Long Fiction and Me

I used to write long fiction.

I came out of an academic background in which books and academic articles were the norm. Everything was exposition: literature review, theory, hypothesis, data collection, analysis, findings, recommendations, significance, logic, passive voice, etc. Everything from the head. That worked for me for quite a while, until my heart started to break out, but I didn’t know what to do with it.

My marriage started to break up during the Great Recession, but I didn’t know what to do. So I started an historical biography of the Curtis String Quartet (1927-1981), the first American string quartet and tops from about 1950-1970. It was my then-wife’s father’s great string quartet. I was hoping that would save my marriage. After all I was living in Philadelphia where they were based and where all the records were. I thought it would save my marriage, but it didn’t. I debated abandoning it but was too heavily invested in it and brought it with me to the Cape to finish it, but got sidelined by a cranky, opinionated, wonderful, lovely old woman, a terrific, by now an almost 100-year-old poet named Hilde Oleson, who beat on me over and over that writing had to come from the heart. She made me so mad sometimes that I thought of leaving her group. But I didn’t. I always asked myself after one of these episodes, “Would I be happier if I left the group or not happier. I always decided I’d be happier if I stayed. That is what saved me. I thought she wasn’t teaching me anything. But actually she was teaching me the greatest lesson I ever learned. She told me once, after class as we were walking down the hallway to the parking lot, “I shouldn’t tell you this, but I’m going to: you’re only a mediocre fiction writer, but you’re plays are fantastic!” That turned out to be one of the greatest writing thing that anyone ever said to me.

I’m trying, now that I’m pretty much sidelined during the pandemic, to finish things are are only half done. One of these is my novel, X Marks the Spot. I was done with it, but turns out it isn’t done with me. I started the novel during a hiatus in the Curtis book, which I have to finish after this. At first, I disliked it intensely because I felt it was hold me back. But, now, I realize, it’s pulling me forward, and it’s fun again to work on.  

But I don’t want to read novels anymore. Too many “thrillers” just aren’t thrilling. And I don’t want to write them. They take to long and you have to explain too much. And I don’t want to tell you how to write either. You can find thousands of books and web pages that will do that. I’m going to write what’s going on with me. That can come from only one source. My heart. I will only tell you what I write.