spirit of NaNoWriMo 2011!

It's NaNoWriMo time!

In The World of John Keats' "La Belle Dame sans Merci"

One of my favourite poems by John Keats, one not written in his usual style either, has to be La Belle Dame sans Merci ('The Beautiful Lady Without Mercy'). It is a piece which is all fey, all faerie... And yet there is a hint of the very real death Keats was facing at the time he wrote this.

I've always wondered who the beautiful lady without mercy represented to Keats; and I've often thought that the knight-at-arms must be a representation of Keats himself, one who is so 'in thrall' upon encountering the lady in the meads (meadows) that he follows her further and further into dark and bewitching realms until he is lost to reality altogether.

Always an inspiration to read, savour and simply take you back to times Romantic (in the classical sense), here is Keats' La Belle Dame sans Merci for your reading pleasure: 


La Belle Dame sans Merci

By John Keats

O what can ail thee, knight-at-arms,
       Alone and palely loitering?
The sedge has withered from the lake,
       And no birds sing.

O what can ail thee, knight-at-arms,
       So haggard and so woe-begone?
The squirrel’s granary is full,
       And the harvest’s done.

I see a lily on thy brow,
       With anguish moist and fever-dew,
And on thy cheeks a fading rose
       Fast withereth too.

I met a lady in the meads,
       Full beautiful—a faery’s child,
Her hair was long, her foot was light,
       And her eyes were wild.

I made a garland for her head,
       And bracelets too, and fragrant zone;
She looked at me as she did love,
       And made sweet moan.

I set her on my pacing steed,
       And nothing else saw all day long,
For sidelong would she bend, and sing
       A faery’s song.

She found me roots of relish sweet,
       And honey wild, and manna-dew,
And sure in language strange she said—
       ‘I love thee true’.

She took me to her elfin grot,
       And there she wept and sighed full sore,
And there I shut her wild wild eyes
       With kisses four.

And there she lullèd me asleep,
       And there I dreamed—Ah! woe betide!—
The latest dream I ever dreamt
       On the cold hill side.

I saw pale kings and princes too,
       Pale warriors, death-pale were they all;
They cried—‘La Belle Dame sans Merci
       Thee hath in thrall!’

I saw their starved lips in the gloam,
       With horrid warning gapèd wide,
And I awoke and found me here,
       On the cold hill’s side.

And this is why I sojourn here,
       Alone and palely loitering,
Though the sedge is withered from the lake,
       And no birds sing.

In The World of John Keats' "La Belle Dame sans Merci"

Do You Do What You Are?

The Muses Urania and Calliope by Simon Vouet
Image taken from Wikimedia Commons

First off, apologies for my short hiatus from my blog!:) It's not blog fatigue, I assure you, that's prompted my virtual absence. The world outside this one simply called more fervently than usual these past few months; I had to take a break until things quietened down a bit.

So, what had me running over to post my thoughts today? A small movie called 'Along Came A Spider':)

A suspense/mystery film based on the James Patterson novel of the same name, 'Along Came A Spider' is a movie that I've watched umpteen times through the years. Can't quite tell you why it tickles my movie-watcher's taste buds....

Maybe it's the superb Morgan Freeman (who plays profiler Alex Cross). Who could resist staying glued to the sight of Freeman as he walks or talks or stares thoughtfully into space?:)

Or maybe it's the classic game of cat and mouse that ensues once all and sundry attempt to trace the whereabouts of Megan Rose, the kidnapped daughter of a senator in the movie.

Or maybe 'Along Came A Spider' is simply a movie that's skilfully crafted, in all senses of the word.

This time though, it wasn't actors/plot/craft that made their usual impression on me. No, it was a piece of dialogue that stood out.

I hadn't noticed this bit of dialogue in my previous viewings. I must have heard it a thousand times by now, but I probably wasn't really listening, if you know what I mean.

Alex Cross and Special Agent Jezzie Flannigan are having a casual conversation in the middle of the kidnapping investigation. And here's the bit that made me perk up:

Alex: You do what you are Jezzie.
Jezzie: You mean you are what you do.
Alex: No, I mean, you do what you are. You're born with a gift. If not that, then you get good at something along the way. And what you're good at, you don't take for granted. You don't betray it.
Jezzie: What if you do, betray your gift?
Alex: Then you betray yourself. That's a sad thing.

'You do what you are'. Hmmmm, I'd never really thought about it that way before. 'You are what you do' is the more common understanding, isn't it? Seems to make so much sense too. But it often felt like a false statement to me! I just could never put my finger on why it rang false. What Alex Cross said put everything into perspective.

You do what you are! There is an intrinsic, real, utterly you 'you' that finds its way into a career/life path! If you flip this somewhat: there is a career out there that is made for who you are, if you have the conviction to find it and stay true to it!

You know, I wish I'd gotten my head around this concept way, way back when. I'm sure I would have had a lot more conviction in pursuing my passions if I had been encouraged to not only find out who 'I' was, but also find out what 'I' was gifted to do, and actually stay loyal to my 'gifts'.

I guess the point of confusion though lies in finding out who you really are to begin with. How do you do that? Through life experiences? The help of those you meet along the way? The devotion to a path of faith?

Life's full of variables, isn't it?

Despite the mix of everything external that can bombard and mold our inner selves however, it becomes clearer and clearer to me that each of us have individual natures. Personalities that are uniquely ours. Personalities that come with their own foibles and eccentricities, but also their own truths.

And the older I get, the more I believe that our passions are a reflection of these truths.

Passion may not be an exhaustive indicator of who we are, for sure, let alone a consistent one. But when we do know we're passionate about something - know in our bones that it's a big part of our very nature, a huge contributor to our joy in life - Alex Cross's bit of dialogue becomes pretty relevant, doesn't it?

It openly advocates us giving our inner passions a vote in deciding what any of us want to do for a living.

Not all the votes. Just a single vote. A small, marginalised but hopeful voice in our decision-making processes. Quite a fair, reasonable idea, isn't it?:)

Ack, but who said life's fair? Or reasonable! In the grand scheme of things, giving your passion a legitimate voice seems almost revolutionary! That I - and no doubt many others - could feel this way about our dreams says a lot. I reckon most of us have so many obligations, you see, that our voice of passion gets drowned out very quickly; obligations beyond our control that are strong enough to push us off the platform of our passion along the way. At the risk of sounding cliched, I must say that holding on to your dreams can be a difficult thing to do if it risks your ability to put food on the table every day.

But, you know, life's often far too short. And security can never really be guaranteed, can it? Not in any meaningful way.

If one sees security as something inconsistent/unpredictable in its own right... Well, somehow passion isn't such a disadvantageous commodity to cultivate anymore! To allow your passion some leeway to push and prod you, infiltrate whatever you're doing (secure or not) and make it all the better for such infiltration... this is surely one of the more enjoyable secrets to 'success' in our far too unpredictable world, don't you think?:)

When I mix working and writing, studying and working, writing and studying - basically any two things that are secure or passionate in their own right, often to the point of mutually exclusivity, things can get complicated. You don't sleep much. You become an insomniac writer, in effect. You sacrifice nights out to ensure you're able to pay the bills and indulge in your writing life at the same time. You sacrifice time that could be spent with friends and family, watching a movie or simply sleeping, all to keep up with warring worlds of reality and imagination, trying your best not to tear in half along the way.

It all seems very messy at the best of times. And the rewards for leading the 'double life' of an insomniac writer can seem a long time in coming.

Sometimes, you wonder if it's worth it at all.

But the more I think about it, if one strategises hard enough, prays hard enough - and yes, crosses one's fingers often enough:) - maybe security and passion can co-exist somehow without jeopardising each other's existence.

What say you? Is that possible? Especially for those dreaming of making it in the world of the creative arts without sacrificing a comfortable life for ourselves and our families?

I sincerely hope, pray and cross my fingers that it is:)

On that note, here's to chasing dreams, staying true to oneself, and maybe - just maybe - being given the opportunity to successfully do what you are, wherever you might be in this mixed-up, unpredictable world of ours, without sacrificing life's precious, memory-making moments along the way:)

Do You Do What You Are?