Guest post
by Cherie Vause
You’ve all seen movies with the opening shot of a dark apartment on skid row. With only the light from a neon sign from the bar across the street, the camera closes in through a dirty window, onto a man who is lying across his rumpled bed, smoking a cigarette, and sipping on a glass of whiskey. He’s unshaven, and hung-over from an alcoholic binge. The camera pans to a typewriter on a desk with a sheet of paper rolled up half-way. The blank, stark white paper is an angry retort to the man’s desperation. Next to the typewriter is a bottle of cheap whiskey, an ash tray, overflowing with dirty butts, and a stack of clean, white paper. He’s broke, hungry, and his gal has left him angry and bitter, but he still keeps her picture on his dresser. He rises, crosses over to the picture and looks longingly at the girl. He turns, and defiantly stubs out his cigarette. He drains his glass of whiskey and pours another. He holds the glass while staring at the crumpled papers all over the floor; then he finishes the last of his whiskey in one furious gulp. This guy is definitely a candidate for a bullet to the head.
The picture is such a cliché that it hurts, and it doesn’t gel with reality. Most authors are sober, happy people because they are doing what they love. I fall neatly into that category of happy sobriety. I am not the kind of person who sits at a bar ordering one double after another until I’m unable to navigate to the door. And, because I’m happily married, I don’t pine after a lost love. However, we are all human, and we do have our moments of despair. Remember the infamous blank sheet of paper stuck in the typewriter, and that poor schmuck agonizing over that first sentence, and coming up empty? Unfortunately, that part of the legend is true.
My first novel flowed without much friction. The story began with an historical figure where his known fate was wrapped up in that first inchoate sentence, “I am a dead man.” The rest of the novel gushed forth like Niagara Falls. However, my second novel was a different story entirely (no pun intended) as it tried to run off in every direction. I must have rewritten it at least a hundred times. I can safely say that I am now satisfied with it, but arriving at that peaceful state was like taking a stroll in a tornado: I spent the entire year rewriting just that first sentence.
You might ask, “Why is that first sentence so difficult to master?” That first sentence sets the pace and the style of the story, and propels the narrative forward with a question, all to entice the reader to buy your book to learn the answer. Think about all the famous first sentences: “Call me Ishmael,” or “They used to hang men at Four Turnings in the old days,” or “I am a sick man. . . . I am a spiteful man,” or “It was the best of times and the worst of times.” These sentences are literally unforgettable. So, how does a brand new author compete with the likes of Melville, du Maurier, Dostoyevsky, or Dickens? By writing something completely brilliant.
Since no one is brilliant or even smart every time they sit down to write, we must set the challenge before us, massage the words, and sometimes beat them until they sing to us with a voice clear and true. It might take a hundred attempts or thousands. Sometimes we must settle for pretty darn good, but never acceptable, or even nice.
That is the riddle of writing that must be solved before we can proceed. We must face ourselves and reconcile the inner voice, which drove the story into existence, all in that first sentence. Writing can be the most frustrating and maddening of professions, but fulfilling. I’ve quit writing for an entire week until that siren lures me back onto the rocks, and I’m scrabbling to keep from drowning in a sea of mediocrity. You could say it might drive a person to drink. Oh, but didn’t I just debunk that myth?
I sigh as I stare at the empty screen of my laptop set on the bar. “I’ll have another double, please, no ice.”
How very, very true.
A fellow conrade-in-arms. Welcome.
I believe great drunk writers are great in spite of the booze, not because of it. That they can create such beauty and depth of meaning while soused is a testament to the resiliency of the human physiology.
Perhaps the booze gave them permission to be bold with words. I’d like to believe, though, that they could have been more creative if they were sober. But, we’ll never know as many of the great ones have left us.
“I’ll have another double, please, no ice.” That might make a good opening line for your next novel. Much depends on who said it…and what she was wearing.
Brilliant! I’ve wanted to use it, but couldn’t seem to find the right story to wrap around it until recently. My mind began to ululate over a lost love. Melancholy can be a source of inspiration besides twenty year-old whiskey.
Need to go back and rework that darn first line!
And don’t quit until you get it right.
As the world’s cheapest drunk I doubt if I could get a word written if I drank. As it is, I drink only upon two conditions: 1. I’m not driving. 2. Someone else is paying for it.
My children think I’m hysterical after I have one Irish coffee.
Hmm… I seem to write the first line after I’ve written – and worked through – everything else. Then again I do seem to catch my muse half way through the story so that may explain it.
Same here. If I waited until I’d got the first line, I’d probably never write anything. Sometimes I’ve even gone back and changed the first chapter (or even scrapped it altogether) after I’ve finished the first draft.
Actually, I’ve done that, too. First line, first chapter, endings. That first line, though, has haunted me even after my piece is completed. I’ve been know to lose sleep at night because my brain won’t shut up. Titles have been known to give me heart palpitations. I believed I was having a heart attack when I had second, third–well, you know–and fourth thoughts about the title of my recently published novel. This was after I approved the cover design and it went to press. Words can be our enemy, as well as our lover.
Usually, not always but usually, my first line is the one that kick-starts my brain into the story.
Nice post, Chéri.
Thanks, T.D. I had fun writing it.
Okay! So, do you ever feel your first sentence smells like leftover fish in the trash?