Barbara Tate’s West End Girls

Guest post by Harry Bingham gives some prepublication back story from an agent’s perspective showing the need to keep ourselves in our story and prune the extra text to highlight the true story.

When people ask me what I do, I never quite know what to tell them. I’m an author, yes, but I also work part-time running The Writers’ Workshop, an outfit in the UK which offers everything from editorial feedback to running writing courses. Needless to say, many of the manuscripts we receive are still fairly raw, some are good but not exciting – and some, a very few, are simply mind-blowing.

Early in 2009, I got such a manuscript through the letterbox. It was huge. 160,000 words or almost enough material for a 600 page book. And it was a memoir, every word of it true.

The author was an 82-year-old British woman, Barbara Tate, but she hadn’t written the manuscript recently – she’d written the whole thing back in the 1970s. And the story she told tracks back still further, to a two-year period in 1948-49, when the author was a young woman, newly independent in post-war London.

Barbara had had a truly difficult childhood. Her father had been dangerous, her mother neglectful. When Barbara was still very young, she found herself abandoned to the less than tender care of her grandmother. Indeed, although she wasn’t directly abused, her childhood was scarred by lovelessness. She’d never really been loved, never really had a friend.

Her two passions were painting and writing. She painted as often as she could, and signed up to correspondence writing courses when and if she could afford them.

Then, to her joy, she became old enough to leave home. She had a few temporary jobs and was working as a waitress in Soho – one of London’s more exotic areas – when she encountered a woman, the like of whom she’d never previously encountered. That woman was Mae: glamorous, impulsive, charming, spontaneous and warm. She was also a prostitute.

The two woman made friends instantly. Although Barbara was (and would remain) rather conservative in her values, she knew friendship when she saw it. She knew love.

Mae offered Barbara a position as her ‘maid’ – half-companion, half general helper. Barbara accepted.

The manuscript told the story of how that friendship developed: touching, astonishing, moving. The trouble was that the manuscript did lots of other things too. Barbara had felt uncomfortable telling her own story, and kept writing herself out of the picture. The manuscript was amazing, but not quite publishable.

Normally, we’d suggest that such a plainly gifted writer do the necessary editorial work themselves. One of our writing courses teaches self-editing skills that a younger Barbara could have made excellent use of. Or we could just have offered detailed feedback and let her make any corrections herself. But she was in her eighties and simply not physically strong enough to tackle the work involved. So we agreed to do it on her behalf: cutting 70,000 words from that giant manuscript to tease out the amazing story that lay buried within.

The shorter and more focused the manuscript became, the more appealing it grew. It was a delightfully surprising combination of chaste and raunchy, nostalgic and energetic. Most of all though, it told a story. About a friendship between two women. Explaining why that friendship arose in the first place, explaining why the friendship was finally doomed.

We sold that book direct to publishers in a competitive auction. It was published very well, got glowing reviews, and sat for weeks on the British bestseller lists. It deserved all its praise.

Tragically, Barbara died (peacefully) before the book was published, but she had met her publishers, signed a contract, seen a book cover. And before she died, she told me repeatedly, ‘Harry, this book is the crown of my life.’ Considering that, after her time in Soho, Barbara became one of the best known women painters in England, that’s high praise indeed. She used to remind me that while her art teacher had wanted her to become a painter, her English teacher had always urged her to write. It turned out that it wasn’t an either/or choice. She’d done both and done them brilliantly.

Harry Bingham is an author of fiction and non-fiction. He also runs the Writers’ Workshop which offers feedback on writing and a range of writing courses.

Metaphor for a New Year

Pictures make powerful story prompts, and this picture of a  crumbling sidewalk is no exception. It strikes me as a metaphor for our path thorough life and fits with the general theme of the new year and story.

Each New Year’s Day I’m reminded that life is a cyclical process. Each year exists within the “container” of twelve oscillating months that fit on a series of rectangular sheets roughly the shape of a sidewalk slab progressing through the year.

Though some may be similar, no two years are quite the same. Even on a newly poured sidewalk, you’ll find variations from one slab to the next, and by the time a sidewalk reaches the age and condition of this one, the differences among the sections are huge.

Each year in our lives has a story to tell. Although it’s anyone’s guess what it might be, it appears likely that each section of this sidewalk experienced some individually unique stresses, leading to its individual array of cracks, chunks and deformities.

This sidewalk is a visible record of the effects of a year – probably in reality a series of years. Our life writing, whether public or private is a visible record of the effects of years on our lives.

A freshly poured sidewalk traversing a lovely landscape is relatively uninteresting in its apparent uniformity and smoothness. It’s good for roller skating, pushing strollers, and playing hopscotch, but otherwise little more than a convenience for walking from place to place. A life with no challenges would be a dull life indeed.

This sidewalk is full of stories. It has repairs and subsidence and other areas that appear to be intact. Some spots are damp. How did this all happen? Is this the result of natural aging or damage? Has it experienced floods? Did a careless crane drop a wrecking ball? What might that have felt like, and how does the sidewalk see itself now? Various years evoke similar questions.

Looking toward the future, this sidewalk will need further repair to remain safe and useful. Lives sometimes need repair, and writing can be a powerful way to effect it.

Taken as a whole, this sidewalk is traveled by people on their way to a destination. Whatever the condition of the rest of the path, this section presents challenges to keep your balance and avoid stumbling. Some years are like that.

At this point my mind wanders to another task for today or tomorrow: updating my personal timeline – the rough equivalent of adding a new block to the sidewalk of my life. I see the similarity between my timeline and this sidewalk. Each year on my timeline is different. Some years were smooth, some were rough and challenging.

Like this sidewalk, the challenging years are the most intriguing, the most likely to provide insight, and the most likely to intrigue readers if I write about them.

I find a certain sort of dignified beauty in this sidewalk, and also in years of challenge.

Write now: Update your personal timeline. Start one if you don’t have one. Pick a year that was especially challenging and write about it. Describe each of the fragments, and how it came to be. What did it mean to you then, and what lessons have you learned? Use this sidewalk graphic as a prompt if it fits.

Photo credit: Bart Everson

Write Like Nobody Will Read

Dance like nobody’s watching,
Write like nobody will read.

These words darted into my monkey mind as I gazed at Christmas lights, thinking back to high school days when folk dancing was a favorite activity. A motley mixture of adults and teenagers gathered each week at the Rec Hall for a medley of line and couples’ dances from many nations. College kids home for Christmas made holiday dances especially festive.

There were never any lessons – you just picked the dances up as you went, with occasional pointers from old-timers. Any athletic ability in our family went to my sister and brother. I was one of those kids always picked last for whatever team was forming in P.E., so, although I loved the music and the dancing, I was never a picture of grace. On some level I knew this, but put it out of  mind. I was having fun. At least until the night Kelly gave me some startling advice.

“Quit trying to make like a ballerina,” she said with a sneer. “Do you have any idea how ridiculous you look?”

Ouch! Where’s the nearest hole? I fled to the ladies’ room to do battle with my Inner Critic.

Kelly was a couple of years older than I and home on break from college. She had studied ballet practically all her life, and she was good enough to turn pro. Undoubtedly watching my awkward attempts was painful for her, and tact had never been her strong suit. Perhaps she meant well, but her words stung. Fortunately she disappeared back to school, and I soon got over the humiliation and enjoyed dancing as much as ever, perhaps more.

I didn’t discount her message. After thinking it through, I did begin to relax into the music more, and seemed to move a bit more fluidly. If I was still a little awkward, so what? It didn’t seem to bother anyone but Kelly. We were there for the joy of dancing, not to put on a performance, and in general we were an accepting group.

Today as I recalled that horrific moment, I made the obvious connection to writing. There was a time when my writing was almost as awkward as my dancing. I have drafts of two short stories I wrote in 1978. They are utterly dreadful! I keep them as benchmarks for measuring progress. When I went to college I fell away from folk dancing, so I’ve had little opportunity to refine those skills. But I have continued writing for over thirty years now, and with lots of feedback, study and practice, I’ve made progress.

Today I often dance at home alone. I dance because I love to dance. I dance like nobody is watching, which is easy, because they aren’t. I write the same way. I write thousands of words nobody will ever see for every hundred I share. Maybe if I took up folk dancing again, I’d do better at it for all the private practice.

My advice for you: Forget the Kelly’s in life. Dance like nobody’s watching and write like nobody will read. If a Kelly wanders in, look for what you can learn and forget the rest.

Write now: about a Kelly experience in your life. How did you react? Did you shut down or keep slogging away? What did you learn then? What can you learn now for revisiting the event?

Image credit: Brendan Lally

The Perfect Christmas Tree

A story of Christmas Past

I stare with disappointment at the tree in our 1958 living room that we decorated two days ago. It looks utterly pitiful — like it’s made from Tinkertoys. The flat-needled branches are sparse, and it has no fragrance. I face the ugly truth: I do not like this tree. I fight growing disappointment with the whole season, wishing it would just be over.

Just then Mother comes home from work, wrestling a huge spruce through the door. It’s almost as wide as it is tall. “Nobody else at school wanted this, so I brought it home,” she explains. Its fragrance instantly fills the house. In meer minutes my sister and I strip the puny tree and the lush new one stands in its place. Santa’s crew of elves couldn’t decorate a tree better or faster than we do. When we finish, we catch our breath in awe. The tree glows with more than colored lights. It glows with Christmas Spirit. With joyful hearts, she and I load the record player and sing our hearts out.

The next day Daddy saws up the old tree and stuffs it in the fireplace. I’m torn at the seeming brutality of burning this poor tree because it wasn’t beautiful enough. I feel more than a little guilty at rejecting it for the sake of appearances. Then I look at the new one and relax —we didn’t deliberately go looking for it. It was a gift, a gift of abundance in this season of blessing. It was a gift of Christmas Spirit, something lacking in the first tree. This is the perfect Christmas tree, and I know it will never be matched in all my years.

“Thank you for yielding your place so gracefully,” I whisper into the flames, grateful that at least the meager tree can give us the gift of warmth to help us enjoy its replacement.

All these years later, I look at our dense, perfectly shaped artificial tree with vague disappointment, then realize it’s the best tree it can be. Not even a fresh tree could live up to the legendary Perfect Christmas Tree. “Thank you for giving us joy each year and being so dependable and easy to live with. And especially, thank you for not dropping needles all over the floor!”

This simple memoir story has become part of my Christmas Tradition, to be handed down through generations. Each year it seems to take on new meaning and become richer. Others read the story and find their own meaning. I’m glad of that, but primarily I wrote the story for myself. It’s a reminder of the day I realized something important as I sat in front of that fireplace. That day was a rite of passage. Each time I read the story, I learn the lessons of gratitude, compassion and purpose more deeply and fully, and the spirit of that lush, amazing replacement tree will always fill my heart.

Merry Christmas and Happy Holidays to everyone.

Write now: Take a few minutes and write about some meaningful Christmas memory – or some other holiday memory if your tradition celebrates another time. Keep this story and reflect on it each year. Edit as your understanding grows. Over the years it will become rich and deep, full of meaning and inspiration, primarily for you, but also for others.

Stories, Stories, Everywhere

One passage near the end of Stephanie Pearl-McFee’s memoir, Yarn Harlot: The Secret Life of a Knitter, struck me as a poignant reminder that stories are in the very air we breathe. In this scene Stephanie and a friend are dividing up the yarn stash of a friend whose rheumatoid arthritis has made it impossible to continue knitting. Story itself  becomes an essential element:

… Lene tells us the story of each yarn as we take it, and slowly, we start to feel better. For the moment we are soothed, lost in the tale each yarn has to tell us.

We pay attention to Lene’s wishes. That blue mohair, the one the color of baby eyes, it was supposed to be a shawl for Lene’s friend Michelle. I take that one. I lay it in the bin and make a mental note: Shawl for Michelle. Ken gets the discounted Aran-weight tweed. Lene had planned an intricately cabled pullover for herself with that yarn. I watch Ken; he’s making the same note-to-self, recording carefully what Lene’s intentions were. The chocolate milk alpaca (a scarf for Lene’s mother, Bea) goes into my bin … .

Stephanie doesn’t mention writing these stories at the time, but telling them soothed Lene, and hearing them soothed the friends. Writing about it in the memoir surely soothed Stephanie again and surely most readers are moved by the touching account. She returns to the subject several pages later when she reports that she did, in fact, knit many items Lene had been unable to complete, and that each time she knit a gift from yarn she received from Lene, the gift tag said, “From Lene.”

This section was a tender counterpoint to most of the book, which was rollickingly funny and laced with evocative sensory imagery. I have dubbed Stephanie Pearl-McFee the “Erma Bombeck of the Knitting World,” and even though I am only a very occasional knitter, I look forward to reading her newly released book, All Wound Up: The Yarn Harlot Writes for a Spin

In a previous post I told about a friend’s tea pot collection and the advice I gave her on how to write the stories they held. Not long ago I saw her again and asked if she’d done any writing.

“Yes. I work on it every now and then, and it’s great fun. I make an extra copy of each and stick it in the pot to keep them together. That way whoever gets the pot next – not soon, I hope! – will know its story, adding value to the pots. I’ve taken pictures of each to put in the computer files. It makes quite an album. Stop by sometime and I’ll show it to you.”

Whether you need a writing prompt for practicing description skills or want to record the stories of your treasured possessions, you too can be soothed with memories as you write the stories of your stuff, and your family will appreciate having them later. You may find it useful to have those details at hand if you later write a more comprehensive memoir.

Write now: Look around the room where you sit. Find some object that’s meaningful to you and jot down a paragraph or few of memories about it. When and how did you get it? What has it meant to you? How have you used it? What memories does it hold? You might want to take a picture to put with the story and make it part of your legacy of family history.

Image credit: Katherine 

The Tree of Me

On a whim inspired by matroyshka dolls and Growing Old: A Journey of Self-Discovery by Danielle Quinodoz, I decided to make a sketch of my “layers.” I found a tabloid-sized sheet of blank newsprint, picked up a pencil, and within about five minutes this graphic emerged showing my life from beginning to now. For the purposes of sharing and further embellishing, I redrew it with color for the boundaries. It’s still rough, as you can see by the orange blotch in the core that didn’t work out quite as hoped. But that’s okay. This is a source of inspiration and insight, not destined for the living room wall.

I was surprised as could be to see it. I’ve thought for ages about a chronological map of stages of my life. I like this one ever so much better. It’s organic and representative. As Quinodoz points out, I hold all those previous layers within me, but redefine them and cover them with new growth as I go.

When I began, I had no sense of direction. I thought I might be making a graph of roles I play. This emerged on its own. I will still work with the role idea later, as creativity further instructs.

I especially value this form, because within the layers I have space to write thoughts about that era. Here I’ve included rudimentary memories of threads of activity and my emotions and state of mind at the time. The layer boundaries are especially bold and jagged for times of great turmoil and upheaval. My world shifted on its axis at these points. The colors aren’t significant. Note that the boundaries are uneven – like the rings in an actual tree. They serve to organize memory clusters to clarify my sense of them and provide inspiration when I write.

Perhaps I’ll develop this further, but for now it’s a super-rich source of writing prompts, and it basically comprises a life-long memoir-at-a-glance, at least for me. Those cryptic notes won’t mean a lot to anyone else. 

It does show chronology, because the rings expand year-by-year. I didn’t put dates on the ring boundaries, but I could. I could do a lot of things. So can you, if you give this a try. I suggest using even larger paper so you have more room to take your time and make more notes.  I predict that you’ll be pleasantly surprised at the patterns and insights.

Write now: Find a huge sheet of paper or piece of posterboard and make your own cross-section. You  might sketch it roughly in pencil first, then move to the full-size sheet. Add detail and make it rich. Then write about each layer.

Writers and Depression

Guest post by Tessa Smith McGovern

Tessa’s observations here may not apply to most simple life writers who write part time and very much for pleasure and self-exploration. But her points are well taken in any event, especially the one about choosing which content to write about. That fits with James Pennebaker’s admonition to mix plenty of bright memories with the darker ones to keep depression at bay. I thank Tessa for sharing these points. It’s always good to know the risks of “turning pro.” 

According to the website health.com, writing is one of the top 10 professions in which people are most likely to suffer from depression. Virginia Woolf, Sylvia Plath, Hemingway…the list of writers who have fought depression is long. But what about people with no history of depression? How might writing affect them?

Well, let’s see. Take an otherwise healthy person, shut her up alone for hours at a time, day after day, month after month, year after year, watch her pack on the pounds (as physical exercise becomes a thing of the past), ask her to write, knowing that the end result can never be perfect and, to boot, tell her there’s no way of guaranteeing if she’ll be published, or paid.

Hmm, tricky question…

So what’s to be done? Well, one option is to choose, when we can, what we write about. Some stories cannot be manipulated. Some demand a sad ending. The bleak beauty of Alice Munro’s short stories, for example, would be lost if her endings were happy (or even bearable). But sometimes, when the first thoughts and images are just stirring, we do have a choice. We can mold content and/or conclusion.

I discovered this for myself by accident. A few years ago, I was reading my mum’s copy of the Daily Express, a newspaper designed to make English senior citizens rant and rave, when I came across an account of pensioners stealing free biscuits from their local cinema. It was so funny, and just happened to fit perfectly into the story I was writing. Each morning, I was amazed to find that I couldn’t wait to continue working on the story. This, after fifteen years of writing! Now I keep a file of strange or funny or awe-inspiring articles. Every now and then, one fits into a story, and makes the writing fun.

Award-winning author and founder of eChook Digital Publishing Tessa Smith McGovern will be chatting about what it takes to write and publish a short memoir, live on BookTrib.com Tuesday, December 7 at 3 p.m. ET. Tessa will be here ready to answer all of your questions and discuss her three essential memoir-writing tips.