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Tiresias in Key West
Apr. 21st, 2012 11:12 amReturned to editing the Novel again after a two month layoff. I edit best when I lose that sense of ownership.
Chapter 3 is a mess. Not quite sure what to do about it. Starts with Steinbeck sitting at his desk trying to write -- the ultimate cliché! -- then going to the beach to look at the tel that was once a Chinese fishing village. He talks to himself. A Sicilian fisherman makes sign of the evil eye. Neither of these things do anything to advance the plot.
Switch to Joe who is drinking tea with his sister Alice. The siblings discuss the poetry of Robinson Jeffers. Again, this does nothing whatsoever to advance the plot except that Alice is a pivotal character.
Switch to Steinbeck who comes home, reminisces about the early days of his marriage to Carol and the haunted arroyos behind Eagle Rock. Leaves home. Again, absolutely nothing here that advances the plot.
Switch to Joe who comes back to his rooming house and finds Carol waiting to seduce him. She doesn’t succeed. This actually is important to the plot.
Switch to Steinbeck who is in the library reading up on the history of the Chinese fishing village. The info dump is moderately important.
Switch to Joe who goes for a walk with Ed Ricketts, and rescues a kid who’s being beaten up by the Sicilian fishermen’s sons. This is essential to the plot.
The style I’m always hoping to emulate is that of the leisurely John LeCarre in the Smiley books. LeCarre appears to be rambling except every single detail he drops in one of those easy, breezy digressions is a bread crumb leading straight back into a dense thicket of plot.
I would like to get the Novel edited by June 30th. I’ve begun thinking more and more about the next book, which will be magical Ernest Hemingway. I want something to happen to Ernest that’s the counterpart to Tiresias’s mythological adventures. Tieresias was a macho Greek prince who one day came across two snakes fucking in a field. He beat the snakes to death. In consequence, the gods transformed him into a woman. After seven years as a woman, he stumbled across two other snakes fucking in a field. This time he left them alone -- and the gods turned him back into a man. Eventually, he becomes a famous soothsayer.
Chapter 3 is a mess. Not quite sure what to do about it. Starts with Steinbeck sitting at his desk trying to write -- the ultimate cliché! -- then going to the beach to look at the tel that was once a Chinese fishing village. He talks to himself. A Sicilian fisherman makes sign of the evil eye. Neither of these things do anything to advance the plot.
Switch to Joe who is drinking tea with his sister Alice. The siblings discuss the poetry of Robinson Jeffers. Again, this does nothing whatsoever to advance the plot except that Alice is a pivotal character.
Switch to Steinbeck who comes home, reminisces about the early days of his marriage to Carol and the haunted arroyos behind Eagle Rock. Leaves home. Again, absolutely nothing here that advances the plot.
Switch to Joe who comes back to his rooming house and finds Carol waiting to seduce him. She doesn’t succeed. This actually is important to the plot.
Switch to Steinbeck who is in the library reading up on the history of the Chinese fishing village. The info dump is moderately important.
Switch to Joe who goes for a walk with Ed Ricketts, and rescues a kid who’s being beaten up by the Sicilian fishermen’s sons. This is essential to the plot.
The style I’m always hoping to emulate is that of the leisurely John LeCarre in the Smiley books. LeCarre appears to be rambling except every single detail he drops in one of those easy, breezy digressions is a bread crumb leading straight back into a dense thicket of plot.
I would like to get the Novel edited by June 30th. I’ve begun thinking more and more about the next book, which will be magical Ernest Hemingway. I want something to happen to Ernest that’s the counterpart to Tiresias’s mythological adventures. Tieresias was a macho Greek prince who one day came across two snakes fucking in a field. He beat the snakes to death. In consequence, the gods transformed him into a woman. After seven years as a woman, he stumbled across two other snakes fucking in a field. This time he left them alone -- and the gods turned him back into a man. Eventually, he becomes a famous soothsayer.
