Monetary Report: Week 19

Well, again I have avoided the dreaded $0.00 week. This week I gathered in a cool $3.39.

I can feel your envy.

That brings my total for the year to: $698.21.

I'll also add in some advice. As a writer, try not to get too smart about the "whys" behind things. If you know too much, it screws up your writing. For instance, I've been studying existentialism very closely with my students. As a result, every story idea that comes to me is existential in nature. That's not good. I don't think one should know what kind of story he is writing. He should just tell a Truthful story and let others argue over what kind of story it might be.

As a writer, it's not good to study literary theory. As an "anybody", it's not good to study literary theory. It's pretty useless.

Fitzgerald said that a writer is not the smartest person in the room, just the most observant.

Saginaw Publishing News

My excellent friend, Josh Maday, had work picked up by Phoebe -- a very cool magazine to say the least.

In fact, he's racking up quite a writing vita, and he's doing the tri-cities proud.

Check out his blog at http://joshmaday.blogspot.com/

Monetary Report of Week 18, and Some Thoughts on Literary Scenes

Not a bad week. I earned $5.90, which brings the total to $694.82. Soon, though, I’ll have a $0.00 week. I can just feel it.

Now, on to scenes. Or groups. Or crews. Or circles.

I sometimes hear people lament that there isn’t really a literary scene in the tri-cities . . . to which I say, thank God. I never could really put my finger on why I think scenes are bad for the participants, other than to suggest that they are incestuous and self-congratulating. Then, I read this great passage by Turgenev that summed up the whole “scene” thing for me. In this case, he’s talking about student circles in Moscow universities in the Nineteenth Century, but he could just as easily be talking about literary scenes in the Twenty-first Century.

“. . . a circle’s the destruction of any original development; a circle is a ghastly substitute for social intercourse . . . Wait a minute, I’ll tell you what a circle really is! A circle is a lazy and flabby kind of communal, side-by-side existence, to which people attribute the significance and appearance of an intelligent business; a circle replaces conversation with discourses, inclines its members to fruitless chatter, distracts you from isolated, beneficial work, implants in you a literary itch; finally, it deprives you of freshness and the virginal strength of your spirit. A circle – it’s mediocrity and boredom parading under the name of brotherhood and friendship, a whole chain of misapprehensions and pretences parading under the pretext of frankness and consideration . . . respect is paid to empty gasbags, conceited brains, young men who’ve acquired old men’s habits; and rhymesters with no gifts at all but with ‘mysterious’ ideas are nursed like babies . . . a circle is a place where underhand eloquence flourishes; in a circle, the members watch one another no less closely than do police officials . . . Oh, student circles (literary scenes)! They’re not circles, they’re enchanted rings in which more than one decent fellow has perished!”

Turgenev nails it with the last line. “Enchanted rings.” Here’s the problem -- scenes, crews, groups, circles are like drugs. They feel good to belong to because the members are almost always misfits. Writers, artists, intellectuals – they never quite fit in anywhere, which of course is what gave them the potential to be writers, artists, and intellectuals to begin with. So, joining a group feels really, really good – but then they begin to lose that misfit nature, which is their creative nature. They belong but, subsequently – by belonging – they begin to lose something. And, yet, they can’t walk away because the group feels good – it’s enchanted. And, self-congratulating. The group can make you feel like you’re a part of something big – when really 99.9% of people aren’t even paying attention.

Beware the group or scene or crew or circle. It may extinguish that which was good and true and original in you. It’s not always a physical thing – like people who live in a city and go to each other’s readings. It could be an online thing . . . a group of people who read and comment on each other’s blogs. It could be a small thing . . . two people who “talk writing” for two hours before watching a Tigers game.

Try to shut out the group if you can. Avoid its enchantments. Stay true and original. Try to do some "isolated, beneficial work."

Most likely, you will fail and, as with any powerful drug, continue using.

If any group would have me, I know I'd be an addict.

Tigers News

The Tigers swept the Yankees! Three in a row! And, they were in Yankee Stadium, no less.

To make a literary analogy, that's like Hemingway going down to Mississippi and outselling Faulkner at a book signing.

Speaking of book sales, I think I might actually sell 400 copies of my novel by June. It's looking really close.

If anyone wants to help me reach my goal, just send a check for $12.50 (payable to me) to:

Jeff Vande Zande
English Division
Delta College
University Center, MI 48710

The $12.50 covers the cost of a signed book and it also covers shipping.

The book makes a great Mother's Day, Father's Day, birthday, Memorial Day or Bloom's Day present.