Tag: philosophy

Ghostwriting: lame or legit?

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A ghostwriter is a professional writer hired by someone to write a book that will feature the employer’s byline (for instance, Bob Jones would hire John Smith, a ghostwriter, to write a book. John would do most of the work, but the published book would say “by Bob Jones”).

Basically, a legal form of plagiarism. The way I see it, there are two types of ghostwriting – one is permissible, and one is not.

Celebrities
Society has an obsession with actors, musicians, politicians, etc., and they all have stories to tell. Very few of them have the skills to write those stories, but they all seem to be coming out with books anyway. This is thanks to ghostwriters, and it is a sensible way to fill a need. I object, however, to calling the celebrity an “author” and allowing the byline to include their name only. It should be classified as a co-authorship, and the ghostwriter’s name should appear beside the celebrity’s on the cover.

Famous authors
Sometimes an author of series fiction gets tired of writing one series, but the publisher thinks there is still money to be had. So they outsource future books to a ghostwriter, providing a basic plot structure the ghostwriter should follow (hence “formula fiction”). While the celebrity situation is acceptable, for an author to do this is disgusting. It goes against everything I believe in. The author is cheating his readers by paying others to do what he should do himself. He can’t put his soul into it because he is not writing it, and the ghostwriter cannot put his soul into it, because he is writing under someone else’s name. Inevitably, then, the book will have no soul. It will be a thin, runny, concoction of words without real feeling. It’s just empty entertainment.

This is no insult to the ghostwriter’s skills. As a copywriter, I have experience writing things for other people, and skill has nothing to do with soul. I work hard to make it good, but it is still not mine – it is the client’s. It will look and sound how the client wants it to, and do what the client wants it to. This is expected from advertising copy. But in novel form, it is the cheap fiction we read as children, the Nancy Drews* and the Babysitter’s Clubs, which we remember with vague fondness, but wouldn’t pick up again – whereas other children’s fiction, the Narnias and Borrowers and Winnie the Poohs, we gladly pick up again, because their authors actually wrote them, instead of farming the work out to be stamped with cookie-cutters.

What’s your take? Is ghostwriting a despicable cheat, or a legitimate business arrangement?

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*Nancy Drew wasn’t technically ghostwritten; it was written by a group of writers sharing a collective pen name. It is still, however, formula fiction.

An open letter to Avi

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Dear Avi,

Last Sunday I was reading The End of Time, the last book in your Crispin trilogy. I was fully absorbed in the story when I turned the page and…let out a sound of shock and disgust. The story had stopped. It didn’t end, it just stopped.

You didn’t resolve anything! The only indication you gave of an ending was to match the last line with the title of the book. All you left me with was the suggestion that Crispin might get to Iceland, where he might find his freedom, but it probably won’t be nearly as nice as he was hoping. And he’s probably never going to see Troth again, and he’ll never claim his birthright as an English lord. What is that about?

I suppose you will give some excuse like, “I left it open ended so the readers can decide for themselves.” That’s a load of baloney sandwiches. If I wanted to make up an ending for myself, I would make up the whole story and never pick up a book at all. Don’t spend 300 pages buying my trust with your words only to abandon me when it’s too late to turn back.

Open endings are only acceptable in short stories, because short story readers are looking for a roller coaster ride, not a trip around the world. They are looking for something that will spark their imaginations and make them think. Novel readers, on the other hand, want something more – they are giving you more of their time and therefore expect a certain amount of satisfaction.

The moment you touch fingers to keys, you are making promises to your readers. Every problem you introduce is a promise for a solution. A novel is like a magic trick – the pledge (“Look at this ordinary bird in a cage!”), the turn (“But see, the bird and cage have vanished!”), and the prestige (“The bird returns!”). What you did was the literary equivalent of cutting a woman in half and not putting her back together again.

I’m counting three possible reasons you didn’t write an ending: you are lazy, you are a coward, or you are a lazy coward. The lazy can’t be bothered to come up with an ending that is simultaneously logical and surprising, happy and realistic. The coward is afraid that his sentimental readers will be unhappy if he writes it sad, and that his snobbish readers will deride him if he writes it happy. Neither of these types has any business writing books. So either hang up your quill for good, or get up off your derrière, grow a spine, and write an ending.

Sincerely,

Be Kind Rewrite. (Seriously. Rewrite it.)

P.S. I see on your website that Kirkus Reviews wrote “Avi guides his hero toward a final, very satisfying destiny in this wonderfully realized conclusion to the Crispin trilogy.” Fess up, that was your mother, wasn’t it?

Writing is Mind Control

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these aren't the droids you're looking for

 

As you pass by an alley on your way to the drugstore, a woman with a face like a dried apricot approaches you from the shadows. Her eyes are squinted so tightly, you’re amazed that she can see at all, but she aims a knobby finger directly at you, and a voice like tires on gravel announces that you have magical powers. You can draw little black marks on paper, she says, and when other people see these marks, their minds are filled with new images, feelings, and ideas.

With years of training and practice, you can hone this natural ability into a powerful weapon—so potent, it could change the world.

Minus the creepy old woman, this scenario is 100% true. Language is a form of mind control. In a way, it’s easy; I can write “mouse in overalls,” and the image will automatically pop into your head. But it’s more complicated than that; did you picture a mouse poking its head out of a farmer’s overall pocket, or did you picture a mouse actually wearing a pair of miniature overalls? You must choose the right words, and combine them in just the right way, for the magic to work.

Plus, in order to plant things in people’s minds, you have to get them to read your stuff—which will be difficult if it is boring or badly written. That’s where the training and practice comes in. The more accomplished you are at showing, not telling, through your writing, the more interesting the story, and the more relatable the characters—the more influence you have over your readers. And, like any power, you can use it for good or evil. Will you teach ideas that improve the world, or make it worse? Bring happiness, or pain? Inspire hope, or despair?

It’s your choice, oh powerful one.

Writing: the Sixth Sense

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I see fictional people. And they don't know they're fictional.

 

After reading my novel (old draft, now discarded) for the first time, my brother’s fiancée asked me where I got the idea.

I had no idea what to say.

Of course there were various influences, from Out of the Silent Planet to Stargate, but I can’t rightly say where I got any idea. I can’t say I made it up, either. It’s inspiration. God breathes it at us.

Writing fiction is like discovering a story that is really going on somewhere, but you can’t see or hear it. Writers are simply born with a sort of sixth sense by which they feel the story. Sometimes we are well-attuned to that sense; sometimes the sense lies to us. We know some details of the story automatically, without even thinking about it, while other details we have to feel for in the dark. That’s why there are so many badly-written books. Those authors haven’t fine-tuned their sixth sense.

We don’t control it; we discover it. That’s why our characters rebel and sometimes refuse to do things we want them to. We can turn them into puppets and force them to our will, but that always makes a soulless, wooden story. There are certain restrictions to playing God. If we interfere with free will, we suck the life out of the story. But if we stick to manipulating only certain parts of the story – the weather, or the timing of events – we can move the story forward naturally. We arrange events around our characters’ personal tendencies, like drawing a chalk line around an ant, to urge them in certain directions. 

Finally, they arrive at the end – having walked there on their own two feet – where they will discover, Author-willing, their carefully-planned happily ever after.

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