Aline Soules

Poet and Fiction Writer

Aline Soules

Whew! NaNoWriMo ends

Remington12I emerge after a month of clacking computer keys and realize that, while I wrote 50,000 words, I still haven’t finished my novel draft.  No matter—I’m “over the hump” and am confident that I’ll finish by the end of December.  It’s been a whirlwind ride, but if I hadn’t leveraged NaNoWriMo in November, I’d be much further behind, so thank you NNWM.  I hope others in the NNWM frenzy have had good experiences, too.  

I also did something I didn’t expect—I signed up for two NNWM online groups, one locally, but one that gathers in my original home town—Dundee, Scotland.  I suddenly got curious about how another place in another country managed the month-long process.  They were fantastic.  There were tons of tips for everything from keeping writing to avoiding carpal tunnel syndrome.  The organizers were terrific.  As for my local online group, they were far less active, but I was also more involved with other writers face-to-face here, so perhaps I missed something.  Regardless, it’s been an interesting experience.  I don’t know if I’ll do it every year, but I’ll certainly do it again when I need to create a lengthy draft.  As many others have found, I got swept up in the camaraderie of it all, the deadline, the word count, the whole experience.  May all our drafts be good ones.

Image Credit:  http://sevenels.net/typewriters/rems.htm

Note on the image:  This is a picture of the make-and-model typewriter that my Dad was given during the war and had to carry with him wherever he went, usually on the back of a motorcycle.  He kept it well into the 1980s.  The platen was so narrow, he had to fold a business-sized envelope to fit into the typewriter if he wanted to type an address.  

Writing En Masse

once_upon_a_timeTalk about writing alone in a group—that’s NaNoWriMo.  We’re 9 days into the process and people’s fingers are flying.  For fun, I signed up both in my current geographic region and in the region where I was born.  Of course, I won’t join them in person—I’m basically a “lurker”—but it’s interesting to see how another region handles itself.  My own region (SF Bay Area) is pretty silent online. I haven’t received too many emails and I’m certainly not sending any.  My original region (Dundee, Angus, Scotland) is going great guns with emails on everything from logistics to preventing repetitive stress syndrome.  I’ve shared a few of their “links” with my two “buddies.”  That’s another part of the process:  buddies.  I have two and have refrained from acquiring more on the grounds that I’ll just get distracted.  This post is a lull for me between work, NaNoWriMo, poetry, sleep, and eating, although I tend to eat at my computer while I’m carrying on with work or writing of some sort.   This past August, I focused on generating poetry in the 30/30 project with Tupelo Press.  This month, I’m focused on my novel, again generating material.  What August taught me and November’s reminding me is that it’s critical to generate work, even as revision, revision, revision is essential for quality results.  Come December, I’m going to try to allot an appropriate balance of time between the two.
Image credit:  theadventurouswriter.com

Revision

revisionWhile NaNoWriMo is the 10% process of spilling your words on the page, revision is the 90% that comes after.  If we spend November on our first drafts, (optimistically finishing the first drafts of our novels) we will be confronted in December with the end results, and this means revision, revision, revision.
I read somewhere (forgive me, I can’t remember where) that more people prefer revision to creating the original draft on a blank page.  If that is the case, then December and the following year should offer a lovely present in the form of lots of raw material with which to work.  For the rest of the writers, the detailed task of revision may be less pleasurable.

Regardless, for any NaNoWriMo first draft novel to be viable, revision is essential.  Revision, however, involves many layers:  Developmental (or Content) editing; Substantive Editing; Copyediting; and Proofreading.  Further, multiple revisions will likely be required, unless the writer is a fabulous first draft writer or reviser.

I plan to participate in NaNoWriMo, but I’m well aware that the end result will be only the tip of my writing iceberg.

Poetry Contests

poetry_contestsFor years, I’ve submitted to contests, fully aware of how serendipitous the results may be.  Hope, however, springs eternal, and I’ve had success over the years, even as competition increases.  Recently, I’ve been involved on the judging side of a number of poetry contests, both for adults and also for young people.  It has been a privilege and a pleasure to be asked to read and engage in such work, but also an eye-opener.  My process has been to begin by reading the submitted works, just to have a sense of the works and read for enjoyment.  Following that, I read again and separate the submissions into three groups:  yes, maybe, no.  I usually end up with more in the ‘yes’ pile than there are awards (generally, awards include 1st, 2nd, 3rd, and 1-2 Honorable Mentions).  I re-read the ‘yes’ and ‘maybe’ piles to cull further and I write notes about each piece at this point.  I keep reading and culling as many times as it takes to winnow down to a final decision, knowing that no matter how hard I try, I cannot achieve full objectivity, but at least having clear reasons for my choices.  The process has taught me how much time and effort goes into the judging process and has given me a new respect for the process when I submit to contests myself.

How to be a "Successful" Poet from a former UK Poet Laureate

bbc-blocks-dark  I recently came across a BBC article that shares Sir Andrew Motion’s “Top Ten Tips for being a Successful Poet” (11 October, 2014).  While this article came out a while ago, what I most like about the article is Motion’s assumption that success relates to the quality of the poem, not to one’s “success” at being noticed, making money (hardly likely with poetry), or anything else that isn’t directly related to being a better writer and, specifically, a better poet.  I’m sure the headline is a teaser to draw readers, but it could just as easily have been called “Top Ten Tips for being a Better Poet.”  The focus is on the work—so refreshing.  Motion was the UK Poet Laureate from 1999-2009 and it’s easy to see why.  He is dedicated to his art.  Take a moment, click on the link, and be inspired.