Net Gains?

Is the internet good for writers?

That's the question on webzine 10zenmonkeys. And answers came there many:

I'm really sick of opinions and of most of what passes for online debate. Even the more artful rhetorical elements of argument and debate are rarely seen amidst the food fights, the generic argumentative “moves,” the poor syntax, and the often lame attempts to bring a “fresh take” to a topic. This is not an encouraging environment from which to speak from the heart or the soul or whatever it is that makes living, breathing prose an actual source of sustenance and spiritual strength.

We're drowning in yak, and it's getting harder and harder to hear the insightful voices through all the media cacophony. Oscar Wilde would be just another forlorn blogger out on the media asteroid belt in our day, constantly checking his SiteMeter's Average Hits Per Day and Average Visit Length.

The web enables us to write in public and, maybe one day, strike off the shackles of cubicle hell and get rich living by our wits. Sometimes I think we're just about to turn that cultural corner. Then I step onto the New York subway, where most of the car is talking nonstop on cellphones. Time was when people would have occupied their idle hours between the covers of a book. No more. We've turned the psyche inside out, exteriorizing our egos, extruding our selves into public space and filling our inner vacuums with white noise.

The internet has made research much easier, which is both good and bad. It's good not to be forced to go libraries to fact check and throw together bibliographic references. But it's bad not to be forced to do this, since it diminishes the possibility of accidental discovery. Physically browsing on library stacks and at used bookstores can lead to extraordinary discoveries. One can also discover extraordinary things online, too, but the physical process of doing so is somehow more personally gratifying.

Used to be I sat at an alphabet keyboard (called typewriters in my day) when I had an assignment or inspiration. Now it's all I do. Go to a library? Why? You can get what you need on the internet. Which means I've been suffering from Acute Cabin Fever since 1999 (when I tragically signed up for internet access). Sure, I could get off my ass and go to a library, but the internet is like heroin. Why take a walk in the park when you can boot up and find beauty behind your eyelids or truth from the MacBook? (Interesting that the term 'boot-up' is junkie-speak.)

J.K. Rowling wrote her first manuscript on paper towels and napkins. You may as well ask the question “Is tissue paper good for writers?”. The answer is the same. Sure it is, if they can write and get it to their audience.

My own feeling is that while the internet offers a huge amount to the writer - especially in terms of fact checking and communicating with other writers - it is immensely distracting. And on that note, excuse me while I go and play online Scrabble.

Maupin Island Discs

Armistead Maupin

Armistead Maupin was a recent castaway on Desert Island Discs . Here are his choices.

1. Mockin’ Bird Hill
Performer Patti Page

2. Moon River
Performer Audrey Hepburn

3. Desperado
Performer The Eagles

4. Maybe This Time
Performer Liza Minnelli

5. You and Me from the musical Victor/Victoria
Performer Julie Andrews and Tony Roberts

6. Hallelujah
Performer K D Lang

7. The Heart of Life
Performer John Mayer

8. The reprise of Wicked Little Town
Performer Tommy Gnosis

Record: Wicked Little Town
Book: The Cole Porter Song Book
Luxury: Vaporiser

Actually, his chosen luxury was a cannabis plant, but Kirsty Young got all BBC about this, so he had to go for the vaporiser (with cannabis extract). Honestly, Kirst, lighten up! It's only a kid-on island.

Banville as Black

Interesting piece in today's Metro about John Banville's new novel. The Silver Swan is a break from his usual literary output. It's a thriller, based on something that happened in his local Dublin neighbourhood. Writing as Benjamin Black, Banville has set the novel in the 1950s, exposing the dark side of Ireland, where church and state ruled with a grimness rivalling regimes behind the Iron Curtain. Says Banville,

"Up until the mid-1950s, Ireland was absolutely lost in permafrost. We were ruled by an iron ideology and there were some utterly dreadful people in charge."

Adopting a different style seems to have helped Banville get back on track with the style which won him the Booker in 2005 for The Sea.

"...I wrote the Black books, which are all about character and plot, to give myself a bit of a kick. "

It seems to have worked - he's 6000 words into a new Banville novel, although he says that, for a writer, all that matters is writing the perfect line:

"Each time I sit down to write, I think of Bart Simpson inscribing on the blackboard "I must write a better sentence." And I'd sacrifice anything to get a sentence right."

Alan Coren, RIP

Alan Coren's passing on Friday has rightly been marked by many tributes. One of the nicest was from Eve Pollard:

"He was warm and funny; witty, clever, kind and a brilliant journalist," she said. "It's very hard to realise now how his earlier pieces caught the zeitgeist. He had a wonderful voice. "He was a dear friend. When you walked into a room and saw Alan, you'd immediately think 'this is not going to be boring'.He was a life-enhancer."

His son, Giles, once described his father's secret for good writing:

"When I was about 11, I would always go to my dad and say, 'What shall I write?' "He would always say,'Whatever the first thing that comes to your head, don't write that because that's what everyone will write. When the second idea comes into your head, don't write that either because that's what the bright kids will write. "Wait for the third idea, because that's the one that only you will do."