Unfinished
I have, in my closet, and in baskets around the house, unfinished knitting projects. They are things I started that somehow never got done before Demon Baby found them and decided to "knit" on them, too. I look at them, now a mess of yarn, and wonder, "Do I try to rescue this poor sweater? Or do I start over?"
So it is with my novels. I write, most of the time, on proposal for existing book contracts. In the next three years, I have 8 books coming out. This is how I make my living. How I keep a roof over my children's heads. How I pay the bills. It's also my passion. I am lucky that the two go hand in hand.
Some of these books, I workshop with my writers' group or a select reader or two. Most I don't because my deadlines are often too tight to take an entire book through a workshopping process. Instead, for my writers' group, I choose books that are unfinished, in some state of disrepair, or some state of suspended animation, and I try to push through to the end, a completed book I can then send to my agent to try to sell. Or not. Sometimes, I don't really care. My writers' group projects are the places I really play--like trying out new stitches in knitting.
But I wonder . . . why they are unfinished. I look at them--there's not some fundamental flaw. They actually are novels that represent some of my best work. I wonder if I don't finish them because they are the books that stretch me . . . or that I can get lost in the muddle of themes and symbolism and just surround myself with words that aren't for sale. Just for . . . the art of it. I don't know.
Some of them are less commercial. More literary. Some are totally outside the realm of anything I've tried before. One is a modern retelling of a myth. An allegorical novel.
But unfinished--like those unfinished symphonies . . . they are. Then periodically, I get this burst. Like deciding once and for all--yes, rip out the stitches, start the sweater all over. The unfinished pieces, with no real deadline, are the ones I feel most free to change. As I recently discussed with a friend, checking ego at the door. Everything is on the table and open to being ripped apart. Maybe, because I earn my living as a writer, these special projects of mine are the ones that teach me.
What is left unfinished in your world?
So it is with my novels. I write, most of the time, on proposal for existing book contracts. In the next three years, I have 8 books coming out. This is how I make my living. How I keep a roof over my children's heads. How I pay the bills. It's also my passion. I am lucky that the two go hand in hand.
Some of these books, I workshop with my writers' group or a select reader or two. Most I don't because my deadlines are often too tight to take an entire book through a workshopping process. Instead, for my writers' group, I choose books that are unfinished, in some state of disrepair, or some state of suspended animation, and I try to push through to the end, a completed book I can then send to my agent to try to sell. Or not. Sometimes, I don't really care. My writers' group projects are the places I really play--like trying out new stitches in knitting.
But I wonder . . . why they are unfinished. I look at them--there's not some fundamental flaw. They actually are novels that represent some of my best work. I wonder if I don't finish them because they are the books that stretch me . . . or that I can get lost in the muddle of themes and symbolism and just surround myself with words that aren't for sale. Just for . . . the art of it. I don't know.
Some of them are less commercial. More literary. Some are totally outside the realm of anything I've tried before. One is a modern retelling of a myth. An allegorical novel.
But unfinished--like those unfinished symphonies . . . they are. Then periodically, I get this burst. Like deciding once and for all--yes, rip out the stitches, start the sweater all over. The unfinished pieces, with no real deadline, are the ones I feel most free to change. As I recently discussed with a friend, checking ego at the door. Everything is on the table and open to being ripped apart. Maybe, because I earn my living as a writer, these special projects of mine are the ones that teach me.
What is left unfinished in your world?
Labels: unfinished works
posted by Erica Orloff at 7:34 AM
30 Comments:
Everything is unfinished in my world!
I think if I had eight books on contract over three years, I would be hyperventilating into a brown paper bag for half the day, so those projects would remain unfinished, too. :-)
You amaze me!
Smart:
LOL!
Unfortunately--or fortunately--I don't have time to breathe into a brown paper bag. In fact, my kitchen is such a mess I am sure I couldn't even FIND a brown paper bag.
Besides laundry?
Hmmm...I have a list of unfinished essay and article ideas. I always plan to set aside time to work on that, but never do.
I also believe that often we set aside what stretches us -- that is what happened to me -- and upon the suggestion of a friend I gave myself 15 minutes to work on something I'd set aside. "You can do anything for 15 minutes." And she was right -- but I came up for air about 8 hours later -- with a completed and revamped very difficult chapter.
A book is never finished, it is merely abandoned.
--Oscar Wilde
That's how I feel. It's a wonder I ever send anything out.
Hi Amy:
I struggle to find the time to work on those kinds of projects where I need a clear mind. Fifteen minutes is a good approach.
E
Jude:
Deadlines push me to turn things in. But the unfinished items just stretch on and on.
E
I'm on draft gazillion right now of a book, and I've noticed a trend. At the end of every major rewrite, I lean back, rub my belly a few times (for good luck) and say, "Well, that's as good as I can possibly do, and I can't do any better, so it will have to do."
But twice now, I've waited a few months, gotten additional editorial feedback, and went back into the book. Both times, even after I swore I was done, I feel the book has taken major leaps forward after another heavy rewrite.
I've come to believe that books are never done, because you can never really tell a complete story. It's always too big to fit into a single book. Just like life. You can never really accurately represent life in a novel because it's too big, too messy, too complicated. There's always another level, always more angles.
Maybe the only time a book is done is when someone makes you finish it :)
JVZ
Hi JVZ:
So completely true. I liken it to a eulogy. How can you KNOW someone in words. It's impossible. How do you summarize a life? I read American Promethus about Robert Oppenheimer. It's a monster book, small print, maybe 600 pages on ONE guy. And yet KEY parts of who he is and why he did what he did . . . we just don't know. He'd dead. We can't ask. And even IF you asked, you can't know for sure.
A book just can't contain a story. Not really. Not ALL of it. That's why the expression "kill your darlings"--they're PART of the story, but don't belong IN the story.
UFO's? Mine are quilting. My wife's are knitting. And then there's the house with the half peeled kitchen cabinets, the boxes that wait to be unpacked, the junk mail waiting to go in the shredder.
Priorities! More time, please!
But I know what you mean about certain WIPs. They get spurts of activity, then I sit back and ponder them for months at a time.
Unfinished yard work, unfinished cleaning. I have an unfinished life. I think the only thing I do get to finish are my stories. I'm pretty sure that's a big part of why I love writing: everything else is endlessly unfinished.
Honestly, it's true. The first time I finished a story, I went to bed and slept like a baby. First time in my life I fell asleep when my head hit the pillow. Up until then, I spent at least two hours a night, unable to shut my brain up for the stories and worlds I lived in.
Sarah:
I have walls needing painting, closets needing cleaning . . . the whole nine yards. At least we're in good company. ;-)
E
spy:
An unfinished life. Maybe that will be the theme of my funeral.
:-)
E
I have several stories just sitting on my hardrive. Most didn't get past page 12. The others that are waiting for THE END has major problems. I'm sure once I figure out those stories problems they'll become finished ms. There is only one story that I don't think I have the chops to write.
I also think it's not necessarily finding the time to write on certain stories, but finding the desire to finish them.
Also, also I've come to believe that books are never done, because you can never really tell a complete story.
So true. Each round of edits I have to restrain myself from rewriting huge portions of the book. I fine tune up until galleys were I force myself to leave the story alone. But yeah, if I had the chance I'd probably revise until I died or got sick of the story.
LOL... unfinished and unwritten is my catalog of stories. Four incomplete and unfinished novels, scores of short stories... finishing means they are ready to submit, be mailed out... means putting myself out there.
As far as anything ever being "finished", I like how Raymond Carver wrote his stories - just a slice out of the whole story - enough to get you to see the story without bringing in everything and the kitchen sink to have it complete. Genius.
Mel:
I guess it's a sign of a good story when we DON'T get sick of it. I am on round three of a draft on two different books and STILl love opening the files.
E
eowh:
What a great example of Carver.
E
I'm still in awe of eight books in three years.
My unfinished things tend to be household projects that need my husband's help. I'm more than happy to attempt drilling the concrete walls, but something tells me it won't turn out as nicely than if he did it. So I wait.
Boxes of manuscripts (I call them practise. Kinda like batting cages of lit)
Paintings (they are never really finished.)
I like Jude's quote from Oscar Wilde. I think I'll post that over my desk. :)
When Spy posted "unfinished life" I thought that would be a good name for a book! Or did someone use that already-lol.
The first book I ever wrote 6 years ago received a request for a full from a New zealand publisher. It consisted of five women coming together at a journalists' conference and each telling their stories of life. It was rejected because the editor said there wasn't enough of a link between each of the stories but she urged me to take a particular story and make it into a full manuscript of its own and then she would love to look at it. I have tried and tried to stretch that out into a full book and it could be done easily but do you think I can finish it even with an editor having basically requested it? No. I can't get past page 70, perhaps because I know how it all unfolds and ends and I hate to know that - I get bored. Every now and then, I open the file and beat myself up about not having taken advantage of this great opportunity. I re-read it, know it's good and then close the file again. I guess it's the story that will always haunt me.
Melanie:
My home projects are a disaster. I usually end up having to hire someone--and last time I did, the guy screwed up to electrical plugs.
Sigh.
I need a handyman.
E
Aimless:
I no longer work in longhand--so no more boxes of unfinished stuff. Just file after file after file on my harddrive.
E
Suzanne:
Well . . . maybe TWO of them could intersect . . . If it still speaks to you all this time later, I am sure something is there . . .
E
hehe, maybe it would be better to ask me what's NOT left unfinished. :P
I like what you say about doing some things just for the art of it.
And holy hell, that deadline. Damn that would kill me. 8 books in three years?
Zoe:
I am one of the walking dead right now. ;-)
E
Erica, I could hug you for the "workshop" reference. I learned how to workshop last Fall semester and have to say it opened my eyes, as well as took away the angst I felt over having strange eyes look at my work. (I've always feared the crit group scenario)
So anyway, I have three finished mss, one of those I'm presently re-vamping. On the hard drive, as well as on several flash drives, are story ideas and three new stories started. Why didn't I dive into one of those rather than revamp the already finished one? They weren't speaking to me like the one I'm working on now.
And that's how I move through my writing world, doing what screams for attention, the one that says, "Do me right this time!"
Erica, I'm good about finishing novels I start. I write linear, and that maybe helps. I do have one I set aside, and plan on reviving one day. I feel guilty when one goes unfinished. It's like I let the characters down in some way.
Now my closets are another thing. Total chaos at times! I'm a work-in-progess, and maybe like Spy implied, nothing is ever finished.
Hi Kath:
I think "wokshop" implies we are PART of the process, and we are choosing to "work" on our novel with a workshop--versus critique group having a more passive sense--I send it out and wait to get hammered by criticism.
Hugs back! :-)
E
Hi Ladonna:
I admire you linear people!
E
hehe, next you can write a memoir about it. :P
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