What Raymond Chandler said…
Tag: Novelist
A Novel is Not a Screenplay
To assist the modification from page to screen by meeting the market half-way, writers are chasing the more lucrative side of wordsmithing by hammering out books which have the actions, expressions and dialogue of movie characters.
If you are dreaming of seeing your work as a major motion picture, professional screenwriters can adapt existing books, hence the words ‘based on’ when you view a book-to-movie deal.
Read on for my thoughts on the situation…
Good news for the future of the film industry but what about the book industry?
Should a writer write a novel similar to a filmscript? I guess if you are determined enough you can learn, but what are you sacrificing along the way? Formatting is important; not too much, not too little. Your characters will be noticeably shallower, the scenery will be sketchy and the action will be like every TV series you have ever watched.
Bend to a market whim? What makes the difference is being different! With or without a movie contract, if you write in a hybrid format, your novel has less chance of standing amongst the notables of your decade. I’ve read several amalgams in the last month. Believe me, it shows.
In my opinion, there is a market for the TV-ready book/screen blend of writing but it is light-weight and not the same as solid, descriptive, memorable words which feed a book reader’s imagination.
And herein lies the problem. There are eager new readers just the same as in the past, but now they are looking for ‘movie action’ because they have grown up with on-demand screens. Substance is not as favourable, skimming is the name of the game.
Again, I say this is a disservice to the reader as well as the book industry.
It’s a long haul and immediate gain for the primary writer is unlikely. Say a director/producer likes your work, every page you have written means extra money is needed in production and, as we know, the financial aspect rules. Gone are the days of blockbuster world success—think LOTR or J K Rowling’s Harry Potter.
Durability is the name of the game. You can find countless info and advice on writing a screenplay or TV script and if you want to do it you will—bearing in mind that any formula has restrictions, your manuscript will not resemble the finished product.
Look closely at Michael Connelly and other writers who have made the transition, in particular their previous jobs. They will have ‘connections’, they will move house ‘to be closer to their work’, they will have ‘legal advice’, an abundance of ‘good luck’, an ‘understanding family’ and other clichés but not the words ‘smooth sailing’.
Write with your heart, write something strong and original, write a standalone which shines with your own unique qualities.
♥ Gretchen Bernet-Ward
‘Peach’ by D. H. Lawrence
Peach
Would you like to throw a stone at me?
Here, take all that’s left of my peach.
Blood-red, deep:
Heaven knows how it came to pass.
Somebody’s pound of flesh rendered up.
Wrinkled with secrets
And hard with the intention to keep them.
Why, from silvery peach-bloom,
From that shallow-silvery wine-glass on a short stem
This rolling, dropping, heavy globule?
I am thinking, of course, of the peach before I ate it.
Why so velvety, why so voluptuous heavy?
Why hanging with such inordinate weight?
Why so indented?
Why the groove?
Why the lovely, bivalve roundnesses?
Why the ripple down the sphere?
Why the suggestion of incision?
Why was not my peach round and finished like a billiard ball?
It would have been if man had made it.
Though I’ve eaten it now.
But it wasn’t round and finished like a billiard ball;
And because I say so, you would like to throw something at me.
Here, you can have my peach stone.
San Gervasio D. H. Lawrence (1923)
* * * * *
David Herbert Lawrence, English author, poet, literary critic (1885–1930) is regarded as one of the most influential writers of the 20th century.
Lawrence’s hard working-class upbringing shaped his life, and he wrote extensively about the experience of growing up in the poor mining town of Eastwood, Nottinghamshire. “Whatever I forget,” he said, “I shall not forget the Haggs, a tiny red brick farm on the edge of the wood, where I got my first incentive to write.”
A prolific writer and traveller, Lawrence earned fame for his earthy novels (some banned) and short stories, and subsequently received acclaim for his personal letters in which he detailed a range of emotions, from exhilaration to depression to ruminating on life and death.
The story of his ashes and final resting place makes intriguing reading on Poets’ Graves
https://www.poetsgraves.co.uk/lawrence.htm
♥ Gretchen Bernet-Ward
Quotation from Cesare Pavese
Cesare Pavese was an Italian novelist, poet and translator, and an outspoken literary and political critic.
Not well-known outside Italy, Pavese is numbered highly among the important 20th century authors in his home country.
Born in rural Santo Stefano Belbo, he often returned to the area, enjoying the solitude away from his turbulent career and heartbroken love life. Pavese was not destined to live long, he died just before his 42 birthday.
✨ Website Biography and Book Review
https://www.poetryfoundation.org/poets/cesare-pavese
https://1streading.wordpress.com/2018/06/24/the-beautiful-summer/
✨ Cesare Pavese Poems
- The Cats Will Know
- Ancestors
- Habits
- You Have A Face Of Carved Stone
- Death Will Come With Your Eyes
- In The Morning You Always Come Back – my favourite
- Passion For Solitude from ‘Disaffections: Complete Poems 1930-1950’.
♥ Gretchen Bernet-Ward
Pre-Christmas Reading Done
Was going to wait for the holiday season but…four authors, perennial and well-seasoned storytellers who can spin a yarn which kept me absorbed to the final chapter. Highly recommended!
♥ Gretchen Bernet-Ward
Writers and Their Imaginations
“For a consciousness to be capable of imagining…it needs to be free.”
― ‘The Imaginary’.
“In a work of fiction, everything is invented, even the things that are not, because once a true event is brought into the realm of the imaginary, it becomes imaginary.”
―
“Things need not have happened to be true. Tales and adventures are the shadow truths that will endure when mere facts are dust and ashes and forgotten.”
― Neil Gaiman, ‘The Sandman #19’.
“Creativity is the brain’s invisible muscle that, when used and exercised routinely, becomes better and stronger.”
―
“Living alone, with no one to consult or talk to, one might easily become melodramatic, and imagine things which had no foundation on fact.”
― ‘Murder Is Easy’.
“It is only through fiction and the dimension of the imaginary that we can learn something real about individual experience. Any other approach is bound to be general and abstract.”
―
♥ Gretchen Bernet-Ward
The Clock is Ticking
♥ Gretchen Bernet-Ward
Thoughts Become Words 
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