Alex de Campi: Gojira!

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5.1.05 The Idea vs The Page

I'm on about page 41 of SMOKE book 3. We had done so much that felt interesting, in terms of formal innovation, in book 2 that I had been afraid to sit down to book 3. The more you get used to the muse coming whenever you snap your fingers, the more the fear grows that one day she won't show up at all.

I grit my teeth and started to write. (The only way to begin is, well, to begin.) The book came faster and better than I expected, and I think we'll at least match the visual spark of book 2. And then I came to a screeching halt in the late 30s. This was one of the climactic scenes, and contained a good bit of the dialogue and concepts on which I conceived SMOKE. Theoretically, it should have been easy. After all, most of it was already written, had been so from my earliest ragbag of story notes and outlines.

Over the course of long walks, I faced that frequent but never comfortable moment of writing: the moment when you admit something you love must be killed for the greater good. All the dialogue I had written for the scene, all the clever turns of phrase, all those great images: delete. In the context of the flesh and blood book that had been written (as opposed to the insubstantial vision for which that dialogue had been sketched out) they now looked heavy and out of place. Just this afternoon I rewrote the scene. I'm finally happy with it. Well, as happy as I am with anything, and considering that works of art are never finished, only abandoned.

Meanwhile, a page from book 2:

( 7:42 PM )

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