Eloquence and Melancholy

I’ve been put through the ringer in my personal life these last two weeks. Combine that with entering the whirlwind world of the Romantic poets in my British Literature class and I have to say, it’s gotten me into quite the contemplative mood. One of the highlights of my writing career so far (embarrassingly brief and rather uninteresting, I’m afraid) was when one of my high school teachers made an off hand comment one day in class that really stuck with me. She said, “Good writers don’t have happy lives.” I was indignant at first, and then a little insecure. Of course back then I was 16, knew very little about the big and scary “real world” and hadn’t yet learned to take what teachers say with a grain of salt. I wondered if “good writer” and “unhappy life” were inseparable. It was enough to shake me for a moment. I wanted to be a good writer, but who purposely sets out to have an unhappy life to achieve that end? This past week has been an introspective one, and I’ve been wondering – is there perhaps a grain of truth to that?

I’ve long been aware that I produce much more eloquent and evocative prose when I’m upset, lonely or just plain melancholic. If I had to describe it I would say that when I’m feeling down I sink into a different state of mind that has a heightened acuity for more striking language and insights. On any given day I have to struggle to get my writing wheels turning (which is normal – any writing guide will tell you that getting started is always the most difficult part), but when I’m upset, my mind is like this fountain of narrative that flows and flows endlessly. It sounds pretentious,  but I’ve honestly had those moments where I have to get up in the middle of the night to write something down because I just cannot bear to forget it. Or times when I feel like I’m not in control of the creative process but rather that it is in control of me. I used to think it was just moments of inspiration, but lately I’ve noticed that they always come in the middle of, or on the heels of some depressing mood.

Literature isn’t my only area of expertise. As a mildly dedicated Psychology student, I know some useful facts about the way emotions affect cognition. I know that depressed people are more realistic about their circumstances where as happy people tend to be overly optimistic. But realistic doesn’t necessarily translate to insightful or poetic.

Or does it?

I have a theory. We get lonely, depressed or melancholic for a reason. I think it’s safe to say that dissatisfaction is a big factor in triggering any of those moods. The major cause of my occasional melancholic moods is dissatisfaction with the way my life is going. Sometimes I think I don’t have enough friends. Sometimes I’ll worry that I’m not extraverted enough to take the risks that make life worth living (although I should point out this is a distinctively North American bias). Whatever it is that gets me down, there always seems to be a common denominator – I get overwhelmed from my reality and wish to take a step back, take a breather before I dive right back in. And I think the connection to the writing lies right there. Obviously, I can only speak for myself when I say that melancholy moods give way to intense introspection, but I don’t think I’d be wrong in saying that I’m not the only one. My melancholy is characterized by a certain desire to be a hermit – I don’t want to be out living life because at that particular moment it’s not bringing me any kind of satisfaction. If I’m not living it then I stand at a special vantage point that lets me view it from a more analytical and critical point of view, and this is where insight comes from. It doesn’t come from being so close to something that you can’t see all its parts – it comes from taking a step back to look at the whole picture and think about how each part connects to the other parts and how it contributes to the whole.

Isn’t that precisely what writing is about? If writers were out living life, they wouldn’t be writing about it. Writers are the ones that sit down and think about where we have come from and where we are going. They observe all the components to life and try to figure out what it all means. They make connections the rest of us don’t precisely because we don’t have the view they do. In order to do what they do, you have to stand at a distance.

So was my teacher right? I don’t think so. I think you can have a perfectly happy life and still be a good writer. I think that teacher saw a link between difficult lives and a heightened literary ability. But she missed the connection between those two – adversity leads to complex emotions and situations. Good writing comes from this, but it doesn’t mean that you have to have a difficult life in order have complex emotions or get into complicated situations. Or that adversity is a prerequisite for insight.

Maybe there’s hope for me yet.

Almost Home Free

Greetings.

So unfortunately for all of you out there who sweetly tune in to see what I've got say this week, I'm afraid I'll have to disappoint you. I do think you're all very sweet for doing that so thank you. I can not even begin to describe the type of week I have had, with two midterms, a close reading and the knowledge of essay due dates slowly but steadily creeping closer. Needless to say, I'm all out of fresh and interesting things to say, at least for right now. Thankfully Reading Week is so close I can almost taste it and it will give me the long anticipated break I need to recharge my batteries.

That being said, I do have interesting things to share. I promised myself that I would update this blog weekly if I could so I'm trying to stick to that.

Here is an awesome link a very good and a very sweet friend of mine showed me lately and it's got really great advice on writing. Check it out: http://www.brainpickings.org/index.php/2013/01/14/how-to-write-with-style-kurt-vonnegut/

Also, seeing as it is Valentine's Day today, and this is both writing and Valentine's Day related (not to mention incredibly amusing - to me at least), I thought I'd share it too. Here is what to expect when you make the crazy decision to date a writer: http://www.cbc.ca/books/canadawrites/2012/02/how-to-date-a-writer-heather-oneill.html.

I'd just like to throw my two cents in and say that while most of the things Heather O'Neill says are exaggerated to the point of hyperbole, they are nonetheless true for the most part. Hahaha.

Enjoy!

My Defense of English

I’ve been a bookworm all my life. Stories were my first friends and they’ve been my solace at various difficult points throughout my life. Adults have always praised my voracious love of reading, rare as it seems to be among my generation. People my age have, for the most part, never understood it. My punishment when I was growing up was the tragic confiscation of my treasured books because I liked to read to the point of neglecting the real world (gasp! So strange, I know). I’ve had books ripped out of my hands, thrown to the floor, and kicked down the hallway by guys who thought it was funny. A girl in my seventh grade class once had the gall to snap shut the open book on my lap and demand that I stop reading immediately.

I’ve gotten over these things, but as you can see, they still stick out vividly in my memory. Despite all the disapproval I’ve received from many of my peers, I’ve always been proud of my love of reading and all the benefits I’ve reaped from it; they’ve served me well all my life. But even now, with all the pettiness that was elementary school and later high school finally behind me, I still get the occasional wide-eyed, incredulous look when I tell people I’m specializing in English (which really should be called Literature). “You’re crazy,” they’ll tell me. “Why would anyone want to do that?”

Why indeed.

This is my defense of English and, as you might be able to guess, it’s been a long time coming.

Among the many complaints I’ve heard about English class, my favourite has to be, “the teacher is reading too much into this. I’ll bet the author didn’t mean half the things she’s saying.” Lately this sentiment has even been made into a humourous Facebook Venn diagram meme thing*, which, I’ll admit, I enjoyed. But people who complain about these things are missing the point. Here is your brief and vastly oversimplified crash course into reader-response literary theory: just because the author did not intend a particular interpretation of their work doesn’t mean that meaning isn’t there to be found, or that such an interpretation isn’t valid. You, my dear reader, bring your own meaning to each text and I, as a writer, have very limited control over what you will take from it, despite my best efforts. English is not about what authors mean or don’t mean to say. It’s about what the text itself means and the ways it uses language and so many other rhetorical and literary devices to convey that meaning. The author is important, yes. But language is a curious, slippery thing that makes it so that the author’s meaning is not the only one that exists or matters.

Another common criticism I’ve encountered (most often from my father) is that it is too subjective. You can say whatever you want and you have to be taken seriously. All you need to get a good grade is to be able to say it well. There is no way to be wrong. Sometimes I hear the inverse – no matter what you say, it is impossible to get a good mark. I can’t really deny the claim to subjectivity. Art is by its nature subjective, and the only defense that I have is that it wouldn’t be art otherwise. Any attempt to understand it on objective grounds would fail to truly appreciate it. Different people are going to read and understand things differently, so no, there is no right answer. But that doesn’t mean there is no point. What people don’t seem to understand is that in English you can’t actually say whatever you want and be taken seriously. You’re entitled to your opinion, sure, but that doesn’t mean you don’t have to defend it. You have to provide evidence for why the text puts forth whatever you it is you claim it does. There is such a thing as a wrong reading: if there is no evidence for your claim then there is a very good chance there is something you did not understand.

To those of you out there that don’t understand why anyone would choose to torture themselves by studying this subject intensively for 4-5 years, let me tell you why I like English. Analyzing a text goes far beyond finding whatever it is a text is saying on the surface (although sometimes figuring that out can be difficult enough, cough-Chaucer-cough. Shudder.). It’s also about determining HOW the text says what it does, and how that presentation affects the meaning for the reader. Different contexts give words different meanings. The same sentence will take on a different implication entirely if you change the speaker. And believe it or not, language is not as precise as you may think it to be. Anytime you are deciphering a message - written or spoken - you are choosing from a wide array of different possible meanings, as well as implications and connotations. Language is fickle and fluid and anything but exact. Because of this, it is immensely satisfying for me to be able to delve into a text and pry loose subtle and significant meanings that weren’t immediately obvious, but still undeniably there. To me, the best professors are the ones who either point to something I thought I understood and make me see it in a new light, or those who make me fully appreciate a text I absolutely hated when I read it on my own.

I am a curious person by nature; I always want to know why. I always want to know why things are the way they are and how they work. English is like a puzzle, a mystery to be solved. You have many cues and hints, all of which you’re not sure how or if they fit together but you have to reason your way through it in order to uncover what the story is really saying beneath that surface level. It forces you to look past the obvious and discover the mechanics that are whirring away behind the scenes. It makes you gather the evidence and fit it into the scope of the bigger picture, and it isn’t until you do so that you will understand why literature matters.

Many people might disagree with me, but I think English (Literature) is important. People write for a reason, and it isn’t always petty, trivial, or intended to make money. We have classics for a reason – something about these stories resonates with us. The most brilliant explanation I’ve heard of why Arts in general matter came from Noah Richler, son of famous Canadian author Mordecai Richler. He said: “Novelists and storytellers - as well as painters, musicians, playwrights, poets, and architects - give form to the times and places that we occupy. They tell us about ourselves – and we have much to learn if we listen. The arts are not an indulgence.” This is exactly why I love to study stories. They are about people and how they go about living their lives. It is a removed perspective that features fictional characters that represent our society and ourselves; we can be critical about them, and by extension, ourselves. Socrates is supposed to have said, “the unexamined life is not worth living,” and I agree. I heard it said somewhere that writers live on the fringe of society and use this vantage point to observe the rest of us. I think we should listen to what they have to say.

Perhaps my favourite thing about English is that it understands that stories never dare tell you outright what they want you to know. Instead, they show you. They paint you a detailed picture and take you along for a ride. And when they are done showing you, they let you decide for yourself what it all means. If you’re someone who likes easy, clear-cut answers then English isn’t for you. As for me, I like the journey every bit as much as the destination, and this is why I can get lost in a book for hours on end. I’m not only interested in how the story ends, but how it gets to that ending and if it does it well. And I don’t mind how much thinking I might have to do along the way.

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* For those of you that don’t know, the Facebook meme thing I’m referring to said something along the lines of – sentence in the book: the curtains were blue. What my teacher thinks this means: The curtains represent the character’s isolation and depression. What the author meant: the curtains were fucking blue.