The Screenplay-novel Manifestos

Please note

2007-05-20T16:42:00.000+09:00

Please note all my regular blogging is now taking place at "Conversations in the Book Trade".

Conversations

2007-03-08T10:09:00.000+09:00

My interviews with Philip Marchand of the Toronto Star, Jennifer Banash of Impetus Press, Richard Nash of Softskull, and Judy Stoffman of the Toronto Star (among others) are now up at "Conversations in the Book Trade".

Update: My interview with Ian Brown of CBC's "Talking Books" and the Globe and Mail is now up.

Update two: An edited version of my interview with Jennifer Barnes of Raw Dog Screaming Press is now up at the Brooklyn Rail.

Update three: New interviews at "Conversations" with Patrick Crean of Thomas Allen Publishers and Jordan Jones of Leaping Dog Press.

Site map

2007-01-02T11:51:00.000+09:00

For an outline of my non-fiction manuscript Burying Another Living Soul, click here.

For examples of my screenplay-novel Truth Marathon, go here.

For my interview blog Conversations in the Book Trade, click here.

Truth Marathon - menu

2007-01-02T11:50:00.000+09:00

To see the main page of my screenplay-novel Truth Marathon, click here.

To hear a podcast of Truth Marathon's plot and historical background, click here.

To see the book trailer, click here.

"Conversations in the Book Trade" -- Fred Ramey

2006-12-11T08:12:00.000+09:00

"Conversations in the Book Trade" is an ongoing series at The Screenplay-novel Manifestos.

I am in the process of contacting people involved with books: either professionals or passionate readers. Hopefully this project will turn into something of a forum: both a resource for readers/writers interested in how the publishing side of things work, and an opportunity for editors, agents and authors to explain their side of the literary equation.

The focus of this project is literary fiction -- in particular, how it is to survive in an increasingly competitive "culture of narratives". I am interested in the reality of publishing now; not how it should be, or might have been if our culture had evolved differently, but how it is at this perilous moment in the early 21st Century, and how it might be in the near future.

Current interview:

Fred Ramey of Unbridled Books:
"What is shadowing the art of literature seems, rather, to be a combination of the corporate need for a sure thing and the instant availability of sales numbers. ..."
[To read the entire interview, click here.]

Previous:

Bev Daurio of The Mercury Press

"A Distant Mirror, Accelerating Quickly"

2006-12-07T10:41:00.000+09:00

My op-ed on why literature is necessary for our full comprehension of history is up at the Korea Times:

Imagine a country is occupied by American forces after a war. Imagine these forces are greeted with tremendous euphoria when they first enter the capital. They are cheered and covered with garlands. An occupation government is established. It proceeds to reorganize the society. But it makes several serious mistakes, and within months the mood of the population has changed...

more

Another War That Didn't Count

2006-11-13T08:53:00.001+09:00

source: Truman Library

"The Cry of the Magpies"

2006-11-13T08:53:00.000+09:00

From "The Cry of the Magpies" by Kim Dong-ni:

Ok-nan said that her coughing fits had occurred even before the half year had elapsed. When months passed by without a word from me and the magpies continued to cry in the mornings, my mother's eyes began to glare in a strange way. Then the strange glaring of her eyes seemed to shift over to a long spell of coughs. At first her condition was not so very bad, but beginning about one year after I left home, she got to coughing almost wihtout fail whenever the magpies cried in the morning....

I remember my mother was in the habit of mouthing such words as "O, God!" or "Help me!" after her occasional coughing fits even before I left home for the battlefield. And now she was replacing those words with "Bong-su!" and "Kill me!"

In my view, there was not much inconsistency in this development. Rather, these seemingly contradictory expressions were no more mutually exclusive than the two sides of one coin. The way I looked at it, "Help me" could very naturally become "Kill me", a suffering deepened into bottomless despair.

[From ""The Cry of the Magpies", Kim Dong-ni, The Portable Library of Korean Literature, Jimoondang Publishing, Seoul, 1961, 2002.]

Truth Marathon -- trailer

2006-11-08T13:04:00.000+09:00

Truth Marathon -- trailer

This is the internet trailer for my screenplay-novel, Truth Marathon. It's meant to capture Truth Marathon's theme of contemporary big-city life -- in particular, the relationship between Paul and Sarah. But it's also meant to capture the novel's underlying theme of the power of history and how it constantly exerts its effect on people, even when they're unaware of it.

There are two major historical events addressed in Truth Marathon: the first is Pearl Harbor, the second the outbreak of the Korean War. About the latter, it is safe to say this still makes its effect felt on the Korean people -- not on a daily basis, but nevertheless regularly, inexorably.

History matters. It matters to individuals. It matters to nations. Yet the paradox of history is that quite often, even when scholarship shows certain facts to be true, it can be glossed over by myth.

[Special thanks to Yang Sang-joon and friend for putting this together]

TRUTH MARATHON - 1

2006-11-07T12:42:00.000+09:00

This is the new opening to my screenplay-novel, Truth Marathon:

EXT. A STREET IN PRE-WORLD WAR TWO TOKYO. MID-DAY.

TITLE: TOKYO, JANUARY 26, 1941.

The street in front of the Japanese branch of the National City Bank of New York. The street is covered with a thin film of snow. Crowds move back and forth quickly: Japanese men, mostly, dressed in sober dark suits, but also the occasional vendor pulling a large wagon or, with her head bowed, a woman.

Sometimes the women are young and officious and also dressed in dark, business-like fashions. But once in a while, they are wearing bright kimonos.

The overall visual effect is of a series of monochromes, from the black of window frames and wrought iron fences, to the dark grey of stone walls, to the steadily dirtying white of the snow -- but all this dotted by an infrequent bob of colour.

A car pulls up in front of the bank. A WELL-DRESSED WESTERN MAN emerges from it. He enters the bank.

INTERIOR. THE BANK. A MOMENT LATER.

The WELL-DRESSED WESTERN MAN stands in line. After a moment, he reaches the front.

JAPANESE MALE TELLER: [with an accent] Hello. May I helping you?

WELL-DRESSED WESTERN MAN: [speaking in a well-educated accent, Ivy League-inflected accent. His manner is friendly; clearly, he is trying to be genial] Konichiwa. Yes, I’d like to convert some yen to U. S. dollars.

JAPANESE MALE TELLER: How much?

WELL-DRESSED WESTERN MAN: [reaching into his jacket and pulling out a big envelope] Well, it’s rather a large amount….

JUMP-CUT. JUST BEHIND THE WELL-DRESSED WESTERN MAN.

ANOTHER WESTERN MAN, also well dressed, taps the first on the shoulder.

OTHER WESTERN MAN: [with a Latin-American accent] Mr. Bishop.

BISHOP (FIRST WELL-DRESSED WESTERN MAN): [startled] Oh, Dr. Schreiber. You surprised me.

DR. SCHRIEBER: [somewhat anxiously] I’m sorry. May I have a word with you?

BISHOP: Shoot.

DR. SCHRIEBER: No. A private word.

BISHOP: [friendly] Sure. Just a moment.

Bishop turns back to the teller, finishes his business, then turns back to Schreiber who is clearly agitated.

SCHREIBER: [whispering] What I have to say is of paramount importance.

BISHOP: Oh. All right, then.

The two walk to an alcove.

INTERIOR. A CLOSE-UP OF THE TWO MEN. THE BUSINESS OF THE BANK CONTINUES IN THE BACKGROUND.

SCHREIBER: What do you know about Japanese foreign policy toward your country?

BISHOP: [in a rather hale tone] Well, it’s complex, isn’t it? [Trying to be witty] That’s what the Japanese do so well. Make things complex.

SCHREIBER: Well, of course. There is complex. But there is also hostile.

BISHOP: Good god, why should the Japanese be hostile?

SCHREIBER: You are interfering with their aims.

BISHOP: What? In China?

SCHREIBER: Well, yes. In China. But also --. [Schreiber turns his head and does a quick nervous scan of the bank. Then he turns back to Bishop] Well, it would seem that since they signed agreement with Germany and Italy….

BISHOP: [shaking his head] Oh, yes, a foolish business, that. Very bad form.

SCHREIBER: Well, since they have allied into an axis, they --. There seems to be a change in your government’s attitude toward them.

BISHOP: [bluffly] I should hope so!

SCHREIBER: But why? You don’t fight in Europe’s war.

BISHOP: No, no. But we thoroughly disapprove of it. We disapprove of fascism.

SCHREIBER: But that is a European movement. Not Asian.

BISHOP: No. But in Japan it might turn into something close enough. And what Tojo’s people are doing in China right now. It’s very shameful.

SCHREIBER: Mr. Bishop. We are both diplomats. We know countries do not pick fights with each other because they think one country’s actions are shameful.

BISHOP: No, no. That’s true. But we can express disapproval.

SCHREIBER: At the diplomatic level, surely. But not the policy level.

BISHOP: What are you driving at?

SCHREIBER: The Japanese have noticed a change in your government’s policy toward them since they signed their agreement. They view this change as a provocation,

BISHOP: [a little pugnaciously] Well, they can view our policies any way they want. Maybe they might take it as a sign they should change some of their own policies.

SCHREIBER: Mr. Bishop. I have to speak more plainly. [Again, he scans the room.] ...

cont'd

[If you're an industry professional and would like to read this in its entirety, please email me at fharvor AT yahoo DOT com.]

To read more about the project, click here.

Slow news day

2006-11-06T13:08:00.000+09:00

Here's a story which deservedly received very little attention in the media:

THE SPECTRE of a nuclear race in the Middle East was raised yesterday when six Arab states announced that they were embarking on programmes to master atomic technology.

;

The move, which follows the failure by the West to curb Iran’s controversial nuclear programme, could see a rapid spread of nuclear reactors in one of the world’s most unstable regions, stretching from the Gulf to the Levant and into North Africa.

There is, incidentally, a Korean angle to all this, since it is North Korea, not Iran, that has recently succeeded in testing nuclear weapons. But that story, too, is in a slow news cycle.

It simmers in the background, however. My wife and I are in the habit of going to Gwangwamun in downtown Seoul on weekends. We like to stroll around the area close to Kyungbukgong and the Kyobo book store. As we make our regular rounds, we pass two rather non-descript buildings. Both are constantly cordened off by bus-load after bus-load of riot police.

The first is the Japanese embassy. It is shrouded in a darkness that is positively eerie. A building that does not want to bring attention to itself (it was deliberately constructed on a side-street), it nevertheless exerts a quiet and unwanted influence on Korean affairs. While the Japanese government publicly states it wishes to eliminate nuclear weapons from the region -- from the world, in fact -- elements in Japan are preparing the groundwork for a build-up of its armed forces. This is partly justified as a reaction to the North's proliferation. But in fact it is also a reaction to the rapid re-ascendance of China to the status of genuine superpower.

The second building is the American embassy. It is situated on a piece of real estate that has pride of place, directly across from the Sejong Arts Center. It is not shy about its presence, since the United States has played so many roles in South Korea's history: benefactor, protector, and, on occasion, oppressor.

These days, even on weekends, the embassy's lights have been on late into the evening, burning brightly. Scenarios are being played out, actions meditated upon.

The peninsula these days is placid on its surface. But underground -- kilometers, or perhaps, decades, deep -- it rumbles.

Standard HI

2006-11-06T12:52:00.000+09:00

Richard Diraddo has new fiction up at Standard Hostility Index. Also, a spanky, er, spanking new homepage video. Finally, as always, the art page, a particular favourite of mine.

TRUTH MARATHON -- character sketches: Paul

2006-11-03T10:10:00.000+09:00

Drawing: Finn Harvor

[Note: the above is how I conceive of Paul, one of the main characters in my screenplay-novel, TRUTH MARATHON.]

TRUTH MARATHON -- OPENING SEQUENCE

2006-11-03T09:38:00.000+09:00

This is the new opening to my screenplay-novel, Truth Marathon:

EXT. A STREET IN PRE-WORLD WAR TWO TOKYO. MID-DAY.

TITLE: TOKYO, JANUARY 26, 1941.

Sometimes the women are young and officious and also dressed in dark, business-like fashions. But once in a while, they are wearing bright kimonos.

A car pulls up in front of the bank. A WELL-DRESSED WESTERN MAN emerges from it. He enters the bank.

INTERIOR. THE BANK. A MOMENT LATER.

The WELL-DRESSED WESTERN MAN stands in line. After a moment, he reaches the front.

JAPANESE MALE TELLER: [with an accent] Hello. May I helping you?

WELL-DRESSED WESTERN MAN: [speaking in a well-educated, Ivy League-inflected accent. His manner is friendly; clearly, he is trying to be genial] Konichiwa. Yes, I’d like to convert some yen to U. S. dollars.

JAPANESE MALE TELLER: How much?

WELL-DRESSED WESTERN MAN: [reaching into his jacket and pulling out a big envelope] Well, it’s rather a large amount….

JUMP-CUT. JUST BEHIND THE WELL-DRESSED WESTERN MAN.

ANOTHER WESTERN MAN, also well dressed, taps the first on the shoulder.

OTHER WESTERN MAN: [with a Latin-American accent] Mr. Bishop.

BISHOP (FIRST WELL-DRESSED WESTERN MAN): [startled] Oh, Dr. Schreiber. You surprised me.

DR. SCHRIEBER: [somewhat anxiously] I’m sorry. May I have a word with you?

BISHOP: Shoot.

DR. SCHRIEBER: No. A private word.

BISHOP: [friendly] Sure. Just a moment.

Bishop turns back to the teller, finishes his business, then turns back to Schreiber who is clearly agitated.

SCHREIBER: [whispering] What I have to say is of paramount importance.

BISHOP: Oh. All right, then.

The two walk to an alcove.

INTERIOR. A CLOSE-UP OF THE TWO MEN. THE BUSINESS OF THE BANK CONTINUES IN THE BACKGROUND.

SCHREIBER: What do you know about Japanese foreign policy toward your country?

BISHOP: [in a rather hale tone] Well, it’s complex, isn’t it? [Trying to be witty] That’s what the Japanese do so well. Make things complex.

SCHREIBER: Well, of course. There is complex. But there is also hostile.

BISHOP: Good god, why should the Japanese be hostile?

SCHREIBER: You are interfering with their aims.

BISHOP: What? In China?

BISHOP: [shaking his head] Oh, yes, a foolish business, that. Very bad form.

to read more, click here

2006-10-29T13:03:00.000+09:00

Saturday Street Market

For more on Korean markets, scroll down

As her career progressed, she moved on to acting and blinking

2006-10-28T20:58:00.000+09:00

From the Saturday Globe and Mail:

I Like You: Hospitality Under the Influence unfolds in full 1950s-style Technicolor kitsch , complete with Sedaris, known best for writing and staring in the TV show and film Strangers With Candy, art-directing herself through umpteen costume changes in her own apartment.

STILLS WITHOUT SCRIPTS

2006-10-28T11:41:00.000+09:00

"A Glimpse of History in the Marketplace"

2006-10-28T11:25:00.000+09:00

The following is the opening to a piece I wrote for rabble on Korea.

Market culture in Korea fascinates me; it's something you can only catch the vestiges of in downtown Seoul, which has been caught up in a frenzy of modernization and self-improvement for several decades now. (I suppose the exceptions are Dongdaemun and, in particular, Namdaemun markets. But they're geared to clothing and electronics, and don't quite catch the flavour of the more traditional markets emphasizing food.)

The demise of the traditional markets is explained as an inevitable off-shoot of progress. And I suppose no-one can argue with the inevitability side of it. But something else is lost, too. I don't want to sentimentalize the markets: with their ramshackle design, their lack of heat, their constant emphasis on discount prices that cut into the profit margins of the people in the stalls, they represent a harsher way of life. But they also represent an autonomy that you don't find in the perfectly cleansed lucite halls of the spanking new department stores.

A Glimpse of History in the Marketplace

She's smiling. They often do here. This part of town is called Nambu Shi-jang (Nambu Market), and though it isn't the only traditional market in Jeonju, it's the largest. It's run in large measure by middle-aged women called ajumas. (Ajuma means aunt. It, along with ajushi — uncle — is an almost universal term in Korea, and can be used to address a multitude of people, from shop owners to bus drivers to strangers.)

The traditional markets all possess the same basic elements: a large indoor shopping area specializing in textiles and cooking utensils and rice desserts and butchers' shops. Outside, an even larger area selling food comprises small booths or sometimes simply individual sellers — the latter crouched close to the ground next to goods which they have spread out in front of them on blankets and plastic sheets.

"Bombing Perfect Strangers"

2006-10-20T08:39:00.000+09:00

[The following are the opening paragraphs to "Bombing Perfect Strangers", a piece that I wrote which appeared in the online magazine rabble roughly three-and-half years ago. At the time I wrote it, the invasion of Iraq remained only a possibility -- and the stand-off with North Korea was much more temperate. But as in life so in history; what goes around comes around, and the piece, I think, has become timely again. I've made a few minor changes to it to clean it up a bit, but this is pretty much as it originally appeared.]

“We don’t want to talk about North Korea,” my students say. “We want to talk about music or movies.”

I’m an ESL instructor at a university in a small city in South Korea. And I’m frequently made painfully aware that most young people today are uninterested in politics. Pop culture is their real passion, and the currency of pop culture is physical attractiveness. When I go to the maze of bars, restaurants and shops that is at the south end of the university campus and pass the bulb-lit merchant wagons that sell pirated cassettes, the music is usually by singers chosen as much for their looks as their talent.

This is so much the way of the world that it feels tendentious to point it out. But, I must; pop culture is like a drug. As the clouds of war gather in the Middle East, not many people in Korea seem especially perturbed. Most are simply happily living their lives. But, underneath, there is pervasive unease in this country over the possibility that unless the regime in North Korea falls of its own volition, there will, at some point, be war in this region of the world as well.

This explains in large measure the antagonism that Koreans often feel toward the U.S. government and “George Bushi.” The relationship between Americans and South Koreans is enormously complex. America — in fact, North America generally — is seen as a kind of utopia. And Americans as individuals are both liked and cherished; Americaphilia runs as strongly here as Americaphobia. But there is a distinction made between the American government and American people. For the most part, current U.S. policy is seen as actually being opposed to the interests of peace. After all, the current U.S. administration has staked its prestige on fighting an “axis of evil,” and needs an enemy in North Korea. This, then, is the theory proffered for why the administration has taken steps to squelch the Sunshine Policy of North/South reconciliation.

to read the rest, click here.

Le Scenaroman

2006-10-13T21:30:00.000+09:00

Claude Chounlasane on the concept of the "scénaroman" (a French neologism for screenplay novel):

"My goal is that readers not so much read a novel as regard a film -- except that this film here is made of words, not images that move. This is the philosophy of the scenaroman: one does not read a book, rather one "reads" a movie."

Claude's blog is entitled Scenaroman, and the work his is posting is called "Un Gars Trop Chanceux" ("A Very Lucky Guy"). You can read his work here.

(Note: it is in French).

TRUTH MARATHON -- screenplay-novel trailer (excerpt)

2006-09-26T07:19:00.000+09:00

[This is the opening to the screenplay-novel trailer for Truth Marathon]

TRUTH MARATHON -- outline and context

2006-09-26T06:46:00.000+09:00

[This is the opening of the outline of TRUTH MARATHON]:

TRUTH MARATHON works on several levels.

On the one hand, it's a social novel: Paul, the protagonist, works on contract. And although as an educated individual with a professional job he is supposedly a member of the middle class, in fact his life is a near-constant series of crises that result from borderline poverty and lack of job security.

His boss hates him. His apartment has rats. His father -- a genial, intellectually gifted individual diagnosed with schizophrenia (he is on medication) -- lives on welfare, spending his days conducting "research" into what he terms "some of the greatest stories never told". On top of this, Paul's mother, who many years ago divorced his father, can't seem to let the relationship go. Unfortunately, the way she expresses her concern is through nagging. The particulars of his life aside, Paul is emblematic of what so many people nowadays live through. In short, Paul is an Everyperson of 21st Century society.

But the novel is also a love story about Paul's relationship with an Korean-Canadian co-worker named Sarah. Sarah is beautiful -- no, she's extraordinarily beautiful, and the pull Paul feels toward her is irresistable. But Sarah also has the capriciousness of the beautiful, and it doesn't help that she is possibly alcoholic.

Sarah's gotten under his skin. Paul loves her ardently, without restraint. Paul has had girlfriends before. But not like this. And so, when she denies that she has a drinking problem, Paul, besotted, tries to keep up with her degree of alcohol consumption rather than bring her back to his level. And in the midst of all this, his problems with work and parents just increase.

But TRUTH MARATHON has an extra element, and that is history: at the heart of Paul's relationship with his father and also his relationship with Sarah are two of the great mysteries of the 20th Century: How could Pearl Harbor and the Korean War have happened the way they did? How could sneak attacks of such devastating magnitude not been foreseen?...

to read more, click here

Male Brains, Female Brains and Fictional Narrative

2006-09-23T16:56:00.000+09:00

My article "Male Brains, Female Brains and Fictional Narrative" is up at LitKicks.

Anniversary of an Idea

2006-09-12T13:25:00.000+09:00

Before the book trailer, before the idea of combining book marketing with the power of short movies, a year ago last Friday I began posting on the idea of the screenplay-novel. The idea is a fairly simple one: merging the form of the screenplay with the depth of character and plot development of a novel (in other words, a screenplay-novel is a longer, more involved work than a regular screenplay).

The idea of writing fiction in screenplay form is not especially new; satirists have been doing this for decades. But where I think the screenplay-novel idea is new is in terms of combining images ("stills") with the text, and also in writing a text that is more novelistic in its style than an actual screenplay would be. (I was once criticized for failing to write a correct screenplay; it's a failure I was proud of achieving.)

Below is the "screenplay-novel trailer" to the work I've been laboring on -- Truth Marathon. It's a story that works on several at once. It is a social novel about Paul, an impoverished teacher trying to survive in the cut-throat world of contract work while helping his mentally unstable father -- an apparent crank who insists that there was a conspiracy behind Pearl Harbor. It's a love story about the relationship that develops between Paul and a co-worker -- a beautiful Korean-Canadian named Sarah. And it's about the weight of history: Sarah is haunted -- by mysterious events in her own background, as well as by the history of her native country. It turns out that Korea, too, had its own "Pearl Harbor".

Here is the trailer. Here are FAQs about the screenplay-novel idea. Here is art that might go with the publishing project. Here is an outline that also gives some historical context and explains why this novel works on several levels. And here is the very first excerpt from Truth Marathon.

I've completed the manuscript. If you're an agent or editor interested in seeing the complete work, you can contact me at fharvor at yahoo dot com.

TRUTH MARATHON -- screenplay-novel trailer

2006-09-12T13:24:00.000+09:00

VOICE-OVER: We live our lives and look for happiness. That's the degree of truth that we care and know about. But sometimes truth is deeper than this. Sometimes truth is not only buried in our personal past, but the past of all the world. Sometimes the truth we have to face is that of history itself.

INTERIOR. A BEDROOM.

A young couple is kissing ardently. The male is Western: slim, intelligent-looking, but with blemished skin and a somewhat awkward and self-conscious manner. The female is Asian: flowing dark hair, high cheekbones, tawny beautiful skin. Yet while she's far more attractive than the male, there is a mute sadness to her, as if she, not he, is the one who finds day-to-day life -- the simple actions of fitting in and being "normal" -- hardest.

PAUL: [whispering] I love you.

SARAH: [not looking at him directly] Just hold me.

INTERIOR. A LANGUAGE SCHOOL.

Paul is teaching.

PAUL: [friendly in a rah-rah sort of way] Hi, everyone! Today we're going to talk about vacations. Where would you like to go on vacation?

A CHINESE STUDENT: New York.

PAUL: [turning to another student, this time Korean] Great! Good! How about you, Hyun-sook? Would you like to go to New York also?

HYUN-SOOK: I hate New York.

PAUL: Oh. Okay.

HYUN-SOOK: [with deranged venom] I hate New York because I hate America! America destroyed Korea!

PAUL: [trying to make light of it and be ironic] Oh. Well, guess you'll have to stick to travelling in Canada, eh?

HYUN-SOOK: No! I just here for English! I hate Canada, too! I hate all Western countries!

JUMP-CUT. A LIVING ROOM IN A SHABBY HOUSE.

PAUL'S FATHER: [with a manic gleam in his eye] Sure, they tell you that it was all a surprise ... Pearl Harbor and all that. It wasn't a surprise! They knew! Roosevelt knew and he kept it a secret! And the Korean war, too. That was foreseen also by Truman. It was how they operated!

PAUL: [upset] That's just conspiracy theory stuff, dad.

PAUL'S FATHER: Look at the facts.

PAUL: What facts? If the facts were there, everybody would know them.

PAUL'S FATHER: Bullshit. People are sheep. That's the biggest fact of all.

PAUL: Dad, you're sick. That's why you believe these things. Because of the ... chemistry in your head.

PAUL'S FATHER: [getting angry] Bullshit times two!

PAUL: [pleading] It's not, dad. You've got to stop believing these things. They're not true.

PAUL'S FATHER: They are true! For both Pearl Harbor and the Korean War, there were government coverups on a massive scale.

PAUL: [almost in tears] No, Dad. You can't keep secrets that big.

PAUL'S FATHER: Then check it out. Talk to the same professor I met.

[He hands Paul a card.]

INTERIOR. A UNIVERSITY PROFESSOR'S OFFICE.

Paul and Prof. Demsky are talking.

PROF. DEMSKY: Your father may not be quite the same as the rest of us ... but that doesn't mean he's delusional.

PAUL: What? You're saying there were coverups?

PROF. DEMSKY: I'm not saying anything categorically. I'm saying that when you look at the evidence objectively -- when you look at what government records and what trained scholars already can demonstrate is factually verifiable -- then you ask an entirely new set of questions.

PAUL: So what's the bottom line? Is my dad onto something? Or just delusional?

[beat]

PROF. DEMSKY: [quietly] Your father is in some ways a perceptive man.

PAUL: So the Roosevelt administration did know about Pearl Harbor? And Truman did know the North Koreans were going to attack?

PROF. DEMSKY: Let's just say the weight of evidence suggests a situation that was far more complex than the official story.

INTERIOR. THE LANGUAGE SCHOOL.

Paul and Sarah are meeting. They're clearly in the first blush of love.

PAUL: Hi.

SARAH: [smiling shyly] Hi.

Then Paul simply smiles. The ardor that he feels is plain.

PAUL: Let's go somewhere.

SARAH: [sadly] I can't. I have to help --.

She turns away.

PAUL: What?

SARAH: Nothing.

EXTERIOR. A CITY STREET.

The young man PAUL is chasing the young woman SARAH. She is clearly upset.

PAUL: Please, Sarah! I wanna talk to you!

SARAH: You can't talk to me! You have nothing to say!

A BEDROOM.

Paul and Sarah are making love.

PAUL: [beside himself] You have no idea how much I love you.

SARAH: [weeping quietly] I love you too.

beat.

SARAH: Excuse me.

She stands to go the washroom. She quickly puts on her clothes.

PAUL lies on the bed, a contented look on his face.

SFX: A door slamming.

PAUL runs to the door. It's ajar. Wind blows against. No Sarah.

Paul is shocked.

EXTERIOR. A HOUSE AT NIGHT.

PAUL is drunk. He's outside Sarah's house.

PAUL: Sarah!! Sa-raaaaaaaaahhh!

A light comes on on the second floor.

INTERIOR. A HOUSE.

Paul confronted by Sarah's mother, Ms. Bak.

MS. BAK: [furious] What can you understand about us? You're just a Westerner!

*

SFX: Low, foreboding music.

VOICE-OVER: Sometimes if you want to find out what really happened, you have to go the distance.

Various

2006-09-09T08:35:00.000+09:00

"The Coward" by Brian Bishop

Amy Reiswig on St. Petersburg

Matt Bell makes a call for submissions

Noah Berlatsky on Jenna Jameson

Noah Cicero interviews Lisa Carver

"Streetwise" by Bobby Farouk

Peter Bergen on 9/11

Site links

2006-09-05T08:44:00.000+09:00

For a post that describes what this site is all about in frequently-asked-question form, click here.

To see the screenplay-novel Truth Marathon, click here.

Ecstatics vs. Ecclesiastics

2006-09-05T08:29:00.000+09:00

J F Quackenbush on the creative process:

There is a difference to be elucidated between the Ecclesiastic writer and the Ecstatic writer. This division has to do with the nature of fascination and Ecclesiastics and Ecstatics are cut from all cloths, exist in all classes, and perdure in all history. An Ecstatic is one who believes in the power of fascination to impart some sense of immediacy on the work. The Ecstatic believes that work must fascinate first. The Ecclesiastic is one who looks down his nose at immediacy and fascination. He is more concerned with doctrine and the nature of convention, and believes that the work of its own merit will draw the reader if the reader is worthy of the work. It is better to be an Ecstatic than an Ecclesiastic.

Gnosticism

2006-09-05T08:25:00.000+09:00

Waggish on the graphic story "The Veiled Prophet":

This cosmology is a gnostic one in that the eternal world reveals itself subjectively and in pieces. Yet David B. seems ultimately concerned with the idea that it is precisely the illusory world that allows we as people to exist and to survive. Every incursion of the Real destroys us. Merely to touch the Real, as Ziska does at the end of "The Armed Garden," is enough to blind one. People exist in the space between the Real and nothingness, condemned to see the world in lies and misunderstanding, and it is those fictions that form our very existence. Fictions keep the Real at bay, though it remains a constant presence.

Hurricane Season Returns

2006-08-29T12:19:00.000+09:00

[a summer re-run]

As the hurricanes of post-literacy sweep their way (and not for the first time) over the levees of literature, we are left to ask one simple question: how will we -- we poor lit-types -- survive? For it is up to us to figure this one out! No mercy for us -- no indeed! We who have set ourselves as guardians of some of the finest traditions of culture have been revealed to be fools who ignored the most obvious warnings ... self-absorbed fools; monomaniacal fools, capable of simultaneously obsessing over one set of problems -- our writing -- while ignoring another: the gathering electronic storm.

Yes, yes, the hurricane, it was foreseen. And not just a week beforehand. It was foreseen forty or fifty years ago! Sharp winds gusted through our living rooms! Powerful breezes sucked back the drapes, fluttered the pages of an open book, and sent shivers over our skins! And the cause of it – the eye of the mindless storm – sat in front of us, a seeming zone of peace, the television!

Well, some will say, be careful how you apportion blame! Was it this small invention, a mere electronic box, that could have triggered the horror and the death that now floods the world of literary publishing? (The corpses lie everywhere: the creative writing MFAs, now draped in plastic sheets, their manuscripts soaked and illegible in the toxic water.)

It’s true, it’s true! The book was in trouble – its levees were weak – long before the television set! Remember the typhoon of 1931? Remember the movie?

We must remember the old disasters! Not because they were worse than the new disasters, but because they put it all in a little perspective! We writers (the ones who still survive) are dehydrating on the floor of the stadium, pacing how we drink from what might be the last plastic jug of water we receive for a very long time! And wasn’t it just yesterday (or a few years ago) that it was all about the twin towers? Wasn’t it only recently that 9/11 was the real cause of the malaise in literary fiction?!

Who knows? We’re shell-shocked! We can’t think straight! But think we must! Yes, we writers have lost very little compared to the ones who have been devastated beyond comprehension: the distraught parents, the orphaned children, the uninsured and the desperate!

But please don’t dismiss us literary types huddled in a corner as self-absorbed! We not only are aware of the greater suffering around us, but wish to document it! And in our state of tender sensitivities, please do not insist that the only valid way to do that now is through an article … through non-fiction! Don’t you see?! That’s how we were traumatized in the first place! We’re novelists, dammit! Indulge us! We are not asking for a gargantuan handout! All we want is the ability to make literary art!!

A bas les demandes sociologique! Down with an insistence on constantly being factual! We realize there is a crisis! The Millennial Century has already shown it is quite adept at producing crises! But don't tell us that's all we can write about! Allow us our scrap of creativity!

We will think in new ways! We will try to anticipate the next storm! Why not new forms, new techniques? Perhaps the levees and break-waters can be strengthened! And so we will do our best, we writers of a literature that seems impractical! We will attempt to be -- well, we attempt to be novel! We will write books that read like screen-plays! We will use pictures, drawings, unveiled autobiography! But please, please ... listen to us as we speak: a moment of indulgence … a small gesture of understanding….....

We want shelter! We want to build a new house to live in!

Various

2006-08-24T13:54:00.000+09:00

Kristen Nelson on things not to do when querying an agent.

Jennifer Jackson on healthy perfectionism.

Matt Bell's new home-page of online short story links.

Rodney Welch on fashion porn.

Amnesty International on proportionality and war crime.

How Can We Read in an Age of Images?

2006-08-22T10:24:00.000+09:00

My essay "How Can We Read in an Age of Images?" appears in the most recent edition of The Quarterly Conversation. Here's the opening:

Typically, a litblog's traffic pales in comparison to image-based sites. For example, I recently came across one image-based site called The Sartorialist. It's based on a grabby idea: just a series of snapshots of people who are in some way well-dressed, with commentary underneath. And then when I looked at the number of profile views the site had received, I--well, I blanched with envy.

Even more heavily visited, of course, are the big name sites with enough corporate dough behind them to generate high-octane buzz. Otherwise sensible newspapers such as The Washington Post or The Guardian have blogs that deal with literary subjects. But while these latch onto the cool of the blogosphere, they do not partake of its democratic nature. Therefore, you, dear reader, are supposed to visit these sites, but they will not visit you.

And then there are the "bloggish" big-money sites. These are not even blogs at all--they are homepages attempting to manufacture their own street cred. An example of this is a site I recently saw put together by the BBC for a white hip-hopper. Attention-grabbing, for sure. But its grabbiness proceeded precisely from its use of image, and its images were effective because they were assembled by well-paid designers.

In any case, the question of the power of the image--the great seduction of looking--is one that litbloggers have to wrestle with....

Click here to see more.

I'm still making my way through the issue. But I've already found several good pieces in it. Well worth reading.

Various

2006-08-18T13:52:00.000+09:00

Rodney Welch, Steve Mitchelmore and Mark Sarvas on Gunther Grass.

Sidney Blumenthal on Bush's leadership.

Ed on the graphic novel vs. the snobs.

Robert Nagle on the next terrorist threat: snakes!

Scott Esposito on Liesl Schillinger.

STILLS WITHOUT SCRIPTS - #25

2006-08-18T13:46:00.000+09:00

DIE HAPPINESS -- excerpt one

2006-08-18T13:03:00.000+09:00

At the beginning of the 21^st Century, against a backdrop of political and military catastrophe, questions of what art is, what art can do, and what art should do acquire new importance. But the irony is that, precisely because of the crisis that is currently unfolding across the world (the crisis of failing and corrupted Western power), these questions seem trivial and beside the point. After all, there is a deep-seated human tendency to view art as secondary to the needs of daily life. More precisely, because art is secondary to essential needs, humans tend to think its importance evaporates.

But that just isn't true. Art -- and by this term I mean all culture, from literary novels to fine art to movies to pornography to advertising to reality TV -- molds our thinking. It even molds our perceptions, or, as they say these days, our hard-wiring. It is both one of the major sources of human folly and one of the best hopes of its salvation. The problem, though, is that when we talk about “art”, there is not one kind, there are several. Some are traditional in their narrative, some experimental, some are socially engaged, some are based on the author’s own experience, some spring from the imagination.

What follows are a series of excerpts from a novella I wrote and then videotaped several years ago. (The tape was never broadcast, but I have copies available for any publishing/broadcast professionals who might be interested.) The monologue is entitled DIE HAPPINESS, and on the surface it’s the story of a love triangle – a contemporary, sort-of, kind-of love triangle.

It's about Nils, a failing artist, and his encounter with Bitte and Hilde, two exchange students from Germany. Hilde is the nice one, Bitte the sexy one. But both are conspicuously decent; they are educated, after all, and they are German. And to be German sums up so many of the contradictions of the 20th Century -- the capacity of civilized people to do astoundingly monstrous things, of course. But more than that, the sins of the German nation were also the sins of economic progress; one aspect of mid-20th Century history that is rarely discussed is not just the failure of the nearby European states to put a stop to Nazism, but their start-and-stop, occasionally-winking complicity with it. Nazism served the goals of some people in some other countries -- namely, it was an effective means of stopping socialist revolution from starting in Germany and spreading across the continent.

To be German, then, is to be both linked to a terrible historical crime but also aware of a historical over-generalization. More than Germany was guilty of the murderous racism that ultimately engulfed Europe, and more than Germans made deals with the devil. As the history of collaboration shows, the Nazis found "willing executioners" in many lands.

But the novella DIE HAPPINESS is not about the Second World War. And it's not about its aftermath. It's about the mid-1990s -- a time when the stock market (but not the job market) was roaring, when the most recent war in the Middle East had been the techno-krieg of Gulf War One, and when a popular dance club tune was Prince's "1999". If the ideology of mid-20th Century democracy was defeating fascism, by the late 20th Century the ideology had become ... no ideology! Hey, whadd're talkin about anyway, egghead? Have a good time!!!

The ideology, in other words, was happiness....

Who could have thought that happiness, too, had its dangers?

DIE HAPPINESS

The adequate moderating of emotion may not sound like the most thrilling topic, but it's a timely one. We live in a world which is headed towards disaster -- what kind of disaster, we don't exactly know. It could be nuclear, it could be pollution-caused, it could be the social instability and resource-depletion which will inevitably result from overpopulation. Or it could be war ... simple, old-fashioned, never-ending war.

There are so many big things on the verge of going wrong that we deal with them by not thinking about them. Or rather, since that's a cliché, we think about dealing with insoluble problems by sublimating them; our fantasy life is dominated by this kind of pseudo-reasoning. We're subconscious extremists. We believe in bold actions, and violent and romantic either/ors. It's hard to approach the beast of Global Complexity without reducing it to something that can be overcome in a showdown with a gun, or, at very least, a yelling argument like the kind you see in a drama on TV.

But the world is filled with grey areas. And grey (as we, demographically, grey) is good. It's subtle. However, subtlety is borne of self-control, and to a large extent self-control feels unnatural to a modern soul. It isn't, it seems, heartfelt. And this is too bad, because sometimes what's constrained is deeper than what's expressed. The trick is in not allowing your constrained feelings to eat away at you; not letting them destroy your capacity for happiness.

In the fall of '95, on Thanksgiving weekend, I met a couple of exchange students from Germany. Their names were Bitte and Hilde, and they were adorable. Meeting them, I felt, indicated that my life was finally taking a turn for the better...

[more to follow]

Ca Dao

2006-08-16T12:16:00.000+09:00

Rick Green on John Balaban and Ca Dao (folk) Vietnamese poetry:

In 1971 John Balaban went to Vietnam to record ca dao, lyric poems passed down orally through generations. Guided by a sympathetic monk, he traversed the war-torn southern countryside, capturing some five hundred ca dao on tape. Most of these poems had never been written down, not even in Vietnamese. In Ca Dao Vietnam: Vietnamese Folk Poetry Balaban presents forty-nine of these stunning, crystalline lyrics in English translation.

The introductory essay suggests that the unassuming, mostly anonymous ca dao are quintessential expressions of Vietnamese culture. “Agrarian dynasties with a cultural continuity of millennia have left few monuments more enduring than the oral poetry and song known today as ca dao.” Linguistic and formal analyses show ca dao to be both ancient (perhaps many thousands of years old) and endemic to Vietnam. In this, they differ from Vietnamese literary poetry, which borrows heavily from Chinese tradition.

As Balaban states in the introduction, “Ca dao are always lyrical, sung to melodies without instrumental accompaniment by an individual singing in the first person…The range of ca dao includes children’s game songs, love songs, lullabies, riddles, work songs, and reveries about spiritual and social orders.” They are informed by a keen, rural sensibility which sometimes appears in brilliant nuggets of folk wisdom.

I am a Mo Village girl.
I wander about selling beer, chance to meet you.
Good jars don’t mean good brew.
Clothes well-mended are better than ill-sewn.
Bad beer soon sends you home.
A torn shirt, when mended, will look like new.

Many of the poems take love as their subject, but patience and duty generally overrule passion. Buddhist notions of karmic destiny foster a romantic quietism and the necessary social coordination of village life makes the fulfillment of individual desire something less than a priority.

[more]

Michael Allen Interview: Part 3

2006-08-11T07:33:00.000+09:00

Q: Is part of the problem with novels that they are overpriced? That is, when they are compared to, for example, the price of a movie DVD, buyers simply don't feel they're "getting their money's worth" with a book?

A: I don't think novels are overpriced -- not remotely -- provided they deliver what the reader wants. Consider the queues forming at midnight for the latest Harry Potter -- a book which the UK booktrade sold at a discount!

No one in the queue would have minded paying the full whack, but, courtesy of clueless marketing, they didn't have to.

Q: And if price is a factor, what can publishers and writers do to change this? In other words, what can they do to offer book-buyers "more"?

A: It's not a question of 'more', it's a question of better. The whole point of the novel is that it tells a story. The right story, told in the right way for a particular audience (e.g. Harry Potter again) exerts a powerful grip on the mind of the reader. And at the end of the book, the reader is conscious of having undergone a powerful (and ultimately pleasurable) emotional experience.

All that writers and publishers have to do is produce the right kind of books for the various audiences which we know to exist. It's not an impossible task, but it does require intelligence, hard work, and PRACTICE.

No one can do the job straight out of the box. After that, it's all down to circumstance, fate, karma, randomness, chance. See my essay On the Survival of Rats in the Slush Pile.

The problem with many novels at the moment is that they are not written for readers so much as to glorify the author. And, unsurprisingly, not many people want to read a book which says 'Look at me! Aren't I clever!'

Commentary: Allen's comments on the marketing of Harry Potter are worth keeping in mind. And they also have an interesting implication: if the book trade was willing to discount these books -- which already had a guaranteed audience -- does that not sugggest an acceleration of the trend over recent years (or decades) to bank too much on a select number of blockbuster titles? In other words, since the discount is a profit-loss, it is in effect more money into the Potter franchise's marketing budget; apart from this particular "investment" being unnecessary, would it not be too much to ask that some more time, energy and money be put into all books that are published (taking into account the varying resources of each publisher)?

Allen is at his strongest when he comments on the marketing/business side of publishing. I suppose where I part company with him is in his strong emphasis on populist writing. It seems to me that there is already an enormous pool of writers out there perfectly willing to give the audience what it wants, entertainment-wise. And I'm skeptical that the emotional experience of reading a Potter book is the sort of emotional experience writers in general should aim for -- just as the emotional experience of a well-made-but-formulaic studio movie certainly doesn't represent the end-goal of all movie-making.

Ultimately, given the stress the publishing industry is under, there will be an increasing pressure on writers to produce marketable product. This may mean attempts to turn literature itself into a form of genre (that is, formulaic) writing.

Personally, I think the publishing industry, which includes many selfless individuals who need to be given great credit for the work they do to try and keep the ideal of good writing alive, would do well to experiment not so much with dumbing down literature, but publishing new forms of it ... as well as good traditional novels.

STILLS WITHOUT SCRIPTS - #24

2006-08-10T13:54:00.000+09:00

Non-mediated Accounts

2006-08-10T12:05:00.000+09:00

Natalie d'Arbeloff on Mid-east bloggers:

To read non-mediated accounts of what life is really like in Beirut and Baghdad and Palestine and Israel, go to the bloggers on the ground. Thanks to Velveteen Rabbi for the link to Mazen Kerbaj (Beirut). There's Rafah (Gaza), riverbend (Baghdad), Allison (Israel). This item from ("American Jews call for ceasefire in Lebanon") is not one you'll find in the mainstream media.

Maybe if bloggers worldwide get to know each other as human beings, beyond the glut of received opinions, ignorance and misinformation, there might be a chance, eventually, for peace based on genuine friendship, across the barriers of geography, culture, religion, ethnicity, nationality and the politics of revenge.

(See also the fascinating/bizarre photos from "The World's Biggest Sand-sculpture Festival".)

A House in Negril

2006-08-10T12:04:00.000+09:00

Geoffrey Philip on agents and The Biz:

Agents control publishing and the majority that I’ve met are in the business to make money. They make their living off the 15% (and upwards) commissions. They have to eat. Realistically, they are the final arbiters of who and what gets published. 95% of all publishers nowadays will not accept the work of unagented writers. Money is the force behind what agents do. In this respect, book agents are no different than any other kind of agent--they sell things: books, cars & pork bellies. For many of them, especially the younger ones, it’s just one of the things that they can do or will do in their lifetimes. If selling books works out, they can retire (before they are 35!) to a beach (it really doesn’t matter which beach) with their Blackberries (or whatever new gadget is in vogue) and drink mojitos (or whatever new drink is in vogue).

If selling books doesn’t work out, they can take a “long vacation” to a fashionable beach somewhere where they can meet and network with someone who’s been there and who can give then some tips on “selling” It really doesn’t matter, for even if that doesn’t work out, they can always move on to something else.

I know. I’ve met them on the beaches of Negril or overheard their conversations that sound like “Sonny” in The Apostle when he rattles of his talents, “I can speak in tongues” and the other “gifts of the Spirit” as merely some of the things that he can do to make a profit for the church: “It's pay before you pray."

2006-08-09T08:36:00.000+09:00

re: Michael Allen -- see also Simon Owens' interview with Allen at Bloggasm.

Michael Allen Interview: Part 2.

2006-08-09T07:58:00.000+09:00

Q: You've also said that generally speaking novels would do well to be shorter. Why do you think this?

A: Can I refer you to my four-part essay on The Problem of Length, published in December 2004. Here are the links:

Commentary: The discussion Allen has on length covers both the marketing and aesthetic reasons for writing novels that are either long or short. (Although the discussion is about books generally, its real focus is on the novel; non-fiction, presumably, is not as prone to fashions in length as fiction is -- fiction, after all, is the skirt of the publishing industry.)

This discussion is a must-read. Allen begins with a history of the novel, beginning with the Victorian novel -- a form we automatically associate with great length. Allen shows that in fact the long Victorian novel was driven by market demand, and makes a strong case for believing this was in large measure because of the influence of one man: Charles Edward Mudie.

Mudie owned many libraries. These were privately-run enterprises. (A person subscribed to the library -- paid a fee, in other words -- and was entitled to borrow books from it rather than buy them outright; the analogy with ebook services is not hard to draw.) Because Mudie's libraries were plentiful, this gave him considerable power as a consumer. There were cases of his buying a novel's entire print run. As a result, he dominated the book market, and his taste had a strong influence on what publishers published. For example, as Allen describes, Mudie realized that he could make a greater profit from dividing novels into three sections. As a result, the "triple decker" novel -- the long Victorian novel as we commonly think of it -- became popular. And so, commercial demands had a noticeable effect on the form of an artistic medium.

Allen continues by illustrating how changing economic circumstances played a significant role in the length of the novel. During the Second World War, paper was scarce; novels became shorter. The length of the average novel fluctuated for a variety of reasons, not all of them economic, but as Allen shows, it is a mistake to think novel-length is merely the result of pure artistry.

Allen continues in following parts of his essay to argue that the novel should, ideally, be short(er). There are sound reasons for this, he says, the primary one being that a short novel places less demands on the reader and forces the writer to tell his/her story directly, instead of allowing the impulse for meandering and unnecessary description to take over. In other words, short novels not only read better, but tend to be better written.

Allen allows that there are exceptions to this rule, and he cites the example of Neal Stephenson. I can't personally speak on Stephenson's work, but agree that the preference for shorter novels must always be, at most, a very general rule, and each work of fiction should be judged on its own merits.

[Just as an aside, a while ago Eric Rosenfield posted on the merits of short literary magazine, One Story.]

FAQs link

2006-08-09T07:06:00.000+09:00

For a post that describes what this site is all about in frequently-asked-question form, click here.

To see the screenplay-novel Truth Marathon, click here.

Team-work vs. solitude: or the medium and the artist

2006-08-08T13:35:00.000+09:00

The following was recommended to me by Robert Nagle of Idiotprogrammer. It is from The Conversations: Walter Murch and the Art of Editing Cinema. The original post is highly worth reading. But what struck me in particular was Murch's comments on how visual artists once worked by necessity as part of a team when painting in fresco but how they eventually were able to work solitarily when painting in oils. Murch extends this comparison with how visual/text artists (if one could call a movie-maker that) work now again in teams when making movies.
This, though, might change once more. Movies (and art that possesses some of the qualities of movies) are in the process of adopting digital technology.This technology once more allows the creator more individuality of expression, in part because digital technology allows more solitude.

Some of the greatest, if not the greatest triumphs of European pictorial art were done in fresco, the painstaking process whereby damp plaster is stained with pigments that bond chemically with the plaster and change color as they dry. One need only think of Michelangelo’s frescoed ceiling of the Sistine Chapel, the pictorial equivalent of Beethoven’s Ninth Symphony.A great deal of planning needs to be done with fresco, and the variables — like the consistency and drying time of the plaster — have to be controlled exactly. Artists needed a precise knowledge of the pigments and how they would change color as they dried. Once the pigment had been applied, no revisions were possible. Only so much work could be done in a day before the plaster applied that morning became too dry. Inevitably, cracks would form at the joins between subsequent applications of plaster, so the arrangement of each day’s subject matter had to be chosen carefully to minimize the damage from this cracking.

There was more, but it should be clear that for all these reasons, fresco painting was an expensive effort of many people and various interlocking technologies, overseen by the artist who took responsibility for the final product.

The invention of oil paint changed all this. The artist was freed to paint wherever and whenever he wanted. He did not have to create the work in its final location. The paint was the same color wet as it would be dry. He did not have to worry unduly about cracking surfaces. And the artist could paint over areas he didn’t like, even to the point of re-using canvases for completely different purposes.

Although painting in oils remained collaborative for a while, the innate logic of the new medium allowed the artist more and more control of every aspect of the work, intensifying his personal vision. This was tremendously liberating, and the history of art from 1450 to the present is a clear testimony to the creative power of that liberation — and some of its dangers, which found their ultimate expression in the 19th and 20th centuries, with the emergence of solitary and tortured geniuses like Van Gogh.

The nature of working with film has been more like painting in fresco than oil. It is so heterogeneous, with so many technologies woven together in a complex and expensive fabric, that it is almost by definition impossible for a single person to control. There are a few solitary filmmakers — Jordan Belson comes to mind — but these are exceptional individuals, and the films they make are geared in their subject matter to allow creation by a single person.

Michael Allen Interview: Part 1

2006-08-06T16:05:00.000+09:00

Michael Allen is the man behind Grumpy Old Bookman -- a litblog that almost certainly is in no need of introduction. Recently, he was kind enough to consent to a short interview. I am posting the interview this week. Although it is short, I've decided to divide it into three parts, since the responses Allen gives are interesting enough that they deserve deeper discussion. (I provide commentary below, but invite further comments.)

Like many of the better litbloggers, Allen is opinionated and informed. And at least some of what he has to say is controversial; he has, for example, argued that the novel may very well wither away and become a marginal art form -- an argument very different from the one made in recent years by, for example, Jason Cowley, who argued the exact opposite (or rather, argued the novel retains its central place within the culture). He has also argued that it is meaningless to distinguish between literary fiction and what is commonly called mass market or genre fiction.

Whether one agrees with him or not, Allen is raising serious questions that need to be discussed. It is unlikely in the extreme that book sales -- particularly fiction sales -- will increase in the short term. (This is an overall statement; obviously some titles will do well individually.) The literary publishing industry currently seems trapped by inertial forces. It would be healthier by far if more change and experimentation took place.

For writers and publishers both, a lot is at stake.

Q: You've said the novel may end up being a very marginal form, like poetry. Why is this? Because of mass media? Or is it because of some characteristic common to many contemporary novels?

A: It must be 20 or 30 years since Gore Vidal (among others) started to point out that, by and large, young people do not read books. They watch television and movies, and nowadays they have iPods and videos on the internet.

Certainly here in England there are figures published occasionally which show that only about 50% of the population reads books. If all that is true, and I believe that it is, then one has to remember that any future decline (or increase) in interest in novels starts from a modest base. Reading novels is not a universal habit, whereas watching television is something done by (at a guess) 95% of the population.

My reasons for thinking that interest in the novel is likely to decline are twofold. First, there is so much competition. Consider the situation in the late nineteenth century. Nearly all the population could read (at least in England), and there were books and newspapers. But there was no radio, no recorded music, no TV, no movies. Outside the big cities, even theatres were rare. So the novel had little competition.

Today, every passing year brings new advances in technology in the entertainment business. Ever more sophisticated devices are created, and it is not too far-fetched to suggest that, within a few years, we will have virtual forms of entertainment which include the viewer/audience as a participant. Against such sophistication, the novel begins to look pretty dull as a source of emotion. (Just as poetry now seems dull to most of us.)

Second, people who write and publish novels often seem oblivious to the medium's strengths (such as they are), and produce novels which even today few people actually want to read. This trend will continue for as long as people go on believing the kind of nonsense which is taught on Eng. Lit. and MFA courses.

Commentary: There are several issues here. There are two I'd like to focus on. The first is the role played by the institutions of literature, in particular university English departments and libraries.

In May of this year, Allen remarked that several decades ago, because of the very good library system that existed in Britain at that time, a novelist could count on selling roughly 2,000 copies. This may sound like awfully small beer in today's hype-addled cultural marketplace, but it was a sales figure that allowed publishers to make a small profit -- in other words, to avoid the fate that befalls many titles today, which is to actually lose the publisher money.

Leaving aside the endlessly complex question of what, exactly, good writing is, focusing on the manner in which it is marketed and distributed is essential if the sustainability of publishing generally is the goal. Contemporary book marketing seems to have left the library system out of the equation. This is too bad, because the old system Allen describes above has tangible benefits the publishing industry -- especially at the smaller levels -- would do well to pay attention to.

The disadvantage, of course, of libraries sustaining book sales was that the library system also limited the number of sales that could occur; obviously, if libraries are sustaining book sales, that means most of the books bought are read by borrowers. Libraries these days have instituted a payment scheme whereby authors receive a small monetary rebate for the books of theirs that are borrowed through the library system, but it's a paltry amount. So a system in which libraries effectively sustain many publishers is not enticing to a modern mentality, which is obsessed with the big score. But these days book sales -- especially literary fiction sales -- are falling so drastically that even the small number of book sales a well-maintained library sytem can guarantee are not bad at all. At the very least, they protect publishers from bankruptcy, and they allow writers the kind of environment they really need in which to grow as artists -- an environment in which they don't feel constantly ignored.

English departments, too, could assist by organizing and developing curriculums that didn't just focus on the canon or the modern conception of the canon (which may turn out to be wrong). They could help augment a library book-buying system by teaching x-number of small press books, for example.

But then, this brings us to issue number two, and the main point raised by Allen -- if young people are so distracted by TV and iPods that they're not reading at all, what is to be done? Would a beefed-up library/English department system really help in the long run if it existed in a post-literate culture in which only a small percentage of the population really cared about books anymore?

Here I think more experimentation -- experimentation with audio books, with reading-as-performance, with new forms of narrative -- is in order. It's time for literary culture to recognize that what a culture like ours produces is narratives. How these narratives are "delivered" is secondary to the quality of the narrative itself.

Perhaps an essential part of what defines literature is simply that it is a narrative that is truthful about how life really is. Look at what popular culture is producing these days: it's entertaining, but it's only a series of unreal fantasies -- of having magic powers, of being incredibly tough and good at fighting, of being unusually good looking.

In a sense, the book (or audio book, or videotaped reading) is more necessary than ever. People now live in a cultural environment in which they are literally saturated with the pop cultural narratives of action movies, porn and video games. We need counter-narratives to provide psychological and cultural alternatives to these ways of experiencing our reality.

Away

2006-07-28T10:52:00.000+09:00

I'm going to be away for roughly a week. My wife and I will be doing some travelling -- close to home and then very far afield. Hopefully my back will last the journeys.

Two links to check out in the meantime are Dan Green's The Reading Experience and Robert Nagle's Idiotprogrammer, both of whom have commentary on this site. Both raise very interesting questions of what, exactly, art is capable of accomplishing. This, it seems to me, is a particularly important issue that needs to be discussed in an ongoing way in the blogosphere, since not only the decline in book sales and general sense of crisis in publishing is of interest to writers, but the rapid widening of conflict in the Middle East creates a situation in which art's power (or lack thereof) needs to be meditated upon.

It is dialogue itself that helps illuminate what any given thing in the world is -- and this is as true of literary art as it is of other fields of human endeavor. In other words, creative people need to talk with each other about questions such as what art is capable of achieving not because there are final answers, but because the dialogue itself is also part of what art "is".

p.s. Hopefully I'll be able to continue my discussion with Dan at some point in the future, because I think there's a little confusion between us about what we mean by artists who work with both art and writing.

Fresh Eyes

2006-07-26T10:04:00.000+09:00

Scott Esposito on reading with fresh eyes:

Sometimes I wonder what it would be like to read a certain book if I had simply bought it without hearing anything about it beforehand. Would I still give it the same attention? The same patience? Would I recognize if it were good or bad? These are important questions because I pride myself on being able to tell well written, artistic books form the hack jobs and mediocrities. I think I can tell what's what, but how could I ever really know, when everything comes recommended?

Truth Marathon: A Screenplay-novel trailer

2006-07-25T18:48:00.002+09:00

VO: We live our lives and look for happiness. That's the degree of truth that we care and know about. But sometimes truth is deeper than this. Sometimes truth is not only buried in our personal past, but the past of all the world. Sometimes the truth we have to face is that of history itself.

INTERIOR. A BEDROOM.

A young couple is kissing ardently. The male is Western: slim, intelligent-looking, but with blemished skin and a somewhat awkward and self-conscious manner. The female is Asian: flowing dark hair, high cheekbones, beautiful tawny skin. Yet while she's far more attractive than the male, there is a mute sadness to her, as if she, not he, is the one who finds day-to-day life -- the simple actions of fitting in and being "normal" -- hardest.

PAUL: [whispering] I love you.

SARAH: [not looking at him directly] Just hold me.

more here

Screenplay novel FAQs

2006-07-25T18:41:00.000+09:00

What is a screenplay-novel?

It's a novel. But it's written in the form of a screenplay.

How did you get the idea of writing a screenplay-novel?

Over time, it dawned on me that I treated movies the way I treated novels: I would appreciate their stories in a similar way, and talk about them afterwards the way a person might talk about a novel. In fact, I do this more often with movies ... mainly, I think, because nowadays movie-watchers vastly outnumber novel readers. There are many people you can have a conversation with about a particular movie, even a very serious movie. It's a lot harder to do that about a particular book, especially if it's literary.

One "aha" moment for me was reading the published screenplay of "Out of Africa". My wife had a copy of it, and it was lying around the house. I live in South Korea, and these kinds of scripts are enormously popular here. They're marketed as an English learning tool (English script on one page, with Korean-language "key points" on the other). But as I read the script I found I really enjoyed it in and of itself. And then I thought, if this works as a book form of an existing movie, why wouldn't it work as a book form of a movie that's never been made? In other words, why not use the same combination of stills and script?

And then there's the creative process involved: Unless writing autobiographically, I like imagining scenes as if they were in a movie. My imagination seems to naturally work that way.

Has this idea been done before?

There's a long tradition of writing satire in the form of a screenplay -- you know, some imagined scene, for example, some inane conversation in the White House. And there is a tradition of teleromans in some countries. These are basically comics made of photographs, not drawings.

But there are no examples of a literary novel written in screenplay form that I've seen. At least, this was true when the idea first came to me. Since then, people have given me examples. One was a script by Michael Turner entitled "American Whisky Bar". I haven't read the book, so I can't comment on it. But some time after it was published, it was produced by CITY-TV and Bruce McDonald as a live television drama. I saw that broadcast. The broadcast was really more like a 1950s-style televised play than anything else. So I don't know if it qualifies.

Personally, I think people will come up with other examples and this will turn into a long-running debate over who was first. And I doubt it will ever be satisfactorily resolved. Instead, what I'd like to emphasize is I'm calling for the screenplay-novel to exist as a distinct form of novel. In other words, I'm hoping that many serious writers will adopt this way of writing novels -- at least, for some of their work.

So it's a good idea because it's new?

Ideas aren't good simply because they're new. I might be the first person to invent chocolate-flavoured cheddar cheese. That doesn't mean it's worthwhile. Instead, I think this idea is good because it has the potential to work. It solves problems for the writer, and solves problems for the audience. It's quicker to produce and quicker to read, yet at the same time, it keys into people's imaginations. It is a very effective way of creating the vividness necessary for a story to "work". At least, this is how it works for me. Some people don't feel the same way. For them, it's not a particularly evocative way of writing. They need more description -- both of the environment and of interior consciousness. I understand this. Because the screenplay-novel is stripped-down, it seems to have certain inherent shortcomings, one of which is less physical description and the other which is the apparent disappearance of interior consciousness.

The first quality can still exist in a screenplay novel. As in a regular screenplay, there is no necessary restriction on the amount of physical description that exists. There are simply conventions; screenplays tend to be very minimalist. However, a screenplay-novelist doesn't have to follow this convention. He or she can include as much description as he or she wants.

Evoking interior consciousness is more of a problem. Interior states of mind don't "disappear" in a screenplay-novel. Instead, they have to be evoked mainly by the characters' dialogue. (This is one reason why I tend to use more description of gestures, facial expressions and tone of voice in my dialogue than you'd find in a regular screenplay.)

The screenplay-novel form is not perfect. It has strengths and weaknesses. But let's be honest: the traditional novel has inherent short-comings, too, not the least of which is its decreasing popularity.

Call the screenplay-novel experimental literature. But it's experimental literature with practical aims.

I've read other screenplays, and they're a lot different from yours. Why?

Those aren't screenplay-novels, they're screenplays. They are meant to be produced into movies. What I'm doing here is a novel meant to be imagined as a movie.

But it's just words. What I like about movies are the pictures.

Books can contain pictures, too.

Why don't you just write a regular novel?

I do. I have. But recently I have become interested in this approach to -- this form of -- writing. It's a method of writing that works for me; that re-inspires me after years of increasing frustration with traditional literary techniques.

So you hate traditional fiction?

No. When it is well done I admire it just as much as I ever did. I have gone through cycles, of course: there have been times in my life when I hardly read it at all. And there have been other times when I read it a lot (Korean literature has been a recent inspiration). But generally for me, something in much of the traditional fiction that gets published these days has withered. I have trouble maintaining interest in it. This does not mean, though, that I have lost interest in fictional narrative overall, since movies, too, are a form of fiction.

If I were the only person who felt this way, I'd blame myself. But many people, including sophisticated people who have invested considerable energy into establishing literary careers, seem to feel the same way. So I think the main problem does not rest primarily with any one individual; it rests with contemporary fiction itself. Or to be more accurate, it rests with the contemporary institutions of fiction.

Why is this? It's not as if literary fiction has gotten worse in its totality. There is a lot of good writing out there, and often -- usually when I read something by someone unknown -- I will be strongly impressed by it. Rather, the problem seems to rest with the fiction that is being chosen by the big publishing houses, the most powerful critics, and the prize committees. Supposedly this should be the best of the best. Unfortunately, a lot of contemporary work that we are told is great is lifeless or false.

Sure. But that's just a subjective opinion. I don't agree.

You're right, it is subjective. Unfortunately, the readership of literary fiction has been declining for years, and recently this decline has become alarming. By all means, read traditional novels, and, if they move you, venerate them. But we have to face the larger cultural reality. We have to think in new ways.

So why don't you just watch movies and TV?

I like movies ... TV I'm not so sure about, although there are good programs out there.

The problem with movies and TV is this: they cost a lot to produce. No, let me rephrase that -- they cost an astronomical amount. Apart from the indie movie scene, which tends to be perpetually marginalized, no one individual can make them. They are group efforts, and while this gives them some strengths, they suffer from the near-inevitable tendency of group creations to lose any singular voice. And it's the singular voice that has to survive. It's the individual consciousness, not the group, that maintains contact with life.

And this is one of the great strengths of books: because they're relatively cheap to produce, they can still be made by individuals. (The contemporary trend toward "packaging" a book is pernicious on so many levels, as the Kaavya Viswanathan incident showed. If this scandal will be enough to stop the general trend to package books and turn even them into bland, committee-made products remains to be seen.)

Mass culture, with its converging technologies such as TV-receiving cell phones and ubiquitous WiBro reception, keeps moving more and more toward post-literacy. We are in desperate need of narrative forms that both can reach an audience but also allow the artist to retain his or her individuality. The screenplay-novel is a way of "writing a movie".

So you're suggesting we just give up? That because mass culture is so pervasive we are obligated to mimic it?

The screenplay-novel is not a selling out. Think of it this way: there are good movies. There is good TV. In other words, both mediums are capable of producing genuine works of art, despite their group-made natures. If you write a screenplay-novel, you should try to make something that also has artistic merit. Obviously, it won't have the linguistic, descriptive power of great novels. But it will have the capacity to stir people's imaginations.

And when reading a screenplay-novel, all people have to do is allow themselves to read it as a director might. This is one of the broad-based effects that movies have had on the modern mind: it is possible -- even natural, it sometimes seems -- to think "cinematically". In other words, our minds have already been conditioned to imagine narratives as if they were movies. Maybe everyone doesn't do this. But many people do, and they do it effortlessly. In this sense, we are all directors now.

The trick is to be a good director -- an auteur, if you will. Remember that the best movies and TV are often made in opposition to mass culture. The screenplay-novel is another way of doing that.

But what about reading? If everyone is "being a director", won't reading suffer even more?

People are still reading lots these days. The trend among readers, however, is to buy more non-fiction than fiction.

What's wrong with that?

Nothing in the sense that non-fiction has always been popular, and now simply is more so. However, we still need fiction. It's not a luxury. It's a necessity, as well. Cultures rise and fall based partly on the stories they tell themselves.

I think screenplays suck. Traditional novels are more interesting to read.

Then read traditional novels. But consider the possibility that the screenplay-novel idea is a relatively new one, and part of your antagonism to them may be the result of being conditioned to read fictional narrative one way and not another. Remember that: the screenplay novel is just another form of narrative.

해미 읍성, 여름에 Haemi Fortress, in Summer (an ultra-short)

2006-07-25T18:35:00.000+09:00

EXT. A SMALL KOREAN VILLAGE. AN EARLY SUMMER EVENING, MID-WEEK.

A WESTERN MAN is walking down the city's main street. To his left is the historic site of Haemi Fortress. He has a peaceful expression on his face, but from his body language we can tell he's lonely.

VO: Those were the days before I met you.

SFX: A light breeze.

EXT. THE INNER COURTYARD OF THE FORTRESS. MOMENTS LATER.

The Western man sees a group of CHILDREN. They are giggling and playing with each other. Then one of them spots the man.

CHILD: 의국인! [Foreigner]

SECOND CHILD: [sing-songy] Hello!

MAN: [smiling] Hello.

ALL CHILDREN: [gleefully] Hello! Hello!

MAN: [speaking slowly] Can you speak English?

The CHILDREN suddenly start to giggle uproariously. But their amusement is more a symptom of shyness than desire to carry the game any further. They run away, still laughing.

The MAN continues walking. He makes his way through small, sad, empty streets.

INT. AN EVANGELICAL CHURCH. TEN MINUTES LATER.

The MAN enters. He is somewhat surprised to see a CROWD OF WORSHIPPERS. They are very involved in their prayers.

The MAN walks cautiously forward.

A MIDDLE-AGED KOREAN MAN spots him.

CUT TO: CLOSE UP of MIDDLE-AGED KOREAN MAN.

MIDDLE-AGED KOREAN MAN: 하느님! 하느님이 자를 사랑하습니다! [God! God loves you!]

EXT. A STREET. MOMENTS LATER.

The MAN is walking by himself again. He looks even sadder than before. A DIFFERENT CHILD spots him.

DIFFERENT CHILD: [especially enthusiastically] Hello!

beat.

V.O.: I don't know what it is was about that kid's voice. It got to my heart more than any church or religion could.... I heard that cheerfully demanding, pip-squeaky voice and all I could think of was another day when the sun was setting -- a hotter day, and happier, too.

Morph

2006-07-24T13:18:00.000+09:00

James Zogby in the Huffington Post:

A symptom of this warped mind-set is the now widely-shared and dangerous notion that has equated calls for ceasefire with weakness. In a rare display of agreement, both the White House and the Washington Post promoted this view last week. In response to a question from Helen Thomas as to why the President opposed calls for a ceasefire, White House spokesperson Tony Snow rudely thanked Ms. Thomas for what he characterized as her "Hezbollah view." Likewise, the Post editorialized that call for a ceasefire would only "reward the aggressors."

In this environment, it has been difficult to promote reasoned discourse and promote political solutions. Calls from the Maronite Catholic Patriarch to end the hostilities, or Lebanese Prime Minister Siniora who challenged the West to express outrage over the damage being done to Lebanon and the Lebanese, have fallen on deaf ears in Washington.

Even more tragic has been the total blackout of any news coming out of Gaza regarding the suffering of Palestinians now enduring their fifth week of Israeli assault.

As I have said before, no good will come of this. Absent international pressure to pursue a political solution within Lebanon and Palestine and between Lebanese, Palestinians, and Israelis, the devastation of the past month will, as in the aftermath of 1982, morph into a new and potentially more lethal extremism.

Immeasured reaction

2006-07-24T12:46:00.000+09:00

Gideon Levy of Haaretz:

Every neighborhood has one, a loudmouth bully who shouldn't be provoked into anger. He's insulted? He'll pull out a knife. Spat in the face? He'll draw a gun. Hit? He'll pull out a machine gun. Not that the bully's not right - someone did harm him. But the reaction, what a reaction! It's not that he's not feared, but nobody really appreciates him. The real appreciation is for the strong who don't immediately use their strength. Regrettably, the Israel Defense Forces once again looks like the neighborhood bully. A soldier was abducted in Gaza? All of Gaza will pay. Eight soldiers are killed and two abducted to Lebanon? All of Lebanon will pay. One and only one language is spoken by Israel, the language of force.

more

Keeping Moral Legitimacy

2006-07-24T12:42:00.001+09:00

Fred Kaplan on the new Army Field Manual: a handbook for U. S. soldiers written by Lt. General David Petraeus and retired Col. Conrad Crane:

Counterinsurgency involves rebuilding a society, keeping the population safe, boosting the local government's legitimacy, training a national army, and fighting off insurgents who are trying to topple the government—all at the same time.

As the manual puts it, "The insurgent succeeds by sowing chaos and disorder anywhere; the government fails unless it maintains order everywhere."

From first page to last, the authors stress that these kinds of wars are "protracted by nature." They require "firm political will and extreme patience," "considerable expenditure of time and resources," and a very large deployment of troops ready to greet "hand shakes or hand grenades" without mistaking one for the other.

"Successful … operations require Soldiers and Marines at every echelon to possess the following," the authors write. (Emphasis added.) They then list a daunting set of traits: "A clear, nuanced, and empathetic appreciation of the essential nature of the conflict. … An understanding of the motivation, strengths, and weaknesses of the insurgent," as well as rudimentary knowledge of the local culture, behavioral norms, and leadership structures. In addition, there must be "adaptive, self-aware, and intelligent leaders."

Meanwhile, a single high-profile infraction can undo 100 successes. "Lose moral legitimacy, lose the war," the authors warn, pointedly noting that the French lost Algeria in part because their commanders condoned torture.

This piece, incidentally, appeared on July 8, just days before the war in Southern Lebanon broke out. Since then, events have moved at such a speed that they almost cause numbness. But a few points worth making (and these are taken from media , such as CNN or The New York Times, who can't be accused of anti-Israel bias):

- Support for Hezbollah has increased throughout the Arab world.

- Most humanitarian assistance to Lebanese people has been provided by Syria (as refugees arrive there; as far as I know Cyprus mainly provides a stop-over).

- The Bush adminstration has refused to call for a cease-fire while speeding up the delivery of laser-guided bombs to the IDF.

- The IDF has been accused by the UN of attacking "excessively and indiscriminately".

The point is not that Hezbollah is better or somehow more virtuous than the IDF. Its leadership has lied about its own use of targetting civilians. The point instead is that in the period of a few weeks, Israel has done extraordinary damage to its own reputation, while the reputation of previously pariah groups such as Hezbollah has increased.

In a situation like this, emotions run so high that on certain topics rational discussion becomes almost impossible. The moral worth of the IDF vs. Hezbollah is one of these. Instead, though, I wonder how military professionals, especially in the United States, are viewing this conflict. It will almost certainly have an impact on the occupation of Iraq -- an impact that will be made vastly more complicated by the fact that Hezbollah is Shiite, and the U. S. has tended to succeed in its relations with the Shiites in Iraq. How will this change, though, when Shiites in Iraq look at the support the Bush adminstration is lending against Shiite militias in Lebabon? Again, the issue here is not the moral question of whether Hezbollah is terrorist. The issue is what the real-world consequences will be of taking sides in a conflict that is inflaming emotions across the Middle East.

In other words, how are American military professionals thinking about the possibility Israeli actions in Lebanon might doom the U. S. plan for Iraq to failure?

I'm not asking these questions rhetorically. I'm genuinely curious to find out what sort of reaction those in the military (or those who deal with diplomacy as it has an impact on the military) are having. What is their thinking? What are their views of the actual consequences the war in Lebanon will have on their own plans? Are they neutral? Supportive of Israel? Beside themselves with frustration and disbelief? They, too, are a group whose opinions need to be made known.

Differing from the official account

2006-07-24T12:14:00.000+09:00

Mark Kaplan on conspiracy theory:

Heard the other day someone say “I prefer cock-up to conspiracy theory every time”. Really? Every time, automatically, without critical thought or reflection? How strangely dogmatic. Sure, there are crazy conspiracy theories, just as there are crazy cock-up theories. But too often, ‘conspiracy theory’ means little more than this: anything that speaks of goals, tactics, strategies other than the ones officially declared; in other words, 'conspiracy theory' as anything that differs too markedly from the official account, anything which – in an age of unprecedented spin and careful government PR – refuses to take such PR on its own terms.

Kaplan's comments are interesting on several levels. The first is that the word "conspiracy" is necessarily pejorative -- but it may simply reflect common sensical skepticism. The second is that the 21st Century so far has turned out to be a Time of Conspiracy Theory; that is, thinking of this sort has become popular. Some conspiracy theories are crazed and escapist. But others spring from a desire to discover the truth about long-buried truths. Some aspects of foreign policy include this. And, obviously, so do the actions of some militant groups.

The hidden aims of governments, groups -- all players in the political arena -- can be viewed, often healthily, through the prism of "conspiracy" ... that is, viewing them simply to try to find out what these entities are really up to.

Peace petition

2006-07-23T11:38:00.000+09:00

Save the Lebanese civilians petition.

(via Charlotte Street)

War Services

2006-07-22T17:36:00.000+09:00

This is from an advertising sidebar next to a story for an online news-magazine:

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Throughout the Region

2006-07-22T17:26:00.000+09:00

This story, by Neil MacFarquhar of the New York Times, covers an issue that I mentioned a few days earlier in my commentary on a recent Juan Cole article. While media have been endlessly repeating over the past few days the question of what role, if any, Syria and Iran will play in this war, what is happening in countries such as Egypt and Saudi Arabia may turn out to have more serious consequences for U. S. policy in the region.

DAMASCUS, Syria, July 21 — In mosques from Mecca to Marrakesh, sermons at Friday Prayer services underscored both the David-versus-Goliath glamour many Arabs associate with Hezbollah’s fight against Israel and their antipathy toward the United States and its allies in the region for doing so little to stop yet another Arab country from collapsing into bloodshed.

“Our brothers are being killed in Lebanon and no one is responding to their cries for help,” said Sheik Hazzaa al-Maswari, an Islamist member of Yemen’s Parliament, in his Friday sermon at the Mujahid Mosque in Sana, the country’s capital.

“Where are the Arab leaders?” he said. “Do they have any skill other than begging for a fake peace outside the White House? We don’t want leaders who bow to the White House.”

The tone of the sermons suggests that the fighting in Lebanon is further tarnishing the image of the United States in the Arab world as being solely concerned with Israel’s welfare and making its allied governments look increasingly like puppets.

“What is creating radicalism in the region is not authoritarian regimes,” said Mustafa Hamarneh, director of the Center for Strategic Studies at the University of Jordan. “Mainly it is American policy in the region — survey after survey shows that.”

The attacks against Arab leaders from the pulpit were all the more surprising because so many governments have exerted some manner of control over sermons in recent years. Dictating the content of the weekly themes is one means of preventing prayer leaders from launching into the kind of political discussions that could inspire extremists.

Here in Damascus, where the Syrian government has been trying to keep a low profile as the fighting in Lebanon surges, prominent prayer leaders focused on the need to donate generously to help tens of thousands of Lebanese refugees pouring over the border. But they also took other Arab countries to task — although without mentioning by name such critics of Hezbollah as Saudi Arabia, Egypt and Jordan.

Sense

2006-07-22T17:21:00.000+09:00

Michael Webster at Tierra del Ciego:

Lebanon has a moderate, representative democratic government and along with Egypt and Jordan, is one of Israel's friendliest neighbors. Unfortunately, Syria has too much influence in Lebanon and it's influence largely unwanted by the Lebanese. Ironically, Lebanon wants Hezbollah out of it's country almost as much as Israel does. Unfortunately, the Lebanese army is small and weak and any move they might make against Hezbollah would surely be countered by the Syrian army rolling across the border. So, if Israel and Lebanon want the same thing, why then is Israel bombing the crap out Lebanon. Wouldn't it make more sense to cooperate with them. Here's an even crazier idea. Maybe Israel along with Egypt, Jordan and Lebanon could create a regional treaty organization, along the lines of NATO. Given the largely warm diplomatic climate between all these nations for many years now, it's not something that would be impossible to accomplish.....

Collaterality

2006-07-22T13:47:00.000+09:00

The child lies like a rag doll - a symbol of the latest Lebanon war
Robert Fisk in Beirut

How soon must we use the words "war crime"? How many children must be scattered in the rubble of Israeli air attacks before we reject the obscene phrase "collateral damage" and start talking about prosecution for crimes against humanity?
The child whose dead body lies like a rag doll beside the cars which were supposedly taking her and her family to safety is a symbol of the latest Lebanon war; she was hurled from the vehicle in which she and her family were traveling in southern Lebanon as they fled their village - on Israel's own instructions. Because her parents were apparently killed in the same Israeli air attack, her name is still unknown. Not an unknown warrior, but an unknown child.
True, the Hizbollah are killing civilians in Israel, but their missiles are inaccurate and the West, which has done no more than mildly disapprove of Israel's retaliatory onslaught, must surely expect higher standards of the Israeli armed forces than of the men whom both Israel and President George Bush describe as "terrorists".
The story of her death, however, is well documented.(...)

This photo reminds me of photos taken during the Korean War. But of course, it could be any modern war in which civilians bear the brunt of the violence.
(Via Wood s Lot)

YouScrewed

2006-07-21T13:48:00.000+09:00

The following is from Ed and it describes YouScrewed, err, I mean YouTube's attempt to slip in a "Google" -- that is, glom onto the creative work of others and turn a profit from it without sharing.

I don't want to get into a debate over whether it's using the same strategy as Google; just to point out that greed is at work. And that's too bad, because while corporate involvement with blogging/video-blogging is probably an inevitability, ripping people off isn't. When the big wheels finally realize that the rules of fair-play apply here just like everywhere else, then everyone will be happy. They have essentially good ideas (personally, my life in Korea would be much improved by a virtual library). But until they start building bridges with creators and rewarding them for what they do, they will -- well, anyway, enough said.

Ed:

Filmmakers, Flashmakers and videomakers beware: PuppetVision uncovers disturbing new terms that YouTube has recently added to its site. You may want to think twice about uploading a video, because

by submitting the User Submissions to YouTube, you hereby grant YouTube a worldwide, non-exclusive, royalty-free, sublicenseable and transferable license to use, reproduce, distribute, prepare derivative works of, display, and perform the User Submissions in connection with the YouTube Website and YouTube’s (and its successor’s) business, including without limitation for promoting and redistributing part or all of the YouTube Website (and derivative works thereof) in any media formats and through any media channels.

In other words, YouTube can take that video you labored over for thirty hours and sell it to somebody else. And you won’t get a cent.

Read the rest here.

STILLS WITHOUT SCRIPTS - 23

2006-07-20T15:26:00.000+09:00

Prayer Beads

2006-07-20T10:40:00.000+09:00

Anthony Bourdain on the situation in Lebanon and how quickly things turned:

Initially, many Beirutis were still going strong at nightclubs as jets flew low and menacingly overhead. Even that proud, famously world-weary attitude quickly changed, however, as circumstances here became even more appalling. I can certainly understand how offensive it might be to those on the ground here--or those with family and friends here--to read some of what's been posted on the other NR thread--and understand why it's been closed for now.

It is indeed heartbreaking and horrifying what has happened to this lovely country--to spanking new, lovingly restored,resurgent Beirut in particular, in only a few days of sustained and seemingly senseless destruction. A few days ago, this was a place where people were bursting with pride for the relative tolerance, progressive attitudes, and lack of conflict between groups.

I was standing with a group: a Sunni, a Christian, and a Shiite--by the Hariri memorial when the gunfire started and the Hezbollah people appeared driving through city center and honking their horns in "celebration" for the capture/kidnappings. The look of dismay and embarrasment on all three faces...and the grim look of resignation as they all-- instantly-- recognized what would inevitably come next...it's something I will never forget.

Of the three, our Shiite security guy, a tall, taciturn man, was the last to leave us, insisiting on staying by our side though he and his family lived in the much more perilous Southern part of Beirut. After witnessing many quick telephone exchanges between him and his family, and as more bombs and shells began to fall, seeing him nervously fingering his prayer beads, we finally convinced him to leave. His house was later flattened.

[more]

Shift

2006-07-20T10:00:00.000+09:00

At Salon, a very interesting piece by Juan Cole entitled "Israel's Maximal Option". In it, he speculates that the Olmert goverment is aiming to shift southern Lebanon's Shiite population farther north into the upper half of this (like Israel) geographically very small country.

Apart from allowing the creation of a buffer zone, such a shift would create a crisis between the Maronite Christians, Sunnis, and Druze who populate the north, and "provoke them to use the Lebanese army to rein in or destroy the Shiite paramilitary."It would also displace an entire population. In the words of Cole, "if it comes about, the forced transfer of the Shiites of the south would have several advantages for the Israelis" but "ethically, it [would be] monstrous" and, on a practical level, would be "doomed to failure".

Forced resettlement -- like any form of collective punishment -- invariably leads to a backlash. In this case, the backlash is already happening: support for Hizbollah is increasing, not lessening. And it is spreading across the region. Though Cole does not suggest the possibility directly, the concern of mainstream media with Syria and Iran's role/response to all this might ultimately pale compared to the potential of revolutionary instability in countries like Saudi Arabia and Egypt where the ruling groups are turning a blind eye to the excesses in Lebanon while their populations seethe. And if the whole region destabilizes, the American project to bring democracy first to Iraq then other countries will fail.

Whether Cole's speculation will turn out to be correct remains to be seen. Possibly it won't happen. Or possibly some variation of it will happen -- after all, the shift of population has already occurred, as civilians flee to save their lives. The question, then, is not whether a population shift will happen, but whether it will be permanent. And if the latter turns out to be the case, it will have ramifications far beyond Lebanon. It will have horrible ramifications for the individuals involved, who will lose much. But it also will have ramifications for the political players outside Israel, who seem curiously unaware of where their long-term self-interest lies. As Cole concludes: "tragically, the United States, as Israel's closest ally, will also have to suffer for its [the Olmert government's] actions".

When Sad Madness Enters Childhood

2006-07-20T07:54:00.000+09:00

The above is via Ed (in turn via Chekhov's Mistress and Moorish Girl). But pride of place, comment-wise, goes to Steve Mitchelmore at This Space, who captures something of the obtuse-yet-happy-faced quality of the early 21st Century with the observation:

We've all heard of Hannah Arendt's phrase "the banality of evil". Eichmann the bureaucrat organising from his desk other people's deaths. Now, with pictures like this one, with English comedy actress Maureen Lipman going on TV to defend the bombing of civilians in Lebanon, and the BBC being so suddenly objective in describing those civilian casualties, we should really change the phrase to "the niceness of evil".

p.s. It's worth noting that one problem with talking about the current crisis is the degree to which each side is freighted with emotion, and views criticism of what it's doing as an attack. For what it's worth, I'd like to emphasize that there is never any excuse for hatred. The anti-Semitism that unfortunately lurks at the heart of militant Islamism is as despicable as the brutality-rationalizing spin that is currently flowing from the Olmert government. It sounds corny to say it, but it bears saying anyway: if nothing else moves you to the core about this conflict, think of the kids. Peace.

An Eerie Silence

2006-07-19T10:18:00.000+09:00

There's been an eerie silence in litblog-land regarding the current catastrophe, er, crisis in the Middle East. This is particularly disturbing given what the likely consequences are. Already we know that the situation has worsened significantly for the entire region, no matter what your political view. And again, no matter what your view, the degree of violence that is taking place is utterly heartbreaking.

The only exception to this silence that I've come across so far has been a post at Moorish Girl. And the silence can't be indifference. (I know litblogland is not exactly populated with people who take media and/or governmental pronouncements at face value). So If other litbloggers have something to add, then please do so.

This is a real crisis. And it will affect us all.

FAQs and Truth Marathon links

2006-07-18T10:01:00.000+09:00

For a post that describes what this site is all about in frequently-asked-question form, click here.

To see the screenplay-novel Truth Marathon, click here.

Geopolitical Flash Fiction

2006-07-18T09:23:00.000+09:00

Life imitates art ... or life becomes art -- simultaneously farcical and dead-serious in its consequences.

This is the feeling one gets while watching a video that was recently broadcast by CNN. And the video itself is like a very short narrative: an example of geopolitical flash fiction. And the fact that the piece in question comes in video form is secondary to the importance of the dialogue it recorded. It is the dialogue that speaks volumes and tells a form of “story”. I want to emphasize this point, because I have spent the entire weekend compulsively checking the news online and have also been wondering about the role literature plays in a time when the world seems to be stepping toward a catastrophe no one will be able to control. (If I find any pertinent examples of literature-about-political-crisis, I’ll add them in a later post.)

The video is entitled “The sh-t heard round the world”. It shows a short sequence of Tony Blair and George Bush caught talking into an open mic at the G8 conference. The two are talking about the current crisis in the Middle East; a crisis that has ramifications far beyond the conflict between Israel and Hamas/Hizbollah. The the “sh-t” is Bush’s expletive. (Bush: “See the irony is what they need to do is get Syria to get Hezbollah to stop doing this shit and it’s over.")

The sub-header at the CNN homepage states, “Bush frustration sparks expletive”. The exact phraseology Bush uses is “this shit”, and what he’s talking about are the Hizbollah attacks on Israel. But when you pay attention to the dialogue, you don’t get any sense that Bush is frustrated. He’s merely speaking the way people do when they’re analyzing a situation and in the company of people they’re comfortable with. A million conversations like this take place every day—though in situations where the stakes are much lower and less hideous: for example, shop talk. How many times have you or someone you know used the phrase “this shit” to refer to some workplace obligation: a piece of paperwork you’re obligated to do, or a badly organized project you’re expected to accomplish? Instead, the one who seems frustrated is Blair.

It’s Tony Blair, with his fastidious tone and thinly concealed exasperation, who comes across as stymied. Blair wants an international peacekeeping force in Lebanon to separate the hot-heads from each other. Bush, by contrast, wants Kofi Annan to put pressure on Syria to put pressure on Hizbollah. Bush sits in his chair, spreading butter on a roll and then eating it contentedly while Blair stands to one side. The body language of the two men is as dramatically interesting as it is revealing: Bush is relaxed, chewing on his roll slightly open-mouthed while scanning the room and listening—more or less—while Blair hovers beside him, trying unsuccessfully to get Bush to focus on the international peacekeepers idea.

The two men appear nothing as much as Oscar and Felix from the Odd Couple: Bush is the relaxed and slightly piggish Oscar, while Blair is the more precise, more alert, but ultimately impotent, Felix.

The dialogue between the two men is on its surface without literary value. Yet at the same time it has literary qualities: it is psychologically revealing, it is dryly satirical, and it has all the ridiculousness and poignancy of tragi-comedy. Unfortunately, however, there won’t be a happy ending to this drama. Yet—for the time being—reality seems to be transforming itself into entertainment automatically.

[note: there's no url for this video clip. To view it, go to this story, then scroll down to the blue highlighted text.]

It's about the Pig, Stupid

2006-07-15T15:48:00.000+09:00

I came across the following article in the Seattle Times while following links from an article in Salon about the current crisis in Lebanon. It seemed so surreal that for a moment I thought it was a joke (it didn't help that I'd just read another piece in Salon about a blogger falling for an Onion piece). But apparently it isn't, which only adds to its effect.

Sometimes the devil -- or the apocalypse -- is in the details.

With the world's most perplexing problems weighing on him, President Bush has sought comic relief in a certain pig.
This is the wild game boar that German chef Olaf Micheel bagged for Bush and served Thursday evening at a barbecue in Trinwillershagen, a tiny town on the Baltic Sea.

"I understand I may have the honor of slicing the pig," Bush said at a news conference earlier in the day punctuated with questions about spreading violence in the Middle East and an intensifying standoff with Iran about nuclear power.

The president's host, German Chancellor Angela Merkel, started a serious ball rolling at this news conference in the 13th-century town hall on the cobblestone square of Stralsund. But Bush seemed more focused on "the feast" promised later.

"Thanks for having me," Bush told the chancellor. "I'm looking forward to that pig tonight."

This 13th-century setting and formal news conference may seem an odd stage for presidential banter. The 21st-century problems that Bush confronts often prompt him to attempt to defuse the tension in the room with a dose of humor.
Reporters from Germany and the U.S. peppered him with questions about the standoff in Iran, violence in the Middle East and flagging democracy in Russia. He answered all in earnest but leavened it all with pig talk.

"Apart from the pig, Mr. President, what sort of insights have you been able to gain as regards East Germany?" a German reporter asked.

(via Salon and As Seen From Just Above Sunset)

Baker's Five Questions

2006-07-15T10:48:00.000+09:00

John Baker has an interesting series at his blog. It's a set of five questions that he poses to various lit-bloggers. The questions are fixed, so that makes the responses all the more interesting since they are quite varied.

To see more, click here.

A Philosopher Considers the Medium Itself

2006-07-15T09:53:00.000+09:00

M. S. Smith on Susan Sontag:

The number of film critics who have indelibly shaped my understanding of the cinema is relatively small, maybe three or four, perhaps a dozen at the most. Susan Sontag is chief among them, though I've never thought of her as a critic per se. During a youth spent at academic institutions in Berkeley, Chicago, Cambridge (MA), Oxford, Paris, and New York, she was trained as a philosopher and thought and wrote like one. And like a philosopher, Sontag had a very precise intellectual agenda; as David Denby wrote in a wonderful summation of her love of the movies, she had absorbed the ideology of the 1960s intellectuals who wrote for The Partisan Review and then attacked their view of modernist art, partly because they had undervalued European experimentalists in film, a medium which they hardly considered worthy of attention.

It is something of a banality to point out that Sontag was a major critic, or, as the terminologie courant has it, a "public intellectual". She could be uneven; sometimes articulating new insights, other times not pushing an idea far enough. Nevertheless, it was her capacity to interest that predominated. Her book On Photography is the kind of work -- which, even though you might disagree with it or simply wish she had extended an argument further -- makes you think about the photomechanical (and now, photodigital) process of generating images as a medium. The corollary that follows from this is that when we think of a particular mode of art specifically as a medium, we are more likely to think of it, too, as a mode of experimentation.

I suppose this is something of a pet concern of mine, given that I sometimes feel the screenplay-novel idea is criticized for being too experimental or not experimental enough. It's probably worth remembering that there are many ways of experimenting, and many reasons for doing so; artistic experimentation often springs from the cultural context it finds itself in.

Experimentation is by definition an attempt to discover "newness". But that newness does not exist as an isolated (or, as they say in academe, discrete) quality. Instead, it has a relationship with the larger cultural context. In short, newness is often an attempt to redefine, and hopefully improve, the cultural context it finds itself in. Newness can co-exist with other, older cultural forms, and doesn't need to be set in opposition to them.

STILLS WITHOUT SCRIPTS -- 22

2006-07-10T16:18:00.000+09:00

Screenplay novel FAQs link -----

2006-07-08T10:08:00.000+09:00

For a post that describes what this site is all about in frequently-asked-question form, scroll down a little, or click here.

Truth Marathon: Character Sketches -- Paul....

2006-07-08T10:06:00.000+09:00

Drawing: Finn Harvor

[Note: the above is how I conceive of Paul, one of the main characters in my screenplay-novel, TRUTH MARATHON.]

[excerpt: Paul is going to visit his father.]

EXT. A RUN-DOWN ROOMING HOUSE, EVEN MORE DILAPIDATED THAN THE ONE PAUL LIVES IN. THE SAME DAY. CLOSE TO SIX IN THE EVENING.

Paul walks up the front steps.

CLOSE-UP. THE DOORBELL.

A sign, clumsily written, states: DOOR-BELL HAS CEASED FUNCTIONING

MEDIUM-SHOT. PAUL.

Paul knocks on the front door. No response. He knocks again – hard.

SFX: Flow of traffic in the background.

Paul knocks again, now pounding with the side of his fist.

Then he bends over and opens the letter slot.

PAUL: [into slot] Da-aaaaad!

SFX: Some footsteps inside the house.

PAUL’S FATHER: [O.S. -- voice very muffled] Coming, coming. Hold your horses.

Slowly, the front door opens.

Paul looks at his father. He is in his mid-sixties. He has long grey hair and the craggy features of someone who has imbibed some form of addictive substance excessively. Whether this substance is liquid, powder, or simply of the mind – addictive thought patterns, the narcotic thoughts of the obsessive – is uncertain. Nevertheless, he looks like a recovered drunk. But he also has a strangely youthful energy.

PAUL’S FATHER: Hi, son.

PAUL: Pops.

PAUL’S FATHER: It’s good of you to come.

Paul doesn’t respond.

The two of them walk into the dim main hall of Paul’s father’s house. It is dark and thoroughly depressing: narrow with a pastel colored paint that is so covered with grime it is difficult to tell whether it was once yellow or green; a bag of garbage that should have been taken out of the house days ago; a non-functioning cuckoo clock.

PAUL’S FATHER: Are you thirsty? Do you want some tea?

PAUL: Sure, why not?

They enter the kitchen. It, too, is old and depressing. But it’s kept in relatively clean order. His father fetches a kettle out of the cupboard.

PAUL’S FATHER: [cheerfully] I’ve got this great root tea. Wanna try it? It’s good for your spleen.

PAUL: What the fuck is a spleen?

PAUL’S FATHER: You know – your spleen. Your gut.

PAUL: Oh. That.

PAUL’S FATHER: Don’t “oh, that” me. It’s a good question. Nothing to be ashamed of. Very few people really understand the functioning of the spleen.

PAUL: I guess they don’t.

PAUL’S FATHER: It’s what cleanses you. Healthy spleen, healthy body. Unhealthy spleen – well, you get the picture.

PAUL: [Looking at a kettle that needs washing] Is this healthy?

PAUL’S FATHER: It’s fine.

PAUL: [peering into its snout] It’s filthy, Dad. Look at all this weird shit inside it.

PAUL’S FATHER: They all get like that. It’s not filth. It’s minerals from tap-water. That’s why you should always distill water.

PAUL: What happened to your distiller, anyway?

PAUL’S FATHER: I told you. Ian stole it. Fucker.

PAUL: Oh. Ian. That was the psych patient who lived here?

PAUL’S FATHER: Fucker.

Paul just smiles.

PAUL’S FATHER: [suddenly impatient and putting the kettle down on the counter-top forcefully] Oh, to hell with this! I need to show you something important!

PAUL: Oh yeah. How could we forget that?

PAUL’S FATHER: Don’t be smart with me! You don’t know what’s going on, do you? You don’t know the forces that are changing your life!

PAUL: The forces that are changing my life are lack of money.

PAUL'S FATHER: Yes! Well! That's part of it!

Book-quisitiveness

2006-07-08T10:01:00.000+09:00

M. S. Smith on readers and their appetites:

Book lovers, I'm learning, are neurotic people: we buy new books even though our shelves are packed with books we haven't read; we make to-be-read lists, only to realize our reach sometimes exceeds our grasp. I picked up a copy of J. M. Coetzee's most recent novel, Slow Man, because a local bookstore had it for 30% off (though, not familiar with Coetzee, I'm not sure if it's the first of his novels I should be reading). I purchased the Penguin Classics edition of Graham Greene's The Quiet American partly because the novel's short enough to get through quickly, and the Penguin edition has a nice cover and those deckle edges that give the pages an uncut, untrimmed appearance. The publication of Jhumpa Lahiri's short story, "Once in a Lifetime," in The New Yorker (May 8, 2006) had me gunning for her Interpreter of Maladies, a Pulitzer-Prize-winning collection of stories. And I've recently become interested in magical realism and the writing of Russian novelist Mikhail Bulgakov, and so I've added his anti-Stalinist novel The Master and Margarita to my list.

STILLS WITHOUT SCRIPTS - 21

2006-07-08T07:04:00.000+09:00

Spoken Word

2006-07-06T17:31:00.000+09:00

Motoko Rich on the rise of the audio book:

While growing in popularity, audio books remain resolutely mass-market-oriented, and Mr. Rubinstein's nonfiction book, which sold fewer than 15,000 hardcover copies, simply had not generated enough revenue to justify the costs of producing a recorded version.

For many authors that would have been that. Mr. Rubinstein, however, was unbowed. He enlisted the help of a friend and sound-studio operator, Joe Mendelson, and managed to recruit a cast of some of his well-known fans, including Messrs. Shteyngart and Bogosian, as well as the rocker Tommy Ramone and the comedian Demetri Martin, to perform as characters in the book....

For what it's worth, I tried doing something similar after staging a one-man play entitled "The Looksist" in the late 1990s. Organizing it was harder than I thought -- even though I met several people who were remarkably generous with their time. Ultimately, what sank the project was people's conflicting schedules and the death-knell of low-budget projects everywhere: being at the mercy of other people's priorities ... just when I got the background music together, the audio person became too busy. And just when the audio person discovered the music had to be re-recorded for technical reasons, the musician was too busy.

What I remember about the project now, however, is that there is lot of creative energy that flows from doing something new. Doing new things always carries risks, one of the main ones being that others will judge experimentation as gimmicky. It isn't.

Recording "The Looksist" didn't quite get off the ground. But in the interim, technology has changed and become more accessible. I'm working on different projects now. But I still like the idea of the audio book or audio story. And one of these days I'm going to do it again.

STILLS WITHOUT SCRIPTS 12.

2006-07-06T13:53:00.000+09:00

Logic Lit.

2006-07-06T13:51:00.000+09:00

Waggish on left-brained literature:

I work amongst engineers, and many of them are voracious readers who, nonetheless, have little connection to any prevailing literary trends. Rather, there appears to be a parallel track of literature that is popular specifically amongst engineers, which I'll call "left-brained literature" for lack of a better term. The provisional definition of the term is simply those books that fall into the category of my having empirically observed them being read by a multitude of engineers with a literary bent. My conclusions are tentative, but I think that it's valuable just to construct this sort of list.

I'm excluding all genre science-fiction from the category, because I don't find it particularly revelatory. I'm interested in that subset of "mainstream," "non-genre" fiction (these relative terms having been established by social consensus), and within that set, which novels of some notoriety and good PR happen to attract members of the engineering professions.

Waggish continues with a list of left-brain lit authors. Each author is described briefly, but Waggish sums up their strengths and weaknesses with a brilliant short-hand. Highly recommended.

To read the rest, click here

The Taepodong Brief/Agenda/Scenario/Dilemma

2006-07-05T17:42:00.000+09:00

At times, living in Korea is like living in a plot from a thriller or the screenplay to an action movie. This morning, it was news that, yes, the North Koreans had launched several missiles, including their ICBM, the Taepodong 2.

The Taepodong test failed. Or at least, this is what we are being currently told, as intelligence and diplomatic sources spin the story to downplay it -- just as they were spinning it to create a sense of urgency a week ago.

In any case, downplaying the test wasn't so hard to do; South Koreans have tended to tune out a lot of the geopolitical chatter they get exposed to. When I asked the students in my conversation class what they thought about the whole thing, a couple of them hadn't heard about it, and only one expressed concern.

At the same time, the stakes are high on the Korean peninsula -- they have been for over six decades now, dating back the the original division of Korea into Soviet and American "spheres". This was at the very end of World War II, and it was a time when Korea -- in its entirety -- had a chance of avoiding the cataclysm that was to follow.

That wasn't the way it worked out, of course ... and it is probably no small coincidence that the secrets that underlie what happened in the lead-up to the outbreak of war in June, 1950, are a distant reflection of the amnesia and indifference contemporary Koreans feel. But maybe we're all a little amnesiac. After all, the Korean War was the de facto beginning of the Cold War. And the Cold War was what shaped to a significant degree the "Long War" we are now stuck in.

For Koreans, the simple reality is this: the Korean War remains an open wound. But it's not just an issue for Koreans. It's an issue that should concern anyone interested in the Cold War and its fall-out.

And what is interesting about the issue from a literary perspective is that South Korea, like so many countries tht endured long periods of dictatorship, developed a tradition of truth-telling in its fiction. But all truths, it seems, still haven't been told about the war.

(To find out more, click here to read an article in the New York Times:)

해미 읍성, 여름에, Haemi Fortress, Summer (an ultra-short)

2006-07-01T10:14:00.000+09:00

Let's hope not

2006-06-29T18:14:00.000+09:00

Grady Hendrix on the contemporary novelization:

The home-theater revolution may have wiped out a large part of the novelization market, but the lessons learned may wind up sustaining the genre. When DVDs first arrived, the studios quickly realized that they could get fans to "double dip" by issuing a bare-bones release of a movie and then following it with a "Deluxe Edition" loaded with special features. Now it looks like literary special features—expanded back stories, cut scenes, and deleted characters—might just make the novelization relevant again.

I'm not sure if the term needs explaining, but novelizations are novels based on movies (presumably that have been produced). They're marketing tie-ins, and part of the movie industry. And this is their ultimate irony: it's not so much a question of whether they're any good (couldn't say because I've never read one, though I did read some TV novelizations -- based on Sergeant Storm and Get Smart -- when I was a kid). Instead, what is tragic about them is they take a medium with great potential for individual creative expression, the book, and make it part of the big studio machine.

That's the major problem with them on a theoretical level: they are not artistically democratic. But that's exactly the characteristic we should be aiming for in our culture. We should be making books that function like movies, not making movies that curtail the function of books.

[See also this post at Wet Asphalt]

STILLS WITHOUT SCRIPTS -- 14

2006-06-26T14:45:00.000+09:00

Celluloid Phoenix

2006-06-26T14:14:00.000+09:00

Philip Marchand on the likely change from celluloid to digital cinema at theaters:

According to Pat Marshall, these issues are pretty well resolved. In five years, digital cinema will be the norm.If so, this will mark a new evolution in the movie theatre, which will exhibit not only movies but sports events and concerts. Wrestling fans will fill the seats when kids tire of Adam Sandler.

In a paper titled, "The future is here ... almost," Lichtman predicts an even more dazzling future for the big screen. "We should be embracing video games and bringing them to the big screen," he writes of one of the most formidable of all rivals to motion pictures. "Technology exists today for the playing of multi-player games on the big screen on an interactive basis. Over the next 12 months interactive bingo will be played on the big screen in England for cash prizes. People who never dreamed of walking into a smoke-filled bingo hall will be enthralled with the concept of coming to a convenient, clean theatre to watch a celebrity comedian host a big game and win money. Talk about a new revenue stream."

Ah, but the art of the cinema! What about those beautiful vistas of John Ford, those dark, moody images of film noir, those vibrant colours of Antonioni? What about the quality of the screen image? Can the digital image stand up to celluloid? "It's a brighter image," Marshall says.

"It's certainly crisper." University of Toronto film studies professor Andrew Keil points out, however, that the digital image "doesn't have the intensity that the celluloid image has."Film buffs talk in general of the "resonance" and "warmth" of the celluloid image, not to be duplicated by anything digital.

So what's your preference? Crisp and bright or warm and intense? Only a tiny minority of filmgoers, of course, respond to the strictly aesthetic qualities of a movie — the use of colour and shadow and framing and all those other film school desiderata. Certainly a younger generation, for whom digital is the norm, and who take rapid cutting and special effects for granted, is not going to care about digital versus celluloid.

"I don't put a lot of faith in the audience to tell the difference," Keil says. "I don't want to hold my own students up as a negative example, but we have gotten to the point, in our classes, where we show most of our film titles on DVD. When we do have a 35-mm print, I always make a big deal about it. Students will come up to me afterwards and say, `I couldn't tell the difference.'"

The issue is of interest to me personally, and of intense interest to film-makers.

When I still lived in Toronto, I was friends with someone who did programming for various experimental film nights. Many of these, like CineCycle, were usually run on shoe-string budgets, which meant small projectors. The result was something reminiscent of a high-school classroom, circa the 1970s; not so much in terms of overall quality, but in terms of one always being aware that what you were seeing on the screen was not "professional".

Yet many of these movies were very affecting. Furthermore, the avant-garde aesthetic that a lot of them employed was not, it turned out, "difficult"; a lot of techniques that used have been adopted by mainstream directors who shoot video and -- yikes! -- commercials. These more commercial directors glommed onto techniques pioneered by experimental film-makers who were supposedly eternally inaccessible to average movie-goers.

The experimental films I saw then could be sub-divided into many different groups. Two groups that stand out in my memory are the shorter films that experimented with the visual potential of film -- that is, the films that had to made with celluloid. (Some film-makers, like Stan Brackage, even used the celluloid itself as a medium; they would scratch and draw right on the film.) The other group was the movies that were about experimental narrative. These were often shot on video because its cost was so low, and allowed a longer movie.

In other words, celluloid allowed the film-maker visual creativity but (generally) demanded a short movie. Digital allowed narrative creativity but demanded a compromise in terms of visual beauty. Ultimately digital began dominating the experimental scene -- probably because of the cost factor. Offered the choice, most experimental movie-makers accepted the loss of visual quality for the flexibility and ease digital provided them.

Digital cameras have come some distance since then. I don't know if they will ever equal celluloid, however. Celluloid is remarkable for its extreme sensitivity, although digital cameras can come quite close. (I'm speaking now as someone who shoots photographs, not a film-maker.)

Nevertheless, it would be a great pity if celluloid were to go. It would be a fitting irony if celluloid were to once again become the dominant experimental medium. I doubt that -- again, because of cost considerations -- but at some point celluloid with be re-embraced for its extraordinary visual range.

Unheroic, heroic

2006-06-26T13:51:00.000+09:00

One shortcoming of lit-blogs is they tend to focus on Big Fiction -- which is fine, and understandable, but means that lesser-known writers remain perpetually marginalized. Therefore, for what it's worth, I've decided to periodically bring attention to online fiction that I think is worth reading. Below are some recent examples.

They are quite different from each other stylistically. And they deal with very different situations. But all of them share the same quality: emotional authenticity. Furthermore, since there's been some discussion in the lit-blogosphere recently about what, exactly, literature really is (and whether this something is any good), I think they help illustrate part of literature's essence. They are about real people. Or rather, since that phrase is a cliche, they are about unheroic people who nevertheless become heroic through their honesty. In other words, one quality that distinguishes literary writing from other forms of fiction is the action of becoming conscious of the truth about one's feelings ... and then telling it.

"Lookout" by Bobby Farouk, of MRBFK

"Rest Stop" by Matt Bell, of mdbell.com

"Discrete Dainty Diva" by Ryan Kamstra of Standard Hostility Index

[Note: Bell's piece is a podcast. You have to click on the link and then listen.]

STILLS WITHOUT SCRIPTS - 20.

2006-06-23T12:50:00.000+09:00

Book State, Book Province

2006-06-23T09:39:00.000+09:00

David Thayer, noting that of the number of books published annually, only a small number (2%) are of existent manuscripts. It is an injustice, and the way to rectify the situation is clear:

We have the capability to ramp up production from 170,000 to 25,000,000. Certain aspects of the process need to be modernized, streamlined, and rationalized. Let’s take the book party. To accomodate this many titles, one continuous party would be organized. Each day 68,493 authors would be feted, lionized, heralded, and praised. Sure, a noon timeslot would be more coveted than one at 3am, but it’s a party, and who knows who might be awake at that hour craving something to read. The event could be televized, fed into the homes of those tired of watching CSI Miami.

25,000,000 books. Let’s not flinch my friends. This is big, bigger than big. We can build a Greater Lebowsky and use the state of Delaware and certain possessions and archipelagos for storage. They don’t mind. As we grow, they grow. Delaware from sea to shining sea, book capital of the universe.

However, consider the following: 25,000,000 manuscripts only includes those manuscripts that are *completed*. Speaking anecdotally, I know at least half a dozen gifted individuals whose main problem is procrastination. And one reason they procrastinate is because they realize (with greater clarity than I do) that there is, at present, no hope.

But they *would* complete these manuscripts if they realized getting published was a sure thing. When we factor in the potential number of manuscripts that would be complete under the auspices of such a project (let’s call it Operation Enduring Reading), then I think a more accurate figure might be 75,000,000 to 1,000,000,000. Hell, who knows? Let’s say 2,000,000,000 manuscripts just to be on the safe side.

Delaware isn’t big enough. Look north. Look to Ontario.

[note: Thayer responds: I was envisioning an expansist Delaware flexing its muscles or muscle as the case may be. Canada has great potential, but I’d look to the Northwest Territories for the Frozen Moment.]

Reviewing, reading

2006-06-22T12:46:00.000+09:00

The following is a nice, honest piece by Andrew Saikali on the process of reviewing, reading:

This is what happens when I don't take notes. Two months ago, I sat down to read Yesterday's People, a collection of eight short stories by Goran Simic. Born in Bosnia, Simic was already a noted author and poet when he immigrated to Canada ten years ago. I decided to write about these spare, haunting and haunted stories, many of them about life in Sarajevo in the mid 90s. But for reasons that now completely mystify me, I wasn't making notes, which would have been fine had I begun writing this immediately. Two months and three or four novels later, I began to write and I hit a brick wall.

While I remembered the images and the tone of the stories, damned if I could remember any names, or specific details. And the images that I did remember were beginning to blend into each other. I was in a haze. I had been immersed in that world. And then I was out. I had shifted through time and space into other worlds. I was in Jonathan Lethem's Brooklyn, then in Stephen Clarke's contemporary Paris, and most memorably I was amongst Balzac's characters in 1800s Loire Valley, as drunk on his words as I would be if I'd been one of his wine growers in the French countryside. The images of the Bosnian war had been overshadowed. I could never do them justice.

So I began to re-read. I cracked open Simic's collection and dove back in, revisiting the characters, and the horrors of war, and the resourcefulness and resilience of spirit that had moved me the first time.

To read more, click here.

( via The Millions with hat-tip to MetaxuCafe)

Writer Apartheid

2006-06-22T12:30:00.000+09:00

I wrote the following post in February. According to my site counter, it's recently been making the rounds of the internet, so I thought I'd re-post it:

The following quote is taken from the Feb. 16 posting at Chekhov's Mistress. The post is about a book by David Kipen entitled The Schreiber Theory (link in quote), and, while it focuses the workings of the film industry, it has relevance for the topic of this site as well:

Like it or not, we avid movie fans subscribe to the auteur theory. French for "author," this school of film criticism focusing solely on directors has permeated the industry since emerging about 50 years ago by critics-cum-directors Truffaut (who coined the term), Godard, Rohmer and others. David Kipen, in The Schreiber Theory: A Radical Rewrite of American Film History, says “auteurism has conditioned us to concentrate on the themes and motives common to a given director's filmography, all at the expense of those poor, obscure hacks who only wrote the damn pictures.”

He's right. Aside from Charlie Kaufman, I find it difficult to think of any writers whose work excites mention among the press or my friends in the same way a director would. Who says “Have you heard about Steve Zaillian's latest movie?” You might if you knew he's credited for writing Schindler's List, The Falcon and the Snowman, Gangs of New York, and Searching for Bobby Fischer....

Kipen's beef is not so much with directors, but with the institutionalization of the idea that directors are the dominant creative force in film. In fact, he duly acknowledges the collaborative effort of filmmaking, as critics of auteurism have always done, but wants to put writers - schreibers in Yiddish, the mother tongue of many of America's first screenwriters - back into the spotlight they deserve.

I'd take Kipen's argument -- and Bud Parr's commentary on it -- a step further. The irony of the movie industry is that while it is so culturally powerful, it has such a capacity to diminish the creative power of the individuals involved in it. The plight of the screenwriter is a good illustration of this. People with the ambition to become film-makers often find themselves in a situation where they have to compromise so much in order to get a project green-lighted, that the "auteur option" ends up receding endlessly from one's grasp. This despite the central place that movies occupy within our culture as a whole.

But then, it's all perfectly logical: the cost of making a movie is so high that of course compromises have to be made. In the publishing industry, a different economic dynamic is at work: because sales of literary fiction in particular are shrinking, the problem faced by the writer is not the cost involved in making a book (expensive, but nowhere near as prohibitive as a film), but the walls that publishers have built around themselves. Publishers these days have to perform an elaborate set of calculations in order to decide which "project" to green-light. PR people have gotten involved in editorial processes. Compared to screenwriters, the literary author finds him or herself involved in an cultural industry at the other end of the spectrum of mass popularity.

The great irony is that both figures -- screenwriter and novel writer -- fight an endless battle against marginalization. And, yep, therefore the point I keep hammering at: a need for new forms that merge the good points of each while sidestepping the really enormous costs of making a movie.

p.s. And for what it's worth, I received some interesting comments along the same lines from Eric Rosenfield of Wet Asphalt after posting a somewhat different piece at MetaxuCafe.

해미 읍성, 여름에, Haemi Fortress, Summer (an ultra-short).

2006-06-20T19:50:00.000+09:00

Breaking through

2006-06-20T15:10:00.000+09:00

Patry Francis on breaking through:

1. You're probably bored with this dictum already, but I have to repeat it, because if you miss this one, nothing else you do will really matter: Write something good enough that people will pay money for it.
In other words, write for love. See vividly, listen intently, feel deeply, store it all up, and when it's ready to explode inside you, give it up. All of it.

I know it's a paradox, but that's how it works. Write because you want to give everything you have, and maybe the world will give back to you. That "maybe" probably sounds unfair. It is. File it under "working conditions."

2. Research like a mad scientist. There are virtually hundreds, maybe even thousands of literary agents out there. Some of them aren't even real bookselling agents. They're unscrupulous fee-charging sharks, whose business is making money off lazy writers' dreams. And yes, I mean lazy! With the abundance of warnings about these predators in print and on the web, I'm amazed that people still fall for their scams. Would you send your child out after dark in an unknown neighborhood? Of course not. Then why would you consider putting the work of your mind and heart into the hands of someone you know nothing about?

more....

Denise Bukowski on the publishing market

2006-06-19T21:00:00.000+09:00

This piece may seem like old news, but it is a forthright description of the realities of the publishing market.

1-sided luv

2006-06-19T20:26:00.000+09:00

The following is a dedication near the bottom of Grumpy Old Bookman's sidebar:

'Reedin iz 4 geekz n sad ppl'

Itz troo: sad ppl still luv bukz eevn whn the ppl hoo m8k bukz 1/2 stppd luvin m

STILLS WITHOUT SCRIPTS - #19

2006-06-17T10:03:00.000+09:00

Yes

2006-06-17T09:57:00.000+09:00

Scott Esposito on reviewing:

The essence of Levi's argument seems to be that Vollmann writes too much and he doesn't write well. In support of this he trots out a couple of quotes from the first few pages of Europe Central and makes fun of them. Okay, that's funny, but I don't think it makes much of a point about Vollmann's writing.

Actually, I happen to agree with Levi that the telephone chapter of Europe Central (the part he quotes from) is pretty weak. Vollmann's books are huge and they could do with some pruning--the telephone chapter would have been one of the things I'd have streamlined.

However, I will say this much in Vollmann's favor: telephone communications are a theme running through all of Europe Central. Many of the key characters (e.g. Shostakovich) have their phone tapped, and the idea that the telephone as an "octopus"--a beast with several arms that can reach into anyone's home and grab them--is an important concept for Vollmann to establish up front. It sets the stage for the book. For instance, in one tense chapter a telephone is used by Hitler to grasp at a besieged general during urban warfare in Stalingrad. The idea that the State, as represented by the telephone, can always reach out and grab you is prevalent throughout the book, and the telephone chapter was Vollmann's attempt to set this metaphor up. However, this only becomes apparent once you've gotten into the book, so I can see how it would be confusing to most people when you open the book and it's the first thing you read. That's why with Vollmann, and any other author, I don't think it's fair to just pull a few quotes and render judgment.

Thirsty?

2006-06-16T11:56:00.000+09:00

David Thayer on lit-blog product placement:

Confession is good for the soul. That’s why after many months of masquerading as a lit blogger, and what a thin disguise it is when you look back on it, what with alien-abducted German tourists, rambling squads of market weight hogs, and ridiculous compound sentences, lederhosen, Emma Peel, Roman soldiers, the Battle of Costco, crime without yellow tape, an imaginary staff, macaroni recipes, it comes as no surprise to anyone that this is not a blog about literature, it’s an infomercial penned by a desperate cabal of indviduals eager to exploit globalization in a new and harrowing manner.

Let’s face it, you’ve been duped. Concealed in the text of each entry is the hidden message to buy things. Thirsty? You bet you are. Here are some of things you probably own as a result of reading this blog: Some blogs are worth reading for the information they provide....

Salon's "Literary Guide to the World"

2006-06-16T10:31:00.000+09:00

Salon is featuring a "Literary Guide to the World". It is a series of articles written about the literature of particular countries (or smaller geographical locales), and is essentially a way for readers who are curious about the writing that has been inspired by these places to have a single resource to turn to.

My main misgiving about the project as it stands right now is its emphasis on "name" writers, and the assumption that they are privy to a degree of knowledge less well-known people possess. There seems to be an attempt to brand the project, and I think that emphasis on literary celebrityhood might ultimately hobble the project overall; knowledge of a country's literature springs from knowledge of a country itself, and while the choices Salon has made so far seem logical enough, there is something of a danger that we may end up getting the occasional literary quickie -- supposed expertise from famous people who do not know an area quite as well as some lesser-knowns do.

However, as I said, the project has gotten off to a good start and is worth checking out.

Here are links to two pieces that I liked in particular, one by Tom Bissell and the other by James Hynes. (Though a note to Bissell: I wish he'd also included Mary McCarthy's "Hanoi" -- an overlooked book that serves as a valuable counterweight to Michael Herr's brilliant but inadvertently war-glamorizing "Dispatches".)

The Indies

2006-06-13T15:24:00.000+09:00

More on independent bookstores (this piece by Laura J. Miller, author of Reluctant Capitalists, a book that was reviewed, so to speak, by Tyler Cowan in Slate). (For my own response to Cowan, click here.)

(via Woods Lot)

"Chasing the Crab"

2006-06-13T14:50:00.000+09:00

If you're a Canadian who's watched the CBC news, you probably saw Bill Cameron. He was a fixture on the network for as long as I could remember. And what was surprising about him was not his appearance -- he had the broad-shouldered, classic good looks of so many TV announcers -- but his wit and originality.

(It speaks volumes of the medium -- unfortunate volumes -- that while professional competence is of course mandatory, physical attractiveness, too, is an extremely valuable characteristic. But originality of mind is simply an option. We all know this and criticize the medium for it. It never changes, however. It never changes yet it should.)

Cameron died roughly a year ago. He had cancer. I recall my mother telling me about it, as a piece of news from back home. We both felt sad, because we both liked him. He was the sort of celebrity you develop a strong liking for. But all this is beside the point, because he was an author in his own right. And it turns out he kept a journal of his illness entitled "Chasing the Crab".

There are other people who've done the same thing, of course. And I suppose that my interest in his writing is magnified proportionately by the reaction that I used to have when I still lived in Canada and enjoyed what he had to say. But putting that whole complex of emotion aside (the complex of "how we know" people we in fact don't know), his journal is still very worth reading. Its last entry has been posted recently by Walrus:

The anaesthetic was lifting. The surgeon's face was two inches above mine, perpendicular to mine, as though he was preparing for a kiss. I'm pretty sure the conversation went this way:

"Can you hear me?"

"Yes."

"I know what this is. We'll do a biopsy but I've seen it before. Adenocarcinoma of the esophagus. Advanced. Aggressive, moves quickly. Your wife took some notes." He patted my shoulder. His face lifted away.

In the May sunshine, my wife told me what he'd said. It was difficult to absorb. My chance of survival less than 20 percent. Surgery to remove my esophagus. Before that, chemotherapy, radiation, a clinical trial to test a new drug. I could feel the iron walls of cancer clanging together around me, shutting down the rest of my life. I had a book half-written, grandchildren not yet conceived. The judgment was unacceptable, but how do you resist it?

STILLS WITHOUT SCRIPTS - no.16

2006-06-10T12:22:00.000+09:00

Screenplay novel FAQs

2006-06-10T12:16:00.000+09:00

What is a screenplay-novel?

It's a novel. But it's written in the form of a screenplay.

How did you get the idea of writing a screenplay-novel?

And then there's the creative process involved: Unless writing autobiographically, I like imagining scenes as if they were in a movie. My imagination seems to naturally work that way.

Has this idea been done before?

So it's a good idea because it's new?

The first quality can still exist in a screenplay novel. As in a regular screenplay, there is no necessary restriction on the amount of physical description that exists. There are simply conventions; screenplays tend to be very mininalist. However, a screenplay-novelist doesn't have to follow this convention. He or she can include as much description as he or she wants.

Call the screenplay-novel experimental literature. But it's experimental literature with practical aims.

I've read other screenplays, and they're a lot different from yours. Why?

Those aren't screenplay-novels, they're screenplays. They are meant to be produced into movies. What I'm doing here is a novel meant to be imagined as a movie.

But it's just words. What I like about movies are the pictures.

Books can contain pictures, too.

Why don't you just write a regular novel?

So you hate traditional fiction?

Sure. But that's just a subjective opinion. I don't agree.

So why don't you just watch movies and TV?

I like movies ... TV I'm not so sure about, although there are good programs out there.

So you're suggesting we just give up? That because mass culture is so pervasive we are obligated to mimic it?

The screenplay-novel is not a selling out. Think of it this way: there are good movies. There is good TV. In other words, both mediums are capable of producing genuine works of art, despite their group-made natures. If you write a screenplay-novel, you should try to make something that also has artistic merit. Obviously, it won't have the linguistic, descriptive power of great novels. But it will have the capacity to stir people's imaginations.

And when reading a screenplay-novel, all people have to do is allow themselves to read it as a director might. This is one of the broad-based effects that movies have had on the modern mind: it is possible -- even natural, it sometimes seems -- to "think cinematically". In other words, our minds have already been conditioned to imagine narratives as if they were movies. Maybe everyone doesn't do this. But many people do, and they do it effortlessly. In this sense, we are all directors now.

The trick is to be a good director -- an auteur, if you will. Remember that the best movies and TV are often made in opposition to mass culture. The screenplay-novel is another way of doing that.

But what about reading? If everyone is "being a director", won't reading suffer even more?

People are still reading lots these days. The trend among readers, however, is to buy more non-fiction than fiction.

What's wrong with that?

Nothing in the sense that non-fiction has always been popular, and now simply is more so. However, we still need fiction. It's not a luxury. It's a necessity, as well. Cultures rise and fall based partly on the stories they tell themselves.

I think screenplays suck. Traditional novels are more interesting to read.