My current WIP is a chore to write. Because it is kind of a contemporary historical fiction YA novel (if that genre exists), based on, of all things, my history, I have a hard time getting the emotion out into fictional events, because even though majority of it is made up, the emotion is real for me, even today. I guess it is a way for me to kind of deal with the facts.
My inspiration for this type of novel came from Sylvia Plath’s “The Bell Jar”. She took the events from her life and fictionalized them. I felt that this was a genius idea, writing about a subject so sensitive, fictionalizing it to get some distance. I decided to take that approach, since the subject matter is still a significant part of my thinking and present. This book is me saying, “goodnight, thanks for coming” to those events and people from my past.
I’m not sure why I just can’t sit down and write the story. Everytime I think of writing it I feel uneasy. So I fart around on Facebook and Twitter some. If it because of the task I have laid ahead of me, laying my friends and my soul bare for the world to see, so be it. It must be said, done. The things in the book are things in which no teen need suffer, but it seems like more and more teens are in trouble these days. So if I can share the things I’ve seen and people I’ve known to others, well then, the fear and procrastination is worth it. When it’s out there in the wild, whether people like it or not, is really not up to me. But it will be gone from my system. I will be able to breathe.
I think you’ll find The Bell Jar is only the tip of the iceberg. There will hardly be a writer out there who has not done that to some degree. When I wrote my first novel I took my lead from Samuel Beckett. Just as he had done in Krapp’s Last Tape, rather than looking back at my life I projected a worst case scenario twenty years in the future if certain thing had or hadn’t happened and that worked out well. Using your own life as a basis for a work of fiction is all well and good – it’s your life to do with what you will – but as soon as you start invading the pasts of others that’s a different matter completely. I’ve been talking a lot recently about the kerfuffle that was caused when the character of Holly in Woody Allen’s Hannah and her Sisters presented her first play to her family who all saw themselves in it and not all were flattered by how they had been portrayed. As far as procrastination goes, if you wanted to be writing then you’d be writing and there’d be no stopping you. You may think this is how you want to exorcise the past but a part of you obviously isn’t keen to stir it all up again now that the dust has settled. I found with my last novel that the book simply refused to go in the direction I had intended it to. I thought it was about time I addressed the loss of my parents and although that forms the basis of the book that is not its central focus. What I ended up saying needed saying but it was not what I intended to say.
Yes, Jim. You may be right, however the dust has not settled. When I am writing it I LOVE it, I’m in my groove, putting words on screen never felt so good. But when I take a break from it I dread going back to it. I really am trying to figure out what is going on. I think it’s just I am procrastinating- talking on the phone, going out, Facebooking, Tweeting when I should be writing. And it’s not just this particular project. The whole act of writing is overwhelming to me, now that I’m no longer doing it for my own pleasure. I’m going to have to get over it.