Do Women Simply Write Differently than Men?

Allow me to plant a bare foot firmly on a third rail of modern society: gender differences. This post is inspired by a column my friend and Vermont College of Fine Arts MFA classmate Laura Warrell shared with me. Published in Salon by Lorraine Berry, it’s titled “Dear female students: Stop writing about men.” Ms. Berry has found that the female students in her creative-writing class often write about the men they’ve loved and lost. The male students don’t.

Ever the manly man, on my cross-country US road trip I paid a visit to the Barber Vintage Motorsports Museum outside of Birmingham, Alabama.

I don’t claim to have the answers on differences, if any, between male and female creative writers. I do know, however, that since returning to an art-committed life and engaging in a community of creative writers, I have found myself a minority. I have taken three creative-writing courses at The Writer’s Center in Bethesda, Maryland. I was the only male in one class and one of two in the others. I have been in two 12-student workshops at my MFA residencies, and in both I was one of two male students.

Now the courses and workshops focused on creative nonfiction, with writers working on personal essays and memoir. I’m sure there’s a blog post on why more women than men write memoir, if that is in fact true. But I think that trend I’ve noticed fits into the larger point I’m exploring here, that perhaps women are more inclined to explore their own emotional interiors on the page.

I believe this trend may be true in fiction as well as nonfiction. Last year I read a fantastic memoir in which the author shares when she was a young writer living with an unemployed boyfriend who belittled her and stole from her. Then I read a great novel by the same author about a young writer living with an unemployed husband who belittled her and stole from her. There was little doubt where the inspiration for the heroine came from, but that knowledge didn’t prevent me from enjoying the book.

Here are some of the questions I’m pondering:

1. Is it even true that women write differently than men? Any sociologist will tell you that data outliers exist. The male poets of the Romantic Era certainly wrote about women and love, and Patricia Cornwell doesn’t write romance novels. The question is if those examples are outliers or instead are representative of the fact that there’s no trend to be drawn from the data.
2. 

   I also tapped into my sensitive side on the road trip, as I took in the roses in the Biltmore Estate garden in Asheville, North Carolina.

   If true, is this a bad thing? Ms. Berry seems to think so, but I think her bigger concern is that the young women in her class lack perspective. She wants them to know that broken hearts heal, are broken again, and yet the person grows and survives. But isn’t that really an issue of age, not gender?

3. If true, is it in part a reflection of the audience? We hear about “chick flicks,” which feature tender stories of love and loss, and “guy flicks,” with crazy sex and action. Clearly Hollywood thinks there are gender differences in their audience. And I suspect you’d find more women than men read romance novels, and more men than women (although I suspect a smaller differential) read suspense. It also seems true that more women than men are published romance writers, and more men than women are published suspense authors. So which comes first, the writer’s inclination or the reader’s expectation?
4. If true, are men simply not as introspective? A primary goal in my MFA is to learn how to put myself on the page. I’ve written about that struggle here on The Artist’s Road, and the very act of sharing that with all of you has been difficult. I’ve wondered if part of the reason I seem poorer at sharing than many of my classmates is that men simply don’t reflect as much on their own lives, experiences and emotions as women.
5. If #4 is true, is that a result of societal conditioning? It’s safe to say that men are not encouraged, as a rule, to share their emotions, although frustrated girlfriends and wives may often wish they would share more. I believe society is more supportive now of men displaying their sensitive side (I’m seeing a lot of male politicians crying), but from an early age, girls tend to receive more support and less derision when they share their feelings.

I’d love to know what your thoughts are on this subject, if I’ve raised any good questions, if you have answers for them, or if this subject is even worth discussing. Join me on the third rail. It’s electrifying!

Creativity Tweets of the Week – 01/27/12

Today’s creativity links outnumber the writing links two to one. I’m grateful to be named a Top 10 Blog for Writers, but I’m also grateful my readers tolerate my polymath interests. These, of course, are some of the links I tweeted this week, and thus are a reflection of what caught my fancy at a moment in time. What’s on my mind also finds its way into my summaries; this week you might see a reference to coconut.

CREATIVITY

• “The Success of Failure: Pulitzer winner’s surprising road to the top,” Todd Leopold, CNN: “Successful people — creative people — fail every day, just like everybody else.” I fail constantly, so by extrapolation I must be very successful and creative.
• “Training Creativity,” Allan Douglas, guest on Creative Flux: Is your muse housebroken?
• 

  This is the Recoleta Cemetery in Buenos Aires, Argentina, a necropolis I visited in 2006. The vault of Evita Peron is located there. Why am I posting this photo, you ask? Since when have my photos had any relation to my posts?

  “Placing Too Much Importance on Passion,” Jane Friedman: So you’re really passionate about something? Who cares, Jane says: “What matters is how that translates into action.”

• “Study: The Brains of Storytellers and their Listeners Actually Sync Up,” Discover: All creative action involves telling a story, I believe. Thus, all creatives connect with their audience on a neurological level. Cool.
• “Open-plan offices killing creativity,” The Sunday Times (Australia): “Research strongly suggests that people are more creative when they enjoy privacy and freedom from interruption.” That’s true for me. Of course, when I crave interruption there’s always Twitter.
• “Ten Steps for Boosting Creativity,” Jeffrey Baumgartner: #9: “Read as much as you can about everything possible.” YES, I AGREE! #7: “Don’t watch TV.” Um, you know a new season of Archer has just started, right?

WRITING

• “Focusing on Flash Nonfiction: An Interview with Dinty Moore,” Jenny Patton, River Teeth: Hey all you flash-fiction writers. Hear from a fav writer of mine–and the editor of Brevity–on the CNF equivalent.
• “The Delicate Tension of Being a Writer,” Charlotte Rains Dixon: “The pull of the story is always with us.  And that creates a constant tension in our lives.” That sounds about right. That, and looming deadlines.
• “How to Put On Your Own Writer’s Retreat,” Jane Porter: Great DIY advice. Given that currently I have a coconut jones, let me add another suggestion–put out a plate of macaroons between writing sessions.

Here’s to a great February. I hope yours is filled with creativity, coconut, and bacon. You could try engaging the first by combining those last two. If you do, let me know how it worked out.

Guest Post: Write Yourself a Bad Review

Today I’m honored to provide a guest post by author and writing mentor K.M. Weiland, whose blog Wordplay also was named a Top 10 Blog for Writers for 2011-2012. Her bio is below the post.

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We all hate the critic in our heads. You know the one—talks with a nasal British accent, uses words like “deluded numbskull” and “insufferable incompetent,” and never fails to announce that your latest story is tripe. This critic of ours never seems to have a good word to say and is always running us down. So, naturally, we try to block him out as much as possible. But what if we were to actually give him permission to speak every now and then? What if his grumblings and mumblings had something of benefit to offer us?

Think about it. We’re used to gritting out teeth, shutting out the soul-battering harangues of our infernal internal editor, and writing the best stories we can. Then we send our poor shivering darlings out into the world to face something even worse than our inner critics (cue thunder and scary music duhn-duhn-duh-DUH)—the outer critics of critique partners, agents, editors, and, perhaps worst of all, readers.

How much better would it have been had we listened to our inner critic’s helpful, if admittedly snarky, advice before we submitted ourselves to the censure of the writing world at large? One of the best and easiest ways to harness the inner critic’s laser-like perception of your writing’s weak points is to write yourself a bad review. Why would you want submit yourself to that kind of depressing degradation? Quite simply, because as painful as it may be, acknowledging your faults is the best way to overcome them.

So sit yourself down at your computer, pretend you’ve just read your story for the first time, put on your best nasally British accent, and start writing your review from the perspective of someone who noticed your story’s every single flaw.

• Have fun with it. Since you have to face your faults, you might as well do it with aplomb. Turn up the snob level, write hyperbolically, and just generally give yourself permission to make this onerous assignment as snarky and witty as possible.
• Be instinctive. Your inner story sense knows more about what’s wrong with your writing than your conscious brain does. In your first pass over the story, don’t think too hard about what you’re writing. If something bugs you—even if you’re not quite sure why—write it down.
• Be specific. Once you’ve got your instinctive list of problems out of the way, go back and flesh them out. Where you wrote “weak plot,” dig a little deeper to identify why it’s weak. The more specific you are, the better your chances of understanding how to fix the problem.
• Be thorough. Review the entire plot. Analyze every character. Skim through the manuscript, page by page, to make certain you’re remembering everything that’s wrong with the story. This is where your ruthless side needs to take the lead. Don’t let yourself get away with so much as a single weak chapter ending.
• Analyze objectively. Once you’ve finished your snarky, snobby, nitpicking review, go back over it with an objective eye. Make certain everything you’ve written down really is a problem—and not just an overreaction from that part of you that wants to believe nothing you write is any good. Depending on how hard you usually are on yourself and how objective you are about your failings, you may want to take a couple days to recover before looking over the list.
• Create a plan of action. Finally, and most importantly, decide what you’re going to do to fix all these problems. If your critic’s disparagements were legion, try dividing them into categories: plot, characters, pacing, etc. Then make a chronological list if everything that needs fixing—and what you can do to improve them.

Writing a bad review can be rough business. But don’t let it dampen your self-esteem. Use it as a building block to face your writing weaknesses and rise above your mistakes. Then, after you’ve finished your rewrite, give a try to writing the “perfect” review.

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K.M. Weiland is the author of the historical western A Man Called Outlaw and the medieval epic Behold the Dawn. She enjoys mentoring other authors through her writing tips, her book Outlining Your Novel: Map Your Way to Success, and her instructional CD Conquering Writer’s Block and Summoning Inspiration.

Creativity Tweets of the Week – 01/20/12

I may have announced yesterday that this ol’ freelancer is looking to return to full-time salaried employment, but I’ll still bring you the best links on creativity and writing (and a bonus topic this week, resolutions) on Twitter and here on The Artist’s Road. Heck, removing the time I spend searching for work and handling back-office details should make it easier for me to continue providing you good value for your money. Although that’s a low bar to set, because I tweet and blog at no cost to you.

CREATIVITY

• “How Deadlines Can Kill Creativity,” Geoff Talbot, seven sentences: I’m not a huge fan of Geoff’s style–a post in seven sentences–as it invariably leads to more questions than answers. Still, this post raised good questions in my mind.
• 

  Meet Comma the Chameleon. He comes and goes, as he did on my cross-country US road trip. His name informs you that I have a jones for grammar and 80's music.

  “Nurturing Creativity for Stronger Brands,” Branding Strategy Insider: I like this: “Most of us don’t understand creativity, but all of us appreciate it.” Yup.

• “The Key to Creativity: Solitude or Teams?” Keith Sawyer, letter to The New York Times: I read recently in Stephen Greenblatt’s National Book Award winner The Swerve: How the World Became Modern that classical poets and essayists collaborated through frequent discussion, debate, and sharing of their work, but still wrote alone. I’d say that’s what I do, sharing with MFA classmates and a local writer’s group and readers of this blog, but still writing alone. So do we even have to ask this question? Can’t it be both?

WRITING

• “5 Lessons I Have Discovered While Preparing for the Writer’s Digest Conference,” Kathy Pooler, Memoir Writer’s Journey: I’m skipping that conference but will be at the AWP Conference in Chicago at the end of February (find me there!), and I’ll follow these tips. (Related: 7 Steps to Writing Success)
• “10 Bloggers Share their 2012 Blogging Formula,” Ann Tran, A Life With Intention: Make sure you have some time to spend with this post by Ann, which is lengthy but contains some good nuggets from successful bloggers. (Related: Congrats, You’ve Won a Top Blog Award!)
• 

  The GPS display in the previous photo shows me crossing northern Georgia toward Alabama. By the time I reached the lonely roads of Idaho, Comma was a welcome companion; and at times quite chatty, at least in my own mind.

  “Thoughts on the Meditative Essay,” Robert Vivian, guest post on Numero Cinq: An appropriately reflective piece by a Vermont College of Fine Arts instructor on a style of creative nonfiction I am only just beginning to understand. (Related: MFA Nugget: Storytelling vs. Fragmentation)

• “Do You Write When You’re Not Inspired?” Joe Bunting, The Write Practice: Can I answer yes and no? (Related: Maintaining Creative Momentum)
• “What Can Woody Allen Teach You About Writing?” John Magnet Bell, Start Your Novel: A lengthy but interesting post complete with videos of Allen. Let me add that any writer can learn simply by reading Allen’s published essays; I’d recommend Without Feathers.

BONUS CATEGORY: NEW YEAR’S RESOLUTIONS

• “Time for your check-in,” Lauree Ostrofsky, simplyleap: Time to see how we’re doing on our resolutions. Lauree (promoter of the “Hug Like You Mean It” campaign) is determined to be More Happy.
• “What Sort of Goals Do You Need?” Cheryl Reif Writes: Know your priorities in 2012, but also what might hold you back.
• “Your Goal-Setting Support System,” Nancy Brook: I really like one takeaway here, of being cautious who you share your goals with. Of course, at the top of this post I shared with the universe my goal of a new job, so I’m apparently being selective about following Nancy’s advice.
• “I Will Write,” Gwen Mullins, Hunger Mountain: Her title says it all, doesn’t it?

In the coming weeks, you’ll see me as a guest blogger on Write to Done (the blog that kindly named me a Top Ten Blog for Writers) and K.M. Weiland’s Wordplay (another Top Ten blog). Hope to see you all at both sites!

 

Maintaining Creative Momentum

I anticipated riding a wave as monstrous as the surfing delights found on Oahu’s North Shore. Instead I’ve been floating in the bathtub that is the Gulf of Mexico post-hurricane season.

Here are some "surfers" I saw during a visit to Florida's Gulf Coast in the spring of 2011. Not exactly the waves I'd watch surfers ride at Huntington Beach during childhood visits to Los Angeles.

Last July I rode a huge creative wave out of my first-ever MFA residency, seemingly unlimited energy that carried me through two “packets” of creative writing, or 60 sparkling pages over two months’ time. I’ve been back from my second residency for eight days now, and the words are coming about as willingly as a male pit bull follows Bob Barker into a veterinary hospital.

My residency was far from a disappointment; it was a phenomenal creative experience, and I suspect the energy I felt came through in my dispatches from Vermont. But my time there lacked the newness of my first residency. I suspect I’ve been trying too hard to replicate the harmonious magic of that initial experience, as the director and screenwriters did with The Hangover Part II.

I’ll have my packet of creative writing done by the end of the month. And I suspect there will be some compelling prose in there; the last couple of days I’ve actually felt pretty good about some of the passages I’ve produced. I know from experience that if you force yourself to produce creatively every day, some decent results will emerge despite any doubts or disappointments you bring to the moment. Those glimmers of promise will make it easier for me to sit down at the keyboard tomorrow and start typing.

Have you ever tried to duplicate a moment of creative magic, only to have it fall short of expectations? Perhaps you returned to a place of great inspiration, or resumed a routine that once provided a creative spark? How have you reacted when your creative energy was lower than anticipated?

Creativity Tweets of the Week — 01/13/12

Your patience has been rewarded. After a four-week hiatus, the Creativity Tweets of the Week makes its triumphant return. Once again I provide some of the best links on creativity and writing I sent via Twitter this week. Note I still provide a focus on creativity despite changing my Twitter handle yesterday from @on_creativity to @PatrickRwrites. Was the change a sign of vanity, or just a wise move away from too many brands? Can’t it be both?

CREATIVITY

• “Finding Purpose, Embracing Creativity,” Patricia Crisafulli, Huffington Post: Having your creative output showcased is a worthy goal, but celebrate the process and the result regardless.
• 

  I intended to include pictures here taken at my recent MFA in Writing residency at the Vermont College of Fine Arts, but in transferring them to my computer I accidentally deleted them. So here's a picture of a neighbor's dog, Bella, taken by my daughter. Why? Because she's cute. The dog, that is, although I think my daughter is as well.

  “Are You Suffering from Information Overload Syndrome?” Debra Kristi, Debra Kristi’s Blog: I fear my Tweets of the Week contribute to IOS. So be it. (FYI, my contest-winning personal essay “Forest Foursome” is a reflection on this syndrome.)

• “The Counter-Intuitive Benefits of Small Time Blocks,” Elizabeth Grace Saunders, 99%: Consider this an anecdote to IOS (see above).
• “More Ideas for Generating Creativity,” Carrie Brummer, ArtistThink: My friend Carrie blogs more suggestions, including the unorthodox “Trade unfinished creative projects with someone and finish them.” Anyone interested in finishing my next MFA packet?
• “Take a Chance on Your Creative Dream,” Sue Mitchell, Your Muse is Calling: You’ll have to change your behavior “in a pretty significant way” with no guarantee of success, my friend Sue says. She’s right. But isn’t anything worth having worth a little risk?

WRITING

• “10 Terrific Creative Writing Blogs,” Sonia Simone, Copyblogger: I’m not including this just because I’m listed as one of the ten. Okay, that’s part of it. But Sonia takes the Top 10 Blogs for Writing winners awarded by Write to Done and provides helpful summaries of each. Of mine, she quotes my description of it as “an ongoing conversation among the blog’s author and its readers regarding the challenges and rewards of pursuing an art-committed life.” Yup. (Question to grammarians: Did I use “among” correctly in that sentence?)
• 

  Here's a picture of some of my monkeys. Why? Geez, you ask a lot of questions.

  “Writing Prompts for Revelation and Transformation,” Christy Bailey, Hunger Mountain: Christy offers ways to “[un]block the creative right brain” on the site hosted by the Vermont College of Fine Arts’ literary magazine.

• “Podcasts about Writing,” Peggy Lane, Hey Biscuit: The print journalist in me resists podcasts for the same reason I resist TV news; I can’t skip around the story. But if you’re stuck in traffic they are lifesavers. Mix them in with moments of silent reflection to allow your subconscious to speak to your work-in-progress.
• “Writing Memoir? Be Counterphobic,” Marion Roach Smith: In other words, let go of the fear. The post reminded me of a favorite craft book of mine, Fearless Confessions: A Writer’s Guide to Memoir by the incomparable Sue William Silverman.
• “Five Writing Prompts to Overcome Writer’s Block,” Joe Bunting, The Write Practice: I avoid writer’s block as a freelance journalist by reminding myself that if I don’t file, I don’t get paid. I’ll keep these in mind for my creative writing.
• “On Becoming a Writer,” Jessica McCann, guest post on creative non-fiction writer: My friend Jessica shares her story to both non-fiction and fiction success. Spoiler alert: Her teenage daughter can’t believe she’d write an essay willingly.
• “Why Authors Tweet,” Anne Trubek, The New York Times: I’ll take a guess. To avoid their works-in-progress?

I’d like to welcome all of the new subscribers I’ve gained since winning the Top-10 Blog for Writers award. As we move forward together, let me know what’s working and what’s not. I’ll keep doing the former and apologize for the latter.

MFA Nugget: A Word from our Readers

ALEXANDRIA, VIRGINIA: Now that I’m back from my second residency in the MFA in Writing program with the Vermont College of Fine Arts, I’d like to direct you to one more source of wisdom I learned from the last two weeks: YOU.

A father and son skate on a make-shift ice rink in front of VCFA's College Hall.

It was hard to carve out time each day to write and upload blog posts. But what kept me going was the fantastic range of comments the posts generated from readers. I would go from having a fascinating conversation on writing in a workshop or the dining hall to having a fascinating conversation on writing in my blog’s comment field.

This isn’t a new experience; I maintain the reason this blog was named a Top Ten Blog for Writers is because of the contributions of readers. But there was so much thought put into some of these comments. The authors of the comments cover the gamut, from beginning writers to seasoned writing instructors. They are all worth a read.

Below is an index of my MFA posts, in case you missed one or would like to go back to read the comments. On Friday we return to our regularly scheduled programming, with the triumphant return of the Creativity Tweets of the Week!

• A Window on Your Narrator (Dec. 30): A window as writing technique.
  
• Illuminating Your Story (Dec. 31): Thoughts on concise writing and revision.
• Creativity and Wasting Time (Dec. 31): Allowing creativity to cultivate.
• Storytelling vs. Fragmentation (Jan. 2): A look at the lyric essay.
• Reading Your Work Aloud (Jan. 3): The headline says it all.
• Revision vs. Re-Vision (Jan. 4): A new way to look at revising your writing.
• Dialogue as Action (Jan. 5): Conflict through dialogue.
• Pacing Yourself (Jan. 6): On writing and Robert Goulet messing with stuff.
• In Defense of Excessive Detail and Sentimental Disclosure (Jan. 7): Rethinking sparse prose.
• And one other post, with a short video of Thai lanterns being launched into the sky, New Year’s Tradition.

MFA Nugget: In Defense of Excessive Detail and Sentimental Disclosures

MONTPELIER, VERMONT: “My observation is that among students of writing, the inclusion of details is very out of fashion,” said novelist, memoirist and biographer Larry Sutin at a lecture here at my MFA residency with the Vermont College of Fine Arts. He finds this most upsetting, and I did as well, once he said during Q&A that the trend most certainly is not reflected in what is being published.

VCFA instructor Larry Sutin

We think of prose as more sparse now. We think of our 21st Century readers as embodying impatience, capable as they are at any moment of whipping out a smartphone and pulling up a video of a cat simultaneously burping and farting. We can’t load them down with physical details of people and places, or emotional details of pain or joy.

Having listened to Larry’s masterful lecture–among great lecturers here at VCFA, he is one of the best, the overpacked room (don’t tell the local fire marshal) a testament to that fact–what he believes is that modern readers resist writers who include detail and emotion poorly. They have not a fear of detail or emotion but a fear of tedium.

“Any writing done badly will be bad writing,” he said. I think that’s the quote, anyway, I was laughing too hard to write it down.

I’m getting a bit punchy here at the end of the residency, so let me simplify things for myself by providing a list of more nuggets from Larry’s lecture:

• Choose your details wisely. Those objects you highlight, facial features you note, emotional moments you elaborate should tell a larger story. Leave out the rest.
• Be unorthodox in your choices. Larry frequently cited letters Chekhov wrote to aspiring writers; according to Larry, Chekhov was a “one-man 19th Century MFA.” In one letter, he advises describing a moonlit night not by noting details of the moon, but instead the glint of light off of a building’s glass. We tune out the familiar but seize on the unusual but accessible.
• Animate the inanimate: Again from Chekhov, when you apply action verbs to objects they become more interesting to readers.
• The distinction between “interior” and “exterior” isn’t real. Everything the author includes in a book drives the narrative. Don’t be afraid to have your character reflect and react internally; they complement external cues.
• Understand the role of understatement. Larry acknowledged much of modern fiction has moments of understatement, but he said careful examination of such prose will reveal that the reader has been queued previously. “Understatement works when we have other details” beforehand, he said.

Here at residency everyone carries a 13-page schedule printed on garish pink paper. It is our crutch. None of us know what day it is, either day of the week or day of the residency. We just look at what’s next and go to it. Thirteen pages sounds like a lot, but in fact it is a model of brevity when you consider how many activities are occurring here. So it’s not surprising they limit the length of the lecture titles in the schedule.

Larry’s lecture was listed on the schedule as “In Defense of Excessive Detail.” This apparently caused Larry some offense. He said the entire lecture title was “In Defense of Excessive Detail and Sentimental Disclosures,” and in fact that was the title in the materials sent to us prior to residency. Larry’s sense of humor can be subtle, so he may have been having fun with the notion that even his own college is cutting details he’s choosing to include in his writing. But the full title is a better descriptor of the lecture.

Perhaps I’m trying to make sure I take the lesson of including excessive detail to heart. Or perhaps I’m feeling sentimental here at the end of the residency. But I’ve decided to break my own internal rule on blog-title length and let Larry’s full title shine above.

What is your take on the use of details and emotional disclosure in writing today? How do you approach details in your own writing?

ABOUT THIS SERIES: As promised, I am posting occasional “nuggets” of wisdom I am acquiring here at my second residency in the MFA for Writing program at the Vermont College of Fine Arts. Previous posts include “Illuminating Your Story,” “A Window on Your Narrator,” “Creativity and Wasting Time,” “New Year’s Tradition,” “Storytelling vs. Fragmentation,” “Reading Your Work Aloud,” “Revision vs. Re-Vision,” “Dialogue as Action,” and “Pacing Yourself.”

MFA Nugget: Pacing Yourself

MONTPELIER, VERMONT: I just took a nap.

Those five words may not seem particularly significant or profound, but they form a sentence I don’t often type. I tend to crash daily around 3:00 pm (the time of day Robert Goulet messes with my stuff), but I’ve learned to put my creative projects aside at that time and take care of busywork: correspondence, bills, organizing.

The snow-covered quad.

But here at my MFA residency at the Vermont College of Fine Arts, I hit the wall. The 1 pm faculty reading–featuring many of my favorite writers here–was riveting. The lecture afterward by a graduating student was both fact-filled and moving. But once those events ended, I crossed the snow-covered quad, made my way up my dormitory’s concrete steps, threw my book bag and coat onto the floor against the pale-blue cinderblock wall of my room, and dove into the too-short bed.

A VCFA residency lasts ten full days. The first lectures begin at 8:45 am. Events continue throughout the day. Most days feature a two-hour workshop in which we critique each other’s writings. Faculty readings occur almost every night at 7 pm. Student readings start most nights around 8:45 pm; one reading I participated in Tuesday night began a little after 10 pm.

And of course we’re all college students, even me, a middle-aged husband and father. That means late nights of socializing. Some things have changed for me vs. college a quarter-century ago. Instead of talking about chicks, I’m talking about the use of metaphor. Instead of shotgunning Pabst Blue Ribbon, I’m sipping Maker’s Mark. And instead of playing “Quarters,” I’m enjoying Scrabble.

The scene of the crime.

VCFA knows it’s easy to burn out at this pace. They warn us–in the student handbook, in a pre-residency email, at orientation–to move at a reasonable pace. Sure, we say. But if you’re a mother of a 10-year-old boy, do you take him to a candy store, tell him he can spend as much time there as he’d like and eat as much as he wants with no worry about paying for anything, but just make sure you don’t eat so much you get sick to your stomach?

We’re not 10-year-olds. We’re adults. But the temptation of the offerings here at VCFA are no different than the licorice and malted-milk balls in front of that imagined boy. Still, I can resist when my body demands it. I have found myself slowing down. Yesterday afternoon I skipped a lecture I was intent on hearing. Last night I skipped the faculty reading. And I took that nap.

I’m awake now, alert and refreshed. I’m writing this post, and will schedule it to post tomorrow morning, the same time my other posts have gone live. And I’m listening to some music, to help pump me with energy. Let me add a detail I swear is true: Moments ago when I put my music player on “shuffle” and hit play, the first song that came up was The Beatles’ “I’m So Tired.”

It wasn’t true. I’m not tired, not at this moment. But if I don’t continue to pace myself, it will be again. So between now and Sunday, when I take the Amtrak Vermonter back to Washington, D.C., I’ll give myself permission to skip another lecture, blow off another reading, and take another nap.

Artists of all types must balance their art with many other parts of life. Are you careful to pace yourself?

ABOUT THIS SERIES: As promised, I am posting occasional “nuggets” of wisdom I am acquiring here at my second residency in the MFA for Writing program at the Vermont College of Fine Arts. Previous posts include “Illuminating Your Story,” “A Window on Your Narrator,” “Creativity and Wasting Time,” “New Year’s Tradition,” “Storytelling vs. Fragmentation,” “Reading Your Work Aloud,” “Revision vs. Re-Vision,” and “Dialogue as Action.”

MFA Nugget: Dialogue as Action

MONTPELIER, VERMONT: “Dialogue is a type of action: a means of developing dramatic conflict, in which we witness the push and pull between characters.” So said Edgar-award winning novelist Domenic Stansberry in a lecture here at my MFA residency with the Vermont College of Fine Arts.

VCFA instructor Domenic Stansberry

Yes, dialogue is a means of character development, Stansberry said, a way to convey who they are and what they want, “but the search for fulfillment of conflicting desire is at the heart of dramatic dialogue.” The conflict can be overt, he said, but often it is effective when “expressed indirectly, under the surface, handled with misdirection, understatement and various forms of camouflage.”

Stansberry’s lecture featured examples of conflict-driving dialogue in fiction–Dostoevsky, Chekhov, Hemingway, O’Connor–and he is a fiction writer himself. But I was one of many creative nonfiction students in attendance. Dialogue is a critical part of my narrative nonfiction. Even when I don’t have to remember the actual dialogue–when I have it recorded–I still as an author must decide what to include, what to summarize, and what to cut. Finding the lines that highlight that conflict, whether explicit or shrouded, is essential to me just as much as any novelist.

What role would you say dialogue plays in your writing? How have you used it effectively?

ABOUT THIS SERIES: As promised, I am posting occasional “nuggets” of wisdom I am acquiring here at my second residency in the MFA for Writing program at the Vermont College of Fine Arts. Previous posts include “Illuminating Your Story,” “A Window on Your Narrator,” “Creativity and Wasting Time,” “New Year’s Tradition,” “Storytelling vs. Fragmentation,” “Reading Your Work Aloud,” and “Revision vs. Re-Vision.”