Maxine Hong Kingston, An American Writer

I had the pleasure of listening Maxine Hong Kingston at the Los Angeles Times Festival of Books, where David Ulin of the LA Times Book Section did a masterful job of moderating a discussion. Maxine Hong Kingston is the author of fiction, non-fiction and poetry. Kingston is an American writer whose work puts her in the ranks of Eudora Welty and William Faulkner.

Her first book, written in 1976, was Woman Warrior: Memoirs Of A Girlhood Among Ghosts. The writer uses the myths told in southern China, brought to the new world by immigrants, reshaped to compliment their new life in America, to tell the story of growing up in a Cantonese-speaking neighborhood in Stockton, California. They are American myths, and Kingston is gratified when her work is seen as "American literature, and not those Chinese books." Through the process of talking story, the myths brought over on boats and planes and settled into the living rooms and kitchens and talked about to the generations that are born here. The book is written in a poetic voice greatly influenced by the cadences and rhythms of her childhood, and very much influenced by the process of "talking story," and remembering dreams.
Maxine Hong Kingston, photo from Koa Books

Dreams are a recurring theme in her work. She believes dreams are important, and can signify something that needs tending to, or our deepest desires. When she was a child, it wasn't uncommon for the family to come down in the morning and ask one another, "What did you dream about?" Talking about dreams was a practice handed down from one generation to the next. This was driven home when Hong Kingston went to China to find her mother's long lost sister. She found her. The first thing the aunt asked Kingston was, "How is your mother, and what is she dreaming about?" Luckily, Kingston had recently spoken to her mother, and had an answer for the aunt.

Like many writers, Hong becomes deeply involved with the characters she creates. When she got to the end of Woman Warrior, she knew all the adventures and experiences still continued. In a way, the characters she creates live life off the page, until she lassos them back to appear in the next book, older, or a bit changed. The imagination enables her to create a reality that includes the lifespan of a character that exceeds any one book.

Of her switch from novels to non-fiction, Hong Kingston cited the Berkeley Fire (where she lost not only her home, but her entire community) as one thing that helped her make the shift. After the devastating experience, she found she no longer wanted to write by herself, that in fact, she wanted the company of others. So she gathered friends and former neighbors as they wrote down their experiences. From this, she went on to work with veterans, helping them tell their stories of war. "I let them write their way home from war," she said. "They find they can make beauty and art from war." And this is the great thing about Hong. One senses her restlessness, her decision not to take anything for granted, but to keep pressing not only herself, but us, to look for answers.

Writing Space

Hemingway writing in Africa

A lot of people at public places not only surf the internet, but also write everything from screenplays to novels. With coffee by their side, the general buzz of the atmosphere around them, often with earbuds helping to create the right mood, they hack out their day's work.

For awhile, I used to take my laptop over to a jazz bar, and get work done over there. I'd have breakfast, knock out some prose, and also fall into a conversation with a varied lot that included a masseuse, a waitress, a police officer, a pianist, and even friends who'd stop by. It was my way of getting out of the house, of walking 2 miles and exercising, then setting up shop. I really loved working there --it was fun. And surprisingly, I got work done.

Last year, my laptop died. Having limited funds, I purchased a desktop, thus guaranteeing my wandering days were over. However, I didn't mind because I'd found that I prefer my little study. I like the resources I have around me. The books I can grab to look up a fact, or find a bit of inspiration from. And like many writers, I also do laundry while I'm hacking away. But often it does feel like I'm chained to my desk, or at the mercy of my cat and dog, which is why I have my little Moleskine book with me everywhere. I write in it, take notes or sometimes jot down entire scenes. Lacking a laptop, my Moleskine has become my own variation of one.

My favorite writer's room is that of Al Martinez, Pulitzer Prize winning journalist from the L.A. Times. It's shaded by large oak trees, and has a view of lush greenery. There are stickers with funny sayings, books upon books, a rolltop desk with pencils, mugs, and at last... his computer. I believe had I looked I even would have found a typewriter. This was a room that was built by a 65+ years of writing. I didn't take any photos. It would have been like me photographing the Pope's boudoir, and somehow, I just couldn't bring myself to do such a thing.

Back in the day of Hemingway and Faulkner, they weren't dependent on either cables, wi-fi, or even electricity. Imagine the little case with the typewriter --no worries about whether or not there'll be an electrical jack nearby, or what would happen if the entire system crashed. Really, if you think of it, not having these worries is a luxury. Anyway, Hemingway wrote everywhere. Here's his place in KeyWest, or in a hotel room with a desk shoved up in front of a door and a mirror. But wherever he was, in whatever space whether small, large, having resources or not, he held to the maxim as evidenced in a letter to F. Scott Fitzgerald: "There is only one thing to do with a novel and that is to go straight on through to the end of the damned thing."

And the same holds true today.

The Guardian ran photos of Writer's rooms. Go ahead, have fun looking at them!

Writer Impossible: The Memoir

Since the kerfluffle with fake memoirist and gangsta-poseur Peggy Seltzer, I've read two memoirs, both oldies. First, André Leon Talley's childhood and young adulthood memoir "A.L.T." Second, Diana Vreeland's own, "D.V." (Note: It must be a sign of greatness to be able to use only one's initial for a memoir). In addition, I've also re-read Peter O'Toole's riotous romp, "Loitering With Intent, The Apprentice." Each has grand stories to tell, storytellers who could regale you with interesting tidbits for hours. The writers were and are keen observers of the world around them, and understand their place or purpose. All three also tell it in a way that is not only truthful, but compelling as well. Would I want to be a guest in a ride-along in their car? You bet!

I'll take the first three lines of each from Chapter 1:
From DV:

"I loathe nostalgia.
One night at dinner in Santo Domingo at the Oscar de la Rentas', Sifty Lazar, the literary agent, turned to me and said, "The problem with you, dollfact" --that's what he always clls me --"is that your whole world is nostalgic."

From A.L.T:

"I shall begin by writing about luxury. I can't be sure exactly what image you'll drum up, but I suspect that it will either be swathed in silk and brocade or dressed in a custom-made English suit."

From Loitering With Intent:

"Uncommonly nippy is it in this old house, where you find me loitering at the base of the stairway in the hall, glum and with iced trotter unhappy in their station on the cold slabs of black and white chequered floor."

Immediately the stage is set. Vreeland, Talley and O'Toole take the reader on a romp. Talley tells you about his childhood, where luxury meant large Sunday meals, pressed sheets, and carefully chosen clothing for church. Vreeland regales the reader with a story about back plasters and Jack Nicholson, then segues to finding the house she left in 1937 on Hanover Terrace. And O'Toole takes you into the world of his early years at RADA.

Missing are tired pity-me flags, the long explanations, the apologies --so evident in lesser memoirs. Usually the one-shots, the pity me poor mommy, pity me poor alcoholic son who has wasted all his money on boozing and drugs.
If they did, I probably wouldn't even have finished the first chapter.
I'd of scrapped them to the book heap reserved for the rats and mice to make warm bedding with for cold nights.

Vreeland, Talley and O'Toole have a wonderful ability with language with which to provide descriptions rich in variety of words and sounds (yes, you can read them aloud). This creates a visual memoir -we can see it, hear it, taste, touch and feel what they're writing about. They have the elusive gift of voice.

"Robert famously was a womanizer, drank whiskey by the bucket, could curse blisters on granite; a martinet at work, he was rollicker at leisure; erudite, theatrical, godless, practical, his industriousness was boundless, his will and determination invicible, his phrasemaking raw.."

(I'm not sure if it's because he's Irish, but O'Toole has a natural inclination for run-ons. But you get the point).

Do they take creative liberties in conveying their stories? Probably. Maybe things weren't as golden in other aspects, but they're not sharing those with the reader at this moment. And memory is a sticky thing --I'm sure I was a size five for decades. However, what they're writing about rings true because of the details given and the voice is so consistent. They aren't playing with pitch or meter, what's coming out is natural and unfettered. And to me, this is the mark of a good memoir: one that told in a compelling and amusing way that has a broad use of language to create visual descriptions.

But above all else: what's written about really did happen.

Writer Impossible: Blogosphere Book Reviews

Another late night. Time to peruse book reviews written by bloggers. I've found a mixed bag. Mostly what I've seen are people confusing a critique, an opinion (usually a recommendation), and a report. I know, I'm quibbling. But there is a difference. Especially since everything on the blogosphere is seen as a review.

Most of the books covered by bloggers are recommendations. Someone likes a book so they pass it along. They aren't critical, indeed have no reason to be --but they are enthusiastic and they want you to know about the book. Since people spend more time on blogs than they do reading newspaper book review sections (which are a dying species), and since printed literary journals are fighting for their existence, what bloggers do to promote reading can't be underestimated. I think new writers who don't become conversant in blogging are missing out.

There are a lot of bloggers who confuse a review with a book report. They break down the plot, beginning middle and end. In other words, they give it away. They're less successful identifying themes or conveying what the author was trying to do, and point out how he was or wasn't successful. In these I've found the one thing lacking is clarity of prose. The review goes on and on. They have a difficult time identifying what they're responding to and why. To them I say, go with the old art school critique:

"I'm responding to this piece because..." or "I identified with this because..."

You don't have to tell us the answers verbatim, but it helps if you know the source of your opinion.

Interestingly, I found more positive notices than negative. It seems that bloggers are less comfortable writing about what they're indifferent to, which can put a blogger in an awkward spot if they've hounded the author for an ARC. I've heard more stories from authors when a blogger befriends an author and requests one. The blogger announces to the blogosphere they've gotten it. They read it and say absolutely nothing. The author is waiting, their blogger buddies are waiting. Sensing a breach in blogosphere friendliness, the blogger offers something terse: "A noble first effort. The author really had a good time writing this."
To these bloggers I say, heed John Updike's advice:

"Do not accept for review a book you are predisposed to dislike, or committed by friendship to like."

And then there are a very rare breed of bloggers who feel they are standard bearers. The world must be held to their view of how things should work. Dutifully, they will break apart the book, tell you every single perceived fault, then pull out the bully club and give it one final swat by saying something like, "by the way, I found out that only a handful turned out for his reading in Sparta GA." Perhaps they're not answering the question posed above: "I'm responding this way because...."

I consider my articles about books to be recommendations (opinions). I write about what I like. I put in the url so that you can look it up and order it. That it's commercial can't be denied. Believe me, I read many books that I don't care for, but I don't write about those. Writing about something you hate and doing it intelligently is far more difficult that espousing the virtues of an author or book. True criticism is a lot more than whether or not you like something. To those pros who can do this, my hat is off to them. Maybe someday, when I can control my inner snark, I'll toss my critical words into the Mixmaster as well.

Anyway, the blogosphere has changed everything. Recently I submitted a recommendation. When it came time for me to categorize it, I chose "opinion." The editor wrote me back... "your piece was a review." I responded, "No, it was a recommendation." Same cat, different breed. I guess I'll have to learn to meow better.


The above article was first published on BlogCritics.org

The Organic Source: A Story

The daughter thinks about art.

Memory 1: The mother worked in the garden. She hauled rock, mows the lawn, trims the tree, plants bushes. A well-dressed neighbor lady walked over to her. "I feel so lazy," she said to the mother. The mother shrugged. It's what she did. Perhaps it was less the ambition the neighbor lady perceived, as much as it was creating a living sculpture from plants, water, sun & shade.

How could the daughter not love gardening? Especially at the house in the country, where avocados grew next to orange trees, 8 vegetable beds grew with a wild profusion of green beans that were planted to form a teepee, heads of broccoli the size of a plate and an apple tree with a tree house.

Memory 2: The mother, who was well into her 50's, decided to take up the piano. Never mind that her daughters blasted through lessons for ten years. Forget that her youngest hated the lessons, only went because she was driven. The mother progressed from scales to chords and accomplished the playing of a song the youngest daughter can sing to this day, "Down in the valley, valley so low. Hang your head over, hear the wind blow...."

How could the daughter not love all sorts of music? Opera, jazz, big band, rock... you name it, she listened to it. Only stopping when the man she married laughed at it, proclaimed much of it intellectually inferior. Until one day, she pulled out all her albums and started playing them with impunity. From there, the rest got sorted out too.

Memory 3: The mother shaped lumps of clay into little people. She also made dishes, bowls, vases. They were funky little things, not elegant, but rustic and oftentimes rough. The little people characters amused only the mother and often the daughter would find them perched in pots outside, carefully arranged in two's or threes.

Much to the daughter's chagrin, she obtained her degree in fine arts. Her area of study --ceramics. However, at this point in time of her young life, the last thing she wanted to remember were the baby blue pudgy ball like characters living in her mother's pots back at home.

Memory 4: The mother dropped the daughter each week off at the library. A huge modern building filled with adventures beyond the farmlands bordering the town. The daughter would check out books --five or six at a time. She'd go home and lie under the dining room table to read.

The daughter became a reader.

Memory 5: The mother wrote letters.

The daughter had penpals at the age of 8. When she was 13, a pen pal's mother met her and said, "One day you'll be a writer." However, the daughter didn't know what it meant. She quickly forgot it.

Memory 6: The mother was a dressmaker. She taught her daughter to make her own clothes.

An imperfect seamstress, the daughter applied the lessons of construction, structure and form as she built her own life.

Memory 7. The mother dies.

The daughter becomes a writer. Many year later, someone asks, "When did you decide to be a writer?"
The daughter thinks back on her childhood. She realizes that her mother's creative projects were her way of reaffirming her own humanity. The daughter understands the importance of art, the relationship to all things --be it fashion, cooking, writing, gardening or raising one's children.
She offers this reply: "I never decided, it just seemed natural."
The daughter now has a daughter of her own. She looks at her and hopes that she does as good a job as her own mother did, bringing art into her life.

Writer Impossible: Modulation and Tone

You, The Piano Man
For Glenn on his 120th Birthday

The flies of stress buzz around my head
as I cross out a transition in prose.
It should start on a low note,
trill higher, gain momentum,
and swoop to a singular, brilliant ping.

But alas, I am stuck --and I have flies.
You, the piano man have always had notes,
words, and music on the brain.
So I phone: 011 61 2 a line to Darlinghurst
where you live amid pianos, music and poetry.

You, the piano man, put down coil setters and gauges.
I only hear silence, and the
flies round my head are getting louder.
“Tempo change,” you finally say.
“That’s it?” I ask.

You, the piano man, catch my L.A. sigh.
A gasp that whisks across the ocean.
“Pace?” I ask.
“Mod-ul-ation,” you say. “Got it luv?”
“No sweat, pet. I've got it,” I say.

A key change --imagine biting a peach
and instead of it squirting, summer’s unleashed,
with John Phillip Sousa and gingham dresses.
Or a dog that plays a sad cello
'cause the cat's run off with the moon.

The flies of stress die away. I'm no longer stuck.

Writer Impossible: Dialogue

1. Johnson told her he was going to the store. He gathered his keys and turned to her as he pushed open the door.
"I'm going to the store," he said.
"Okay," she answered.
"I'll be right back."
"Okay."
"See you soon."
"Right."

2. "The generator for the EV-365 is a double charged lithium hydrogexenator, that has duel focal points of charmeuse lasers that double as guiding beacons for the energy flow. This design is based on Sir John Litton's well known studies on outer space, and his hypothesis of the relationship between zero gravity and forward motion. Of course, his models failed, especially the ZWX-4, which lacked lithium hydrogexenators, because they just didn't have the technology back then. They also lacked charmeuse lasers," said James West, President of Production.
"So you're saying that it's the lithium hydrogexenator and the charmeuse lasers that are the key to success? What about his later models that worked without these things? The AWBB-48-00? Or the TRP-45-68759?"

We call the first treading water. That is, small exchanges where information that doesn't move the story forward but just fills space. The second is using dialogue as an SUV for information.

In both instances, the information may be imparted in a different way --compacted, parsed and exchanged for a stronger scene. Dialogue is difficult. First attempts will almost always be redundant. Often they will impart far more information than needed. And sometimes the reader is being told what he or she can already infer.

Dialogue in writing is much different that dialogue used in scripts. In movies, you can have exchanges like the one above because you have a supporting cast of environment, action, light, facial or body expression and even music. But in books, too many exchanges like this become nothing more than treading water or as in the latter, drowning the reader in too much information.

Dialogue must reveal character, use only the most essential words, convey emotion, provide information and move the story forward. It is the artful combination of the right words and phrases to create the illusion of talking.

In the book "What If? Writing Exercises for Fiction Writers" by Anne Bernays and Pamela Painter, Kingsley Amis said this about dialogue:
"I always try over the phrases, fooling the reader into believing that this is how people actually talk. In fact, inevitably it's far more coherent than any actual talk ...but when in doubt I will repeat a phrase to myself seven or eight times, trying to put myself in the place of an actor speaking the part."