A Short Shrift to the Short Story?

I have written and had a few short stories published in various anthologies, but am yet to finish a novel. Often, I’m told I would never arrive as a writer if I stick to writing short stories—a novel is the true test of a writer’s mettle.

When I look at my novelist friends, I tend to agree. Some have been writing their novels for over an year. Others, much longer. The plots are long and convoluted, the character arcs difficult to keep track of, maintaining timelines and consistency nothing short of a nightmare.

But be as it may, I do think the short story gets a short shrift.It does not receive  major awards, nor recognition. To write a short story may not take as much physical and mental energy as a novel, but it needs a different kind of skill. Sometimes, I begin to write something one year, don’t seem to get it right, and then have a moment of epiphany an year later (because the story keeps simmering at the back of my mind), when I finish the draft. There are stories I’ve written and got accepted for publication in a matter of two weeks, but they’ve required a tremendous intensity of effort.

I think the following excerpt from an article by Chris Power in Guardian last year sums it up well:

“The short story…acknowledges the vastness and diversity of life by the very act of focusing on one small moment or aspect of it. The story is small precisely because life is so big. Novelists are expected to tie up loose ends, whereas the short story writer can make a virtue of ambiguity. The short story is fundamentally different from the novel; not better, just different.”

Where do you stand in the novel vs short story debate? Have you written more short stories or novels? Which do you prefer as a writer, and as a reader?

Bad Movies Give Birth to Fiction

Alex J Cavanaugh decrees in his blogfest:

On Monday, September 19, post a list of up to ten of the worst movies you’ve ever had the misfortune to watch. Films that just oozed awfulness and featured plot holes so big you could drive a bus through them.

Alex's Worst Movies Ever Blogfest

So without further ado, I present the 10 worst movies ever, imho, but instead of writing about them, I’ll use as many of their titles in a piece of flash fiction (that would hopefully make more sense than the movies it was inspired by, lol.) Hopefully Alex forgives the liberty I’ve taken…(* I’ll run hide under the table right after posting this*

So here are my 10 worst picks:

1.   Heaven’s Gate (1980)                           2. Mommie Dearest (1981)

3. Showgirls (1995)                                     4.   Battlefield Earth (2000)

5. Sweet Home Alabama (2002)              6. Gigli (2003)

7.   The Room (2003)                                 8.   Derailed (2005)

9.   Alone in the Dark (2005)                   10.  I don’t know How she does it (2011)

So, ahem, now for the flash fiction:

Mommie Dearest, M.D.

Mother to Son, Mary Gallagher Stout

I don’t know how she does it, but Mommie dearest manages to derail my life every time she steps into it, which is often. By Mommie dearest, or MD (as I call her when I’m alone in the dark), I mean my wife Gigli’s mother.

Mine, bless her, gave up the ghost when I was still a fairly runt-sized boy, and just about the only thing I remember of that woman is the smack of her hand on my bottom.

MD uses big words like Heaven’s Gate, Hellfire, the Earth as a Battlefield Between Good and Evil. I’ve grown up with small words like cold, hunger, roof, money, food, knife, rain, dark, sun, blood, water, hate, winter, and done just fine.

So MD’s words are lost on Gigli and me, who, unknown to her mother, is a showgirl at a gig I got her in the next town, Muck City, in our sweet old state of Alabama. Gigli is what they call her there, and what I call her ever since I married her ten years ago. MD calls her Gertrude.

Just yesterday, MD stopped by, and tried yet again to take me to church, being Sunday and all. She calls herself my soul-doctor.  It has always been like that in my marriage; me, Gigli, and MD makes three.

I left, of course, so Gigli could deal with her mother like she always does. I got drunk as a skunk, and came back home hoping MD had left. Not.

So I went to The Room, where I take all ladies who remind me of MD, to be alone with them in the dark. Knife, blood, Heaven’s Gate, we did it all, as usual—me and the woman I found. I left her in a trash bag, the letters M and D scrawled on her pitted bottom.

I’m tired now, and if you know me, you’ll know I’m a man of few words. I like it straight and narrow. So the next time MD stops by, she comes with me to The Room, and I don’t care what Gigli has to say about it. I’ll make an honest, spiritual M.D. out of her yet.

———-

A to Z Stories of Life and Death

If you liked this piece and would like to browse through more of my work, check out  A to Z Stories of Life and Death, available on Kindle and Smashwords.

P.S: The story came from the movie titles and the picture, and I took it down as it came. It is not meant to offend sensibilities.

Show me a Rhythm and Love me a Dance

Crystal Blue Angel Wing Copyright Shadoweddancer

Each morning I write, sometimes days based on word prompts,  picture prompts on other days. Here’s the picture and the piece I wrote in the last ten minutes:

————–

Show me a rhythm and love me a dance, he said to her, his feathers ruffled against the cold breeze.

Now why did he say that? He had forgotten sensation in the time he had spent away from the human world, which could be an year, an aeon, or a few seconds in the silly vocabulary they use to measure the immeasurable, which is a point, after all, a line, a circle, a sphere, a spring all at the same time.

They sat suspended between times, between worlds, and it is this that intrigued him, that he could feel it all–how cold it was outside the cave, the softness of her skin embedded on her soul, the taste of her last meal of asparagus and wine, just before she left her world in his arms, this famous singer-dancer-entertainer.

He sensed it all, but could not decide if he liked it. He had moved so far away from like and dislike, from the polarities of that world.

But there was nothing for it, he had to wait before the gates opened again, and in this wilderness between worlds, this cave was all he could manage. Not much harm in letting the sensations take him for this breath of time, and then he would carry her to the gates, and return to pick up his next charge.

But that is not what happened.

The singer-dancer-entertainer woke up in her home, a few seconds later, coughing up wine, startling her guests who had begun to mourn her.

He found himself in the dark, reduced to a dot of existence, a cellular tissue of awareness. A mistake. All angels knew feeling was a mistake, they’re not supposed to feel, just be.

Now he must be born into this human world. Must learn, through pain and sensation, to rise above both. He must remember.

———————-

A to Z stories

If you’re intrigued by this story, look up A to Z stories of Life and Death,my ebook of short stories just like this one. Many thanks to Rachel Morgan and Alex J Cavanaugh for featuring this book on their blogs. I’m overwhelmed by the generosity of the blogging community, and would like to thank all those who visit my blog and cheer me on. Writing is sometimes a hard, lonely job, and I’m happy that other than the satisfaction that comes from the process of writing, I’m fortunate enough to be given so much love.

Should I withdraw my story from the Colonial CCC Press?

Critical, Cultural & Communications Press/Colonial, Czarlike & Covetous Press?

I have been agonizing about removing my story from the CCC Press anthology.

It is supposed to be “post-colonial” literature from Singapore, but the behavior of the the CCC Press shows it might be stuck in colonial times. I’m not sure, but seems like that for now.

They want to retain the right to abridge my work and to continue to publish it not just for one year, but till they decide to let it go out-of-print.

And in the meanwhile, they are going to charge sub-licensing fees to any publisher who decides to publish the story again , including, hypothetically, my own anthology!

None of the other publishers I’m working with which include Monsoon, MPH and Marshall Cavendish have such rules.

I’ve never really thought of making money from my writing (or I wouldn’t be writing fiction at all), but it is the the attitude of CCC press that is making me re-think my submission.

So far, two people in the publishing world whose opinion I respect have weighed in, advising me to withdraw.

I’ll have to take my time over this one, because I want to be professional, not precocious. I’m a beginner writer, and do not want to shoot my mouth in an unbecoming way. At the same time, I’m not over-eager to publish “under any circumstances”.

The give-back of writing is in the process of writing—if it were in publication, I’d stop after my first book. So, is CCC Press really being unfair, or am I being sensitive? Time will tell.

Update: I’m still looking for advice on this. There is further discussion on the CCC Press contract problems issue here and here.

Writing about Luigi Pirandello, English, Italian

Eleven Short Stories- Undici Novelle- Pirandello

I’m reading Eleven Short Stories or Undici Novelle by the Nobel Laureate Luigi Pirandello. It is a dual language book, and for a lover of Italian and of short stories, a rare piece of indulgence.

What I love about the book is not just Pirandello’s masterful storytelling, somewhat reminiscent of Chekov, but also the lyrical quality of the Italian, when I read it just after the English version. With English you have to make an effort to make your lines sound lyrical, spoken Italian is music itself.

Here’s an excerpt from the short story Citrons from Sicily, or Lumie di Sicilia:

He leaned his head forward so he could observe the illuminated room at the far end, and he saw a great number of gentlemen in tailcoats talking confusedly. His sight grew dim; his amazement and agitation were so great that he himself didn’t realize that his eyes had filled with tears; he closed them, and he shut himself completely in that darkness, as if to resist the torment that a long ringing laugh was causing him. It was Teresina laughing like that, in the other room.

Sporse il capo a guardare in fondo la sala illuminata e vide tanti signori in marsina, che parlavano confusamente. La vista gli s’annebbio’: era tanto lo stupore, tanta la commozione, che non s’accorse egli stesso che gli occhi gli si erano riempiti di lacrime: li chiuse, e in quel buio si strinse tutto in se’ quasi per resistere allo strazio che li cagionava una lunga squillante risata. Teresina rideva cosi, di la’.

Writing about writing a lot

I wrote a lot today, and finished a short story to boot.

Though I am feeling lousy (which I wont rant about here cos I have my separate rant blog now) otherwise, it is nice to go to bed with the thought that I at least got a lot of writing done.

Writing about “Hell Found Me”

Wordle for

Writing short stories is what I have wanted to do for quite some time. But it is a difficult genre to master, and I am not entirely persuaded it is the right genre for me and what I have to say. While the writing comes easy, I am not so sure it flows as well as some of my poems.

Here is a prose-poem kind of vignette I had done some time back. I call it “Hell Found Me” :

Hell found me. I knew it would, sooner or later, but did not know it would be quite so soon. I had become quite an artist down the years I spent here. But now I am caught.

It is here that I have to stay, chained for all time, in the middle of this mindless desert, acres of salt, and little else. The cracks left by the wind on this never-ending salty stretch are mirrored by the raw cracks on my feet. Someday the cracks on my bleached bones will mirror them. First the birds, and then of course, the sun, will have their turn. It is a long wait.

But today as I lie scorching, I am flesh and blood. I can feel the heat under my bare body and the pain from the many cuts made on it to attract vultures. For years I have traveled these lands where no man dare make his home, where there is no soil for a blade of grass. Only salt, white, grey or dirty, meets the eyes, no matter how many miles one walks.

This was my home. I was a wanderer and this entire spread belonged to me, for it was I who would guide the trader who risked his life walking into this wasteland of salt. In exchange for things that took my fancy, an amulet, a carved box, or a piece of embroidered cloth, I would offer to lead him to the best place, where the salt was pure, pristine, and so white it hurt the eye. I would guide him in and out in a day, he would not get lost in this salty desert. He would come once, twice, many times, and grow my hoard in the caves I stowed them in.

Unknown to him, it was not his possessions I was after, it was his flesh. Ah, human flesh! Salty as the air I breathe, smelling of salt as the water I drink, and warm, so warm. No animal flesh can compete, and I should know, I have tasted most I could catch. I have hunted in jungles, and I have hunted beside farms. Crippled at birth, I knew no mother and the only herd I was ever part of was a group of beggars by day and thugs by night. I have loved human blood since then, it quenched my thirst and killed the dull ache in my belly. Most nights I went hungry. There were rats to catch of course, but rats can be quick.

Besides, hunting men is far more rewarding. They are more intelligent. It needs great cunning. I earned the trust of many, and when I decided the time was ripe, my meal never knew what hit him. I hate struggles. I do not like wasting precious energy in this desert, and trust is the perfect weapon. I would always ask them, on what was to be their last trip, to bring me some good wine. I would, as always, be quiet; I do not know much of talk, and it does not amuse me. They would be merry, and drink more than I. Most of them died in their sleep, dreaming happy dreams, which ended with a quick, firm, blow to the head. It is as good a way to go as any.

But as with all good plans, mine had a flaw. News of my unseen hoard grew with each small merchant that gave me a trinket. Then, you came, the robber in the guise of a merchant. And when the robber met the hunter, the robber won. You are now a speck in the distance, carrying away all the trophies of my hunt. They do not mean much to me, and you are welcome. I am chained outside my cave, from where I can see all the bones I tore flesh from, and I am content.

As birds tear at mine, I shall think of the poison I smeared on all my treasure and how you will be writhing in agony soon. You know, I have begun to like my hell. The way I see it, it is just a few vultures having a good meal, and I do not grudge them that.

For some reason I have always wanted to turn this into a poem. Today I got an idea how. I was on Sharon Bakar‘s blog when I saw this intriguing link to Wordles, a free software that lets you create word clouds of whatever text you choose to feed in.

This is the link to the Wordle I created from the text of the vignette here. (Click it to see a bigger image). I like the way all sorts of unlikely words join up in the Wordle: “chained, hunted birds”, “years drink”, “scorching treasure”, “walking pristine”….I know random poetry generators can give you much the same kind of unlikely word combinations, but I like to see the Wordle do it so visually.