Le Guin Apprenticeship Journal

When I was a mere sprat, I wouldn't read. It took every (extremely) concerned adult in my drab, bookless life a loooooong while to realise the problem was the stories I'd been listening to. Greek Myths and The Faraway Tree are some of the standouts I remember. Then, when it came to reading for myself, the stories were just Bill and Ben and their big red ball, Sally and Ted go on a picnic. Where was the Plot, where was the Adventure!? Where were the Characters?! Eventually, someone sat me down and patiently explained that if I endured Bill and Ben are boring as hell a little while longer, I could make my own way to The Hobbit in the end. And the rest, as they say, is history. I love words; I'm sure all of us here do. I love the sounds, I love the shapes they make in my mouth. I love the pictures they make in my head. I love the feeling when a stranger's words find a place to take hold in me. And I love the dream that my own words may do the same somewhere, somehow, someday.

But all this gushing is making me a little self-conscious, so I'll move on: in the spirit of "feel the fear and do the thing anyway," I'm starting a little project. I'm working my way through Ursula K. Le Guin's incredible writing craft book Steering the Craft. And I'm going to-gulp-share my progress here as I go along.

So, on to...

Exercise One: Being Gorgeous

Soon after the Great Book Opening of my childhood, my favourite piece of anything with words became The Quangle Wangle's Hat, by Edward Lear.

On the top of the Crumpetty Tree

      The Quangle Wangle sat,

But his face you could not see,

      On account of his Beaver Hat.

For his Hat was a hundred and two feet wide,

With ribbons and bibbons on every side

The Quangle Wangle's Hat, Edward Lear

As I've already (over)shared about my love of words, said in that slightly gooey way I think I said it, you may not find any of this the least bit strange. And Le Guin makes me feel even less embarrassed now, as I re-open her book to look at today's exercise; I've noticed a quote I highlighted on the very first page where Le Guin talks about children naturally delighting in the sounds of language. In repetition, the mouth-feel, the "crunch and slither" of the words. And how, while some writers keep this delight, others grow out of it, which, in the writer's own words, is "a dead loss." Well, since we're about to do onomatopoeia. Phew.

While Le Guin's Exercise One expressly says not to use rhyme, Lear's nonsense poem was the first place I really experienced this bliss of word sounds that Le Guin describes, and that I would, to the relief of my parents, later come to wallow in in more grown-up places like Shakespeare and Gerard Manley Hopkins.

All of this exposition is to say... Exercise One, Part One made me feel quite fizzy:

Write a paragraph to a page of narrative that's meant to be read aloud. Use onomatopoeia, alliteration, repetition, rhythmic effects, made-up words or names, dialect - any kind of sound effect you like - but not rhyme or metre.

Steering the Craft, Ursula K. Le Guin

Le Guin invites us to play. Relax, and be unencumbered by the "rules." This is our writing art for art's sake. So, ok... here I go:

And... breathe.

Le Guin poses some questions to consider when thinking or talking in a writing group about the pieces we might have written in response to this exercise, so I figure I might jam a little before I let you go. Since I've naughtily dragooned you into being my writer's group - please -

And, since I've already brushed against the theme of self-consciousness once here: Le Guin suggests the idea of being "self-consciously" beautiful in your writing is worthy of discussion. I have to admit I found myself putting a lot of pressure on these words to be the best I've ever strung together. Not least because this was also THE FIRST exercise. What if I got off to a trudging, crunchy, grey start and hexed myself? I swear I could feel the spectre of The Great And Terrible Le Guin hovering at my shoulder watching me form every word as I wrote, tsking in my ear. My pen definitely stuttered. As did my brain. When the thing was done, however, I was all over chuffed with myself at seeing it through. Also pleasantly surprised that I'd made a point in it. I was certain that focusing on sound and beauty would distract from meaning, so behold my bone-deep shock when I read it through and realised it was about something. The wonders, they are ceaseless. Which is something else I adore about writing.

If any of you out there choose to have a go at being gorgeous, I'd love it if you'd either link back to this story so we/I can find your work, or maybe circle back here and comment what your experience was? (Do link your exercise in your comment if you feel comfortable sharing!) Did you love/hate being gorgeous, and why? Did it open up your writer's voice, or uncover one you didn't know you had in you?

I think that's plenty for now, don't you? I could use a cup of tea. Maybe I'll see you at the next one.

xx

P.S. - Le Guin suggests some further reading, for those of us who just can't get enough sound and beauty in our language. The Color Purple, by Alice Walker. The Country of the Pointed Firs, by Sarah Orne Jewett. And Kent Haruf's Plainsong. And for the classic fantasy fans among us: Alice in Wonderland, which I am so very tempted to leap into re-reading right now.

Except I'm halfway through Ocean Vuong's On Earth We're Briefly Gorgeous. Which, could that be any more perfect a coincidence? Because truly, the language is so luscious I feel like I'm on a lazy river of honey. It works a kind of spellbinding as well, because the content is relentlessly painful and confronting and the beauty lulls you so you'll read on at pace, head first into agony, wrapped in magnolia petals.

Please, drop any other reading recommendations you can think of in the comments. My TBR, though as tall as me, can never be long enough. Never!

I myself can't recommend this one highly enough:

With that, goodbye. For real this time.